Sandi L Boucher (Red Thunderbolt, Seine River First Nation) records a personal video from her sun room describing her discovery that reconciliation must be built as a movement. She lists and characterizes the kinds of people she wants to serve—change-makers, lifelong learners committed to growth, people who believe a better future is possible, and those actively making changes in language and behavior—and invites viewers to join the movement. The tone is intimate, motivational, and reflective.
Chapters
Good morning, you absolutely amazing person, you. And yes, it's one of those days that I'm completely, totally excited and it may just involve you. Let's talk about it. Hi, everybody. My name is Sandy Boucher. 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 I am coming to you from my morning office. Guess what I like to call it. This is the sun room in my home. And I love it because it's surrounded by windows. Whether it's snowing outside or cold, or warm or hot, I just love this room. It's one of the reasons I fell in love with this house. But over the course now, I don't know about you, but it takes me about a year after moving into a place for everything to settle into what they should be, including what I use rooms for. For the record, this is going to make me sound horrible, but for the record, I live in a four bedroom house and I live alone. But right now, one of the bedrooms is my gym. One of the bedrooms is a walking closet. It was a small bedroom. One is my office and one is my actual bedroom. So I, I make use of this home. Working from home changes things, but still spend all my time and love being in this room. And this morning, not only did I remember why my office is upstairs, a reason that doesn't apply anymore, but I realized, why isn't this my office? So guess what? It's going to be gonna do some major shifting around here. I've already given my son a heads up, giving him a warning, we got some moving to do, but this is gonna be amazing. And that's only one of the reasons I'm excited so. You know, recently I identified that reconciliation is so much more than an action. Then it needs to be a movement. It needs to be something that you start small and that pace. So once I got that revelation, I started really researching and looking into how to build a movement and what defines a movement and what makes a movement successful as opposed to one that isn't. It's definitely been an interest of mine since the beginning of the year as part of that research. Today, one of the questions that my research asked was who do you want to work with? Who do you want to serve? Who are the kind of people that you want to be engaging with and reaching? And I find that when you're asking those kind of questions, you best just do a, like a, I want to say a verbal dump, but it's not verbal, it's writing it down. So you just start making a list. So I wanted to share that list with you and then I'm going to tell you at the end why. So these are the kind of people, genuinely, honestly, this was first thing that came to my mind, heartfelt utterances, whatever you want to call them. These are the people I want to serve. So the first thing that came to my mind was the change makers. The people that are trying to create a chain, whether it's in their family chain, they're trying to break old, old habits. They're trying to change their relationship and improve it for the better. They want to change how they speak and find their voice and find their inner power, whatever it is. These are the change makers, the people that are willing to do something, even if they're not sure what yet to create the change they want to see in their lives. So that was the first thing. Which brings me to the second point. These are the people committed to change and growth. These are tend to be the lifelong learners. Right. I am never too old to learn something new. That kind of person. Next, those who believe in the possibility of a changed, positive future. Because you don't go through change if you don't think it's going to change anything. Sorry about that. I should have turned notifications off and see if I silence it on my phone, will it silence on my Mac. So these are the people that believe because why are you going to change if you don't think the future is going to change? Right. If you don't somewhere deep down inside believe that your family dynamics could be better, you wouldn't be going through the change. And maybe that's why a lot of people don't try or don't believe in change, because they're totally disillusioned about the future. But these people believe, even if it's a tiny bit, even if they'd never say it out loud, they want to believe that maybe, just maybe, things could be better. Okay. Boy, did that ever sound like me. 30 flipping years ago, 35 years ago, in a shelter for abused women with my children, believing that this did not have to be my reality, it didn't have to be my present or my future. These are also the people that are doing. I'm sorry about that binging. I just. Can I. Silence options recording. Okay. These are not only the people that want to change something and believe in some small way, it's possible they're actually doing something to change it. So they're changing the words they use. They're Changing the actions they take. They're changing the books they read. They're changing the people they watch on YouTube, whatever. They're doing something, they're changing something. They understand. They. Without change, nothing changes. Right? So these are. I kind of got cute here for a second, and I thought this is the activist army, right? But it's not necessarily a political change. So that really didn't fit. These are positive because they believe in that future change. I'm not talking about toxic positivity, walking around smiling all the time when the world's going to heck in a hand basket. They're positive about change, open to learning, committed to encouraging other people that are trying to invoke change. I like that. These are the people, as I mentioned, who are changing. I'm looking at my notes here. They're changing how they speak, how they reach out, the words they use. They're you doing that to bring their world together or the world together. These are agents of change who. Now, this is the important part, because whether they've identified it or not, these people realize that the change starts with them, but it doesn't stay with them. That if they change their vocabulary, they change the conversations they're having with other people, which changes the message other people hear, which could in turn change the conversations they have. These people that I want to work with know the change starts with them, but it doesn't stay with them. And that's where I got excited, because that's when I realized there is a really good chance. I just described you, the person interested in watching my videos. So here's. I got a statement here. I wrote down. Give me a yes in the comments. If you're wanting to change something in either your world, your relationships, your community, your country, whatever it is. But you know, it starts with learning and thereby changing you and the words you use to speak to others and the actions you take. If that sounds like you, then you are already part of this amazing reconciliation movement. And that makes me excited because even if you don't realize it, I see it in you. And I love it. I get the emails every single day. Thank you for that. I never thought of that. I'm not using that word anymore. I never looked at it that way. That is what I'm talking about. That is positive change. And. And that is a movement. I'm so excited. This is going to be such an amazing year. Okay, until tomorrow. I have some furniture to move. Talk to you soon. I love you. Take care. Bye. Bye.
