Identity Library

Veronika Becher 0:14
Hey everyone, and welcome to another episode of identity library. My name is Veronika Becher, and today I'm joined by Gavin Bell, and thank you so much for being on podcast. First of all, thank you for

having me. Gavin Bell is, well, a friend of us, like, talked to us, and was like, hey, you need to talk to this guy. He's such an interesting fellow. And I was like, why not? We're gonna go with that right? He's right now an assistant right at the multi assistant director. Yes. And would you like to just introduce yourself a little bit more so we get to know you as a person, for sure. So I am Gavin Bell. I'm from North Carolina, specifically Durham, North Carolina. I currently work at NC State. I've been here professionally for about three years, and I work in an assistant director in the Multicultural Student Affairs Center, so a lot of different things with student programming, student support, empowerment, professional development, all that good stuff. So yeah, this is fantastic. We had a conversation just like a week ago, and I was like, this is going to be such an interesting podcast episode, and I'm so excited about it. And even though it's raining so much, yes, we're talking about definitely raining today. It's so bad. People are joking about it. They're like, Oh, Veronika, you're feeling, you know, like you're in Germany again. I'm like, No, this is not what I want here, because your weather cannot decide if I should keep my winter jacket or take it off

100% it'll be 70 degrees one day, and then 40 degrees, literally, the day after that, exactly. And also, I was so unsure if I'm gonna have a voice. I, like, lost my voice couple of days ago, and I was like, This is bad, like, I hope I can just record it somehow. It's definitely important for a job like this. For definite. No, this is when you call your friend, like, please, Abdullah, help me record this episode for me, because I need the person on my podcast. But yeah, we are actually here to discuss a topic that I've been willing to discuss for a while, but I just didn't know who to approach on campus. And it's just the whole topic of Native Americans, right? And I would like you to give you just a rundown of like, who are Native Americans? Like, just for people and listeners that are not from here, how does it look like? Just, where are the tribes? Yeah, for sure, yes, sir. And I can start. I'll start zoomed in, quote, unquote, and then I'll kind of zoom out. So I'm a member of the Lumbee Tribe of North Carolina. And so quick context there, the Lumbee Tribe is about 60,000 individuals. We are in the southern part of the North Carolina area. So present day Robeson County. So that's very much on the North Carolina South Carolina border. All right, North Carolina is home to eight state and federally recognized tribes. So you have Lumbee, but you also have Eastern Band of Cherokee. You have saponi, occaneechi band of the saponi nation, Waccamaw, siouan, meharon Halawa, saponi, okonichi. I'm

trying to think, if

Gavin Bell 3:10
I'm the person Terry, I think that might have been everybody,

yes, yes, yes, yes. And so you have eight tribes in North Carolina specifically, but then you also have a lot of different communities, especially across the country. So North Carolina, eight tribes historically. But then also zoomed out, we have over 500 nations across the country. So and those are pretty much across, you know, East Coast to West Coast, obviously in the Midwest, down in the southwest, lot of different areas. South Dakota, yeah,

exactly.

Yeah, for sure, yeah. And a lot of the different tribes, I mean, we, I mean, every tribe is very unique in its own way, like all different tribes, like they're not a monolith at all. So there might be certain cultural practices and customs that are similar across the, you know, different groups, but each tribe has its own entity and has its own relationships and own belief systems and own dialects, sometimes languages. And so it's a group that is especially in America, and I think even beyond America as well, not a lot is known about them, especially in the present tense. A lot of times when you think about Native Americans and indigenous people, it's solely focused in the past, right? The whole quote, unquote, stereotype of cowboys and Indians and everybody wearing headdresses, stereotypically horses, teepees. And you know, there are different aspects of certain tribes histories that do reflect aspects of that, but it is not the broad stroke stereotypes and assumptions that a lot of people assume that it is and so it's very interesting, especially on the east coast, where Native community isn't as populated as it might be. In the Midwest, Oklahoma area, for example, it is very interesting, because a lot of us feel like we are walking into worlds where, yes, we have our native identity, but it's.

Especially if we don't grow up in our tribal community. Specifically, you know, you are navigating with a lot of different cultures, different communities, belief systems that may or may not be familiar with your community or your culture at all. So I, for example, to give context about me, I grew up in Durham, North Carolina. So that's near Duke University. For those that might be familiar with Duke University Chapel Hill, NC State. That's where I grew up at. But all my family on my mom and my dad's side are from Robeson County, so that's where the present day Lumbee people are. And so a lot of my life was living, especially during the week in Durham, and engaging with a lot of different cultures, different belief systems, especially with Research Triangle Park and Duke University being right up the street. You know, Durham was an area where so many different people were coming in for education and knowledge, and so just a melting pot of people. And I was usually in Durham the only native in my neighborhood, native in my schools, native on my sports teams. And so I felt like a lot of times like I was put in a position where I had to be a spokesperson for all native people. And that can be tricky, you know, difficult, right? You're talking about how many different tribes out there, and if they are like, I would see them like nations. If you can see it definitely like you have your own culture, right? That means you can be your own almost countries, like if you see it this way. And how can you I had literally conversation about that, how people see Europeans, for instance, and how like they think that, oh, everyone in Europe is the same. And I'm like, that's not the case. Like our values are so different. Like in France, you have completely different culture than in Germany, but we are, like neighboring countries, right? But we are completely different. Also, even in Germany itself, we have different parts of Germany that differs greatly from what we expect Germans to be. So when we think of, oh yeah, Oktoberfest, like the typical thing that people like, drink beer and so on. Like, I didn't grow up actually, in the region where we had Oktoberfest at all. Like, it's not a thing at all in my like, in the western part of Germany. And I think there's the same right? So having all the pressure that you have to be the ideal picture of how a Native American should look like, should act, what cultures like, representation of everything like, Oh, what do you think like as a Native American? And then you're like, how should I even do that if I don't even know all the customs that everyone has Right? Right? Because there's a lot of different aspects to it. Because, especially a lot of native people that don't live within their tribal community, they might not even be exposed to certain aspects of their own tribal culture, so they may or may not even know anything about their culture at all. Number one, number two, even for me, like I said, the Lumbee Tribe, even if we're just going to make it tribal, I mean, I can't speak for 60,000 people. Lumbee Tribe, like everybody in the tribe, is not a monolith. There's different political opinions, there's different religious beliefs, there's different approaches to nature, community, and so I couldn't even speak for all of them if I wanted to. And then you also add on to the fact that there are so many tribes like me. As a Lumbee person, I can't speak for somebody that's Navajo, the name, I can't speak for somebody that's Lakota, like, I can't do that. That wouldn't be appropriate for me to do. And so I think that's a reality of it as well. And that's also paired, kind of like you were saying, I know we were having our conversation last week. We were talking about how, even beyond, you know, Europe as a whole area, there's so many different cultures, countries, communities, belief systems, and not everybody looks the same. It's the same. It's the same thing with Native people, but I think especially because of how we've been stereotyped in the media, specifically, there's a very strict phenotype that is associated with Native people, whereas the long black hair, you know, feathers in your hair, and that whole physique, and that's not necessarily discrediting native people that do look that way, but not all native people look that way, the same way we were talking about in Russia, for example, how there's different phenotypes, there's different ways that people look, there's different ways that people speak, show up, and it's the same way with Native community. I mean, you think about, even if we're going to bring math into what the odds of 500 different tribes all across the nation looking and acting and speaking the exact same way, that's not likely, and especially when you combine the reality of America right where America is a place where so many people have come, whether it be for opportunity, immigration, some communities by force over different centuries as well. There's so much mixture culturally, racially, communally in a lot of our communities, especially on the East Coast, and so it's not even appropriate to assume that everybody would look the same anyway, the same way we don't do that for Latin America, for example, the same way we don't do that for other areas, we recognize the diversity. But I think because the Native community is statistically a lot smaller than a lot of those other communities, it's easier for those stereotypes to stick, because you might be coming from New York, you might be coming from LA, you might have never in your life met a native person to even counter those stereotypes. And then I even told you, before we started, we never learn about it like, I think there's a small percentage of like.

