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Xiye Bastida, 17-year-old climate activist and global youth leader, discusses the world-wide climate crisis strike planned for September 20, 2019. Extraordinarily articulate, insightful, and dedicated, Xiye encourages all of us to engage in these critical times, to participate in the “Fridays for Future Movement,” and to take action wherever we’re located, joining the millions of people in 130+ countries, being organized by 6,000+ youth leaders!
Joined by her mother, Geraldine Patrick, Xiye discusses her blended indigenous background (part Celtic, part Otomi-Toltec), and her deep connection with the living water that animates all life on planet Earth. Understanding that the essential role of humanity is to take care of life, she also discusses maintaining balance – health and well-being – in the midst of leading an urgent global movement with colleagues like Greta Thunberg. Her advice includes: maintaining the flow of friendships and family, connecting with nature, the importance of sleeping, eating well, and self-care practices.
Not only is Xiye a profoundly effective leader and organizer, she is also still a high school student! Recognizing that the gifts we are each given are in fact responsibilities, Xiye urges each of us: “Don’t just watch us… strike with us!” and discusses how the youth of today – Gen Y and Gen Z – will account for 37% of the voting population by 2025.
She recently launched a Youth Activism Training Program, sits on the Administration Committee of Peoples Climate Movement, is a member of Sunrise Movement and Extinction Rebellion, was invited to speak about Indigenous Cosmology at the 9th UN World Urban Forum, and was awarded the “Spirit of the UN” award in 2018.
More information at: strikewithus.org. Twitter: @xiyebastida Instagram: xiyebeara
Transcript
(Automatically generated transcript for search engine optimization and reference purposes – grammatical and spelling errors may exist.)
Welcome to the YonEarth Community Stewardship and Sustainability Podcast Series.
Today we have the opportunity to visit with Shia Bastida.
Hey Shia.
Hi.
How are you doing today?
I’m good.
Thank you.
Great.
So excited to have this conversation with you and to share with our audience all of the amazing work you’re doing organizing really all over the place.
Shia Bastida is a 17 year old climate activist living in New York City.
In 2018, she became the leader of her school’s environmental club where she mobilized 600 students in the first global climate strike.
Since then, she has taken a citywide leadership role in organizing climate strikes and speaking out about climate justice issues in rallies.
Bastida was born and raised in Mexico as part of the Atomi Toltec Indigenous Peoples.
Currently, she is one of the lead organizers of Fridays for Future and sits in the Administration Committee of People’s Climate Movement.
Recently, she launched a youth activism training program to expand the climate justice movement.
Shia is a member of Sunrise Movement, Extinction Rebellion, and in 2018, she was invited to the 9th United Nations World Urban Forum to speak about Indigenous cosmology.
Notably, she received the Spirit of the United Nations Award in 2018.
Shia, it’s so wonderful to have this opportunity to speak with you.
Obviously, you and I have met. We’ve been together for a few days at the American Renewable Energy Day Conference in Snowmass, Colorado.
It’s been an incredible gathering of folks.
And I am so excited to be able to share the story of what you’re doing and most importantly, what our audience can do to get involved, regardless of where you’re located.
And to dive right in, can you just share what’s happening, what’s coming up, and what can we be engaging in?
Yeah, so right now the youth movement, the climate strike movement, has really taken up.
And it’s been a real catalyst for the future action that it’s needed to address the climate crisis.
And right now we are organizing the September 20th climate strike.
And this is a different kind of strike because it’s intergenerational.
The past strikes that we’ve had have been youth led. On March 13th, we got 1.6 million students marching with us worldwide.
On May 24th, we got 1.9 million students worldwide.
And for September 20th, we’re calling for adults to join us because to solve the climate crisis, we need this movement to be collaborative.
We ask youth, we cannot vote yet.
So that’s why we’re relying on adults who can vote and represent the voice that we need to protect our future.
