Episode Transcript
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The following is a paid podcast.I Heart Radio's hosting of this podcast constitutes
neither an endorsement of the products offeredor the ideas expressed. Welcome to Becoming
the Journey. This show will bea series of conversations that will inspire listeners
along their life's journey. This show'smission is to cultivate a community of mentorship
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by sharing our experiences in our life'sjourney. Nobody's journey is a straight line,
so no matter where you are inyours, this show is for you.
Meet Grace Levrey. Welcome listeners.This is Becoming the Journey and as
you know, Becoming is a showof conversations about experiences and knowledge that can
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inform you or be that Aha momentwhile you are struggling. You can message
us on Instagram at Becoming the Journeyand share with us how my guests experiences
and journeys resonated with you. Myguest today is Andrea Ard. She is
an accomplished mate singer, songwriter,actor, speaker, wellness trainer, and
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the founder of Sacred Feminine Learning Lodge. I can mention her accomplishments in the
entertainment industry, but this show isabout her humanitarianism. Andrea is an influenza
in feminine leadership and was named oneof the Women Executive Networks Canada's Most Powerful
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Women the Top one hundred award winnerin twenty twenty. She is an advocate
for rematriation and reconciliation and she trainswomen to lead like a goddess and helps
all gendered people to reclaim and embodythe qualities of the sacred feminine. She's
also the author of the Seeds fromthe Sacred Feminine Wisdom Cards, which will
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be released by the Way with MangoPublishing on May ninth, twenty three.
Welcome Andrea, Pleasure and we're goingto have a very interesting conversation. My
first question is what is it meanto lead like a goddess? Well,
don't she grace? Thank you forhaving me. Before I answer your question,
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do you mind if I introduce myselfin the way that I feel comfortable?
Don't she? Kio? Wow?Andrea Menard dish Nika Shawn. My
name is Andrea Menard. I ama Mati woman from Treaty one Territory in
the homeland of the Mate who's currentlyliving in the unseated traditional territory of the
Squamish, the slavey tooth, andthe Musquin people also known as Vancouver,
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British Columbia, Canada. So Iam honored to be here and I thank
you for sharing some space with memy pleasure. What was the question about
lead like a goddess, lead likea goddess? Yes, yes, one
leads like a goddess. So inmany ways you're you heard a lot in
my introduction about about me being afacilitator of the rise of the same scred
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feminine, sorry, of the sacredfeminine itself, and as an indigenous woman,
the lens that I look through isall about, is all about getting
in touch with the feminine aspects oflife, and that includes Mother Earth.
She is the original source of wellnessfor humanity. She's the original source of
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sacred feminine wisdom and energy. Soin our world where we are brutal to
Mother Earth and we are brutal toall things feminine, just think of where
emotions or emotional expression sits in thebusiness world, or in law, or
in all of the economics. Like, it just doesn't fit, it doesn't
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It isn't welcome. And you know, anything feminine, if if you are,
is considered weak. So if youif you act like a woman or
throw like a girl, or anything'slike that, it's always less than or
something derogatory. So, according tomy elders, we are in a time
called the rise of the sacred feminine. I first heard that from an elders
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gathering that took place on the SaggingFirst Nation in twenty and twelve in the
Turtle Lodge, and it was agathering of elders from all across Turtle Island,
which is North America, and theycoined the term for me, we
are in the time of the riseof the sacred feminine. And this is
coming from indigenous elders. Now thatsounds like it's something to do with women,
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because it's feminine, and it does. According to my elders, this
era we're entering in is going tobe led by women. However, it's
also much much much bigger than that. It is a time where we are
returning to a way of thinking thatis more holistic. So, for instance,
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if the systems in place right noware all pretty much created by,
you know, the masculine principle andvery much exclusionary to anything that was outside
of that white male model, youknow, and everyone's been struggling to get
inside that white male model and ithasn't worked. It hasn't worked for everyone,
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and those who do succeed have tosort of take on those those masculine
skills, which are great. Masculineaspects of life are beautiful or incredible,
but when they are not tempered withthe beautiful, nurturing stillness, the nurturing,
intuitive, emotional aspects of the feminine, then we then we become out
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of balance. And so I wouldsay that to lead like a goddess is
so much part of my work injust learning how to embody the sacred feminine
that we are meant to lead with. So that's women embodying our sacred feminine
and leading like the feminine parts ofourselves which are left out, and of
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course other nonwomen, you know,all gendered people, to actually adopt qualities
that are more holistic, that aremore collaborative, that are more in tune
with emotional wisdom as well as earthland based wisdom, because as I said,
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the rise of the secret feminine isall about, you know, moving
into value for the things that havebeen devalued in the systems that exist,
and that includes Mother Earth. Thatincludes women, that includes indigenous people,
that includes nurturing men, that includespeople of color, black, all land
based cultures, non white in manycultures, and also voices of two spirited,
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transgender, non binary voices, thevoices of animals, all the things
that have been left out, peoplewith disabilities, people with extra abilities,
all of those are coming home tothe circle to be valued. And so
the rise of so the leading likea goddess is about taking in this new
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wisdom and leading from that place,you know, because at the moment,
asking CEOs of companies and stuff tolead like goddesses is many way an impossible
task. But for women who arein positions of power and who are literally
breaking down and cannot seem to goon the way they did, this is
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the moment that this rise of thesacred feminine is waiting for. It's waiting
for those who cannot do it.The old way that always worked got them,
you know, success and benefits,but all of a sudden, that
system or that way of being isn'tworking anymore. Leading like a goddess is
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about making that shift to saying whatwill work for me, what will be
good for me and others? Howcan I be in this job and change
the culture of what I have beenin. If I'm the leader here,
how can I do it? Andto me, leading like a goddess is
all about listening to your self wisdom, listening to self care, listening to
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your exhaustion, and listening to yourfamilies who who don't necessarily recognize you as
a happy person anymore. So longanswer, that's leading like a goddess.
And I understand that part, butlet me put a little few punchlines in
there. Okay, So wouldn't youthink of and I know people don't think
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of it this way, but isn'tthe term feminism and masculine masculism actually verbs
But don't describe a gender. Theyshouldn't describe a gender. They should describe
a trait, which which helps inexplaining the male having what they call feminine
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side, a female having a masculineside. But isn't it just a trait
that we should all adopt and that'sthe balance. Well, here's the thing,
is that all of humanity, allof life, has both the feminine
and the masculine aspects. We alldo. We are all on a spectrum.
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So this very binary way of lookingat the world is actually incorrect.
It is actually not who we reallyare, and when when we are put
into roles that limit us, like, for instance, men are not allowed
to cry, women are not allowedto be angry, and if women do
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have feelings, they're considered this right, like that is not a valuing of
feminine parts of ourselves. Men aresuffering so so so deeply because they're not
allowed to feel except rage and lust, and that is not a fulfilling,
satisfying life. So for me,this is not about male female at all.
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I think we all have those parts, so we might identify more with
one of the other, but lifeitself has both. Like twenty four hours
of a day, half of itis feminine, which is the night,
half of it is masculine, whichis the day. You know, So
that they're not good or bad,they're just different and they're traits. So
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all beings have them. But forsome reason in our society and this western
you know, because that's not anindigenous way of looking at things, it's
a Western colonized way of looking atTo me, the whole world is colonized
because you know, colonization has conquering, has been and suppressing motions and competing
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instead of collaborating, conquering instead ofcollaborating, has been the way, and
that is brutal to humanity, isbrutal to the land, it's brutal to
families. And so if this hasbeen the way, then somewhere along the
line, anything feminine became devalued,and it attempted to be extinguished. And
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if that meant a man extinguishing theirfeelings to survive, that that had terrible
consequences. And for women in thesedays, and for those who want to
succeed, and if they're single parentsor whatever, having to succeed in this
world to make money, to havesome sort of power is to act masculine,
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is to use our masculine skills ofdoing, doing, doing, action,
action, action, action, action, action, action to the point
of exhaustion. That is all alsobrutal, brutal. So we have all.
We all have both. It's whetherwe use them in a day.
Like, for instance, a womanwho is about to cry in a meeting
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and then stuffs it down. Sheis accessing her masculine part of herself.
