Thanksgiving is a Day of Mourning
The Beginning Of The Holiday Season
Well, today marks the beginning of the holiday season. Personally, I have been moving farther and farther away from the commercialization of the holidays the deeper I do my own personal healing and inner work, decolonize my own mindset, and educate myself about the ongoing silence of victims of abuse/violence perpetuated by “the system”.
Over the years, I have watched the commercialization of the holidays become a socially acceptable form of extreme gaslighting. We are literally brainwashed to BUY BUY BUY and if you do not spend a lot of money then there is a stigma that you are a horrible person.
This has created intensified mental health distress and immense undo stress in people. For what? To BUY more and accumulate more STUFF? To add to our already cluttered chaotic stressful lives? Has more material things actually brought you more joy? Really?
We are so addicted to BUYING people’s love that we do it through stuff and we wonder why we struggle to relate to our parents, children, partners etc.
To me, charity begins at home at should be daily not just when the holidays come around. Isn’t that what Thanksgiving is supposed to be about on some level? When we can come back to purpose and put a stop to gaslighting, life changes. It does NOT get carried away. We, then, are able to view life differently and can give from our hearts more effectively.
What is Thanksgiving Anyway?
Today is Thanksgiving. What is this holiday really?
Is it the government and religious institutions desire to paint a different picture than the truth? Is it to sugar coat the horrors they perpetuated on people in the name of colonization?
Do we really know the truth without being gaslighted in some way?
Here Is the Truth As I See It
Thanksgiving is a product of colonization that poisoned this land and resulted in the genocide of millions of indigenous the US government chooses to ignore and teach false truths in elementary schools. To the indigenous, it represents a Day of Mourning.
Why?
According to Roy Cook, “The pilgrims (who did not even call themselves pilgrims) did not come here seeking religious freedom; they already had that in Holland. They came here as part of a commercial venture. One of the very first things they did when they arrived on Cape Cod — before they even made it to Plymouth — was to rob Wampanoag graves at Corn Hill and steal as much of the Indians’ winter provisions as they were able to carry. (Suppressed 1970 Speech of Wamsutta (Frank B.) James, Wampanoag.)“
What happened here was complete desecration and disrespect of the dead on sacred burial sites.
“Ironically, the first official “Day of Thanksgiving” was proclaimed in 1637 by Massachusetts Governor John Winthrop. He did so to celebrate the safe return of English colony men from Mystic, Connecticut. They massacred 600 Pequots that had laid down their weapons and accepted Christianity. They were rewarded with a vicious and cowardly slaughter by their new ‘brothers in Christ‘.”
As per various accounts, many natives were also sold into slavery.
If you are thinking, well that was then, and this is now. THINK AGAIN. What happened in Standing Rock in recent years and continues to happen, is current. If it were not for live Facebook feeds showing armed militarized vehicles, tanks, gas grenades, machine guns and more storming natives sitting in sweat lodges, ceremony and prayer unarmed, there would have been another massacre.
We can’t spiritually bypass or white wash our way over this truth.
What I know is this …
If we want to heal the epidemic of trauma – personal, generational, past life, collective – we must face this fact.
My Actions …
Today, I pause. I acknowledge the need to decolonize my own mindset. Today, when I sit around a table with other white folks and immigrants this afternoon, I will observe the lie perpetuated as an underbelly sick at its core yet with compassion for they have been gaslighted and do not see.
Today, I sit in honor of the sacred, the ancestors & original stewards of the sacred lands I occupy.
I honor all things sacred on this earth. I ask the ancestors of this land, the Massachusett people, to forgive my ignorant subconscious complicity to this abuse as I was sold a propaganda promoted by our government in the schools I went to learn what we were told was history. It was a very slanted one at best.
I give thanks for any wisdom the ancestors of this land choose to share with me so I may become a better steward of this land.
For Those Awakening To The Truth …
Understand that Thanksgiving or otherwise known as a Day of Mourning can be a highly triggered day for many especially the indigenous who still inherit the generational trauma due to genocide.
Be gentle with yourself AND others as you process this new truth.
When we work to decolonize our belief systems, we transform our own – generational, personal, past life – trauma in ways unseen personally and collectively.
For me, understanding this new truth and DOING the work, the weight from the residual effects of generational trauma that runs in my veins as well as collectively become lifted and I am able to be of better service to help other lift their traumas personally and collectively.
What will you do?
With appreciation,
Laura
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