And what we’re doing is a lot of organizing, a lot of planning, a lot of outreach, and really getting the word out on white, so important for us to address this issue right now.
Because what we do in this next 10 and 0.5 years is really going to define the next 10,000 years.
Yeah, so this really underscores the sense of urgency that we really need to have around these issues, right?
And I heard you earlier talk about the importance of our languaging around this and that the term climate change is really actually not an appropriate term anymore.
So up to recently, we’ve been using the term climate change to define what’s happening in this world.
But that term cannot encompass the catastrophe we’re living in.
We need to use terms as climate crisis, climate breakdown, climate emergency.
Since the strike started, there has been over 600 governments who declared that climate emergency.
And up for September 20th, which is going to be predating the September 23rd climate summit in the UN, we’re asking all governments to declare climate emergency.
And that is what we’re bringing to the table, the sense of urgency.
If we don’t do something in really the next 18 months politically, we cannot ensure a livable future.
In 10 years, I’m going to be 27 and I should be worrying about what I’m going to do after the university and where I’m going to work, not where I have to live.
Yeah, that’s right. So I’m so struck.
As we discussed, she, you are the same age as my son Hunter.
And he is also increasingly engaging in the ecological and environmental issues that face us.
And I’m just, I’m so struck that you are putting so much of your time and energy into all of this.
While also in a few weeks you’ll be back in high school, it’s your senior year.
You’ll be applying to colleges. You’ll be doing many of those things.
My gosh, to take on this level of responsibility and really a sense of ownership around the imperative to impact the future.
Where does that come from? What is it that planted that seed in you?
So I am an auto me from Mexico is an indigenous community.
And the indigenous philosophy is that we take care of the earth because the earth takes care of us.
So we need to bring that sense of reciprocity into the movement.
And we need to remember that we are on earth to take care of life, not to take over life.
And something that really shifted my world around was that in 2015 my town suffered from flooding.
And from then we moved to New York City.
And that is when I realized that the climate crisis follows you everywhere.
There’s no way to escape it because it’s really affecting all of us.
And it’s the only issue that is affecting everyone everywhere.
And the only thing we can do is face it so that it doesn’t affect some people more than others.
Because that’s the justice part of it that we’re bringing to the table.
Absolutely. So this event, September 20th, it sounds like this is going to be taking place in cities all over. Is that correct?
Yes. So there’s, it’s going to take place in over 130 countries.
And there’s over 6000 people who have pledged to organize for September 20th.
And in the United States alone, we have strikes in over 100 places.
And if you visit strikewithos.org and you put your zip code in, you’ll be directed to your nearest strike.
If there’s not a strike in a location that is comfortable for you, you can organize your own strike.
And we have toolkits and resources for you to get permits and press and outreach.
And we just really want this movement to expand all over the world nationally locally.
And you shared also earlier that the strike on the 20th of September, that’s not the final show.
Is it, it’s not the last draw by any stretch, is it?
So we really want to emphasize that September 20th is not a goal. It’s just a catalyst for future action.
And the engagement of humanity in the protection of Earth.
It’s a catalyst for the culmination of thousands of climate activists that won’t stop fighting until the climate crisis is reversed.
Absolutely. It’s so important.
So I have a question that I know a lot of our audience is going to relate to in different ways.
And in other episodes, we’ve talked about the cultivation of health and well-being and maintaining balance in our own lives,
while we’re also increasingly engaging in these incredibly important issues.
And so what are some of the practices and the methods you’re using to maintain that balance as you’re putting so much of your energy into this mobilizing work?
While also working as a student and maintaining friendships and all that, what’s your key for balance?
So it’s very important to keep your friendships flowing and your relationship with your family alive.
And also it’s very important to go back and be in contact with Earth and Mother Nature because that’s when you remember what you’re protecting.
If you are in an office or studying for tests for hours, then you get disconnected from what we need to be in contact with.
So one of the main things is really being in contact with nature,
and maintaining your relationships open.
