Sandi L Boucher, Red Thunderbolt Woman of the Loon clan, says the first step to decolonizing is to envision a different life. She used vision boards and post-it notes as a child to dream toward concrete achievements, and argues that dreaming builds self-confidence and self-worth.
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Red Thunderbolt Woman, Loon clan, Seine River First Nation in Treaty 3 Territory (Northern Ontario).
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Hello, you super duper double delicious person, you. I am a little excited this morning. I know you can't tell it is what it is, but I tripped over while I was doing my work, while I'm watching my training videos, I really. Not my training videos. That would be quite the ego trip. No, watching the training videos I watch to get better at what I do. And I realized something. I actually realized the first step you have to take to decolonize. And for people who are non indigenous, you might think decolonizing sounds insulting. Why wouldn't you want to do things the way we do them? That's not what I'm saying. Decolonizing is about remembering who we were before the others came. It's about remembering who we are. And guess what? When you do that, it's not just about decolonizing. It's because decolonizing leads to confidence and self esteem and self worth and all of the good stuff. The foundation for an amazing life. And this was the mind blowing part. I realized I took the first step when I was a kid. Let's talk about it. Hi, everybody. My name is Andy Boucher. Yes, I'm the author of all those books. They're out because I'm taking them to a seminar this afternoon. But that's not why I'm here. I'm Red Thunderbolt, woman of the Loon clan, a proud member of Seine River First Nation in Treaty 3 Territory in Northern Ontario. And this afternoon I'm going to help some people decolonize. And I didn't even realize that because you see, we're talking about oppression. And if you don't know what that is, that is discrimination that is either sanctioned by the government, accepted by society as a whole, or both. The oppression of Indigenous peoples continues today. Name another group that has to send their grade nine student to live with strangers to get a high school education. Name another group of people that has to share police services between communities and, and has very, very limited access to health services, not to mention lack of clean drinking water. I could go on and on. Oppression is bad. That's. Nobody's denying that. But internalized oppression to me is even worse. Having suffered from it, probably still suffering from it. Not to as large of an extension as I used to, to clarify, Indigenous, indigenized internalized oppression is what happens to a member of a group that has been oppressed for a long period of time. Over time, they start to believe the bs. They start to believe the stereotypes about themselves and their own people. And you recognize these people because they say Things like why bother, why bother going to school? Canada is never going to accept me. They're never going to respect me. They're always going to look down on me. Why bother sending my kids to school? It didn't help me, it's not going to help them. That's internalized oppression and people get judged for having those attitudes when they don't even see it's a reaction to the environment. When a flower doesn't bloom, you fix the the environment in which it grows, not the flower. There's nothing wrong with indigenous people but nobody can save us. That's pretty blunt, pretty direct. Welcome to Red Thunderbolt woman. No one can save us except ourselves. And the first step to decolonizing, to achieving self confidence that, that, that self esteem selfworth that we all crave. Are you ready? Is imagining a different life, envisioning a different life, daring to envision a life that people say we can't have. Now as a young woman in the rope and wood swing in the front yard of our house, a house that was filled with love but did not have running water. I used to swing on that swing and I used to dream and I dreamt of the apartment or at least the window in a high rise building where I would overlook the city. This was the place I now lived. I envisioned myself sitting at my desk as the boss of the company I ran. I envisioned myself healthy at the gym, working out, running on the treadmill. I envisioned so many things. I wrote out a list here. Did I forget? Oh, I envisioned writing a book. No, I didn't tell anyone those things. That's what visioning is all about, right? It's the crazy dreams we have in our head that we don't dare tell people because they'll tell us we're nuts. They'll tell us it's never going to happen. But what people don't realize, we don't need other people believing it's going to happen. We need to keep envisioning because one by one the things I envisioned came true. And I have never stopped envisioning. There is still some crazy things I'm envisioning and I bet everything I have that they're going to happen. So what I did, I did the vision boards I did. I have post it notes over my desk as we speak speak. But because I do videos on a daily basis. I don't know, about a year and a half ago I thought wouldn't it be fun? I took all the pictures of the things I wanted and put them into a video I Added my intro to it, the intro I use in these videos. And I put it together. And then I watch it every single morning to start my day visioning what I want every day. Telling creator, the universe, higher power, Dr. Phil, Oprah, whoever. You believe in what I want to achieve. And then about six months ago, because anyone who knows me, if it's not fun, I'm not going to do it, I decided, you know what? Be fun. Because one day I was watching my video and I realized how many of the things I've achieved. So I put my video back in the editing program and I put check marks on the stuff I achieved today. I wanted to share that video with you just to give you an idea what I'm talking about. I hope it inspires you to create a vision board, to put post it notes on your wall or to even create a video. And if you can't do any of that because you share a home or an office with people that will ridicule you. I get it. I so get it. Guess what? Lateral violence is part of internalized oppression too. We attack our own because it's hard to hit the federal government. Dream. Dream. Anyways. Envision. Anyways. On your drive to work, envision that amazing career you have. Amazing. That amazing relationship you enjoy. Imagine the amazing number in your bank account because you don't worry about bills anymore. Not because you want to be rich and look down on people. You want the freedom and the lack of stress that comes from knowing your bills are paid. Dream, my friend, dream. Because that's the first step to decolonizing. Confidence, self esteem, self worth, all of the good stuff. Until tomorrow. I love you. Take care. Bye. Bye. I promised in the opening I was gonna review the latest draw. Is this thing not amazing? Now? I should have called this up before I turned on the video, but I want to see. I have. It's not going to be a messenger, is it? No, it's going to be in Facebook. That's where it's going to be. My son, who made this amazing, amazing, amazing thing, sent me the measurements. And I do want to give those to you because people are always interested. What the heck happened? Oh, I know what happened. I know what happened. I went into Facebook and I was on my business page and that's not going to work. I need to be in my personal page so I can get the information. Okay, here we are. Okay. Level Up Presents is my son's Facebook page. That's also his website that's under construction. Now I just gotta wait for a Facebook messenger to load, so I can scroll back, and it is four by six inches, so four inches. That's not right. Oh, that's six inches. Duh. That's the six inches side. Four inches side. And it's three inches wide. And how do you do this? Look at this. Look at this. Oh, my God, it smells amazing. As always, it's made from reclaimed wood, so it's got all of the little nuances I just love. And it just slides in. So if I line it up properly, it's like it slides in so easily. I love it. I mean, this is a perfect gift. This is a perfect little keepsake. There's so many things you can have in here. And by the way, I got to show this. He probably doesn't want me to, but whatever. There's another one for sale. My God. He treats these with linseed oil. My God, they smell amazing. So this one's going up for sale on his Facebook page. $50 plus shipping. TA da. To get your own. So if you want it as a gift and you don't want to take the chance of the. The draw. There you go. This one is in the draw. They're both. Well, they're both the same design, obviously, again, because of reclaimed wood. Every single one of them is unique and one of a kind. I love this. $10 a ticket. 3 for 20. Send them to the address below, which is my son. I love this one. You're gonna love this one. Get your tickets today.
