What I Learned From the Native Americans

It's hard to put into words what I learn from the Native peoples. What they have taught me is how to survive, how to understand my experience and my life.

But I'll try and make a list. I learned:

• That a tribal, circle-based people can exist within modern American society. It is not easy, but it is possible.
• That "religion," like many of the constructs that we struggle with, is a white man's idea. What we had before was our Traditions, the Way of the People.
• The stories I read about Indigenous children who were taken from their home communities and dumped into Christian boarding schools gave me the closest image I could find to explain the way I felt when I entered the public school system, or tried to cope with the outside world.
• That who you are as a people is about culture, history, practice, and relationships-- not about color.
• That the study of Colonialism is essential to an understanding of the world, especially of racism, economic exploitation, and environmental disaster.
• That the Tribal Government that the dominant culture recognizes may or may not be the legitimate leadership of the people.
• That our ceremonies are not "empty rituals," but are necessary to keeping the people -- and the earth-- whole.