When Honesty Hurts ...

Hello, you absolutely amazing person, you. We have to talk about something. You see the way it works in my world. Not only does my interactions and what I read or what I watch, not only does that give me ideas for videos, but when something keeps coming up, I take that as a sign from creator that I need to do a video on it. In. In other words, it's something you need to hear or, or someone you love needs to hear it. It's a topic that needs to be discussed and there is definitely something that keeps happening. It's part of my learning journey. We should talk about. 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 the reality is, I don't know how old you are, but there's a really good chance you've heard that phrase. What? That whatever quote, whatever it is, don't ask the question if you can't handle the answer. Or some variation on that. And you know, I always heard that in the kind of smart alley way, you know, someone daring you, you better not ask me why I'm doing this, you're not gonna like the answer. That kind of thing. I kind of really dismissed it as irrelevant to my adult professional life. Like, whatever those kind of attitudes went by in my 20s, right. If not before then. But today's video is about when honesty hurts. And it's something I am seeing play out time and time again, not only in my seminars, because I've definitely spoke to it before, but in other people's discussions. And these people then reach out to me to ask me how to handle it when they asked a question and the answer hurts. So just gonna kind of babble here for a second because I'm. Like I said, I'm still trying to figure this out in my mind. But one of the things I know for sure is that indigenous peoples. Now, of course, there's disclaimers depending on how assimilated you are, but as a general rule, the indigenous peoples I've met from across the nations, we don't take the heart out of things. We bring our heart to our relationships, to our workspace, to the grocery store, to the coffee shop. We live with our emotions intact, which is counter to mainstream. That tends. I have met and seen, met so many people and seen so many work environments where they want you to bring your brain and they want you to bring your skills, but please leave your emotions in the parking lot, safely tucked away in your car that's not even humanly possible. I hope you know that. I mean, people do it every single day because they're forced to. But that's not a healthy human existence in my Indigenous eyes, through my Indigenous perspective. So what happens? And then we're going to add into this nightmare the fact that Indigenous peoples have been and continue to be hurt by Canada, the government body, and by Canadians. Sometimes without intent, but intense, not needed to cause harm. So we have this history and we have to acknowledge this history. The history of the residential schools, the history of the creation of the reserve center system, the history of Indigenous peoples being removed from the places where they've always lived and confined into these small little communities. And they're being oppressed through legislation, not being allowed to leave the reserve unless you get permission from the Indian agent. Indian agents assigning us last names because we didn't have any. Our kids being taken and sent to residential schools and often renamed their haircut chew to forced to. To wear different clothing, to be different people. This is reality. And then Canada decided that the solution would be these people need jobs. I used to work in employment training for almost 20 years. I know the drill. But you don't inflict a ton of harm on an individual, a family or a community, offer no supports to healing and honestly think that a job is the answer. But over the course of time, news flash to you if you didn't realize this. Indigenous people don't like pain like anyone else. Indigenous people don't like poverty just like anyone else. So a number of us have decided, you know what? I can work hard, I'm intelligent, I'm going to go get that job. I don't want children and grandchildren living in poverty problem. These people go into the workforce and often are incredibly successful. That does not in any way mean they are healed. And often it means they absolutely are not. Because who had the time? They were busy raising their families, raising their children, running their households and, and trying to earn a paycheck. They were using their brain and their skills and leaving their emotions in the car in the parking lot. And those emotions were wrapped around and cocooning a whole lot of trauma and a whole lot of pain. So now we're looking at modern day and we're having these reconciliation discussions and we're talking about hard truths like what I just shared. And I'd be willing to bet a whole bunch of Indigenous people if they were watching this video, they have now been traumatized. They were hurt by me simply acknowledging the history, not because we shouldn't acknowledge the history, but because these people are hurt. So we have to realize that there are indigenous people forced into the workforce