Veronika Becher 10:00
Cool content in our history classes in Germany, where they mentioned, oh, they're Native Americans, but I never knew about the tribes. I had to live in South Dakota to realize, oh, there are so many different tribes, and it's much more diverse than that, and people act differently in these tribes. And it's just like the realization, oh, there's much more than just the like picture you have, oh, just Native Americans that live there, and they kind of like, don't interact with the other people. That's the picture that we get when we live in a different country. And I think that was also, like I said, the reason why I wanted to bring you on here, because it was like, We need a person that would not speak for all tribes and would not speak for the full tribe. But I love to have the story of just one person and just see how it is. How does it feel like to be at state in this like in getting out of your community? And maybe, do you have something like a certain tradition that stick to you, that you feel like you still incorporate into your daily life? Yeah, for sure. I think one of the cool things with my tribe, because it's so big, we have this thing in this usually the week of July 4 every year. It's an annual thing, but it's called Lumbee homecoming. And that's a time. So in Robeson County, you have one town in particular called Pembroke. Pembroke is where the tribal headquarters is located. So whenever you drive into Pembroke, I'm pretty sure on the sign, it says, Welcome to Pembroke home in a Lumbee. So that's like, basically, like the quote, unquote motherland. And so, you know, Lumbees, at this point, especially in history, are all over the country. A lot of people are in North Carolina. But there's also Lumbees that live in California, Portland, New York, for example, and so on that week of Lumbee homecoming, which, like I said, is around July 4, all the people come back for the most part. And so everybody's in specifically that small town. So it's parades, there's a car show, there's a pow wow. We even have a pageant, like as a miss Lundy pageant. We have a million different things going on, and it's almost like a if I had to compare it to another American thing, but it's almost like a Mardi Gras for Lumbee people. And it's, it's really, really cool, especially over the last couple of years because so many other tribes have started coming. So when you have Lumbee homecoming, you have a lot of people that do bead work and different things with crafts and different aspects of their culture pottery, that will sell their items and display their items. And it used to be just the primarily Lumbee thing, but now you have all the other tribes in North Carolina that attend. You have tribes even from outside of North Carolina that it's in, that's really cool as well. Would you say you have a good relationship with other tribes, or is it more your tribe keeps to themselves? If that makes sense. No, that's a good question. I think it's tricky, because part of the dynamic that you engage with across different tribal communities is that there's federal recognition or state recognition. So I'll give like a overview of that. So federal recognition is when you have a relationship your tribe has a relationship directly with the federal government. Now usually that came around the time of Indian removal. So what some people know as like the Trail of Tears for some tribes, things like that.

Gavin Bell 12:58
During that time when Indian tribes were getting put on reservations that was also an agreement, basically, between them and the federal government. They had a relationship with the federal government, and so federally recognized tribes that are usually on some type of reservation. They sometimes those tribes they have,

you were talking about federal recognition and tribes, and so tribes that have a direct relationship with the federal government, that's usually implying that they live on a reservation, right? And that reservation is technically a whole other legal entity versus the US. So the law on a particular reservation, let's say the Dene reservation, the Navajo reservation, that might be completely different than sometimes the law right outside of there, in like actual us. And so that provides a different dynamic, even when it comes to benefits, when it comes to resources, when it comes to opportunities with education. And so a lot of our tribes on the East Coast, Lumbee, being included, are state recognized, and that means that you're recognized by the state government, but you don't have a relationship with the federal government and a lot of state tribes. The reason that is the case is because on the East Coast, in particular, removal was not as quote, unquote, clean cut as it was in certain areas of the country, and a lot of tribes were splitting off from one another. There are remnants of different tribes that were combining. So different groups that were in North Carolina at the time were combining together, creating new tribes, new communities, and so removal wasn't as clear cut. So the people that are now culminated to be the Lumbee people today. They know who they are. They know that they have the origin that they have native community, but it's not a the same relationship with the federal government, which is why Pembroke is just a town, but it's a town in North Carolina. It's not a town

within a reservation, if that makes sense. So it's something where all the community knows that Pembroke is the motherland, but it's not one of those things where it's a different.

Legal jurisdiction. And so what that creates is that when you are only state recognized, you don't have access to certain health benefits, certain opportunities for resources to come into the community in the same way federally recognized tribes might. So the Lumbee had been trying to get federal recognition for quite some time, and that can get sticky, because a lot of different tribes,

and I don't even want to name different tribes, because they don't want to get into all the politics of that. But a lot of different tribes might have different opinions. Whether they agree with it, don't agree with it, and that can create tensions across different communities. And some of that is tied to tribal identity, the origin of different tribes. Some of that is tied to the politics of it all. Some of that is tied to resources. And like I told you, the Lumbee are a very big tribe, and so,

well, we would, we would take all more resources if we ended up having a relationship with the federal government. That might be resources that, quote, unquote, get taken away from another tribe, for example. And so that can be a challenge, and it's very real. And I think obviously there's a lot of across Indian country in different ways. There's a lot of tribalism that occurs in different capacities. And I think there are a lot of things, especially when we're looking at it from policy, when we're looking at it from legislation, when we're looking at it from government relationship, there are a lot of things that can, quote, unquote, divide tribes and cause tribes to be pitted against each other, and at the end of the day, that's not going to be conducive to growth for any of us. And then one of the things that we've recognized, especially in North Carolina, across our tribes and our communities, is that there's more power and unity. A part of unity is also making sure that we are communicating with each other, making sure that we are equitably supporting one another as well. So for example, just because the Lumbee are bigger does not mean that any less support should also be given to our hallowa saponi Brothers and sisters. You see what I'm saying? Like, if they're going to support us in certain things, we got to make sure that we're supporting them with that same energy, that same spirit, that same compassion. And so I think a lot of the conversations around things like recognition, when it comes to things like blood quantum, when it comes to things like language, like I said, there's a lot of different things that are unique across different tribal communities, but it is important, even with all of those realities, to make sure that at the end of the day, there is still a baseline of communication, dialog and unity. Because in this day and age, especially with our population in the country being so small, we don't have the privilege to click up and to divide out. You know what I mean? We have to make sure that in certain regards, we are on one accord, supporting and advocating and protecting each other.

Veronika Becher 17:41
I like that. No, seriously. I think it just makes me like, feel good to hear these things. No, seriously.

Would you say like, if you describe your language, you were talking about how you have a different language in your specific tribe? How does it affair like? How does it like? How should I imagine? Is it a dialect from English? Is it a different complete language? Does that make sense? Yeah, that's a good question.

I would say.

