Thoughts on responding to the Death of Loretta Saunders, the lessons of Positive Youth Development and Inspiration by the teachings of the greater Leader Tecumseh from the War of 1812
There is a teaching on the path to Awakening and Seeking Enlightenment that we are all “already awakened” and just have to learn to accept and realize this fact in order for it to happen. It seems far too easy but I believe there is a deep eternal truth to this. Think it speaks to the fact there is always a part of each of us that is awake and knows who we truly are. Knows who we are as individuals but also as part of a greater human family. The secret is to recognize that part of ourselves and fan it like a flame being kindled until it catches fire. To do so is hard and we need support but it is possible and it does happen.
Perhaps the same is true of human societies and communities. Perhaps there are always parts of communities that are already “awake” and living consciously and if recognized, nurtured and fanned the lessons of these communities can act to awaken the larger community. I believe this is true. And I believe there is a model used in social change that is expressed as “Asset Mapping” and “Positive Development” that can serve to recognize these part of our communities and can help us to learn how to fan these Potential Awakenings until they become something larger and infectious and contagious. And I describe these places of awakenings not as Static Givens but as Moments, Windows of Opportunity, points where skilful leverage can be applied like the hands of a skilled healer. They are like Ley Lines, Meridians, Windows and Doorways into new opportunities, new ways of seeing and living.
They become apparent at the strangest times. Sometimes in moments of great crisis and tragedy something cracks open and gives a glimpse of something larger.
This is what I see in the tragic death of Loretta Saunders. It is a moment in time, it is a tragedy and yet at the same time a moment to see and embrace new opportunities to advance larger causes, to pursue the path of awakening, to fan the flames that will bring a new dawn.
The task that Loretta took on was monumental and heartbreaking – to pursue the question and the fact of the death and disappearance of so many of her First Nation sisters in this great country of Canada. Don’t understand why her own journey led her to become another victim and don’t see in that circumstance a bigger hand guiding things. Yet there is a mystery here, profound and unsettling. Loretta’s life and death is like some great and worthy Zen Koan to truly reflect upon. But not to reflect upon as some idle self absorbed practice but to reflect upon with heart, mind, will and all our human faculties.
Here is where I move to the idea of Positive Development and Asset Mapping and fanning the flame of what is. In an earlier reflection I wrote about one possible response is to find a week in our calendar year and celebrate our First Nations in our country and communities. I did not think that was going to “solve anything” but it was in impulse born of the thought that one of the first steps is understanding. Another step is celebration. Another is doing this together in community. One other thought I had was to bring people together to watch the film of Andre Cazabon “Third World Canada” that tells of the plight of many of the First Nations in our country as something else that could lead to greater understanding.
Other people will think of other ideas and the ideas I put forward as I said are not some easy way to change everything. But after putting both these ideas forward I came to learn there already is a National Aboriginal Awareness week in our country. It happens the first week every year after Victoria Day weekend in May. I know this is celebrated in different parts of the country and in different communities.
So a thought came to me that comes from the perspective of “fanning a flame” that is already there (an asset) and working with opportunities that already exist (positive development). Why not come together around this particular event in time on the calendar? Find out what is already happening in communities and find ways to promote these events. And where things are not yet happening if possible find ways to fan the flames. Perhaps this week will be the time to show films like Third World Canada in some of our communities. Perhaps it is a time for those of inspired by Loretta Saunders life and stricken by her death to come together and talk with each other. The opportunity is there. Perhaps we can contact our libraries and our community centres and our municipalities and ask if we are celebrating this week. In our community our federal MP Lois Brown has deep connections with First Nations – perhaps she would be supportive of recognizing this week in the community that I live in.
This is where the potential of Positive Youth Development comes in as well as the lesson and legacy of the great First Nation leader Tecumseh. What if Youth realize more and more the power of their voice and their agency to become engaged in issues like this? I believe and experience Youth as being natural Revolutionaries – that is why as a community and a society we have ambivalent feelings toward them and we are often scared and leery of them and withhold from them the tools they could use to start to make changes or to be more widely heard. The gifts of Youth are many – Idealism, Passion, Energy, Creativity, Resourcefulness, Imagination, Appetite for Justice and Fairness. Again I don’t see these as static always present qualities but they are inherent and if nurtured and fanned they can become potent tools for positive transformation in their own lives but also in the life of the larger community. Also they are the ones amongst us who often have potent skills and aptitudes in the tools of the new ways of communication, using the newest tools to communicate and spread ideas.
The lesson I learned from studying Tecumseh the great Shawnee chief during the War of 1812 was the brilliance of his vision of working together with the British and with other First Nations for the larger collective cause of the First Nations. The death of his greatest British ally Brock and the turning of history led to failure of his initiative in his own time frame. But his vision was not really a failure because it was a snapshot of what can be done again and again. The lesson to be learned from History and the line of time is that nothing is ultimately a failure or a success – each are unfolding steps on a journey. Tecumseh acted on a greater vision of people working together in solidarity toward a larger cause. This can happen again and I know it is already happening right now. Many social activists are coming together with the activists of Idle No More and finding common cause.
I present the ideas here just as starting points for further thought and discussion. I am just one voice but there are many. Together we can find ways to fan and kindle the flames of a greater awakening.
Tim Greenwood
March 3, 2014
Youth - Feeding the Good Fire 