On Saturday evening (11/21) I traveled to the Penobscot Reservation on Indian Island to watch the independent documentary "Trudell" and hear poet/AIM activist/actor... John Trudell speak after the film. I am still feeling the experience, absorbing his words...
I am very impressed by this man. He is eloquent. He is self aware. He is passionate but rational. For me he speaks truth, pure and simple. Much of what he said was not new to me, but I had not realized it's pervasiveness. Native people have dealt with the reality since 1492... but those of us who are of mixed or non-native descent, have not understood how destructive of the human experience our national legal/political/financial systems are. Trudell considers economic policy
John states it simply. These policies are insane. They are anti life. They are anti nature. They are founded on economic properties that ignore law and seek to dis-empower individual responsibility. His focus on personal responsibility is what I am working to absorb. Having been raised in a culture that celebrates property and privilege, it is sacrilege in our national conversation to suggest that life choices that are based on acquisition and "power" are not a true pathway to a good life as a human being. It is a truth that I have always intuitively felt but never had affirmed by the people around me. To hear him speak is to finally understand my own discomfort and alienation with/from my culture's morays. I have not lived with this awareness long enough yet to know how or what my future choices will look like... I am still ruminating... my body, spirit, heart and head are not in accord yet as I have no answers...
I am allowing my spirit to take the lead. I love how Trudell's spirit when faced with "reality" is based in awareness, recognition, and the power innate within individual consciousness rather than in fear or anger. I am determined that is the direction of the path of a true Human Being. John Trudell on the Identity of being a Human Being
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