You know, really ground yourself spiritually and keep this momentum going because I really bring it to everything you do.
I believe that the climate crisis affects every aspect of our lives.
So when I’m in school, my college essay is about the climate crisis.
My research project in chemistry is about how a warming weather actually affects the oxygen and water.
So I’m aware of this every day and my main purpose is to really communicate to others what’s going on.
And my passion is to help people and I believe that the climate crisis is affecting the most people.
Absolutely. And I want to come back to that point in just a moment, but I can’t help but share that a little bit older than you.
As I mentioned, you’re the same age as my son.
I’ve been practicing and really attempting deliberately to deepen my own balance practice.
And what I have found as a writer, as an activist, as somebody very engaged in recording episodes like this and so forth is that if I’m not deliberately going out and connecting with the woods and physically connecting with the soil,
my cognitive performance declines, my energy declines, my mood and attitude actually gets negative.
And sometimes I realize, holy smokes, I have so much work to do right now.
The thing I have to do is unplug and go connect with nature.
Yes. And one of the most important things as an activist is to really take care of yourself and eat.
Don’t forget to eat. Don’t forget to sleep.
And these are things that people who are in the movement don’t tell you because we’re so busy talking about solutions and actions.
But in order to keep on going and in order to maintain the strength that we need, we really need to take care of each other.
It’s so beautiful and I really love that opportunity we have as individuals to understand to embrace and to practice the truth.
And that stewardship regeneration sustainability really is an inside out gesture.
And it starts with how we’re caring for ourselves and our immediate relationships.
It’s such a beautiful piece of wisdom for each of us to carry.
Okay, so I have to ask, you mentioned chemistry.
What are you thinking about in terms of what you want to study and where you think you’ll be heading on the personal path?
So I wanted to study biochemistry a while ago.
But now I realize that we as students, we are messengers of the ethics and science.
And the climate crisis has been solved. We just need to implement those solutions.
So now I’m going into environmental studies, international relations and political science.
Because I believe that now we just need to bring all of this together and really keep communicating it to people.
And really realize that this is a global issue that requires global solutions.
Absolutely, you know, this is something so many of us in the YonEarth community are really familiar with that.
By and large, we are not facing mere technical challenges.
In fact, we have a lot of the solutions, as you say, and that ultimately this is a question of culture.
And this is a question of what we’re mobilizing as a society and why, right?
The fundamental why, which is why we call it why.
And you know, we need to change this culture of consumerism, of complacency.
In order to change that culture, we need to change the narrative.
And in order to change the narrative, we need to communicate personal stories of people who are going through hard times in real time.
So we are really into this movement.
We’re really bringing forward personal stories and personal solutions to make it personal.
Because the environment is personal.
Absolutely.
And on that note, with your personal story, you and your team recently put together a beautiful video that we’ll be sharing on our whyhonourth.org blog page where you’ll see a handful of other videos from some of our other ambassadors.
And she, to make it official, I’m so happy to welcome you as our newest ambassador to the whyhonourth community.
And it’s a real honor to be able to share your story and what you’re doing with our network.
And the fundamental hope and imperative here folks is that each of us is mobilizing around these efforts.
And I want to say in addition to engaging with the protest movement in your area on September 20th.
Also, please consider supporting financially the work that she is doing.
And if folks want to support financially, how do they connect with you to do that?
The best way to connect is to go to our website, start with us.
Yep.
And we have a coalition of seven youth groups, including extension rebellion youth, sunrise movement, future coalition,
fight us for future, US youth climate strike, earth guardians, and earth uprising.
Any of these organizations take money.
And right now we’re putting together a fund where we can direct all of our donors and we can take money accordingly.
Oh, beautiful.
Okay, so it’s kind of like a central shared fundraising resource that you guys are then allocating out of depending on what’s happening.
Okay, that’s really, really beautiful to know you’re doing that.
Well, I have to say we’ve got off camera.