She's colonizing her own feelings by suppressingthem. That is just part of the
wider culture that she's participating in,but individually, her masculine part of herself
is suppressing the feminine within her ownbody. So you're absolutely right. It
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is an aspect, but we allhave them, but society has giving them
properties. They have given these propertiesto women, these properties to men,
and they don't mix. And ofcourse, I think the rise of the
voices of the non binary, transgenderand two spirited community are here to teach
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humanity about that spectrum. Yeah,so it's unfortunate. But the way you
described not as a trait, andI describe it as a trait. But
you know, we're put in pockets. You're feminine, your masculine, which
means you're a female, you're amale. It's the normal thing to talk
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to people today. That's normal,and normal, I believe is a colonized
idea in and of itself, theword normal. But you and you talk
about getting in touch with yourself andyou're feeling your emotion I talk about it
as we should be doing self auditsconstantly, and I know you kind of
laughed at that, but coming fromyou know, a financial background, and
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I expressed that all the time.But the other thing that I believe in
is you know, we talk aboutchanging the room and seat at the table,
empowering women. My spin on it, and you can it's definitely go
against me on this. I don'tcare, but it's it's I think women
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have always been empowered. They justhaven't been impassioned enough to be who they
want to be because they feel challenged. And I don't think you can change
the room. You have to breakthe cycle because it's a cycle that we're
in and it continues on and onand on until we step up and break
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that cycle. M Oh, I'mI'm I'm on board with you. I
think there are I think there are, yeah, systems the cycles need to
break. But here's the thing isthat the system is incredibly sophisticated. It's
self perpetuating. We don't have todo anything, you know, and it
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just keeps going. We just haveto participate because it's meant to train us
to participate. But indigenous people andpeople who have not been trained into it
as well, or who have failedin getting into like most women, you
know, and many women have succeedednow, right, But so we're in
a time where people have got intothe system, but ultimately the whole system
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is self perpetuating and so in orderto change the systems that is so sophisticated,
it's we're being programmed to be obedientto it without even knowing. Is
that when the only way to breakit is if individuals, one at a
time start to become as you say, impassioned or starting to listen to the
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wisdom of the self and to meand my people. We talk about being
open like listening to ourself, listeningto the wisdom within our bodies, listening
to our emotions, listening to thewisdom of our ancestors. And when we
are in a state of receptivity oflistening, which is a feminine trait,
but not female. It's a femininetrait when you're listening, when you're receptive
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to higher wisdom, you're receptive toyour own feelings to go, oh,
why am I upset? Who?Wow, I'm upset about this? What?
What? What was said that whenmade me so upset? You know?
So, as you say, selfaudit, when you listen to your
feelings, when you listen to thosethings in that receptive state, you begin
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to hear the wisdom that is tryingto guide your life. Your intuition is
there to help is it looks likeyour ancestors, your intuition, your body
knows your dreams and wishes. Soif you were to listen, you might
actually realize that you're being led towardsthem, you knowe. By ignoring them,
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we have all sorts of terrible consequences, whether to just straight up unhappiness,
or policies that suppress another being oranother nation, or policies that destroy
the earth. Without listening to thewisdom of our bodies and our ancestors and
the intuition of all the interconnectedness ofall life. Without tuning into that,
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we make incredibly bad decisions. Soin order for the system to change,
individual one by one by one byone by one by one by one by
one, have to start listening toself wisdom instead of regulated wisdom or regulated
programming, because that's what we defaulttoo. So there's a quote that says
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knowledge comes from finding the answer.Understanding what it means brings wisdom, and
that's a journey that everyone, Ithink should take, and I think Marcel
Prouse said it best when he saidwisdom is a journey to discover for ourselves.
But people don't do that. Andif you're talking about going back to
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the land and going back to yourancestors. How do you distinguish between finding
that wisdom for yourself and self discoveryor taking from those ancestors that learning well.
To me, it's not a pastthing, it's a present thing.
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Our ancestors are with us now.The land is talking to us now,
and we have we have incredibly importantmission, like we have a mission to
listen to those things. Now whenyou say it, did you say listening
to yourself or listening to ancestors?To me, they are one in many
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ways. Like some people you cancall them whatever you want. I call
them ancestors. But you know,you can call it your intuition, you
can talk it to you can youknow, name a person it's my dad
on the other side, or it'sit's God or angels or whatever it is.
Is that there is wisdom from ahigher perspective that is available to us.
The mother Earth has wisdom calling andcrying out to us all the time.
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But who listens to the land,you know, Like who actually goes
and says, those birds are herefrom me? What are they here to
teach me? What are they?Oh, there's a visit from a bug
today. What's this little bug teachingme today? You know, like you
may be in cities where you don'tmaybe not have as available to open natural
land or spaces, but it's MotherEarth is everywhere. She's under your feet,
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she's comforting you, she is sheis clothing you, feeding you,
sheltering you. With every single piecethat is on the earth. He comes
from our Mother. And who givesthanks, Who who takes times, who
actually acknowledge the wealth of abundance thatour mother gives us. That is a
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profound change in a person's life whenthey start to recognize that the Mother is
a living entity that we are incommunication with. So when we say,
oh, I'm going to listen tomy self, that's great, that's great,
But is it yourself that is programmedor is it yourself that is in
communion withal? Because that happens whenyou open to a higher wisdom, When
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you open to prayer, ceremony,walking, meditation, living in service,
all of those things they open youto a higher become more available to higher
wisdom. And to me, there'snothing more important. When we are living
in a very very very sick societythat is disease ridden in the mind,
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and in the body. We havea lot to learn from those who are
connected, like who are land basedcultures and who are people who who do
ceremony and way of life in communingwith the natural world, which creates a
community. Ceremony creates a community,and I think that's something that we have
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kind of separated ourselves from. Yes, we do have communities, but they're
idealistic communities. There we've separated ourselves. I think we've gone back forty years,
to be honest with you, We'veput ourselves into little boxes. You
know, We've got you know,black lives, Asian lives, indigenous,
bipoc where not. We should neverbe separating ourselves. We should be learning
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from each other, and we shouldbe talking to each other and finding wisdom
in other cultures as well as theland. I would agree to that some
extent. Yes, we do needto be coming together. But just like
you know, feminism, as youbrought up feminism, it came on the
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scene early on with a roar becauseit had to. It's like voices of
women have been so suppressed that theyhad to come screaming out the gate in
order to be heard. Nobody listened, and that is in many ways happening
now in this return to the circle. All those voice, indigenous voices,
black voices, like all the onesyou mentioned, they are coming screaming out
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the gate because nobody cared. Nobodyin power listened and all they heard was
moir and they just tuned it out. So we had to come in screaming.
And I have to encourage people tobe patient with this time. According
to my elders, it is therise of the sacred feminine. We are
entering it. We are just atthe beginning of a new era for humanity
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where we move into more balance.We move into balance where we honor our
different voices, the diversity of whowe are, as we honor the diversity
of nature. We are a partof the whole, and no one part
is more important than the other.And we live in a culture that believes
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there's one at the top, there'sone type of person at the top,
and everyone else is below, andthat is a false, false way of
looking at the world and very dangerousway of looking at the war. So
if we have patience that right nowwe are in a rise. We are
in a time where all these voicesthat have been silenced are like bursting through.
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It's like the throats are finally open. And it's not going to be
the prettiest thing, because how doyou have a suppressed culture that has never
been heard before all of a suddencome into a scene and try and be
like somebody who's been speaking for therest, you know, for all of
time. So it's going to bea little imbalanced, it's going to be
a little messy, but it hasto be on the rise of the sacred
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feminine and the rise of a newhumanity. We must be patient with ourselves,
with our reactions and with our feelings, because they're coming explosively on the
scene and voices that are just newto being heard might be a little messy,
and that's okay. We just haveto have some patience with it.
So we should find a particular heelmodality and trust that we can begin with
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that. I would imagine, um, yeah, they're a good friend of
mine. Yeah, yeah, absolutely, And we're going to touch on that
in a minute. But there's agood friend of mine. Her name is
Janina Curtain. She wrote a bookcalled Standing in the River of Time,
and she said, there is thisidea that joy and pain are separate,
but I feel they can sit sideby side, that we can be more
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fluid with our emotions so that wedon't get stuck in the pain. And
that kind of resonated with me thatthat one particular sentence. M she's an
amazing poet. Um and she isalso from the By the way, they
may teen nation, Um. Butit's a great it's a great book.
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Um. You talk about four sacredbodies, So can we touch on that
a little bit? Yeah, absolutely, I tend to use you know,
not that I ever planned to doit, but it just is the way
I look at the world, andI have the symbol of the medicine wheel
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is most people associate with Indigenous wayof looking at the world, and it's
very very useful because if you've neverI think most people have seen it.
It's a circle with four equal quadrants. And Indigenous people we have a holistic
way of looking at life, whereall things like these are four equal distant,
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equally shaped parts of the whole.And so for instance, we work
with the four Sacred directions, whichis honoring the four sacred directions, the
east, southwest, north, honoringthe four sacred bodies, which is what
you're asking about which is the mental, the physical body, the emotional body,
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the mental body, and the spiritualbody. The for sacred elements,
fire, earth, water, air, I could go on and on for
sacred medicines, always all of these. So it's a great symbol to represent
how we look at the world.So, for instance, in our culture,
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in the Western culture, there isa reverence for the mind and the
body. Right they've got to beyoung, and they've got to be taught,
and they've got to be sexy,and they've got to and you've got
to be smart, and right like, there's a reverence for them. Whereas
the emotional body and the spiritual body. It's like the emotional body is the
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least understood and the least respected inthe Western culture. And of course that
is where most people are sick,because the emotions have been encouraged to be
ignored and suppressed, which doesn't workvery well. Humans or emotions will always
come back to bite you in inappropriatetimes, inappropriate ways. And so for
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me, I work well for herehere's how it started. I work with
the four sacred bodies. I haveyou know, I work with the four
sacred elements. My traditional names areNinshkotee, which is an enschnabe moan name
I was given in ceremony means firewoman, which is a powerful element in a
woman. And in my naki Awenname, which I was given in ceremony,
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is not goutin, which is grandmotherwind. So I have wind and
fire, and I am an earthbased person and I am I am deeply
connected to the water. So I'mdeeply connected to the four sacred elements,
and a lot of my work hasto do with connecting with those elements.
