0:05
So our last question is for Elsie, the tribal victim.
0:10
Set aside TVSSA grant funds, healing services.
0:14
For you, Elsie, what are some of the ways you've seen Alaska Native programs or tribal communities use TVSSA funds to weave culture in all aspects of their victim service work?
0:27
Thank you, Jana.
0:28
I just want to thank Mita and Carolyn for your words.
0:31
And again, I'm just honored to be here and this whole idea that healing is possible and how culture is healing and we're getting back to that.
0:45
And I, I think it's, while it's a federal program, oversee is allowing space for tribal communities to really grasp or envelope their programs in a way that allows victims to come home to themselves.
1:10
And so anytime that we have grantees using culture as a foundation for healing, it goes a long way.
1:19
It's acknowledging that we as people have gone through collective trauma and how our ancestors for generations have known what it means to be a good relative.
1:35
And we have those cultural teachings and practices and ways of being that allow us to be in balance not only with ourselves, but with our family, our community, with the land, the water, the animals, with the universe.
1:54
And I think that's so important and it, it's almost like I always believed that our ancestors were beyond trauma informed care.
2:05
We, we hear that term a lot.
2:07
And I believe that our ancestors had a way of seeing the world that allowed people to be whole.
2:17
We were born whole and whatever events that happened hardened a part of our hearts.
2:26
And as we and using cultural practices, cultural using culture, it's almost like it softens that and allows it to metabolize differently and people are able to then decide what they're going to do with that trauma.
2:44
It breaks it up.
2:45
It's not part of our identity.
