Our primary goal is to build capacity in communities which will empower the community by providing the tools necessary to address and recognize the inter-generational trauma.
Furthermore, our goal is to build within this system a process of checks and balances to prevent lateral violence from taking hold. We understand that until there is an understanding of trauma, it will recur. It is important to identify the source of the trauma, accept and address it.
Support community healing through developing and delivering an addiction prevention management curriculum training.
Through growth and education, we aim to become expert leaders in substance abuse training to help provide aid to the people we love.
Promoting healthy sober communities through sponsored activities and online workshops throughout the year.
Create an online space for a national conversation on individual and collective trauma and addictions in our communities.
Identifying inter-generational trauma and reducing its influence on indigenous communities through tools from a compassionate inquiry process.
GIFT will establish an accreditation body within the foundation to establish authority and create leaders in their communities.
Over the summer of 2020 during a global pandemic, a small group of professionals got together over Zoom to discuss offering services to Indigenous communities across Canada. Initially the group got together as a sort of ad hoc group ruminating about a shared traumatic experience to debrief. What made this particular experience interesting is that it occurred while working in an Indigenous educational cultural center. You have to admire the courage it took for them to come forward in an environment that was laden with lateral violence and oppression.
Why this is significant to the initial founding group, is because lateral violence in indigenous communities happens and no one talks about it openly. This group of professionals are attempting to make sense of a senseless episode.
Maurice J. Kistabish is originally from Pikogan, Quebec, but is currently a member of the Apitipi Anicinapek Nation (formerly the Wahgoshig First Nation) in Ontario.
Destiny Gorman is a member of Athabasca Chipewyan First Nation (ACFN). She completed high school in Fort McMurray, Alberta at Father Mercredi High School, received
Mike Mercredi is a visionary, mentor, cultural coordinator, and instructor. He lives in the Hamlet of Fort Chipewyan, with his wife and 2 daughters. Mike
There are a number of places you can find us online and in real life. The contact for to the right is one of the most dependable.