Now, the four Sacred bodies.How I came to work with it is
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because my emotional body was really,really, really loud and it was starting
to become unhandable because I'd been suppressingthings too long, and so I went,
okay, fine, I'm going tofigure out how my sacred body,
my emotional body works. This isit. I'm doing it. And of
course I got a whisper from thegrandmothers that said, if you are going
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to work with one body, youhave to work with all four, and
that was confusing, while I'm like, well, how what do you mean?
And through my practice of receiving andlistening and going to the land,
I discovered that these four sacred bodieshave wisdom for us. We are all
four bodies, and we are allfour. We just may be more familiar
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with one or two and more dominantone maybe two and the other two means
we are not very familiar with themat all. So if we walk around
in the world with using our onebody, then we have a longer way
to go into developing awareness and communicationwith the other bodies. But boy,
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oh boy, it is a reallyuseful tool. So we're talking about tools.
This is a tool that I developedfor myself that I realized was helping
others. And during COVID, Istarted doing some of this work online to
help people, and I created alittle audio course so that people can take
it home with them. So it'sall about letting the voices speak in the
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way they speak. You know,we're thinking, okay, speak English if
you're if you're an English native speaker, you say, okay, feelings,
speak English to me, tell mewhat's going on. But that's not how
That's not the language of feelings.They have their own language that we need
to go to them. Honoring thoselanguages. We need to come to them
in a humble way. You knowsaying I'm willing to receive how you want
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to communicate with me. And itmight be rage, it might be grief,
grief, grief and tears that arenon ending. It seems so or
physical body has so much to tellus, but we just go, oh,
yeah, it hurts whatever, let'spop some pills. We don't necessarily
think it has wisdom to share withme. We're not taught in this Western
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culture to listen, as though listeningwill let it go. Sometimes that it
will leave us when we listen.So I work with those I help people
create a communication and a relationship withthose parts of themselves that have been quiet,
that have been not as developed.And there's so much wisdom to be
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had inside. There's so much wisdomif only human beings knew what was waiting
for us. I'm going to interruptfor a minute and say, you are
listening to Becoming the Journey on WORseven ten iHeartRadio. Let's continue my conversation
with my guest Andrea Minard. Ipulled a little piece out of a book
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written by and I'm probably pronouncing herlast name wrong, Jean tell it Ta
ta Um, and it talked aboutLouis Riel's people, and it says the
the Mate were flamboyant, defiant,loud, and definitely not noble savages.
They were nomads with a very differentway of being in the world, always
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on the move, very much inthe moment, passionate and fierce. They
were romantics and visionaries with big dreams. Does that kind of explain how you
are? Oh, I would saypartially. I mean that's a big book.
That's probably you probably got that quotefrom the Northwest is our mother,
and it's it's Louis. Yeah,it's Louis. Yell. It's Louis riel
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was our leader, and he wasthe last human our leader to be hanged
in Canada. He was hanged fortreason um. But it was basically Matie
people were just trying to be acknowledged. So the last war that took place
on Canadian soil was with the Matipeople, and we had Louis Rielle was
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an educated man and was doing hisbest to abide by legal political ways of
discourse, with petitions, with letters, with petitions, letters, petitions,
letters, and we were systematically ignored. And so when when the government brought
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things to our brought surveyors to ourland, to basically cut up our lands
in into little one mile squares.It was. It was very offensive because
we had been trying to be includedin the conversation and Louis Rielle, you
know, so things escalated and weare a passionate people, but we've also
begun as a like. We havebeen ignored from the very beginning. We
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have been at odds with the powerbecause of our indigenous roots, with our
way, our governance system are ourway of following the buffalo. See in
Canada, there are three indigenous peoples. In the US where you are from,
most people would say Native Americans period. But in the in Canada we
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have a whole wide, wide northernranges that are populated by Inuit people,
which have a different culture than theFirst Nations who were the first peoples within
the prairies and the lower lower terrains, and so Maytee people were a mixed
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people of European and First Nations people, but we were left alone. We
were the offspring of the Kier duBois, individual fur traders that would calm
up the rivers, and they wewere left alone with our offspring and families
in the First Nations. Women longenough that we developed our own self governance,
our self our own language. Wewere buffalo hunters, we were translators.
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A lot of Maiti families new sevenlanguages, so we were the ones
sort of communicating between the different peoples. And and so we have incredible passion,
we have incredible skill set, Wehave culture that involves the fiddle,
which is a European gift from thepeoples that came to this land. But
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we also land based, and wealso were very respectful of land and ceremony.
So so yeah, I would sayall those things are true. And
yeah, we we we fought hardto be seen, to be listened,
to be heard. We fought andwe did not succeed, but we have
not died. We are still hereand we are we are because of that
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passion, because of that belief inwho we are, and because of our
family ties. We are still hereand we are succeeding. And yeah,
and very much and just tried tobe suppressed. Like Matie people had a
very very hard time after the resistanceof eighteen eighty five and Louis Rielle was
hanged, and we were houseless andhomeless and landless. That we were our
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base, land base, was gone. We had no place to go,
so we were consider the road allowancepeople. We built shacks along the road
allowance, which was government land.So we were the road allowance people.
And we had very, very veryhard times for many, many many years.
But it was Louis Rielle who wasalso a prophet. He was a
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visionary and just like many of us, you know, he was very much
in touch with, you know,the Catholic religion, but he was also
a visionary on his own right.He had visions and which is why Matie
people trusted him. And he hada vision that said, you know,
it's a very famous quote in Canadaand sometimes used and reused, but it
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is important to know that these arethe this is the Mati people. That
he said that my people will sleepfor a hundred years, but it will
be the artists that awaken and bringthem back their spirit. So in many
ways he knew we were going tohave a rough time, but it would
be people like me who's an artist, who's you know, and all those
who are who are tapping into thevisions of our people, who are tapping
(36:30):
into wanting a better life, whoare believing in a better life, that
are coming to the foe like me, I guess so, I know this
is a sore subject, but Ido want to touch on it briefly,
and that is the burial of allthose children. And look, I'm going
(36:52):
to tell you, I'm Catholic,born, raised, Catholic, you know,
and and to me, I'm justlike taken aback by the whole thing.
But do you do you feel thatwhatever political solutions have been agreed to,
that is there something else we cando? Because I know for a
(37:15):
fact, and again, correct meif I'm wrong, that there are still
there's still a lot of poverty,a lot of drug addiction, a lot
of stealing of women, and alot of suicide within the indigenous. And
I'm not just saying the mate,But where do we go from here?
(37:38):
Well, what you're what you justdescribed was an outcome. Everything you just
said are from an outcome of colonization, a brutal, brutal colonization. And
in the US you are incredibly ignorantof the history of what happened to indigenous
people on your own land, andCanada is not any better. But we're
(38:00):
getting there. We have taken atleast our government has taken steps to discover
what those colonization and illegal practices were. Of course they were made legal,
These inhumane practices were made legal.And so do you have children. I
do. I have three and threegrandchildren, right, So imagine that your
(38:25):
children at four years old, fiveyears old, and six years old,
that government authorities were authorized, withcomplete authority, to come into your home
and take your children, and ifyou resisted, you would be arrested and
(38:45):
put in jail. They take yourchildren because they know better how to raise
them than you do. We needto put them into these schools so that
they don't stop speaking your language,and they stop learning your ways and you
learn our ways instead. So theywould take your children from your home and
imprison you if you stood in theway. That happened for generations upon generations
(39:08):
upon generations. And but we don'twant them too educated, so we got
to make sure we kick them outat grade seven or grade eight, and
then send them back to a placewhere they can't speak with their relatives anymore
because they don't know the language anymore, They barely know who their relatives are,
they don't know anything. And thenthey don't fit where they are sent
(39:29):
back to. And so oh,maybe I'm going to leave this place and
be with other people who were withme. So that's generations of messing with
families. And then nobody understands wherealcoholism or drug abuse or violence comes from.
It was learned, It was taughtby the overculture. It was taught
(39:52):
by colonizing forces that were brutal tobeautiful, beautiful people and families. So
this happened to every single Indigenous personthat touches these lands. North America was
our homeland and it is. Weare the most invisible, you know,
every other We talk about genocides thathappened across the world, but this was
(40:15):
one that was massive. Millions uponmillions upon millions of Indigenous people were killed
in our own land, and nobodyknows what happened. Nobody knows why or
what happened to the surviving ones.They were put in reserves, they were
ignored. Like Mayti people, wehad no land masses, so they separated
(40:36):
us. They were children were abusedin all sorts of ways. So when
when you hear about the children beingfound in these you know, oh my
god, children are being but found. We've been screaming about them for since
we lost them. But you couldimagine. So here you are a parent
with your children inside these schools,and you expect them to come back in
(40:58):
June or whenever they're allowed to comehome. You send them back in June
if you're allowed to come home.Sometimes they had to stay over the summer
as well. But if you wereallowed to have them come home in June
or and they just didn't come home, you'd be like, well, what
happened? And then parents would goand try and find them. And sometimes
they were eight hundred kilometers away sothey couldn't or five hundred miles away,
(41:22):
and some were closer, which theycould go and stand outside the gates and
be ignored. But imagine that youfind out five years later because your child
hasn't come home for five years andthen never did come home, Well,
that's because your child died that firstyear, and they never told you.
