A short YouTube monologue by Sandi L Boucher (Anishnaabe, Seine River First Nation) critiquing modern work systems that demand unrealistic productivity ("a hundred thousand things in an hour"). She contrasts mainstream expectations—blame, convenience, strict deadlines—with Indigenous time and relational teachings that prioritize human wellbeing, and urges recognizing system-level causes of stress rather than blaming employees or customers.
Chapters
I don't know about you, but I have a really hard time doing something if I don't think I'm gonna enjoy it. Even worse, I have a really hard time doing something if I think it's gonna be boring. This morning I'm supposed to be typing a report or producing, creating a report and I will get to it. But honestly, it's one of those days where I'm doing some thinking and that's the advantage. Disadvantage, depends how you look at it. Of living in Canada, but viewing the world through an indigenous lens, because I just don't accept so many things. Just because that's the way it's been done forever doesn't mean it's the right way. Especially since if it's something mainstream's doing, probably doesn't make a lot of sense in Indian country. That's what I wanted to talk about today. I really wanted to look at this need for convenience that I find in mainstream. I'm not even sure there's an Anishna word for convenience because convenience doesn't fit into our teachings. Things happen when they're meant to. Things happen because they're supposed to. This whole idea of controlling time is ludicrous to us, but I watch mainstream trying to do it all the time. Today I want to talk about a system. I want to unpack a system that doesn't seem to be working for anyone. And I am not just talking about indigenous people. So 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 want you to imagine for a second a person that I run into almost daily or interact with almost daily. So this is the classic, I want to say overworked employee. So they tend to work for a large corporation or a large non profit or maybe federal government, provincial government, municipal government. These are the people that have 5 million things on their to do lists and they should. They are expected to get 100,000 done per hour. These people are stressed to the nines. And then a customer calls in or a client calls in and that's just, just not convenient. And I don't want to say a percentage here, but a lot of times it's kind of obvious to the customer or client that their call wasn't convenient. So that is the system though. That is the system. This expectation that all these things need to be done usually to make the board of directors, the, the investors happy, fill their coffers or it's to make a politician happy proving that funding that non profit was a good idea because they did 5 million things with the 1 million things they were given to work with. It's insane because this system doesn't work for anyone. I can't be the only one that sees this. The employees are at their wits end. They are completely and totally stressed. And guess what? 99% of the time they are blaming themselves until they finally get to the breaking point and realize this is ridiculous. And then the customers are blamed for having a complaint or wanting to call in or God forbid, needing information or instructions on something that's not convenient. Didn't you read your manual? And then if they're trying to serve a community, whether it's a municipality or an indigenous community, you've got to hit this deadline. You got to get this stuff to us because we need to get these things done. It doesn't work. There is absolutely no healthy people in that system. I don't even know if the ones on top are healthy. But those employees are risking their health. The stress level they're under is ridiculous. The customers are being blamed for having questions that are part of being a customer. And the communities are judged. Guess What? Yes, I'm 60 years old. Yes, I've been on the planet for quite a while. But I think you could have figured out too, people aren't convenient. I have never met a convenient person. People are multifaceted. Often they are carrying. We talked about in another video. They are hurt. They could be overwhelmed. They could be stressed, they could be tired. They could be scared. Scared. And these are the people. We work with people. But that system of getting a hundred thousand things done in an hour doesn't allow time for a human to be a human or for a human to support another human. These are, this is not healthy soil at all. People don't grow in this environment. They get stressed, they get burned out. And then they're more hurt and more scared and more overwhelmed because they need that paycheck. Does this seem sane to you? And the problem? No one blames the system. They will blame the employee for not being able to hit the targets. They will blame the customer for not understanding it. And they will blame the municipality for not having the capacity or not responding in a timely fashion. They will blame everyone but the system that works for no one. And in indigenous communities, especially those following more traditional teachings, no one is stressing out over how much I get done today. All very dedicated, all doing what they can in a given day, but only doing what they can in a given day and realizing that some ridiculous standards set by someone who doesn't understand the needs of the job just don't apply. And the other thing, we're human. Which means if I need to work at a slower pace because of whatever is going on in my life today, I need to do that. And if I have a colleague, a co worker or an employee who is stressed and needs some support, I'm taking the time to do that. Even if that means I'm not getting the hundred thousand things done today. But guilt and gaslighting and blame are all used to make the people believe they have to do the hundred thousand things in an hour. That is not physically possible if you haven't heard it in a while. It's not you. It's not you. You have the right to say, I can't get this done in an hour. You have the right to say I have questions. You have the right to say, I don't have the capacity or can't hit this deadline. This system is the problem. And the silence is acceptance. We have to change things because I know from our side of the feather that system just looks nuts. And it's mainstream that gets frustrated with us when we don't want to jump on the the hamster wheel. Why? We already have high blood pressure and diabetes in our community. We don't need to add more stress. That's where my mind went today. I guess I should go write that report. I will if it's meant to be today. If not, I'm going to sleep soundly tonight knowing I was thinking of you and took the time to talk to you in my Anishnaabe way of thinking. That just makes sense. Until tomorrow. I love you. Take care. Bye. Bye.