Gavin Bell 18:10
All right, so I think it's very the language conversation, especially on the East Coast, is very unique, because a lot of our tribal communities, like I said, when you're talking about I'll contextualize it this way. When you're talking about in 1492 Christopher Columbus sailed the ocean blue, that whole thing, a lot of our tribal communities have been engaging with Europeans, different part of the black diaspora since the 1500s right? A lot of other communities, especially when you're talking about the West Coast, when you're talking about the Midwest, a lot of that deep engagement, and not coming till a couple centuries later. And so that matters, because when you're talking about all the different communities, especially in the south, that were coming together, and that were, you know, especially in North Carolina, South Carolina, that whole area that were coming together and exchanging cultures, exchanging language, exchanging values that's going to play into the native experience in those areas. And so the Lumbee people were also an amalgamation of a lot of different groups that were coming together, both tribal and from the local area, that were coming together and uniting. We're the mixture of all of that. And so part of that reality is that different languages had to be combined. And so a lot of times the trading language, especially in those regions, was English. And so Lumbee speak English, is what I'm saying. And so I'm sure that there's like different origins. If we were to go far back into some of like, the origins of like the Lumbee people and different tribes that came together, I'm sure that there's different languages and different dialects in that regard that could be identified. But it's cool, because the Lumbee people as a whole, we speak English, but our dialect of English is very unique, and so the same way, for example, if you're in New Orleans, the way they speak English, it's English, but it's a very different dialect, very different cadence, with Lumbee people, the way that we speak. English. It's a combination of that old English from back in the day, and it's a combination of even, I would say, AA V East African American Vernacular English, and also, like, there's native aspects in the communication as well. And so all of that combines to be a very unique southern dialect, and especially when we're together. I could be in California, for example, and if somebody speaks, I don't know if they're lumpy, just off of how they're speaking, not even off of how they look, but off the how they're speaking. And so that's a cool dynamic, and I think it's something that when you're trying to find unity, and sometimes it can be challenging to find unity if you don't have language, quote, unquote, or like, a unique language for a particular group of people, but because our English is so uniquely ours, like Lumbee English, and you know how we communicate with each other, and even our cadence and how we speak, it's a really beautiful thing, especially whenever you have been away from your tribal community for some time. So even whenever I've been in Durham or even here at NC State working, it's always nice when some of the Lumbee kids that attend NC State come by my office, because that dialect is familiar, and for me, that represents a level of home, a level of family. That's what I associate that with, because that's a lot of how my family speaks. And so it's a nice reminder of where we come from and who we are, even with all the different growth of being here at NC State and traveling and going places, because those are all beautiful things too. But it's nice to have a familiar reminder of your origin and where you come

Veronika Becher 21:29
from. Do you have certain words that you use that we don't use in our daily like just people that are not from your tribe? Let's say this way daily life, something that you feel like is super specific and has a certain meaning. Maybe,

Gavin Bell 21:43
I think sometimes, like, the way I'll put it, it's not necessarily like new words, but it's the way your words are used. So like, for us, for example, like, the same way somebody might be like, What's up, bro, what's up, dude. Like, we say, what's up, pie, like, PA, like, except for some people, like, what? And what I mean is, like, for pie, some people mean that means Dad, right? But for us, that means bro, what's up pie, you know what I mean? And then, like, even when we're talking about, even sometimes, like, depending on, you know, somebody that's FEM, identifying a woman, like, what's that? What's up gal? What I mean, like, real quick, like that. And for some cultures, like, even, like, when I was talking to one of my friends who's from the Bahamas, like that same word, in that cultural context, can be a very derogatory term to use towards a woman, but for us, that's more of a endearing term, like Sister, you know what I mean? So sometimes the way that we use words, and even how we put sentences together, how we kind of combine certain words and things like that. That's what makes it unique. So like, somebody's saying, I'm trying to think about a general example, but somebody might say, oh my gosh, I almost died today. For us, we'd be like, I've heard people back home say, Oh, I'm like Toy died today. I'm like Toy died the way that they combine certain things. And you know, there's always that conversation, especially in the American South, where there's so many different slings, right? La Crosse, even just the South, like there's not even just one, quote, unquote, Southern accent, like, Louisiana has its own thing going on. South Carolina has its own thing going on. And so there's so many different dialects coming out of the south where it's assumed to be ignorant, quote, unquote, not proper. We see that same conversation with African American Vernacular English as well. And so it's a challenge, I think, especially whenever a lot of my students come up here to school, right? If they leave the tribal community in particular, and they come up here, a lot of how we speak is seen as, Oh, you must be less intelligent. You must not be, you know, on that same level of academic, you know, standing as somebody else. Why are you here? And then that idea of imposter syndrome comes in. And I think that's also just a stereotype, probably even beyond America, about like how American southerners are. And there's a lot of reasons that stereotype exists like Americans. American southerners must all be white. They must all be racist. They all speak like they are ignorant. You know, all of them live on a farm. I mean, I think there's a lot of broad stereotypes, and it's so interesting to go into all the nuances, not even just racially, but also like, what do these different dialects represent? What do they mean? How did they originate? How does that then play into the story of who people are and how they show up in space, right? But the one of the things I do tell my students, especially that come up here, because, I mean, I think, like for anybody, and I know there's probably different ways, especially when you're coming from abroad, that you could probably relate to this, how somebody might assume a million things based off of your accent and how you speak, and a lot of those things might not be fair. Oh, you must not know English, or you must not be able to do this, or they'll, you know, there's a lot of different assumptions. And one of the things whenever my Lumbee students in particular, come here their first year, a lot of times, there's always that moment in the first couple of weeks where they come in my office and they're like, Gavin, I'm about, I'm pissed. Like, there these people are getting on my nerves the way they're talking about me, the way they're looking at me. They think I'm ignorant. And some of these kids had a 4.0 in high school. They were top of their class, like they're not ignorant. And it feels like, for them, they're getting assumed

Veronika Becher 25:13
to be certain way, that they are not based on just their origin. And even then, people don't even know fully their origin, right? If you're not even familiar with your tribe, then how can you even it's just like they put you in the box. Oh, you're Native American. This is how Native Americans are. It's the same thing that happens to me, though, like you said, with like, being from Germany, and then people being like, Oh, this is how you should be, and this is how you should behave. So all Germans are this way, like, there's just a stereotype of our language, the way our language sounds like I was talking about that, and how people always like, they think of world war two movies, and they like, always such a harsh language. I'm like, No, it's not. We are actually having a much softer language than you would anticipate. And it's the same thing. We have different dialects in Germany. So when I moved to the south, we had sweeping as, like, a dialect. And I'm like, I don't understand them at all. I'm sitting in the Chi hospital trying to, like, get to my doctor's appointment. I'm like, I don't instead, anyone who's talking next to me, because it seriously sounds like just a solvent accent that you can't pick up at all, right, right? We'll just talk like that. But then I grew up in a region where we have, like, the, I would say, the cleanest accent, or, like, we don't really have a dialect that is, like, so prominent. Most people don't even use it anymore, if that makes sense. And so it's so odd, I'm curious, like, how do you preserve the history, like, of your tribe that people actually like, remember it, if that makes sense, inside your tribe, but also outside of your tribe, I