Those are what the bodies and thosegraves are is the families that went what
(41:45):
happened to my child? What happenedto my child? They didn't have the
decency to actually tell them their childdied in our care. That's the type
of disrespect and lack of humanity thatwas perpetrated against the people's So people go,
why is there so much violence,why is there so much drug abuse?
Well, because nobody knows the truthand they keep and most colonized colonizers
(42:10):
or people who settled in this landstill think that we'll just get over it.
Find you know, you've got todo something to fix your communities.
Well, you know what, whathelp our communities is people finding out what
really happened. That would and that'ssomething right, but a curious question.
And I truly believe that that itis the outcome that makes a difference in
(42:31):
not the intention, but what wasthe intention? I can't I cannot fathom
this in my head, Like whatdid they want to accomplish by taking these
young children, putting them in thisschool, okay, teaching them the English
(42:51):
ways and not the the culture thatthey came from. What what was there?
What was the thought process? Theywanted to civilize them? But how
do you civilize them when you're abusingthem and then you are throwing them out
into the world at a certain agewhere they have no no balance, no
(43:15):
no standing, They don't know wherethey belong. But isn't that isn't that?
The question is that where did thathorrific way of looking at the world
come from well, it came fromyour people's homelands. You did that to
yourselves, and you brought that overhere. You took put kids in your
boarding schools and you beat them,and they were to be seen and not
(43:37):
heard, and they were treated asslaves and they were you know, you
brought that to our lands. Right, your own lineages are rife with trauma,
major pain, and that way oflooking at the world, that there
is a hierarchy of importance. Iguess king being number one king, and
(44:00):
then queen royalty, and then whitemen and then you know, then other
men, and then maybe women andthen dark you know, dark skinned women,
and then and then and then indigenousI don't know, indigenous people,
animals. Maybe we're above women whoare above indigenous people. You know,
we were treated as flora and fauna. So with that belief that I am
(44:22):
superior to you, you can literallydehumanize anyone below you. And it's still
going on, like within people's training. That is what white supremacy is.
It is a way of looking atthe world that is so blinding to those
who see it. Who's who livetheir life that way? Anyone who's below
(44:43):
that definitely see through it because theydon't fit in. They are the they
are the brunt of that brutal wayof looking at the world. But those
who are stuck in that way ofthinking that that supremacy, you know,
shining through everything they touch is iswhat they brought to this land. So
(45:05):
of course they thought, well,we are doing them of those indigenous people
a favor, were we need tomake them more like us so that we
can help them. But that isthat that's a white supremacy. That is
I am superior to you. Youcan't possibly have anything I need to learn
from, so we need you tomake you like us with no self knowledge
(45:28):
that you are brutal, brutal,unaware folks that came and did a lot
of damage, you know, andthat's because you have been damaged. You
have been damaged, Your people havebeen brutal to you. Oh my god,
the middle Age is what you didto torture yourselves. Oh my god,
you guys got some healing to do. So, of course you and
(45:52):
the unfortunately with they're canceling a lotof that learning. Where I am a
true believer that unless you learn fromhistory, you can't know what to do
today, how to be different,how to change it, how to break
the cycle. We have to parallelthese things. And you know, they're
banning books, they're they're canceling.It's just it boggles my brain. Again.
(46:14):
I just I just don't understand itall. But and white supremacy absolutely
still exists. The Trump era hasproved that and so um yeah, So
my question is where does one start? And I know, getting in touch
with yourself healing, I mean,but where would you start if you had
(46:39):
to start from the beginning healing?Well, healing is number one. That's
that's the work I do because Idon't believe systems can change unless individuals change.
So that's my core belief about this. So you have to do your
own work. But your own workwith your with your lineages is that there's
(47:00):
something unhealthy that has been passed downwithin your lineages and that has gone un
processed, unlooked at, and ithas created a system of domination that seems
normal, that seems normal, andit is not normal. So yes,
(47:22):
working on your own healing, yourown lineage, but also educating yourself about
oh wow, you know we nevernoticed we considered these indigenous peoples of this
land uncivilized because they didn't have structures, they didn't have things, they didn't
have industry. But what they didn'tsee was these people have been living here
(47:47):
for time immemorial, over fifteen thousandyears, and nothing is wrecked. They
have not brutalized the land, theyhave not poisoned anything. And what they
do create, what structures they domake, is in harmony with the land
around them. There's been ceremony andprayer about how to create buildings or create
(48:12):
lodgings that are in alignment that don'tharm the land, or they move,
they go the water, and theland has been used up here, so
we need to give it a breakand leave so we can replenish it in
another four years when we come back. So they never saw the wisdom that
was present. Instead they saw throughtheir own damaged eyes, and that got
(48:37):
passed on. Now they're going,oh, fifteen thousand years and you didn't
kill anything, You didn't kill theland, like destroy it. Oh,
maybe there is something there, ormaybe they have a philosophy or religion if
you want to call it that thatis more in keeping with something healthy.
(49:00):
You know, nobody's dominating anybody elsethey raised their children is very different than
we do. You know, theydidn't, they didn't see that as value.
And so to me, to learnhow your ancestors viewed indigenous people or
to other cultures that they travel tosays a lot about what you learn and
(49:22):
see today and try to unravel that. So unraveling and decolonizing your own way
of thinking happens when you're curious,when you ask questions, and when you
actually face the lineage of trauma thatyou come from. There is a lot
of stuff that if humans dived intothat boy or boy, Wou'd be a
(49:44):
different We'd be a different planet.And I'm a big proponent of reading.
There's an amazing amount of things youcan learn from books and from people who
have had their own journeys. Itruly believe that I know it and to
end soon, but I need toget two more questions in there. One
is you are in the film andtelevision and music industry. Yeah, I'm
(50:09):
going to say this, and I'llprobably get a lot of flak for it,
but I don't care. I thinkit's a toxic industry and I'm not
just saying that I'm involved in it. How do you separate yourself from because
there's a lot of white supremacy,there's a lot of you know, still
(50:30):
we're not diversified enough. I meanwe're trying, but how do you separate
yourself from that? And I'll usethe word toxicity again, but that's any
word I could think of right now. Yeah, No, I would say
that's pretty fair. Is that theyare. They are an industry. Do
not doubt for a second. It'sa machine and it's self perpetuating, and
(50:52):
it's very sophisticated, and everybody getssucked into it, gets sucked into it.
That it's based on fame and fortuneand youth, and those are they.
That is a sickness that is permeatingeveryone because somehow we believe that that
(51:13):
is the ideal that we need tobecome young forever and rich and so much
wealth that you spil it around andbuy toys, right, consumerism. It
is absolutely toxic. And so howam I in it? How have I
survived in it? I have givenmy career away. If you really want
(51:34):
to know, this is the truthI gave. I came into this life
with gifts I came to share.I'm a singer, I'm an actor,
I'm a storyteller, right, so, or I'm a storyteller and I'm a
singer. I knew that these areand and I'm an expressor of emotions.
I'm a deep, deep feeler.So if those were my gifts, then
(51:58):
the arts industries do seem to bewhere I would go. But the arts
industries don't value creativity. They valueoutcome and money and product and how it
looks, you know. And sofor me, I said, if I'm
meant to be in these industries,and I'm talking to the grandmothers, you
(52:22):
know, my ancestors, I'm like, look, if this is my path
and I'm meant to be here,then you help me. Like I'm not
I'm not doing this unless I'm changingthe world somehow. Like I'm not going
to survive this, this way oflife. I'm not going to it's too
seductive for toxicity. It's very seductiveto want things that don't matter. And
(52:42):
I thought, I, if thisis where I'm meant to be, then
you have to help lead me topeople and projects and trusting in my own
creativity and you helping me with expressingmy own creativity in a way that changes
the world for the better. Iwant to be of service or I'm not
doing it. I think you've accomplishedthat and that's amazing, and I'm hoping
(53:04):
my involvement in the industry, Iam a partner in the studio, I
can do the same thing and bringgood quality, diversified, meaningful things to
the entertainment industry. Everyone. Andreahas seeds from the Sacred Feminine Wisdom Cards,
which will be out on May ninth. I suggest you go to her
(53:30):
website and join Andrea. I cannotthink thank you enough. You've been amazing
and thank you. Listeners to Becomingthe Journey. You can listen to us
on WR seven ten, iHeart Radio, or wherever you listen to your podcasts.
Thank you, Thank you, GraceMarcy. You have been listening to
(53:50):
Becoming the Journey hosted by Grace Labrey. Tune in weekly to hear more conversations
that will inspire listeners along their life'sjourney. The proceeding was a paid podcast.
iHeartRadio's hosting of this podcast constitutes neitheran endorsement of the products offered or
the ideas expressed.
The following is a paid podcast.I Heart Radio's hosting of this podcast constitutes
neither an endorsement of the products offeredor the ideas expressed. Welcome to Becoming
the Journey. This show will bea series of conversations that will inspire listeners
along their life's journey. This show'smission is to cultivate a community of mentorship
(00:21):
by sharing our experiences in our life'sjourney. Nobody's journey is a straight line,
so no matter where you are inyours, this show is for you.