We’ve got mom.
Your mom is here with us, Geraldine.
And as a parent, my heart is glowing, knowing that she is doing this incredible work in that she and other students like her are the force that is creating the future we want for our kids and our grandkids.
And Geraldine, I was hoping you might come join us on camera here and just share a little with us for you as mom.
How does this feel that this is all happening?
Well, for me, it’s a continuation of the energy that dad and mom have been channeling for a long time.
We were also activists that were mobilizing Mindaje in Mexico and myself in the South of Chile.
We were trying to make people understand that we didn’t need to dam the most sacred river of the Mapuche peoples in seven places.
That energy was really not necessary if we were all conscious of how we were consuming the electricity in our homes and in the industry.
And that required a lot of frontline presence together with our Mapuche sisters and brothers.
But also being there in city halls or the equivalent in Chile and calling for press conferences for a long time.
And ever since when I moved to Mexico, we came together with your father.
We also continued in this path through keeping a space in the newspaper nationally where we would especially your father would be writing for this newspaper.
We became professors at university. So we’ve always been channeling a philosophy that is about the caring of our life, which is what we have inherited to you.
And I think that you’re doing it in such a balanced way, you know, communicating so we feel really proud of you.
And we were here to support you in every level.
Yeah, absolutely beautiful. And what as a professor, what do you teach?
So it’s ethno ecology.
Ethno ecology, cool.
And maybe for some of our audience, you might not be familiar with that term.
Ethno speaks about indigenous peoples, right?
And so ethno ecology is the interdiscipline. It’s a combination of disciplines where you are able to understand together with an indigenous community.
How is it that their customer vision and their value system and their loss of origin and their original stories or creation stories drive how they interact with mother earth, how they understand and build knowledge around mother earth and her cycles.
And how it will determine what they do when they do it throughout the year cycle and how they will be reading the signs that nature gives them.
So to do this or that or to plant this or that.
So it’s being beautiful, you know, it’s allowed me to understand.
So the original calendars of Miss America, meaning the Maya calendar, the otomi total calendars of your dad’s people.
And also the Michigan Aztec calendar, right?
Some of the most sophisticated in the world.
Yeah, yeah, they are fascinating.
It’s absolutely wonderful.
The mention of cycles reminds me last night.
There was some discussion around the predominant Judeo Christian and Abrahamic creation stories and stories and mythologies around time as it continues in this linear notion versus an understanding that it’s cyclical, which all of us regardless of where we come from on the planet.
We are all of indigenous heritage and all of our peoples, if we go far enough back in time, had a cyclical understanding of the reality.
That’s how things work here with the moon, the solar cycles, the seasonal cycles, the water cycles, et cetera.
That’s right.
And I’m so struck. I love, first of all, I have to share that my personal attunement to lunar cycles, to solar cycles, to seasonal cycles actually makes me happier and more balanced as an individual.
I know that from experience.
And I’m curious from your perspective with a different cultural context, what do you think this means in terms of what we’re doing as a global society?
So right now we are on a lot of linear cycles, not only in terms of time, but also in terms of money and the economy.
So what we want is more production, more money, more growth.
And in control of growth is another type of cancer.
And that system that we’re in right now is unhealthy.
So we need to go back to cycles.
And it doesn’t mean it’s here, but it’s a spiral that goes up.
And we transcend with it. And we need to go, as you said, back to recognizing the cycles to harvest, to plant cycles of calendar, cycles of consumption.
We’re not telling you don’t eat meat. We’re telling you eat meat when there’s a special occasion.
So we need to bring back that consciousness of really connecting with the cycles of the earth.
When you disrespect, when you disrespect the cycles, you’re disrespecting indigenous cosmology and you’re disrespecting the earth itself.
And for those of us who believe in a creator, it’s a disrespect of our creator, right?
Absolutely.
So I have to also ask, as a parent, one of the things we get to do as parents is name our children.