Gavin Bell 26:46
think Lumbee homecoming is a big thing. And then within the tribe, I mean, you have different levels of people's awareness. So like I said, like, just because somebody is native, even if they're living in their tribal community, their traditional tribal community, that does not mean that they're gonna know all the ins and outs of the culture. And if anything, it's a challenge in Indian country right now, because a lot of our young people are, you know, stepping away from a lot of that, because to be American means to put all of that aside. And I think it's the same thing on a on a micro level of what most American teens, they want to be accepted. They don't want to feel different. They don't want to be ostracized or feel like all the eyes are on them, or all the questions are coming their way. And so that's something that the Lumbee people have navigated. And especially a lot of our communities in the south, there's a lot of having to bring some of that culture back that's been lost over the years too, because there's so much assimilation. There's so much adaptation to European standards that's happened in all of our communities. And not all of that is bad. Let me be clear. Like some of that, it's not a matter of it being good or bad. It just is. And so when you're talking about certain dances, and you're talking about pow wow culture, when you're talking about certain ceremonies, even like certain herbal remedies and people passing that down. A lot of it, for most of the community, is very oral, and that's for most native people as well. You get it from the stories from your grandparents. You get it at even like something like Lumbee homecoming, the stories that are told, right? And I mean, you have homecoming where that's something where the history is obviously represented annually. But I mean, even beyond that, you have to have different opportunities for people to come together. And so beyond some of the oral tradition and people telling stories and passing that down, we also have pow wows. And so there's a lot of pow wows nationwide, and a pow wow basically just to give I know people might be familiar or not familiar, but it's basically a gathering of Native people. And it doesn't have to be just solely native people. Solely Native people, but there's a mixture of some of our traditional dance styles. There's a lot of drumming. Same thing as long be Homecoming, how I was speaking about earlier, vendors will come out and sell their items, especially if they do things like bead work, pottery. It's an opportunity for people to come together. It's very familial for Native people. And you have different types of pow wows. You have collegiate pow wows. So for example, NC State has a pow wow every year, and that's a huge opportunity where we want non native people to come to that. We want people to learn about our culture and about our community, right? But then you also have different tribal pow wows that happen back in our tribal community. So the Lumbees have a pow wow. The Holly was a pony. Have a pow wow. Basically, every tribe in North Carolina has a pow wow at some point throughout the year. And those are opportunities for non native and some native people to come and learn about who they are, like what are some of the traditions that are part of this life, right? And that's a way for, I think young people in particular, to have a tangible way to connect. Because, yeah, pow wow is like, you could learn this particular dance style and be involved that way. You might be a part of a drum group. There's a drum group on NC State's campus, for example, called mesquiway. And that means red wolf and Algonquin, I believe. But that's a lot of our young bull. Ways, both Lumbee and non Lumbee, a lot of other tribes that are on this campus that they come together and they drum, and there's certain songs that they learn that have been passed down from generation to generation, right? And that's a way for them to not only learn more about their culture and who they are, because sometimes this is the first drum group that they've ever been a part of, but it's an opportunity for them to learn about who they are, while also having fellowship, because that's a big thing. I think, with a lot of the learning that native people engage with, a lot of the passing down and keeping the culture alive, most of that, in some capacity or another, is revolving around community and family and bringing people together. And like I said, we're very big on that community. Obviously, we have Lumbee community, for example, where our tribe comes together, but it's also one of those where it's not exclusive either. Like we want it to be something where people are able to learn and connect, because we don't want it to be something where we're left in the past, and part of that is also making people aware of what is our present like, even going back to like, when my students are frustrated, I'm like, Okay, that's fair, but you also have to reflect on what are the different realities about where we come from and how we perceive other people. So even going to what you were talking about, and I've actually used that, I'm like, yes, you're mad, and they assume all these things about you based off of how you speak, but also you thought Europe was a country, you know? And I'm sure that they probably, in their first couple of weeks at NC State, probably saw somebody that was from Europe or somewhere, and they assumed a million things. And probably thought, oh, Germany is the exact same as the UK, which is the exact same as Spain, because that's a knowledge base that we're coming from in our community, right? And so a lot of it is, it's not excusing some of those assumptions, especially when those assumptions can cause harm, but it is important to reflect on what am I also needing to learn? And that's one of the things that's really big with Native community, is this idea of, I want you to hear my story, but I also need to hear your story, and I need to hear it fully, meaning that even if you're telling your story, and there's certain parts I don't understand or I don't agree with, doesn't matter, I need to listen to the full thing before I start speaking,

Veronika Becher 32:15
before I start judging. Something we learn is this active listening thing, where a lot of times, when we talk to people in like, we already assume or like, we listen to someone rather than talking, and we really assume the answer. We don't really even listen to what the other person is saying to us, right? It's like, we really have a filter on it and like, Oh, this is how it should work. This is how I see these words. This is my interpretation. But actually hearing the person. And I think that's the challenge to actually not judge the person, be like, especially when we we're not gonna get into these topics. But I think like, political views here in the United States, like people are so driven off as black and white. There's no gray zone in between that they never listen. But people don't think about that. Their values that might be the same in both like categories, right? It's the same, like with if you have a picture of how Europe should look like and how Germans should act, it's not always the case, right? There's so much more diversity. We also have so many subgroups, like in Germany right now, I think the biggest populations are people from Turkey, but it's like so odd, right? You don't have the picture of like, Germans and to Turkish people being in the same like space, right? But that happens all the time. And the second one is Russian and Ukrainian people. So you have completely different like cultures just merging into one space and trying to, like, sit together. And another thing that I was thinking of is you were talking about spirit back when we were talking, just like getting to know each other. And it just sticked to me, like, literally, till today, how you said when you enter a space, right? It's like, what type of Spirit does the other person have? Right,

Gavin Bell 33:52
right, right? Because, and that's the thing with a lot of my students, because part of the reality, even beyond the dialect, for example, when you tell somebody here on this campus that you're Native American, there might be a lot of questions that they ask because, like I said, especially in this area, you might be the first one that they've met in person, right? And a lot of those questions, especially if you're coming from a tribal community and you're familiar with your culture, some of those questions to you might be, quote, unquote dumb or, like, silly to us. You know what I mean. But one of the things that I tell my students is that okay, when people are asking you questions, pay attention to their spirit, because once again, you might be the first person that they've met, and there's a difference in spirit. When somebody is asking something to get a rise out of you, or asking something to be funny, like, do you have an Indian name or something, or do you live in a teepee or something? Versus, like, if somebody's saying, hey, like, genuinely, do you have an Indian name? Like, I'm curious. That's a different spirit versus somebody that's being antagonizing. And I encourage our students, especially our Native students on campus, to pay attention to spirit, because it's not a matter especially a native community where. We're not looking for you to say the wrong thing so we can cancel you off the face of the earth. That's not how we move. We want to be able to tell our story, but only if it's going to be heard and received. And so if somebody has a spirit of warmth curiosity, they've earned the right to be heard by you, and they want to know your story, even if it's a silly question answer the question.

Veronika Becher 35:20
But it's also, I think, important to convey, especially this message, because a lot of times we are scared to ask even questions, because we think we're gonna be, like, feeling dumb about it, right? And nobody

Gavin Bell 35:32
wants to feel like they're causing somebody else harm. And yes, or like,

Veronika Becher 35:36
oh, I actually don't know how it is in Germany, like, I I've had a student, um, volunteering at organization called neighbor to neighbor. And it's mostly like, it is like people with Native American background, also, we have a lot of people that are just African American students coming into the space, and then I'm just the German student, right? So it's like, such an odd situation. So people like, Oh, I've never met a German student before. They don't even sometimes know what Germany is. And that sounds crazy first, right? We judge people so often, like, Oh, why wouldn't you know what like Germany is a country, right? But then I realized, if you live your whole life in these communities, you never, ever engage with people from other cultures, other countries. How should you know? And Germany is also not the closest country to begin with that. I was like, It's okay. You can ask me questions and I will answer, even if it's like, really funny, like, questions that you think about and then, like, that's like, something odd to ask someone, but it's okay, I will answer. I think the worst that I've experienced personally is when people don't believe me, when I tell them a story, oh, this is how Germany is. And they like, I don't believe you. I don't think that's the case. You don't know what you're talking about. It's

like it wasn't up for debate.