Meet Grace Levrey. Welcome listeners.This is Becoming the Journey and as
you know, Becoming is a showof conversations about experiences and knowledge that can
(00:42):
inform you or be that Aha momentwhile you are struggling. You can message
us on Instagram at Becoming the Journeyand share with us how my guests experiences
and journeys resonated with you. Myguest today is Andrea Ard. She is
an accomplished mate singer, songwriter,actor, speaker, wellness trainer, and
(01:08):
the founder of Sacred Feminine Learning Lodge. I can mention her accomplishments in the
entertainment industry, but this show isabout her humanitarianism. Andrea is an influenza
in feminine leadership and was named oneof the Women Executive Networks Canada's Most Powerful
(01:29):
Women the Top one hundred award winnerin twenty twenty. She is an advocate
for rematriation and reconciliation and she trainswomen to lead like a goddess and helps
all gendered people to reclaim and embodythe qualities of the sacred feminine. She's
also the author of the Seeds fromthe Sacred Feminine Wisdom Cards, which will
(01:55):
be released by the Way with MangoPublishing on May ninth, twenty three.
Welcome Andrea, Pleasure and we're goingto have a very interesting conversation. My
first question is what is it meanto lead like a goddess? Well,
don't she grace? Thank you forhaving me. Before I answer your question,
(02:15):
do you mind if I introduce myselfin the way that I feel comfortable?
Don't she? Kio? Wow?Andrea Menard dish Nika Shawn. My
name is Andrea Menard. I ama Mati woman from Treaty one Territory in
the homeland of the Mate who's currentlyliving in the unseated traditional territory of the
Squamish, the slavey tooth, andthe Musquin people also known as Vancouver,
(02:38):
British Columbia, Canada. So Iam honored to be here and I thank
you for sharing some space with memy pleasure. What was the question about
lead like a goddess, lead likea goddess? Yes, yes, one
leads like a goddess. So inmany ways you're you heard a lot in
my introduction about about me being afacilitator of the rise of the same scred
(03:00):
feminine, sorry, of the sacredfeminine itself, and as an indigenous woman,
the lens that I look through isall about, is all about getting
in touch with the feminine aspects oflife, and that includes Mother Earth.
She is the original source of wellnessfor humanity. She's the original source of
(03:24):
sacred feminine wisdom and energy. Soin our world where we are brutal to
Mother Earth and we are brutal toall things feminine, just think of where
emotions or emotional expression sits in thebusiness world, or in law, or
in all of the economics. Like, it just doesn't fit, it doesn't
(03:47):
It isn't welcome. And you know, anything feminine, if if you are,
is considered weak. So if youif you act like a woman or
throw like a girl, or anything'slike that, it's always less than or
something derogatory. So, according tomy elders, we are in a time
called the rise of the sacred feminine. I first heard that from an elders
(04:12):
gathering that took place on the SaggingFirst Nation in twenty and twelve in the
Turtle Lodge, and it was agathering of elders from all across Turtle Island,
which is North America, and theycoined the term for me, we
are in the time of the riseof the sacred feminine. And this is
coming from indigenous elders. Now thatsounds like it's something to do with women,
(04:35):
because it's feminine, and it does. According to my elders, this
era we're entering in is going tobe led by women. However, it's
also much much much bigger than that. It is a time where we are
returning to a way of thinking thatis more holistic. So, for instance,
(04:56):
if the systems in place right noware all pretty much created by,
you know, the masculine principle andvery much exclusionary to anything that was outside
of that white male model, youknow, and everyone's been struggling to get
inside that white male model and ithasn't worked. It hasn't worked for everyone,
(05:17):
and those who do succeed have tosort of take on those those masculine
skills, which are great. Masculineaspects of life are beautiful or incredible,
but when they are not tempered withthe beautiful, nurturing stillness, the nurturing,
intuitive, emotional aspects of the feminine, then we then we become out
(05:41):
of balance. And so I wouldsay that to lead like a goddess is
so much part of my work injust learning how to embody the sacred feminine
that we are meant to lead with. So that's women embodying our sacred feminine
and leading like the feminine parts ofourselves which are left out, and of
(06:03):
course other nonwomen, you know,all gendered people, to actually adopt qualities
that are more holistic, that aremore collaborative, that are more in tune
with emotional wisdom as well as earthland based wisdom, because as I said,
(06:26):
the rise of the secret feminine isall about, you know, moving
into value for the things that havebeen devalued in the systems that exist,
and that includes Mother Earth. Thatincludes women, that includes indigenous people,
that includes nurturing men, that includespeople of color, black, all land
based cultures, non white in manycultures, and also voices of two spirited,
(06:51):
transgender, non binary voices, thevoices of animals, all the things
that have been left out, peoplewith disabilities, people with extra abilities,
all of those are coming home tothe circle to be valued. And so
the rise of so the leading likea goddess is about taking in this new
(07:13):
wisdom and leading from that place,you know, because at the moment,
asking CEOs of companies and stuff tolead like goddesses is many way an impossible
task. But for women who arein positions of power and who are literally
breaking down and cannot seem to goon the way they did, this is
(07:36):
the moment that this rise of thesacred feminine is waiting for. It's waiting
for those who cannot do it.The old way that always worked got them,
you know, success and benefits,but all of a sudden, that
system or that way of being isn'tworking anymore. Leading like a goddess is
(07:57):
about making that shift to saying whatwill work for me, what will be
good for me and others? Howcan I be in this job and change
the culture of what I have beenin. If I'm the leader here,
how can I do it? Andto me, leading like a goddess is
all about listening to your self wisdom, listening to self care, listening to
(08:22):
your exhaustion, and listening to yourfamilies who who don't necessarily recognize you as
a happy person anymore. So longanswer, that's leading like a goddess.
And I understand that part, butlet me put a little few punchlines in
there. Okay, So wouldn't youthink of and I know people don't think
(08:46):
of it this way, but isn'tthe term feminism and masculine masculism actually verbs
But don't describe a gender. Theyshouldn't describe a gender. They should describe
a trait, which which helps inexplaining the male having what they call feminine
(09:11):
side, a female having a masculineside. But isn't it just a trait
that we should all adopt and that'sthe balance. Well, here's the thing,
is that all of humanity, allof life, has both the feminine
and the masculine aspects. We alldo. We are all on a spectrum.
(09:31):
So this very binary way of lookingat the world is actually incorrect.
It is actually not who we reallyare, and when when we are put
into roles that limit us, like, for instance, men are not allowed
to cry, women are not allowedto be angry, and if women do
(09:54):
have feelings, they're considered this right, like that is not a valuing of
feminine parts of ourselves. Men aresuffering so so so deeply because they're not
allowed to feel except rage and lust, and that is not a fulfilling,
satisfying life. So for me,this is not about male female at all.
(10:18):
I think we all have those parts, so we might identify more with
one of the other, but lifeitself has both. Like twenty four hours
of a day, half of itis feminine, which is the night,
half of it is masculine, whichis the day. You know, So
that they're not good or bad,they're just different and they're traits. So
(10:41):
all beings have them. But forsome reason in our society and this western
you know, because that's not anindigenous way of looking at things, it's
a Western colonized way of looking atTo me, the whole world is colonized
because you know, colonization has conquering, has been and suppressing motions and competing
(11:01):
instead of collaborating, conquering instead ofcollaborating, has been the way, and
that is brutal to humanity, isbrutal to the land, it's brutal to
families. And so if this hasbeen the way, then somewhere along the
line, anything feminine became devalued,and it attempted to be extinguished. And
(11:24):
if that meant a man extinguishing theirfeelings to survive, that that had terrible
consequences. And for women in thesedays, and for those who want to
succeed, and if they're single parentsor whatever, having to succeed in this
world to make money, to havesome sort of power is to act masculine,
(11:50):
is to use our masculine skills ofdoing, doing, doing, action,
action, action, action, action, action, action to the point
of exhaustion. That is all alsobrutal, brutal. So we have all.
We all have both. It's whetherwe use them in a day.
Like, for instance, a womanwho is about to cry in a meeting
(12:11):
and then stuffs it down. Sheis accessing her masculine part of herself.