I know that she has a beautiful name with a lot of meaning layered into it.
And I was wondering if you might share that with us.
Yeah. So when she was still in my womb, we were thinking with dad, what was your name going to be?
And she came a lot. So she means soft rain, drizzling rain.
The rain that fall in September time when the corn is pretty much just building up its contents so that it will be really nice and juicy.
And when she was born, she quickly showed us that she had so much energy that I said, okay, why don’t I look for her?
I’ll look for a Celtic name because of my Celtic ancestry.
So I found that Beata would be a good fit.
And Beata means the one who regulates the weather.
And it’s actually a mermaid.
So the mermaid of the log has this capacity to regulate the weather.
And I said, well, that’s beautiful because where you were born, in the headwaters of the Lerma River,
which is the longest river in Mexico, starting in Taluca Valley or Zambata, the Valley of the Moon,
this sacred river holds a mermaid as well.
And she, according to the Automie Celtic, customization is also the keeper of the weather.
So I found that connection was beautiful and that, yeah, she He was owning that name as well.
It’s absolutely wonderful.
And then so fitting to the work that you’re doing.
This makes me think, too, that we know as we look back
through the last few thousand years of the history of what
we would call the civilized world, that in many regions
of the planet, that civilization has
left in its wake deserts.
Desertification, right?
We think of places like the fertile crescent, which
is now an expanse of sandy desert by and large.
And one of the great opportunities and imperatives we
have right in front of us is this restoration,
reforestation, aforestation, work, soil building work.
And one of the things that occurs as we help heal ecosystems,
the water cycles kick in in such a way that the way the living
trees and plants interact with water is actually affecting
weather and bringing in more rainfall, precipitation,
places that would otherwise be arid if not outright desert.
And so I was wondering if you might speak to that a little bit,
this connection with water and what that means to you.
So I’m sure you’ve heard it before, but water is life.
And that is so true in so many ways.
Water has, you know, it’s immortal.
And it’s always going to be here, regardless of where we are
here or not.
But our duty is to protect that energy.
The energy that water has.
And it flows.
It’s always flowing.
It takes many shapes.
It’s chemical composition is also very, very pleasing.
It’s polarity is very interesting.
And it’s just such a special element.
That is just one of four elements that are really part of everything.
And without water, we have nothing.
And without fire, we have nothing.
Without air, we have nothing.
Without earth, we have nothing.
So it’s this balance of these four elements that are so special.
And water is particularly the one that I connect with the most
because my name is Rain.
And I believe in the power of water to bring life,
to make everything be born again.
To that rebirth that we need.
And the water cycle is also very interesting.
And if you think about it, if we have a lot of heat,
it’s just a lot of water is going to evaporate.
And that’s what we have a lot of rain.
So it’s essential to understand water in this sense of how
helpful it can be to revitalize everything.
But if we don’t respect it, it can also be destructive.
And that’s why we need to go back into that balance
of water being what it is meant to be, which is protection
and nurturing.
Absolutely, beautiful.
On one of our previous episodes, our friend, Kimba Aram,
who is a musician, shared about a movie she created called
Water, that features all kinds of research
that’s been going on all around the world.
And certain parts of the world where water has been even
further energized and charged than we find in other regions.
And it gets into the chemistry and even the geometry
and the patterns of water as essentially a liquid crystal.
And it’s in all of us, right?
Each of us is at least 70% water.
Often with newborns and young children,
that can be as high as 90% water.
Water has memory.
Water is one of the ways we do our healing work
with the biodynamic soil activation
and stewardship work that we do.
Water is essential.
And she ate the fact that your name means what it means.
It reminds me of my childhood in the Pacific Northwest
with those gentle, soft rains that would come through.
It’s just wonderful and beautiful.
Thank you for sharing that.
So I want to ask also, you know, with the Wyners community,
the book Wyners, we have a reference to Gen.
Why, the millennial generation, which I actually
missed myself by like four years.