because poverty sucks, that have not healed and they're having to deal with I don't care attitudes or stereotypical comments, racist comments in the workplace, the emotional labor and the, the price, the racist harm that these people endure for a paycheck. Everyone else gets hazard pay. They should. And, and I was just talking about the natural resources, the mining industry yesterday. I am totally impressed when anyone. Impressed, maybe not the word surprised when an indigenous person actually is able to maintain employment in one of those environments. And then my heart goes out to them because I'm worrying what are they enduring. Because every single time we hear one of those racist slurs, it's like a body punch to our spirit. And after a while that person, if you get used to that behavior, it's an abusive relationship and the harm is continuing. That is as far from reconciliation as you can get. So if you're walking around with a, like I mentioned in yesterday's video, because I can attitude and you're gonna say I don't care reconciliation and I don't care about indigenous people, I hope your employers acknowledge that just having you in that space means it's an unsafe space. And you should come with a disclaimer because you will inflict incredible harm on indigenous people. And unfortunately in modern day you probably won't even have to pay for that. What's going to happen is the indigenous person is going to leave and they're going to be blamed for not being able to cut it. Why do we have to keep enduring the non indigenous existence? How is that reconciliation? Reconciliation is two parties deciding. We don't want to hurt each other anymore and we want to actually work together. If you're still inflicting harm, reconciliation can't happen. Employers own that. Do not use the word if you're not even attempting to create a safe space. This is something I have to contemplate, definitely because I talk about hard truths. In my seminars I have debated whether I should wear my ribbon skirts, which I always do in seminar, whether I should wear them going forward. Now I don't wear them to protect myself. I. If I actually thought I needed protection from the work I do, I wouldn't be doing the work I've done my healing. I've heard the stupid comments and I know I will hear more ignorant comments I should say, meaning people lacking information, ignorant of the truth. But I'm afraid that wearing my ribbon skirt signals to other indigenous people that this is a safe space. And it is a safe space in that I will not let anyone be attacked in that space. But if they don't let me know what the dude at the table is whispering, then I can't keep them safe. And I need to vocalize that at the beginning of my seminars. I need to encourage non Indigenous participants to pretend and act like Indigenous people are sitting at their table table. Because nowadays there's Indigenous people that look like me. And if you can't see my tattoos, you may not realize I'm Indigenous. But I definitely got your number if that's the kind of stuff you're sharing. I don't want to be part of inflicting harm on Indigenous people. But hard truths need to be discussed. I guess what I'm going to encourage Indigenous participants to decide is whether they've had enough healing to attend because I don't want them hurt. But we have to talk about the heart's truth and healing is on each and every one of us. What's that other quote? Healing can be a long and often painful journey. But without it, life is a long and often painful journey. We can't. When I go into seminar, I encourage my participants to speak their truth, even if the non Indigenous truth is I don't understand. I don't understand why this is so important. And sometimes that's incredibly painful for an Indigenous person to hear. Their heart screams out, how can you not think this is important? But that's because we're coming at it from an Indigenous lens. How many things are we totally committed to in our lives that don't personally cause us harm? We're appealing to non Indigenous Canadians to be allies from us with us. But that's a choice. Reconciliation isn't a choice for us because it affects her every single day. They can't say same. It's a complicated insanity that we're dancing in. And it's all the result of Canadian history. Not Indigenous history, Canadian history. Owning what you did Canada did to its Indigenous peoples and the fact that to this day there's still a whole lot of pressure to get a job and not a whole lot of supports to heal first. And no surprise, it's falling on the employers to deal with the aftermath. Food for thought. I know I'm going to be thinking about this for a long time to come. I need to help. Well, I've been helping Indigenous heal for 15 years. That work most definitely has to continue. And I gotta clear the blinders for the non Indigenous. That smart alec common in the lunchroom is a dagger to the heart of the indigenous person you didn't realize was passing by in the hallway. And that's not a safe space. That's not reconciliation. The journey continues. Cuz we got work to do until tomorrow. I love you. Take care. Bye bye.