She's colonizing her own feelings by suppressingthem. That is just part of the
wider culture that she's participating in,but individually, her masculine part of herself
is suppressing the feminine within her ownbody. So you're absolutely right. It
(12:33):
is an aspect, but we allhave them, but society has giving them
properties. They have given these propertiesto women, these properties to men,
and they don't mix. And ofcourse, I think the rise of the
voices of the non binary, transgenderand two spirited community are here to teach
(12:56):
humanity about that spectrum. Yeah,so it's unfortunate. But the way you
described not as a trait, andI describe it as a trait. But
you know, we're put in pockets. You're feminine, your masculine, which
means you're a female, you're amale. It's the normal thing to talk
(13:20):
to people today. That's normal,and normal, I believe is a colonized
idea in and of itself, theword normal. But you and you talk
about getting in touch with yourself andyou're feeling your emotion I talk about it
as we should be doing self auditsconstantly, and I know you kind of
laughed at that, but coming fromyou know, a financial background, and
(13:45):
I expressed that all the time.But the other thing that I believe in
is you know, we talk aboutchanging the room and seat at the table,
empowering women. My spin on it, and you can it's definitely go
against me on this. I don'tcare, but it's it's I think women
(14:05):
have always been empowered. They justhaven't been impassioned enough to be who they
want to be because they feel challenged. And I don't think you can change
the room. You have to breakthe cycle because it's a cycle that we're
in and it continues on and onand on until we step up and break
(14:26):
that cycle. M Oh, I'mI'm I'm on board with you. I
think there are I think there are, yeah, systems the cycles need to
break. But here's the thing isthat the system is incredibly sophisticated. It's
self perpetuating. We don't have todo anything, you know, and it
(14:48):
just keeps going. We just haveto participate because it's meant to train us
to participate. But indigenous people andpeople who have not been trained into it
as well, or who have failedin getting into like most women, you
know, and many women have succeedednow, right, But so we're in
a time where people have got intothe system, but ultimately the whole system
(15:11):
is self perpetuating and so in orderto change the systems that is so sophisticated,
it's we're being programmed to be obedientto it without even knowing. Is
that when the only way to breakit is if individuals, one at a
time start to become as you say, impassioned or starting to listen to the
(15:31):
wisdom of the self and to meand my people. We talk about being
open like listening to ourself, listeningto the wisdom within our bodies, listening
to our emotions, listening to thewisdom of our ancestors. And when we
are in a state of receptivity oflistening, which is a feminine trait,
but not female. It's a femininetrait when you're listening, when you're receptive
(15:54):
to higher wisdom, you're receptive toyour own feelings to go, oh,
why am I upset? Who?Wow, I'm upset about this? What?
What? What was said that whenmade me so upset? You know?
So, as you say, selfaudit, when you listen to your
feelings, when you listen to thosethings in that receptive state, you begin
(16:15):
to hear the wisdom that is tryingto guide your life. Your intuition is
there to help is it looks likeyour ancestors, your intuition, your body
knows your dreams and wishes. Soif you were to listen, you might
actually realize that you're being led towardsthem, you knowe. By ignoring them,
(16:37):
we have all sorts of terrible consequences, whether to just straight up unhappiness,
or policies that suppress another being oranother nation, or policies that destroy
the earth. Without listening to thewisdom of our bodies and our ancestors and
the intuition of all the interconnectedness ofall life. Without tuning into that,
(17:00):
we make incredibly bad decisions. Soin order for the system to change,
individual one by one by one byone by one by one by one by
one, have to start listening toself wisdom instead of regulated wisdom or regulated
programming, because that's what we defaulttoo. So there's a quote that says
(17:23):
knowledge comes from finding the answer.Understanding what it means brings wisdom, and
that's a journey that everyone, Ithink should take, and I think Marcel
Prouse said it best when he saidwisdom is a journey to discover for ourselves.
But people don't do that. Andif you're talking about going back to
(17:45):
the land and going back to yourancestors. How do you distinguish between finding
that wisdom for yourself and self discoveryor taking from those ancestors that learning well.
To me, it's not a pastthing, it's a present thing.
(18:07):
Our ancestors are with us now.The land is talking to us now,
and we have we have incredibly importantmission, like we have a mission to
listen to those things. Now whenyou say it, did you say listening
to yourself or listening to ancestors?To me, they are one in many
(18:33):
ways. Like some people you cancall them whatever you want. I call
them ancestors. But you know,you can call it your intuition, you
can talk it to you can youknow, name a person it's my dad
on the other side, or it'sit's God or angels or whatever it is.
Is that there is wisdom from ahigher perspective that is available to us.
The mother Earth has wisdom calling andcrying out to us all the time.
(18:59):
But who listens to the land,you know, Like who actually goes
and says, those birds are herefrom me? What are they here to
teach me? What are they?Oh, there's a visit from a bug
today. What's this little bug teachingme today? You know, like you
may be in cities where you don'tmaybe not have as available to open natural
land or spaces, but it's MotherEarth is everywhere. She's under your feet,
(19:25):
she's comforting you, she is sheis clothing you, feeding you,
sheltering you. With every single piecethat is on the earth. He comes
from our Mother. And who givesthanks, Who who takes times, who
actually acknowledge the wealth of abundance thatour mother gives us. That is a
(19:47):
profound change in a person's life whenthey start to recognize that the Mother is
a living entity that we are incommunication with. So when we say,
oh, I'm going to listen tomy self, that's great, that's great,
But is it yourself that is programmedor is it yourself that is in
communion withal? Because that happens whenyou open to a higher wisdom, When
(20:12):
you open to prayer, ceremony,walking, meditation, living in service,
all of those things they open youto a higher become more available to higher
wisdom. And to me, there'snothing more important. When we are living
in a very very very sick societythat is disease ridden in the mind,
(20:36):
and in the body. We havea lot to learn from those who are
connected, like who are land basedcultures and who are people who who do
ceremony and way of life in communingwith the natural world, which creates a
community. Ceremony creates a community,and I think that's something that we have
(20:59):
kind of separated ourselves from. Yes, we do have communities, but they're
idealistic communities. There we've separated ourselves. I think we've gone back forty years,
to be honest with you, We'veput ourselves into little boxes. You
know, We've got you know,black lives, Asian lives, indigenous,
bipoc where not. We should neverbe separating ourselves. We should be learning
(21:21):
from each other, and we shouldbe talking to each other and finding wisdom
in other cultures as well as theland. I would agree to that some
extent. Yes, we do needto be coming together. But just like
you know, feminism, as youbrought up feminism, it came on the
(21:42):
scene early on with a roar becauseit had to. It's like voices of
women have been so suppressed that theyhad to come screaming out the gate in
order to be heard. Nobody listened, and that is in many ways happening
now in this return to the circle. All those voice, indigenous voices,
black voices, like all the onesyou mentioned, they are coming screaming out
(22:06):
the gate because nobody cared. Nobodyin power listened and all they heard was
moir and they just tuned it out. So we had to come in screaming.
And I have to encourage people tobe patient with this time. According
to my elders, it is therise of the sacred feminine. We are
entering it. We are just atthe beginning of a new era for humanity
(22:30):
where we move into more balance.We move into balance where we honor our
different voices, the diversity of whowe are, as we honor the diversity
of nature. We are a partof the whole, and no one part
is more important than the other.And we live in a culture that believes
(22:51):
there's one at the top, there'sone type of person at the top,
and everyone else is below, andthat is a false, false way of
looking at the world and very dangerousway of looking at the war. So
if we have patience that right nowwe are in a rise. We are
in a time where all these voicesthat have been silenced are like bursting through.
(23:12):
It's like the throats are finally open. And it's not going to be
the prettiest thing, because how doyou have a suppressed culture that has never
been heard before all of a suddencome into a scene and try and be
like somebody who's been speaking for therest, you know, for all of
time. So it's going to bea little imbalanced, it's going to be
a little messy, but it hasto be on the rise of the sacred
(23:36):
feminine and the rise of a newhumanity. We must be patient with ourselves,
with our reactions and with our feelings, because they're coming explosively on the
scene and voices that are just newto being heard might be a little messy,
and that's okay. We just haveto have some patience with it.
So we should find a particular heelmodality and trust that we can begin with
(24:03):
that. I would imagine, um, yeah, they're a good friend of
mine. Yeah, yeah, absolutely, And we're going to touch on that
in a minute. But there's agood friend of mine. Her name is
Janina Curtain. She wrote a bookcalled Standing in the River of Time,
and she said, there is thisidea that joy and pain are separate,
but I feel they can sit sideby side, that we can be more
(24:27):
fluid with our emotions so that wedon't get stuck in the pain. And
that kind of resonated with me thatthat one particular sentence. M she's an
amazing poet. Um and she isalso from the By the way, they
may teen nation, Um. Butit's a great it's a great book.
(24:52):
Um. You talk about four sacredbodies, So can we touch on that
a little bit? Yeah, absolutely, I tend to use you know,
not that I ever planned to doit, but it just is the way
I look at the world, andI have the symbol of the medicine wheel
(25:15):
is most people associate with Indigenous wayof looking at the world, and it's
very very useful because if you've neverI think most people have seen it.
It's a circle with four equal quadrants. And Indigenous people we have a holistic
way of looking at life, whereall things like these are four equal distant,
(25:37):
equally shaped parts of the whole.And so for instance, we work
with the four Sacred directions, whichis honoring the four sacred directions, the
east, southwest, north, honoringthe four sacred bodies, which is what
you're asking about which is the mental, the physical body, the emotional body,
(25:57):
the mental body, and the spiritualbody. The for sacred elements,
fire, earth, water, air, I could go on and on for
sacred medicines, always all of these. So it's a great symbol to represent
how we look at the world.So, for instance, in our culture,
(26:18):
in the Western culture, there isa reverence for the mind and the
body. Right they've got to beyoung, and they've got to be taught,
and they've got to be sexy,and they've got to and you've got
to be smart, and right like, there's a reverence for them. Whereas
the emotional body and the spiritual body. It's like the emotional body is the
(26:41):
least understood and the least respected inthe Western culture. And of course that
is where most people are sick,because the emotions have been encouraged to be
ignored and suppressed, which doesn't workvery well. Humans or emotions will always
come back to bite you in inappropriatetimes, inappropriate ways. And so for
(27:07):
me, I work well for herehere's how it started. I work with
the four sacred bodies. I haveyou know, I work with the four
sacred elements. My traditional names areNinshkotee, which is an enschnabe moan name
I was given in ceremony means firewoman, which is a powerful element in a
woman. And in my naki Awenname, which I was given in ceremony,
(27:33):
is not goutin, which is grandmotherwind. So I have wind and
fire, and I am an earthbased person and I am I am deeply
connected to the water. So I'mdeeply connected to the four sacred elements,
and a lot of my work hasto do with connecting with those elements.