And you’re now talking about the combination of Gen.
Y and Gen. Z.
And it’s such a powerful, emerging part
of the demographic of the planet and of this country.
And I’m wondering, could you just walk us through what,
what do you mean?
First of all, by Gen. Z Gen. Y.
And then what are some of these demographics,
statistics that we should all be aware of?
So Gen. Z is my generation.
I think it goes, it started in 1995 to 1999.
And what’s interesting is that most,
we are the largest generation right now.
And by 2020, 37% of the voting population
is going to be Gen. Z and Gen. Y, which is extremely powerful
because we know that we need to get involved
in that political system in order for our future
to be secured.
And that’s why I really advocate for our involvement
in local policy, understanding of state policy,
national policy, and always keeping in mind
international agreements and international relations.
So we are the fastest growing generation.
And we’re also going to be the largest group of individuals
age-wise, which is also amazing because if you think about it,
each child represents two parents most of the time.
So when you get a child into the movement
and they talk to their parents, that is how it grows.
And that’s why this movement has grown very organically.
And that’s why adults are so eager to help us.
Because they understand that they could have,
they had the opportunity to have children
and really grow up, look at their children grow up.
And just the thought of their children
and not having that opportunity must be crazy.
And I know my mom wants to be a grandma, but yeah,
we are extremely powerful in a sense
that we strike today, but we will vote tomorrow.
We strike today and we vote tomorrow.
I love that.
So let me just remind our audience.
This is the YonEarth Communities,
Stewardship and Sustainability Podcast Series.
And today we are speaking with Shia Bastita
and her mom, Geraldine.
And I want to be sure to mention that you can join all
of this action through strikewithus.org.
And be sure to check that out where you can enter your zip code
to get the immediate resources in your area.
Also, connect with Shia through Twitter.
Shia Bastita is her handle there.
And on Instagram, it’s Shia Barra, B-E-A-R-A.
And we’ll have this in the show notes as well,
so you can get spellings, et cetera, there.
And I also want to take the opportunity
to thank all of our monthly giving members
at the YonEarth community who are helping make this series
possible, as well as all of our community mobilization work.
We are now published as our Community Mobilization Kit.
So you can get that at the website, along
with all of our other resources.
And if you have not yet joined the monthly giving program,
you can do this at whyon earth.org.
Just click on the Donate button.
And you can choose any level that works best for you
to give on a monthly basis.
When you join, I’ll send you a code
so that you get free downloads of all of our e-book
and audio book resources.
And in fact, you can share that code with your friends also.
I would also like to thank several of our sponsors
who are helping support this work.
And they include Patagonia, Madera Outdoor,
Weylay Waters, Earth Coast Productions, Purium,
the International Society of Sustainability Professionals,
the Association of Waldorf Schools of North America,
and the LIDGE Family Foundation.
Thank you all so much for your support.
And it is so exciting to be collaborating
and mobilizing with you.
Frankly, we’re all just getting started.
This is a climate emergency.
It is imperative that we act.
The amazing secret to all of this is the more we act,
the higher our own qualities of life become.
Our own relationships, our own health,
our own well-being is enhanced as a result
of doing this important work.
And with that in mind, I’d like to ask, perhaps it’s
a bit more of a spiritual question.
What do you think is happening on the planet right now
for our species?
What do you think it is that we’re going through?
So I think that we are on a spiritual level
that is, it’s about learning.
And it’s about making the right choice.
It’s about choosing morality over greed, personal power.
And it goes back to choosing planet over profit,
choose the future over profit.
And that has been said over and over.
But what we need to realize is that all of this
is a challenge for humanity and a challenge for ourselves
into what is the right thing to do.
And the right thing to do is so abstract.
But right now it’s becoming so clear.
And it’s our opportunity to take that chance of doing this.
It required a very big challenge for all of us to come together.
