The STRENGTH of the People.

What many do not realize is the history of strength of Native People.  Oppressed over hundreds of years, robbed of land, of culture, pushed out and ignored by society except when convenient, they are people who have known great suffering, great trials and yet, overall they have maintained a great spirituality and strength-love based, compassionate strength that is incomprehensible, and admirable. I don't know a people that have remained so peaceful and steadfast in the face of this kind of horrific abuse.

We all have our breaking point, but it may be  that Native Peoples tolerance comes from their place of spirituality-how else can you explain it? The ability to remain peaceful while witnessing your people being beaten, abused, humiliated and in the past killed is truly otherworldly.  The moments that I have spent in my past, and recently attest to the fact that there is something unique about them.  Perhaps it is their true connection with nature and the Creator, a connection which is practiced everyday, all days, not as a routine religion, but as a way of life.

Even I, being the peaceful hippie that I am, when standing in front of aggressive riot police had mixed emotions of compassion and sadness for what they are doing, and a conflicting anger of wanting to punch them.  It is so difficult to remain compassionate in the face of injustice.   Often when people on our side would even say the slightest harsh words, they were reminded by someone nearby of love and prayer. Whether it was directly spoken to them or not, before the negative thought completed itself, you heard and felt an overwhelming sense of love, prayer and peace from the protectors.

And even in the recent face of aggression, rubber bullets, baton beatings, mace, tazers, wrongful arrests, humiliation of arrests, abuse and killing of horses, you still hear prayers, peace, and love resonating from our side.  The protectors are water and nature protectors.  But now even more I believe, this title also translates to protection of our true spirits. Protection from the infiltration of negative in the form of aggression, anger, hatred, greed, selfishness.

The overall spirituality of peace, love, compassion, and prayer that exists there reminds us to protect what we should be as humans-exactly the example that we see in the faces of the people who struggle constantly against the aggressors.