Why are you not believing or trusting me that my values are different than they are with like, for French people, for instance, even then, you can't even generalize it just by countries, because, like, even the country is so diverse, and, yeah, that's just something that always crossed my mind. I'm like, Why did you ask if you're not believing me? And I'm like, the person that lived there, so I probably have more experience. So I think it's always interesting to see people go abroad and then come back and they talk to me again, like, Veronica, you're actually right. I didn't know that this is how it is. And I'm like, Yes, I think we need to see some things sometimes with our own eyes before we that's the

Gavin Bell 37:31
point of college, right? I mean, and that's what I tell a lot of them, is like, the same way a lot of people are going to be learning about you. I also encourage them learn about these other people too, learn about these other cultures, because especially at a school like NC State, this is going to be the only time that it is this type of diversity and opinions beliefs all in one space like this college is a very unique experience. And so yeah, there's going to be some challenges with that. Yeah, there's going to be people that antagonize but there's also going to be a lot of growth, and there's not and there's going to be a lot of opportunities, not only for you to give the knowledge of our people and to bring us into the present for some folks, but it's also going to be an opportunity for you to learn about all these different communities and also how, not only are they unique, but also how are they similar to ours. Because especially in a lot of native communities, especially like, I won't even just say Lumbees, but I think a lot of us, part of our survival throughout history, has been being closed off to people, all people, not just white folks, but everybody. And a lot of our elders, for the sake of survival, have passed down messaging, even if it wasn't explicitly that they've passed down messaging that kind of resembles an idea of stick with your own people, quote, unquote. And college is the opportunity to blow that out of the water, where you're on a campus now, where you're not going to have a choice but to engage with some new people. And that doesn't mean that you don't still have Lumbee family and community and friends here. I'm not saying that, but this is the one time that you have, especially if you might end up going back to the tribal community to work. This is the one time that you have to get out of your zone, get out of your comfort zone a little bit. And obviously, I don't want students to feel taxed as if they are the spokesperson for the tribe, and they shouldn't have to be, but I do want it to be something where they don't leave this place with regret, because they only stayed in their small bubble that they came in with. That's exactly

Veronika Becher 39:27
what happened so many times I feel like it's funny how I'm just drawing the like conclusions and everything from my German experience, even though it's very similar, I see so many times these huge groups of international students, always sticking together. We live in the same building. We sometimes in the same even apartments, and then we always stay on our small groups, because we feel like no one else will understand us. This is how it feels like, I think, and it's just your comfort zone. People speak the same language, they have the same like Slang Meaning. Know exactly what you like to eat, etc, etc. And and then you like, I don't know, I feel like I wanted to get out of this bubble, and it was so difficult, because it's like, it's challenging, I totally agree, like, I think it's difficult and it's scary sometimes to be like, in a space where no one understands you at all, where you're the only one who's like an international student standing in the row of only Americans. I think I remember we had this exercise once, and it's this professor, I feel like he did it in a really, I didn't like the way he like constructed the course material, because he asked us to line up accordingly where we are from, like in North Carolina, specifically assuming that, first of all, everyone is from North Carolina in the classroom. Second of all, you can't be from anywhere else, and then his class content would be tailored only to people that are from this region. So if you were living, like even in Charlotte, or like somewhere else, like in a different city, just in North Carolina, you would be not fully understanding the class content because it was completely tailored only to this like specific region, even though the class content had nothing to do with that. It was just his examples were like, oh, but you know what I'm talking about, right? So I don't mind anymore being like an outsider in this scenario, but it feels like it creates this like thing of in group and out group. I don't know if you know like this term, and it's just like, I think that's something that, even in class content you can facilitate and actually work on to have a community where people don't are not scared to ask questions, but you also feel included. And like, people ask you, oh, what do you think of it? What is your experience like in those discussions? Yeah,

Gavin Bell 41:36
I think that that opens up the door for like, how we were saying like, for there to be commonality, and commonality and commonality doesn't mean that you're not also recognizing the differences, because all of our different cultures and identities have beautiful, unique aspects to it, and those should be celebrated. But it's also important to recognize some of those commonalities as a way of bridging understanding, and that's part of the reason I love among other things, like working in multicultural student affairs or Student Center, because there's so many different backgrounds, both native some of the students in there my native kids from my tribe, my area, but there's also so many other people, whether it be grad students, undergrads, different races, different religious beliefs, different cultures, different identities. And it's cool to be able to see folks come together that on paper they would never be friends. And all of a sudden they start talking week after week, and they start realizing, Oh, we actually have a lot in common, and that is not negating their unique differences. And by understanding the commonalities first, though, what that then opens the door to is them being able to actually discuss openly their unique cultural experiences, their differences, their identities, in a place that they feel safe. Now, because a lot of times like, things are done out of order, we expect a lot of these students to come to a college campus and talk about these different aspects of who they are, intimate aspects of who they are, without earning the right to be heard, right? You have to encourage going back to the idea of spirit. You have to have a spirit of warmth and care and compassion that's genuine in students and students, even in everybody else, can feel when something's genuine or not genuine, right? We can all feel that vibe when somebody's saying all the right things, but their spirit isn't isn't good. And so I think it's important to set those baselines, and by finding commonalities, a lot of those baselines are a are able to, I think, a little bit, be easier identified, and by starting there now, we're opening a door for these other unique differences to now be discussed and dialogued about, versus being debated about, because that's different dialog. It means that I'm listening to fully what you're saying. You're listening to fully what I'm saying, versus me just listening to you for the sake of a rebuttal, prove

Veronika Becher 43:44
a point that you're wrong, that the way you see the world is not the way it should be. And I think like, that's not the way it should be at all. I think especially like, when it comes to like, we also talk about that, I think it fits really well mental health. People struggle like I was looking into some statistics the other day, we have around 70 to 80% of people that feel lonely. And that's not even look in the United States like loneliness being a huge issue in our current like culture and especially students, feeling lonely all the time. But one of the main thoughts that people apparently like figured out through studies, is that they think that no one else feels lonely around them, because no one else could comprehend how they feel like because, because

Gavin Bell 44:30
that's how social media will perceive it. You think everybody's out here having fun, but you know,

Veronika Becher 44:34
and that's not the case, right? And I think this is how it works. I think emotions go beyond just the culture and the background and where you're from, and like the family you grew up in, we feel similar things, right? That's something that can be in overlap in any culture. It doesn't matter if you're in a tribe, what type of tribe you're in, or if you're just like, I don't know a southern guy that everyone thinks like. Be certain way, right? So I think like, that's exactly the thing. And when we don't speak up, we don't talk, we don't trust other people because they're different, we will never actually uncover how we feel like deep inside, or how we like, we cannot express it, right? And I think working on that and being like, able to open up to people with other backgrounds is also important. 100%

Gavin Bell 45:22
100% I think the really cool thing about, I think the blessing and the curse is that how you were saying, a lot of people are dealing with this thing, this challenge, this heaviness, but it's also a benefit in recognizing that, at the end of the day, cultural differences, aside, identity aside, a lot of us need the same baseline, right? A lot of us want to feel connected. A lot of us need to refocus a center on our well being, and we make that such a unique thing for different groups and different people. And it doesn't always have to be. And I know we were talking about this last week, but one of the cool things that I was able to do within the past couple of years, especially working in higher ed, post pandemic, we were seeing a lot of that same stuff in our reports, where students were just feeling isolation, they were feeling depression, loneliness, no sense of belonging, no reason to stay on campus, things like that. And I knew that from the just looking at the reports, these were coming from different demographics, different identities. It wasn't just one specific type of student that was feeling this way. It was the students across the board. And so I was like, Okay, I want to be able to bring in a framework that is visual, that's very practical, but that also can be something that affirms my native identity and representing my native community, because a lot of our frameworks that we utilize in Native community across different tribes are very visual, they're very practical, they're very holistic in nature, and they emphasize this idea of balance within oneself versus just quote, unquote, doing a bunch of good things. And so one of our frameworks, specifically is the medicine wheel. And the medicine wheel. The best way I can put it is four quadrants within a circle, and all those quadrants are interconnected in some type of way. And those quadrants are not separate entities from each other. They're all once again interconnected, interrelated. And depending on the tribe that you're talking to, they might have a slightly different interpretation. For some people, they view the different quadrants as part of, like the circle of life, almost, for example. So like your birth to your adolescence to your adulthood, to eldership, transitioning into the next world. So quite literally, the