And it’s extremely devastating that this is happening,
but we have to look at it from the best perspective possible
and think this is our opportunity to build a global community.
And relationships have been factored for centuries now.
And now I’m seeing all types of different people
come together in the religious spectrum,
and the generational spectrum, and racial ethnicity.
And everything is really coming together in a way
that I don’t think a lot of people have seen before.
And we are even realizing a relationship
with the earth and animals.
And why did it take us so long?
It’s because we’re interested in saving ourselves.
And that is, we have to move past that
and realize that this is also an ecological crisis.
And it’s species, millions of, I don’t know,
it’s like one million species are dying every day.
I think it’s 200 species are dying every day.
And species that we have not even seen.
So this is really an awakening for all of us.
A spiritual awakening, a creative awakening,
because right now we just need to be creative
and we need to be active, we need to be connected.
Absolutely, absolutely.
And it reminds me that in so many of our indigenous
and traditional cultures, the role of the human being
on this planet is to be the steward in a stewardship
relationship to our places.
And my sense is that more and more of us
are reawakening to that role and reclaiming that role.
And we have to.
There’s an imperative to doing so, right?
It’s beautiful from my perspective
that that’s part of what we get to experience in our lifetime.
That this is happening all around the world.
In Geraldine, I want to ask you the same question
from your perspective.
Again, as mom and having been engaged in this kind of work
for many years, what do you think is happening
on the planet right now?
Well, I can tell you from the teachings
that the elders left, the autonomy and the Maya
saw this period of crisis and of awakening happening.
And it’s fascinating how it’s completely inserted
in this 26,000-year cycle.
And within that, there’s five equal cycles of 5,200 years.
And within that, each of them, 5,200-year cycles,
there’s 10 cycles of 5,120 years.
So how precise can it be that the automaton take
left on stone a date, which was 13-year, 13-read,
which was 1492, when from Europe,
there’s the first contact with this continent.
And they had seen already that this 10th cycle, 5,120 years
into the future, would be really, really critical,
would be the clashing of cultures and of custom visions,
would be really tough.
And that it would require so much suffering
to interact in a way whereby there could be
mutual understanding and dialogue.
And yes, indeed, we have come into 2012,
which was a completion of the 5,120-year cycle.
And even the last 52 years were critical,
even according to very old shinto traditions from Japan.
They had the same calculation of this last 52 years.
It’s incredible.
And now they say that, yes, we are coming
into this intercultural dialogue, this dialogue,
and unification process, where all religions
can talk to each other and acknowledge each other
and connect with each other’s beliefs,
with them in a peaceful way, in a constructive way,
understanding that we’re all in this co-evolution,
whereby we are just in this flow of creation
and of renewal of the creation processes.
And what we were told, according to what’s written on stone
and written on these beautiful codices,
we call them painted ancient books
in central Mexico, is that we would still
need to go through a phase of 13 years after 2012.
So that makes it 20, 25?
25, 20, 26, which would be the final shetting of what we don’t
need, what we would really come to realize,
like you’re saying, you know, prioritize,
and have a very clear criteria of what
we need to emerge into, you know, come into being,
that we will feel lighter when we shed from what we don’t need,
when we detoxify ourselves from what
has been keeping us stagnant and with unclear vision.
So we are in the middle of those 13 years right now,
and it’s really a pivotal time where we have, like she says,
the last 18 months for that awakening and shifting moment
and take that risk and come out of that comfort zone
and really say, OK, enough is enough.
And I will do all that I am responsible for doing,
because according to the personal vision of indigenous peoples,
more than gifts were born into the world with responsibilities.
And so it’s clear we are here to take care of life
in every of her forms and every of her expressions.
And I just want to say here that, while you’re in earth,
the awakening that you had and the agency that you have
and how so many are joining you and thank you
for the opportunity for she yet to come more into your world
and vision, you know, it’s so comforting to the spirit
that you’re the indigenous regenerative work
and teaching.
