Meet Kayla.​

We are from the Jicarilla Apache Nation, and so a lot of our traditions, our customs, our games, our songs, they come out during the springtime again. And so it’s been a really good way for me to take care of myself, but also just to physically. Bring myself back to things that I have done for years, right? Like just having just like physically playing the games and having your body do those motions again is immediately like, oh, you know, I remember how this feels now.There’s a really deep and rich culture.

We’re out around the Puget Sound area and Washington. And there is luckily, there’s a really deep and rich Coast Salish culture out here for all of these Lushootseed speaking tribes prior to the pandemic. Me, my son and my family, we go really deep for culture and traditions like that is something that we have acknowledged is selfcare like. Yes, this is something that we would do anyway.

 But we acknowledge that this is a form of healing. So things like speaking the language, sharing songs, dances, getting on the canoe, you know, harvesting things like this is something that we would practice anyway. But it’s really in the last couple of years, it’s been a really big movement over here to make sure that you’re realizing you’re not just doing this because you’ve always done this. You’re doing this because it’s connecting you. It’s healing you. You know, there’s a lot of generational trauma that has occurred with native folks out here.

It’s important to not just go through the motions…but to really understand.

And so it’s just really important that you’re not just doing things as part of the motion, but that you’re really understanding, that you’re feeling right. There’s a group of us, we’re all Lushootseed language teachers and or speakers. Language revitalization is one of our passions. And so while we all come from different tribes, this is all something that we share. And there are three virtues. These come from the cedar trees.

These are something that the cedar trees teach us. And these are virtues that we live with. And those virtues are to be kind, to be helpful and to be sharing. If I’m going through a really hard time, I sound a little bit crazy, but you can just hear me like repeating them over and over again. Like, if I have really bad anxiety, like that’s something that I do to just cope.

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