Veronika Becher 47:31
circle. It's a circle, right? That means there isn't like a beginning and an end and then you're done with it, right? It's a continuous cycle of working on yourself, working and improving 100% and

Gavin Bell 47:43
a lot of how we associate specifically healing to go to your point is healing is circular in nature, meaning that there's no beginning and no end. It's a journey. Healing and well being is a journey. And so when you're thinking about that medicine wheel, some tribes, they also view it more on the internal piece. So you have one quadrant that represents your personal, one quadrant that represents your mental, one quadrant represents your spiritual, one that maybe represents your emotional, for example. And one of the things I started looking at, I was like, Okay, this is actually kind of applicable for what our students are going through, like, how are you balancing these different areas of your well being? Because a lot of times the way I like to think about it is that if you I'll paint a picture for you. I'll paint a picture and do it this way. So imagine a scene where there's a man in a boat. He's out on the lake and he's fishing. It's a nice day. He's relaxing, all of that. And let's say you're just a silent observer to the scene. You're a fly on the wall. All of a sudden you start noticing that in the bottom of that bow, four holes are starting to form, four leaks, and they're all starting to take up water pretty quickly, right? And it probably is not going to take long for the man to realize this as well. So he starts seeing it. He's like, Oh my gosh, I'm about to sink. And he starts working meticulously to get the holes patched up. And he gets three of the holes perfectly patched up in the boat, but then he gets to that last hole, the fourth hole, he looks at it, He shrugs, and he keeps on fishing. Now you as the observer, you're going to be like bro, like you need to, you need to get that fourth hole like you might not be sinking as fast, but you're still going to sink. And that seems like a very common sense thing to say, right? But a lot of times, as humans, that's exactly how we navigate the infrastructure of our own well being. We'll focus on one to two areas that maybe are more familiar, whether it be our physical or our emotional, but then other areas that are maybe not as familiar. We'll avoid those areas. And even though we know we're quote unquote sinking, we think that just pouring in a bunch of quote, unquote good things to our physical well being is going to save us. And I know for me, I'll even use myself as an example during the pandemic or right after the pandemic. I was, like I said, working with a lot of students, but I was also in a place where I thought, at that point, if I poured a lot into my physical well being, I. I did a whole bunch of stuff. I went on, worked out every day. I went on walks, did this, did that, then I would be okay and I wouldn't have to sit with the things that I emotionally needed to sit with. I didn't have to have community in my life the same way I didn't have to sit with anything in my spiritual I could just avoid those if I was doing a bunch of good things physically. And that's not how life works, because we are multi dimensional beings. And so it almost works like a scale, like you're pouring a whole lot into the physical, and you might not be doing anything, quote, unquote wrong, but there's still an imbalance that needs to be addressed. And so I started drawing out the medicine wheel in the coffee shop up the street on my own. And what I would do I made four areas physical, well being, spiritual, well being, emotional, well being, and then communal well being, and that one's a little bit unique, but I like using communal because when we look at a lot of the research going back to what you were talking about, especially in higher education, a lot of student retention to graduation revolves around having a sense of belonging, having a sense of community, mentorship and support on campus. And those are all very communal things. And so for myself, I would make bullet points. So on that sheet of paper, I would draw on my medicine wheel with those four areas, and I would just make simple bullet points, okay, this week. How did I pour into myself, physically? How did I pour into myself, spiritually, emotionally, communally, and that way I could see, like, Okay, I might have eight bullet points in my physical section of the wheel, but if I only have one bullet point or no bullet points in my emotional doesn't mean I'm doing anything wrong. But there's a little bit of an imbalance that I probably need to address for that following week. Could

Veronika Becher 51:36
you give examples? Because if I think of, like, spiritual I always think of, oh, that means you're going to church, type of thing. But I don't think that's yeah, and

Gavin Bell 51:42
that's a good that's a good thought. That's a good thought, because I think for a lot of different communities, spiritual means a lot of different things to different people. So I'll kind of, I'll hop through each one, because even physical, there's a stereotype there where physical well being must be, well, I'm going to the gym every day, or I'm going on a three mile run every day. I'm not even talking about that. I'm talking about baseline. Are you drinking water throughout the day? Something simple, because I like to be able to make it practical, especially for our students on this campus. You have certain weeks, especially in college, you might not be able to go to the gym for three hours every day, nor should you, but you can drink water every day. You have to think about, are you eating some type of colorful plate, as at least once in the day, aka, a little bit of fruit, little bit of vegetables, something. Are you engaging in deep breathing, especially in there's periods where you just feel a lot of anxiety. You can feel it well enough in your body, especially, you know, like in our chest, we start hunching, you know, our shoulders kind of come up a little bit. We start feeling like all that hurricane in our head, like, are you engaging in deep breathing throughout the day to help re regulate your system? Because the way I talk to our students about it is like you ever seen somebody have an anxiety attack? You know, something that's mental manifest physically in the same way, part of how you can slow yourself down mentally is by first slowing yourself down physically, right? Those things are interconnected. Meditating,

Veronika Becher 53:04
like yoga, works really well. I realized that for myself too, like deep breathing, like, if you don't like the way meditating works, it's just like breathing in four seconds, breathing out double the time, and just doing a couple of times, just having like, I don't for me, it's like in the morning drinking my cup of tea. And it's the five minutes I'm giving myself in the morning before I start everything. It's just having my alone time to just like, feel my body, feel my like myself present in the current, like moment. And the other thing is forced bathing, something that is actually derived from in Japan as a tradition that people go out into the forest and they just weep and they just walk there. And the similar thing that I've seen in Germany a lot of times. Sundays for us are family days. What we do? We get some breakfast so fresh buns baked in the bakery, we eat together with the whole family, and then go out in the woods and all we do is walk. Like we don't do anything else. And you would talk with our family, walking

Gavin Bell 54:04
is so important, though we don't even talk about that. Like walking is so helpful, especially like when you got a lot on your mind. Like walking, quite literally, opens up more areas of your brain. And so I tell folks a lot of times, if you have a whole lot of things swirling up in your mind, or even if you just need to take a minute to just re regulate. Walking is also a version of re regulation. Go out

Veronika Becher 54:23
and don't, especially when you're with family, don't sit inside the whole time. Of course it was raining and pouring like today, maybe that's not the right, right. Sometimes I would literally, I would be like, honestly, I can take my umbrella and I'll be fine, and I just need to walk a little bit. And especially in a country where people mostly drive it's so intuitive where I'm like, Okay, I know it's 50 minutes and it's a walk, and you maybe don't want to walk the 50 minutes, but they might be more productive for you and your well being than just, like, driving with the car. And I'm not even talking about the fact, like people talking about the environment and what is better to walk or, like, take the car. I'm talking about yourself. Right? You're talking about yourself seriously. Like, take yourself also, like, as an important factor in the to this whole thing, and just walk, yeah, go ahead. Sorry, no. Like, yeah,