Now, the four Sacred bodies.How I came to work with it is
(27:55):
because my emotional body was really,really, really loud and it was starting
to become unhandable because I'd been suppressingthings too long, and so I went,
okay, fine, I'm going tofigure out how my sacred body,
my emotional body works. This isit. I'm doing it. And of
course I got a whisper from thegrandmothers that said, if you are going
(28:18):
to work with one body, youhave to work with all four, and
that was confusing, while I'm like, well, how what do you mean?
And through my practice of receiving andlistening and going to the land,
I discovered that these four sacred bodieshave wisdom for us. We are all
four bodies, and we are allfour. We just may be more familiar
(28:42):
with one or two and more dominantone maybe two and the other two means
we are not very familiar with themat all. So if we walk around
in the world with using our onebody, then we have a longer way
to go into developing awareness and communicationwith the other bodies. But boy,
(29:03):
oh boy, it is a reallyuseful tool. So we're talking about tools.
This is a tool that I developedfor myself that I realized was helping
others. And during COVID, Istarted doing some of this work online to
help people, and I created alittle audio course so that people can take
it home with them. So it'sall about letting the voices speak in the
(29:27):
way they speak. You know,we're thinking, okay, speak English if
you're if you're an English native speaker, you say, okay, feelings,
speak English to me, tell mewhat's going on. But that's not how
That's not the language of feelings.They have their own language that we need
to go to them. Honoring thoselanguages. We need to come to them
in a humble way. You knowsaying I'm willing to receive how you want
(29:51):
to communicate with me. And itmight be rage, it might be grief,
grief, grief and tears that arenon ending. It seems so or
physical body has so much to tellus, but we just go, oh,
yeah, it hurts whatever, let'spop some pills. We don't necessarily
think it has wisdom to share withme. We're not taught in this Western
(30:14):
culture to listen, as though listeningwill let it go. Sometimes that it
will leave us when we listen.So I work with those I help people
create a communication and a relationship withthose parts of themselves that have been quiet,
that have been not as developed.And there's so much wisdom to be
(30:37):
had inside. There's so much wisdomif only human beings knew what was waiting
for us. I'm going to interruptfor a minute and say, you are
listening to Becoming the Journey on WORseven ten iHeartRadio. Let's continue my conversation
with my guest Andrea Minard. Ipulled a little piece out of a book
(31:03):
written by and I'm probably pronouncing herlast name wrong, Jean tell it Ta
ta Um, and it talked aboutLouis Riel's people, and it says the
the Mate were flamboyant, defiant,loud, and definitely not noble savages.
They were nomads with a very differentway of being in the world, always
(31:26):
on the move, very much inthe moment, passionate and fierce. They
were romantics and visionaries with big dreams. Does that kind of explain how you
are? Oh, I would saypartially. I mean that's a big book.
That's probably you probably got that quotefrom the Northwest is our mother,
and it's it's Louis. Yeah,it's Louis. Yell. It's Louis riel
(31:49):
was our leader, and he wasthe last human our leader to be hanged
in Canada. He was hanged fortreason um. But it was basically Matie
people were just trying to be acknowledged. So the last war that took place
on Canadian soil was with the Matipeople, and we had Louis Rielle was
(32:12):
an educated man and was doing hisbest to abide by legal political ways of
discourse, with petitions, with letters, with petitions, letters, petitions,
letters, and we were systematically ignored. And so when when the government brought
(32:34):
things to our brought surveyors to ourland, to basically cut up our lands
in into little one mile squares.It was. It was very offensive because
we had been trying to be includedin the conversation and Louis Rielle, you
know, so things escalated and weare a passionate people, but we've also
begun as a like. We havebeen ignored from the very beginning. We
(33:00):
have been at odds with the powerbecause of our indigenous roots, with our
way, our governance system are ourway of following the buffalo. See in
Canada, there are three indigenous peoples. In the US where you are from,
most people would say Native Americans period. But in the in Canada we
(33:22):
have a whole wide, wide northernranges that are populated by Inuit people,
which have a different culture than theFirst Nations who were the first peoples within
the prairies and the lower lower terrains, and so Maytee people were a mixed
(33:43):
people of European and First Nations people, but we were left alone. We
were the offspring of the Kier duBois, individual fur traders that would calm
up the rivers, and they wewere left alone with our offspring and families
in the First Nations. Women longenough that we developed our own self governance,
our self our own language. Wewere buffalo hunters, we were translators.
(34:09):
A lot of Maiti families new sevenlanguages, so we were the ones
sort of communicating between the different peoples. And and so we have incredible passion,
we have incredible skill set, Wehave culture that involves the fiddle,
which is a European gift from thepeoples that came to this land. But
(34:35):
we also land based, and wealso were very respectful of land and ceremony.
So so yeah, I would sayall those things are true. And
yeah, we we we fought hardto be seen, to be listened,
to be heard. We fought andwe did not succeed, but we have
not died. We are still hereand we are we are because of that
(35:00):
passion, because of that belief inwho we are, and because of our
family ties. We are still hereand we are succeeding. And yeah,
and very much and just tried tobe suppressed. Like Matie people had a
very very hard time after the resistanceof eighteen eighty five and Louis Rielle was
hanged, and we were houseless andhomeless and landless. That we were our
(35:23):
base, land base, was gone. We had no place to go,
so we were consider the road allowancepeople. We built shacks along the road
allowance, which was government land.So we were the road allowance people.
And we had very, very veryhard times for many, many many years.
But it was Louis Rielle who wasalso a prophet. He was a
(35:44):
visionary and just like many of us, you know, he was very much
in touch with, you know,the Catholic religion, but he was also
a visionary on his own right.He had visions and which is why Matie
people trusted him. And he hada vision that said, you know,
it's a very famous quote in Canadaand sometimes used and reused, but it
(36:06):
is important to know that these arethe this is the Mati people. That
he said that my people will sleepfor a hundred years, but it will
be the artists that awaken and bringthem back their spirit. So in many
ways he knew we were going tohave a rough time, but it would
be people like me who's an artist, who's you know, and all those
who are who are tapping into thevisions of our people, who are tapping
(36:30):
into wanting a better life, whoare believing in a better life, that
are coming to the foe like me, I guess so, I know this
is a sore subject, but Ido want to touch on it briefly,
and that is the burial of allthose children. And look, I'm going
(36:52):
to tell you, I'm Catholic,born, raised, Catholic, you know,
and and to me, I'm justlike taken aback by the whole thing.
But do you do you feel thatwhatever political solutions have been agreed to,
that is there something else we cando? Because I know for a
(37:15):
fact, and again, correct meif I'm wrong, that there are still
there's still a lot of poverty,a lot of drug addiction, a lot
of stealing of women, and alot of suicide within the indigenous. And
I'm not just saying the mate,But where do we go from here?
(37:38):
Well, what you're what you justdescribed was an outcome. Everything you just
said are from an outcome of colonization, a brutal, brutal colonization. And
in the US you are incredibly ignorantof the history of what happened to indigenous
people on your own land, andCanada is not any better. But we're
(38:00):
getting there. We have taken atleast our government has taken steps to discover
what those colonization and illegal practices were. Of course they were made legal,
These inhumane practices were made legal.And so do you have children. I
do. I have three and threegrandchildren, right, So imagine that your
(38:25):
children at four years old, fiveyears old, and six years old,
that government authorities were authorized, withcomplete authority, to come into your home
and take your children, and ifyou resisted, you would be arrested and
(38:45):
put in jail. They take yourchildren because they know better how to raise
them than you do. We needto put them into these schools so that
they don't stop speaking your language,and they stop learning your ways and you
learn our ways instead. So theywould take your children from your home and
imprison you if you stood in theway. That happened for generations upon generations
(39:08):
upon generations. And but we don'twant them too educated, so we got
to make sure we kick them outat grade seven or grade eight, and
then send them back to a placewhere they can't speak with their relatives anymore
because they don't know the language anymore, They barely know who their relatives are,
they don't know anything. And thenthey don't fit where they are sent
(39:29):
back to. And so oh,maybe I'm going to leave this place and
be with other people who were withme. So that's generations of messing with
families. And then nobody understands wherealcoholism or drug abuse or violence comes from.
It was learned, It was taughtby the overculture. It was taught
(39:52):
by colonizing forces that were brutal tobeautiful, beautiful people and families. So
this happened to every single Indigenous personthat touches these lands. North America was
our homeland and it is. Weare the most invisible, you know,
every other We talk about genocides thathappened across the world, but this was
(40:15):
one that was massive. Millions uponmillions upon millions of Indigenous people were killed
in our own land, and nobodyknows what happened. Nobody knows why or
what happened to the surviving ones.They were put in reserves, they were
ignored. Like Mayti people, wehad no land masses, so they separated
(40:36):
us. They were children were abusedin all sorts of ways. So when
when you hear about the children beingfound in these you know, oh my
god, children are being but found. We've been screaming about them for since
we lost them. But you couldimagine. So here you are a parent
with your children inside these schools,and you expect them to come back in
(40:58):
June or whenever they're allowed to comehome. You send them back in June
if you're allowed to come home.Sometimes they had to stay over the summer
as well. But if you wereallowed to have them come home in June
or and they just didn't come home, you'd be like, well, what
happened? And then parents would goand try and find them. And sometimes
they were eight hundred kilometers away sothey couldn't or five hundred miles away,
(41:22):
and some were closer, which theycould go and stand outside the gates and
be ignored. But imagine that youfind out five years later because your child
hasn't come home for five years andthen never did come home, Well,
that's because your child died that firstyear, and they never told you.