So you want to acknowledge that.
Thank you.
Thank you.
There is a lot of healing involved in this work that we’re doing.
And that’s inside.
That’s in the world.
And my hope and prayer for each of us
is that we engage in that healing work even more deeply,
even when it’s uncomfortable.
And we’re pushing through some of that discomfort.
It’s so important.
And I love the message around the responsibilities.
And for many of us, we think in terms of the gifts
that we’ve been given and to recognize those as responsibilities,
I think it’s such a beautiful key to opening the door.
Yes, that’s your dad’s wisdom coming through.
Yeah.
Beautiful.
Well, thanks to you both.
And before we sign off for the moment,
I want to just reiterate, September 20th
is a massive event worldwide.
Engage with it.
Go to strikewithus.org to connect with what’s
happening in your area.
Check out the amazing video that Chie and her team
created that we are going to have on the YonEarth blog page.
And it’s just a beautiful piece.
In fact, the music on that is by Compton Kids, right?
Yeah.
We have to chat about them for just a minute, right,
before we sign off.
You know, they’re amazing.
They’re the purpose of the anthem, which is called Stand Up,
is to bring together the youth movements
that have been going on for the past five years, 10 years.
So we’re bringing together Black Lives Matter,
gun control, like enough is enough, the climate movement.
We’re really bringing it all together
to show that we understand that all of these issues
are interconnected, and that we are 20% of the present,
but we are 100% of the future.
20% of the present, 100% of the future.
This reminds me, you know, many of our traditions
speak of seven generations.
And speak about making our decisions
with that responsibility, with the next seven generations
in mind.
And I remember for years and years, I’m part Mohawk, actually,
from the Erecoil League.
And I remember for years feeling, my gosh, seven,
I mean, great number, but pretty abstract.
And then I realized, wait a minute.
Because I had met my great-grandmother.
Yes.
And if I am so fortunate to meet any great-grandchildren,
that is a span of seven.
Yes.
You’re about here, and you’ve met Bums tree,
and you’ve met this tree.
Yes.
That’s how.
Yes, that’s consciousness, and that’s wisdom.
Yes.
It’s right in spots.
100% of the future.
And Geraldine, you and I are in the middle of that.
I want to give you the opportunity
to make a final statement or message to our audience
before we sign off.
And then we’ll give Chia the last word,
as we’re moving forward on that beautiful progression
of seven generations.
Yes.
Yes.
So everyone listening here, remember
that you all have ancestors.
And that ancestors pretty much, you know,
the one here, if you’re around here or here,
was with all these roots, with all these wisdom
that we relate to indigenous peoples.
So please do your homework and look for those roots.
And with dignity, find the wisdom
that your ancestors were carrying.
And bring it forth into your current way of living, you know.
Reconnect with that memory because,
swiftly, as simple as it might sound,
to look at the moon when you are, you know,
in the season of planting or sewing or harvesting,
it’s that kind of simple teaching that will feed your spirit
so much.
And really ensure that we participate
in the reharmonizing and regenerating of Mother Earth.
Mm.
Beautiful.
Thank you.
And Chia the…
So what I want to say is that we all have the responsibility
and the liberty, thankfully, to make our voices heard.
And everyone’s story is so important
to bring into the movement.
And just doing something for what you care about is being an activist.
And we should all be activists in this time and age.
And really recognize that whatever you care about,
whatever your skills are, you have…
you possess the creativity to be part of the movement
in a constructive way.
Recognize that this is intergenerational.
This is political.
This is about racial equality.
This is about transportation, energy grid.
This is about everything.
And so really anything that speaks to you,
you can use it to speak to everybody else.
Absolutely beautiful.
Well, thank you both for taking on the responsibility
of speaking and of sharing your messages in general
to the world and specifically today
with our YonEarth community.
It’s a real pleasure and honor to have you on the show.
So thank you both very much.
Well, thank you so much.
Thank you.
Thank you.
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