Gavin Bell 55:10
no, that's perfect. That is fine. Um, I think part of like, the spiritual thing to go back to that, because that quadrant that's going to mean different things for different people. And I know a lot of our different communities, whenever I say spiritual, there's a lot of different connotations that come to mind. And that come to mind, and so spirit doesn't have to look one way. I think for some people, when they hear spiritual, especially spiritual well being, they're automatically going to orient to a higher power. So their communication with God, the Creator, the things seen, the things unseen. For some people, they're going to orient to their environment. And that can mean two different things. For some people, when they think about spiritual well being, they think about, what are areas where I feel spiritually, warm, safe, cared for. So for example, even the center that I work in, I've had a lot of students that say, Okay, I come here because this is where my spirit, I feel warm, I feel safe. So it could be an actual environment that way, and it could also be what we were talking about, even with physical getting out in nature, some people orient to their natural environment. So recognizing that you're just one living entity amongst millions of other living entities, sometimes that helps to take the pressure off your shoulders. For some people, spiritual is going to be more of an internal endeavor. So what are the things, the hobbies that you engage in that just ignite your spirit, aka those things that don't feel like work, those things that you can just do when all of a sudden you blink and three hours have gone by. Some people engage in all three of those. And that's totally fine, too. I kind of engage in all three, you know what I mean. And so however, in manifest for you, the one thing that has to be understood is that you have to orient to the present moment in order to gage any of those three. So what I mean is that a lot of times we as human beings, we kind of swing on a pendulum, and on one end you have anxiety and apprehension, aka the future. On the other end, you have the past, aka guilt, where you're sitting in the past on something that you messed up or did wrong, a relationship that maybe you tarnished. Very rarely do we as humans orient to the present, though, and the present is where grace is grace for yourself, compassion for yourself, and then in that grace that we develop in the present that ultimately leads to growth, but you can't have growth without first extending your self compassion. And I think a lot of our students, especially in undergrad, they beat themselves over the head, 24/7, and they don't orient to the present moment. And even if they do, they definitely don't extend themselves grace. They usually sit in that other G. They usually sit in guilt versus sitting in grace and growth, especially genuine growth, not just accolades, not just, quote, unquote, doing a bunch of good things that has to come from a genuine, authentic peace that you have with yourself first and foremost. And that's a lot of times how I contextualize the spiritual quadrant. And that's very similar, even when we think about emotional like that whole quadrant. Because part of the emotional quadrant is that I think as human beings. This is my opinion, but I think it's human beings like we are designed to fill the full spectrum of emotions, regardless of your identities, positionalities. We are designed to fill the full spectrum from joy to sadness to anxiety to even anger. We're designed to fill all those things. And I think the problem often comes up when we suppress different emotions that we need to feel or avoid different emotions that we need to feel. And I mean, I'm a young man, and we talk about this a lot in my community, is that a lot of our young men, especially from tribal community, you know, we don't expose our sadness. We don't even like necessarily have joy authentically. Either we're not we're not supposed to be too happy or too outgoing, or too cheesy, or too anything. And I think over time, we don't realize the toll that that takes on us spiritually. That's why the spirit is connected to emotional but I don't think we recognize the toll that that takes on us over time. And you see so many men, when they get older, where they just seem like they're just like dead man walking. They're alive, but they're not alive. And I think that's the result of suppressing emotions for so many years. And so a lot of what I talk to my students about is like, how are you feeling what you need to feel authentically? In other words, how are you acknowledging it? Because once again, anger is not bad, but when you suppress anger and it turns into rage, now that's a problem when you suppress sadness a lot of times that can, over time, have really bad outcomes, even when we're thinking about the extreme of joy, sometimes we'll put things in our body to just feel euphoria, you know what I'm talking about. And even that in excess can be a problem. And so how are we feeling authentically what we need to feel in a proactive way versus a reactive way, and how are we doing that, even when it's uncomfortable? I talk to my my young men, a lot about that where, yeah, for some of them, it's going to be uncomfortable the first couple times you actually allow yourself to experience sadness. But here's the thing about us, especially in this day and age, we will avoid awkward situations or uncomfortability. You. Even if we know what's going to have a really bad effect later. So you'll have a lot of these young men, especially where we're from, where they'll avoid sadness for years, and all of that's boiling up because emotions are like energy. They can't be created or destroyed. All that energy is in there. It's not going anywhere. You might think you're suppressing it, but it's not going anywhere. And really what you're creating is a volcano, because then all of a sudden, that wrong person tries you on the wrong day, and all of a sudden you just completely blow up. All that stuff you've been holding in has turned into Pompeii. We'd rather have a Pompeii effect versus just having a little bit of uncomfortability. And that's something that I really encourage students to sit with. I'd rather you have some uncomfortable and some awkwardness versus you blowing up at somebody and saying something that you can't take back, doing something that you can't take back. Right? And that's very similar, even when we finalize it with communal that part of the wheel, where, who are the people that can give you truth when you can't give it to your damn self? Who are those people that know you, that love you, that care for you, and even beyond some of those deeper relationships, like who are just your support systems? Because not every relationship needs to be super deep, and I talk to my students about this a lot. I should not in my practitioner role know every single in depth thing about every part of their personal life that wouldn't be appropriate, but I don't need to in order to support them, right? So you got to have different levels, which I'm not saying, give your full life story to every single person you meet. That's not appropriate or healthy. But how are you balancing having some surface level supports with one or two people that maybe know you want a deeper level? And how are you engaging in those? Because a lot of times, whenever we get anxious, a lot of times, whenever we get in our head about something, we will self isolate, right? We become hermits, in a way, and sometimes that that can last for a week, for some people, will last way longer than a week. And we as humans are designed to be around community, and that doesn't mean that you need to be super extroverted every hour of the day. I'm not saying that either, because there's a difference between taking moments for yourself versus self isolating. Those are two different things. Sometimes you do need to have moments for yourself, even when we're going back to the physical wheel full circle. Sometimes that deep breathing, you need to do that solo in order to truly experience the effects of it, you know. So that there's aspects where you do need to be alone, I think sometimes, for your health, for your wellness, for your ability to reflect, but there's also just as many, if not more times, that you need to have people around you that are affirming you, empowering you, guiding you and educating you. And obviously that's super important in native culture, where part of who we are is listening to our elders, part of where we are now, and part of the reason that the tribe has survived and continued to adapt through the generations is because of community and staying close to one another and caring for one another and protecting one another, Right and so, yes, I think that there is a lot of power in recognizing who you are as an individual. But part of everybody's Medicine Wheel, part of everybody's wheel, has to somehow connect to the community in their environment as well. And that does not mean because here's the other thing I tell my students, that does not mean that you're going to do that perfectly, either, because we've all had situations where we risked or not risked. Maybe that's not the right word, but we all have situations where maybe we opened up to somebody in our community and they were not a person that we ought to have opened up to all of a sudden, especially a lot of us from these small towns like you, told the wrong person your business all of a sudden. It's around that town like wildfire, right? But in those moments, I think sometimes we swing the pendulum to the other extreme, going back to that pendulum analogy where we just basically say, Screw it. I'm never opening up to anybody ever again. And that's just as harmful, right? That doesn't mean that you suppress what somebody did to you, because once again, you have to acknowledge that, and you have to feel what you need to feel, but do not let that then create a wall between you and the rest of the world, the rest of your environment, because that's not how you're going to live, in a fulfilled way, both in college, but also out here in the real world too, whether it be interpersonal relationships, whether it be your family, whether it be relationships at work, you're gonna have to Put yourself out there every once in a while, and once in a while, and you're not going to get that perfect. But once again, all these areas of the wheel are interconnected. That's where that grace aspect has to come in, because when you center in grace for yourself, that's going to give you a better ability to have grace for other people, and that empathy that a lot of times we don't even have for our own self. We wonder why we don't have it for other people. Most of us, don't even have it for ourself. We don't give each other compassion. We're our own worst critic most of the time.

