You know what sucks?
Lateral violence.

Not from strangers who know nothing about me…
but from our own people.
The comments, the digs, the policing, the “you’re not doing it right,” the “you don’t look Lakota enough,” the “who taught you.”
The jealousy.
The bitterness.
The tearing down.

And it’s wild, because that behavior?
That’s colonizer behavior.
It’s exactly what they wanted us to do to each other.
Break each other’s spirits.
Doubt each other’s teachings.
Destroy each other’s confidence.
Attack each other’s identity.
Make sure we never trust, never uplift, never celebrate one another.

Our ancestors didn’t survive genocide, boarding schools, forced removals, starvation, outlawed ceremonies, and relentless erasure…
so that we could turn around and harm each other the same way.

I’m out here teaching plant knowledge, educating, sharing culture, raising my kids, running a community-centered business, helping people heal, and trying to leave the world better than I found it.

And the hate I get for simply existing as who I was born to be is unreal.

But here’s what I know and what my elders taught me:
When people attack your identity, your family, your authenticity, your appearance—
they’re speaking from their own wounds.
Their own scarcity.
Their own disconnection.

I refuse to carry that.
I refuse to swallow their hurt like it’s mine.
I refuse to dim my voice to make someone more comfortable in their misery.

I was taught to stand strong, to stand in truth, to keep going even when others want to drag me down.

So to all that lateral violence aimed at me lately?
All that weird, ugly energy trying to knock me off my path?

Nah.
I’m not shrinking.
I’m not stopping.
I’m not breaking.

I’ll keep teaching.
Keep creating.
Keep building.
Keep uplifting our people.
Keep doing the work.

Because that’s what a good relative does.
And I’m not carrying colonizer behavior into the next generation.