Those are what the bodies and thosegraves are is the families that went what
(41:45):
happened to my child? What happenedto my child? They didn't have the
decency to actually tell them their childdied in our care. That's the type
of disrespect and lack of humanity thatwas perpetrated against the people's So people go,
why is there so much violence,why is there so much drug abuse?
Well, because nobody knows the truthand they keep and most colonized colonizers
(42:10):
or people who settled in this landstill think that we'll just get over it.
Find you know, you've got todo something to fix your communities.
Well, you know what, whathelp our communities is people finding out what
really happened. That would and that'ssomething right, but a curious question.
And I truly believe that that itis the outcome that makes a difference in
(42:31):
not the intention, but what wasthe intention? I can't I cannot fathom
this in my head, Like whatdid they want to accomplish by taking these
young children, putting them in thisschool, okay, teaching them the English
(42:51):
ways and not the the culture thatthey came from. What what was there?
What was the thought process? Theywanted to civilize them? But how
do you civilize them when you're abusingthem and then you are throwing them out
into the world at a certain agewhere they have no no balance, no
(43:15):
no standing, They don't know wherethey belong. But isn't that isn't that?
The question is that where did thathorrific way of looking at the world
come from well, it came fromyour people's homelands. You did that to
yourselves, and you brought that overhere. You took put kids in your
boarding schools and you beat them,and they were to be seen and not
(43:37):
heard, and they were treated asslaves and they were you know, you
brought that to our lands. Right, your own lineages are rife with trauma,
major pain, and that way oflooking at the world, that there
is a hierarchy of importance. Iguess king being number one king, and
(44:00):
then queen royalty, and then whitemen and then you know, then other
men, and then maybe women andthen dark you know, dark skinned women,
and then and then and then indigenousI don't know, indigenous people,
animals. Maybe we're above women whoare above indigenous people. You know,
we were treated as flora and fauna. So with that belief that I am
(44:22):
superior to you, you can literallydehumanize anyone below you. And it's still
going on, like within people's training. That is what white supremacy is.
It is a way of looking atthe world that is so blinding to those
who see it. Who's who livetheir life that way? Anyone who's below
(44:43):
that definitely see through it because theydon't fit in. They are the they
are the brunt of that brutal wayof looking at the world. But those
who are stuck in that way ofthinking that that supremacy, you know,
shining through everything they touch is iswhat they brought to this land. So
(45:05):
of course they thought, well,we are doing them of those indigenous people
a favor, were we need tomake them more like us so that we
can help them. But that isthat that's a white supremacy. That is
I am superior to you. Youcan't possibly have anything I need to learn
from, so we need you tomake you like us with no self knowledge
(45:28):
that you are brutal, brutal,unaware folks that came and did a lot
of damage, you know, andthat's because you have been damaged. You
have been damaged, Your people havebeen brutal to you. Oh my god,
the middle Age is what you didto torture yourselves. Oh my god,
you guys got some healing to do. So, of course you and
(45:52):
the unfortunately with they're canceling a lotof that learning. Where I am a
true believer that unless you learn fromhistory, you can't know what to do
today, how to be different,how to change it, how to break
the cycle. We have to parallelthese things. And you know, they're
banning books, they're they're canceling.It's just it boggles my brain. Again.
(46:14):
I just I just don't understand itall. But and white supremacy absolutely
still exists. The Trump era hasproved that and so um yeah, So
my question is where does one start? And I know, getting in touch
with yourself healing, I mean,but where would you start if you had
(46:39):
to start from the beginning healing?Well, healing is number one. That's
that's the work I do because Idon't believe systems can change unless individuals change.
So that's my core belief about this. So you have to do your
own work. But your own workwith your with your lineages is that there's
(47:00):
something unhealthy that has been passed downwithin your lineages and that has gone un
processed, unlooked at, and ithas created a system of domination that seems
normal, that seems normal, andit is not normal. So yes,
(47:22):
working on your own healing, yourown lineage, but also educating yourself about
oh wow, you know we nevernoticed we considered these indigenous peoples of this
land uncivilized because they didn't have structures, they didn't have things, they didn't
have industry. But what they didn'tsee was these people have been living here
(47:47):
for time immemorial, over fifteen thousandyears, and nothing is wrecked. They
have not brutalized the land, theyhave not poisoned anything. And what they
do create, what structures they domake, is in harmony with the land
around them. There's been ceremony andprayer about how to create buildings or create
(48:12):
lodgings that are in alignment that don'tharm the land, or they move,
they go the water, and theland has been used up here, so
we need to give it a breakand leave so we can replenish it in
another four years when we come back. So they never saw the wisdom that
was present. Instead they saw throughtheir own damaged eyes, and that got
(48:37):
passed on. Now they're going,oh, fifteen thousand years and you didn't
kill anything, You didn't kill theland, like destroy it. Oh,
maybe there is something there, ormaybe they have a philosophy or religion if
you want to call it that thatis more in keeping with something healthy.
(49:00):
You know, nobody's dominating anybody elsethey raised their children is very different than
we do. You know, theydidn't, they didn't see that as value.
And so to me, to learnhow your ancestors viewed indigenous people or
to other cultures that they travel tosays a lot about what you learn and
(49:22):
see today and try to unravel that. So unraveling and decolonizing your own way
of thinking happens when you're curious,when you ask questions, and when you
actually face the lineage of trauma thatyou come from. There is a lot
of stuff that if humans dived intothat boy or boy, Wou'd be a
(49:44):
different We'd be a different planet.And I'm a big proponent of reading.
There's an amazing amount of things youcan learn from books and from people who
have had their own journeys. Itruly believe that I know it and to
end soon, but I need toget two more questions in there. One
is you are in the film andtelevision and music industry. Yeah, I'm
(50:09):
going to say this, and I'llprobably get a lot of flak for it,
but I don't care. I thinkit's a toxic industry and I'm not
just saying that I'm involved in it. How do you separate yourself from because
there's a lot of white supremacy,there's a lot of you know, still
(50:30):
we're not diversified enough. I meanwe're trying, but how do you separate
yourself from that? And I'll usethe word toxicity again, but that's any
word I could think of right now. Yeah, No, I would say
that's pretty fair. Is that theyare. They are an industry. Do
not doubt for a second. It'sa machine and it's self perpetuating, and
(50:52):
it's very sophisticated, and everybody getssucked into it, gets sucked into it.
That it's based on fame and fortuneand youth, and those are they.
That is a sickness that is permeatingeveryone because somehow we believe that that
(51:13):
is the ideal that we need tobecome young forever and rich and so much
wealth that you spil it around andbuy toys, right, consumerism. It
is absolutely toxic. And so howam I in it? How have I
survived in it? I have givenmy career away. If you really want
(51:34):
to know, this is the truthI gave. I came into this life
with gifts I came to share.I'm a singer, I'm an actor,
I'm a storyteller, right, so, or I'm a storyteller and I'm a
singer. I knew that these areand and I'm an expressor of emotions.
I'm a deep, deep feeler.So if those were my gifts, then
(51:58):
the arts industries do seem to bewhere I would go. But the arts
industries don't value creativity. They valueoutcome and money and product and how it
looks, you know. And sofor me, I said, if I'm
meant to be in these industries,and I'm talking to the grandmothers, you
(52:22):
know, my ancestors, I'm like, look, if this is my path
and I'm meant to be here,then you help me. Like I'm not
I'm not doing this unless I'm changingthe world somehow. Like I'm not going
to survive this, this way oflife. I'm not going to it's too
seductive for toxicity. It's very seductiveto want things that don't matter. And
(52:42):
I thought, I, if thisis where I'm meant to be, then
you have to help lead me topeople and projects and trusting in my own
creativity and you helping me with expressingmy own creativity in a way that changes
the world for the better. Iwant to be of service or I'm not
doing it. I think you've accomplishedthat and that's amazing, and I'm hoping
(53:04):
my involvement in the industry, Iam a partner in the studio, I
can do the same thing and bringgood quality, diversified, meaningful things to
the entertainment industry. Everyone. Andreahas seeds from the Sacred Feminine Wisdom Cards,
which will be out on May ninth. I suggest you go to her
(53:30):
website and join Andrea. I cannotthink thank you enough. You've been amazing
and thank you. Listeners to Becomingthe Journey. You can listen to us
on WR seven ten, iHeart Radio, or wherever you listen to your podcasts.
Thank you, Thank you, GraceMarcy. You have been listening to
(53:50):
Becoming the Journey hosted by Grace Labrey. Tune in weekly to hear more conversations
that will inspire listeners along their life'sjourney. The proceeding was a paid podcast.
iHeartRadio's hosting of this podcast constitutes neitheran endorsement of the products offered or
the ideas expressed.
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