Veronika Becher 1:04:45
It's literally an example maybe with I've been reading on Attachment styles a lot. That's but

Gavin Bell 1:04:51
definitely not into random. It's very connected to this

Veronika Becher 1:04:54
thing, like how relationships work and how we always want the our partner to like us as. Certain way, to love us a certain way, but then we don't love ourselves this way, like, why do we have to wait for a partner to treat someone well, to like, take care of them, if we don't do the same thing for us? And it's not something that we are egoistic or egocentric, that we only focus on ourselves. It's the fact that we also need to give love to ourselves and pour something in our own cup before we can actually pour into someone else's cup. And even then, it's their own job to also put in their own cup. We are not the ones saving everyone, right? We so it's, I think it's really difficult. I have one last question to clarify you're talking about. We're thinking at the present moment. So if I'm filling out this wheel in the present moment right now, and I'm like, Oh, I go to the gym on Mondays, and I don't draw that. This was maybe spiritual on Tuesdays, but I don't really draw every single time. Can I still put it down as criteria, things that I pour it myself in, or does it have to be something that I do present in the present moment? Does it make sense that, if you haven't drawn for a year, does it make sense?

Gavin Bell 1:06:03
Yeah, that's a good question. So I think the beautiful thing, and let me zoom all the way out first to contextualize. I think the cool thing about indigenous frameworks is that they are not static, so it can flow and cater to the individual. So what I mean is, I have some people where they'll do that same type of wheel after a month, they'll do that wheel after a year, and reflect on the whole year. And the example I was given, I do it. Did I do that thing? Whatever that thing is, within the week, you know? So, like, it can kind of evolve on whatever timeline you want it to. For some people, like, if they're really having to do a serious check in with themselves. They can think about it. Okay, did I physically pour into myself today? But for some people, they might do it at the end of a week or at the beginning of a week. That part can vary. And I know one of the things we had talked about last week was, well, does every bullet point count the same when we're bringing like the quantitative aspect into it, right? Like the math aspect, because does going to the gym, for example, count the same as did I feel my joy this week? Or did I feel genuine sadness? If I needed to feel sadness, did I grieve? Some people might ask, okay, well, what if like the gym felt more intense than that? Or, what if even like, honestly, for some people, what if that grief was more intense than even going to the gym three times? Three times a week, you know? And the cool thing that I've done at times is like, either I do the bullet points or you can also shade a quadrant of the wheel. So, and that shading is up to your discernment, where, if something feels even if you only have two bullet points, but those things were heavy and very consistent and very present on that given week. Shade the Quadrant for how much you think that represents. The same way somebody might have five bullet points in the physical but maybe it's not super significant to them, or maybe it didn't take up a whole lot of time. Well, shade the quadrant according to how much you think it represents, and that's still going to allow you to be able to see at the end of the day, if you have physical and emotional going to that example. And they're both pretty well shaded, maybe not perfect, but they're pretty well shaded. But you have nothing in communal you haven't kicked it with nobody that week. You haven't talked to anybody. You ain't called your parents. You ain't done something, you know, that's something where it's a gentle accountability for that next week, because that's the one thing about it. Even what we were just talking about, you cannot beat yourself up the wheel, and that framework is not utilized to beat people up. So if you're looking at your communal you have no bullet points. That is not something to be like, Oh my gosh, I'm such a loser. I'm not doing something right? People don't love me. I That's not what you need to do. It's a gentle accountability, and then you take small steps of growth that next week that are realistic and that are feasible, you know? And I think that has to be, what is ultimately centered in the framework, is gentle accountability for oneself, not beating yourself over the head, because at the end of the day, you're gonna have some weeks where it feels very balanced across all four of those quadrants. Maybe in the spiritual you've engaged in your hobby, maybe, like your hobby, that thing that pours into you internally, maybe it's drawing your art. Maybe you had a week where you did that well, and you also went to the gym, and you also hung out with your friends, and you also experienced all the emotions that you needed to experience, or felt everything that you needed to feel. There's some weeks where it's going to be almost like damn near perfect, where it feels very balanced, and there's also going to be weeks where it is not that way. And so if we're going at it from a baseline of beating ourselves up anytime we're, quote, unquote, out of the perfection spectrum, that's not going to be conducive to growth. And that's not what a lot of our people when you look at a lot of a lot of native culture, it wasn't about, once again, being perfect, because that will is no beginning and no end. It's a journey. And that journey doesn't even necessarily have a destination, where, when you get to the destination, you're perfect. That journey, in and of itself, is the beautiful thing.

Veronika Becher 1:09:59
Thank. Can change. Things can shift. Maybe two weeks ago, was fine going to the gym and was enough physical on the physical aspect, and then maybe a month later, that's not the case at all. Maybe you don't feel the fulfillment in going to the gym anymore. And I just love that. I think that's such a nice framework and tool, because I feel like everyone can do it at home. You don't have to talk with other people about that. It's something you can do for yourself. It's like you just need paper and a pen, and everyone has it, hopefully. I mean, if not, you can do it in your head. Worst case, and I would like to leave the listeners with maybe one last like, advice or something that you feel like sharing, is there something specific? Yeah.

Gavin Bell 1:10:42
And I mean, even closing up that conversation that we were having, I mean, if you remember at the beginning, like part of the reason I ended up utilizing that wheel, what they ended up turning into, was that I would go to different organizations across NC State's campus, different student orgs, native and non native, and we would go through that workshop, basically the same thing that I just discussed with you, and it was cool to see how whether somebody was white, black, international from North Carolina, from California, that wheel was beneficial to them. That was the cool thing about it. And I think all that to say, I know a lot of the focus for this podcast has been native culture, native identity, native framework. But I want to go back to that baseline point of at the end of the day, everybody wants to be loved at the end of the day, everybody wants to be cared for at the end of the day. A lot of the things when it comes to our need for balance, our need for community, those are the commonalities that we need to center in and by censoring in those censoring and grace for ourself, and then, therefore having the capacity to extend grace to those around us, that's how we're going to get to a place where, how we said before, genuine dialog is able to happen. And we're in a place right now, especially with, you know, not even just America, but our world right now as a whole well, we need to have the capacity and the heart and the spirit to have conversation with one another and to learn from one another and to hear one another's stories fully, authentically, not for any ulterior motive, not for a rebuttal or debate, but Just for the sake of simply hearing somebody else's narrative. And I think the cool thing that the wheel represented for me, especially in my role now, was that it was a nice reminder of, yeah, all these students are coming from mad, different environments, but they all needed the same thing, and then taking care, because I view it like a hierarchy and ease. A lot of these students, like how you were saying, We they're feeling lonely. A lot of us as people are feeling lonely, and we're sitting here trying to have empathy for other people and learn about different cultures. Those are at the top of the pyramid. You got to take care of those baselines first, if you yourself don't even feel okay, if you yourself don't even feel balanced, you're not going to have the bandwidth to take in knowledge, empathy, not you know anything for anybody else or any other community, whether it be a college campus or whether it be beyond that. And so that's what I would leave folks with. Don't focus so much on doing just a bunch of, quote, unquote good things. Really think about that idea of balance. Think about that idea of holistic well being, and think about that idea of what are the baselines that bring us together versus tear us apart?

Veronika Becher 1:13:31
I like that. I really like these words. Thank you so much for sharing the medicine wheel, and I really hope that more opportunities will, like, open up more doors for you to share this medicine wheel. I think it will be very beneficial for a lot of, like, different groups and entities. And I, I'm so excited. I'm happy that we were I'm just there listening like, it's so good. I'm so happy about that. I appreciate

Gavin Bell 1:14:00
that. Thank you. I've enjoyed this. This is my first time doing a podcast, so this is pretty cool.

Veronika Becher 1:14:05
I'm super happy to hear that. I really hope that any of the listener might connect, might feel that, oh, this is something that resonates with me, and if not, and if you don't feel like this resonates with you. And maybe if someone tells you a story and it's not really you don't agree with their point of view, that's okay. I think being respectful and still listening is important, even if you don't think you fully understand it or you fully like agree with their point of view. So thank you so much, Kevin for being here on this podcast. And yeah, thank you. Yeah. Thank you so much. Have a nice date. Bye, bye.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai