My Fellowship has been such a incredible learning and growing opportunity for me in so many ways. I have been addressing violence against Native American and Alaska Native Women for 17 years. I lived in and survived many forms of violence all through out my childhood, teenage years and into young adulthood when I ended the cycle of violence with me. I believe that living, surviving and healing from so many forms of violence has given me the first hand knowledge, wisdom and fire needed to address it. Through the course of my leadership development in the last 17 years I have grown in leaps and bounds and all that I have acomplished. My goal was not to be the one who holds the key to the critical work to be done to address these issues, but that the programs developed would be owned by the community and tribes. I have seen the fruition of our work with those I have worked with within our organization take hold and become institutionalized by my tribe and a couple of others. I feel my leadership development through the Fellowship allowed for my growth to expand in seeking out incredible Indigenous Community Based Practices on a global scale, to really expand my thinking, to broaden the lens that I was looking through, challenge my capacity to grow in my knowledge as well as my own belief that I can do this. The Fellowship allowed me to truly go out and take hold of what I literally could see on a macro global level to seek out solutions already in practice to bring back to share with others. This Fellowship has allowed my leadership to literally take the lead in this work as I do not believe it is being done. What stands out to me is how I have this vision that has become tangible and real that is rooted in leadership. As you know, I have expressed my internal challenge in claiming the title of leader when I feel I am merely just a helper of the people. I feel more confident and comfortable in talking about leadership and my place within it. One of the attributes of my wolf clan is being strategic. I always felt that my peripheral vision of the needs and solutions were of my clan attribute, but now, I am seeing that I am the leader of the wolf pack. This Fellowship has allowed me to see in other areas where I am seen as the one to go when in need or help within my very big complex family. An older cousin who lives just a block away whom we rarely ever talked to each other recently started to communicate with me. He was suicidal and needed someone to talk to. I told him I would always be here for him and he can over any time, he said, "Thats what mom said", I told him I would drive him 45 minutes to his moms if he wanted to go and be surrounded by family, he said, "Mom said you would do that." The Fellowship has allowed for me to witness and truly see that is a sign of leadership within my own family. I normally would alway help, but not see it for what it has been. We all may not get along, but when it comes to serious issues, I am sought out as a leader in our family for help which I give unconditionally. There are many pieces that stand out to me in the leadership development of the Fellowship. I feel that my fellowship has exponentially expanded my leadership development in my self guided project work. What I am doing is absolutely brilliant as I am planting seeds of change for out future generations. Change takes a long time, this I know in the work I have done over the last 17 years which has garnered my skills to be able to plant those seeds and to help them grow. I believe in order to be a great leader, one must have the capacity to have the peripheral view/vision to not only see what the issues are but to feel for the people and have the courage and strength to stand up to seek the solutions for change and be willing to sacrifice for them without anyone knowing. The Bush Fellowship has allowed myself to give permission to accept my leadership in all that I do. I do know that I have so much more work to do and that my leadership development with my self guided project will only grow in ways I have not begun to fathom. I would like to thank the Bush Foundation, Bush Coaches and my Fellows for the incredible support to help my grow and develop through my self guided project. Our Bush Coach calls were so helpful at times I felt I was not doing enough and to be reminded that my work is spiritual. My self guided project is just that, spiritual. When I submitted my application and hit the send button, I felt and knew right at that moment in time, I would be a Bush Fellow. Leadership in the field of social change truly is spiritual work, it takes faith, hard work and sweat, heartache, compassion, tears, fury, laughter, ceremony, medicines and endless sacrifices without a drop of expectation of recognition. Its the giving of unconditional love and the ability, courage, strength and at times the audacity to stand and defend what you believe in, which has been the only thing that has ever changed the world…this is happily, exhaustively and humbly me. Miigwech!