Indigenous Women's Traditional Gathering

Description

Jude Services, along with Cold Lake First Nations, is excited to present the first annual Indigenous Women's Traditional Conference? to take place on May 27 - 29, 2016 at the traditional territory of Cold Lake First Nations called English Bay located a short distance from the beautiful city of Cold Lake, Alberta. The theme is, Healing from the Past, Moving Forward. The purpose of this event is to bring Indigenous women together to begin the process of reconciliation and help each other heal from the past wrong doings such as residential school syndrome, the loss of our livelihood, how it has impacted our children and grandchildren, bringing back traditional parenting skills, self care, dealing with grief and loss, moving forward and creating healthy communities. Women are the givers of life and we hope to inspire them by providing the tools that will enable them to move forward and take their place in society as leaders and caregivers. Workshops would focus on building respectful relationships, traditional parenting, grieving and forms of grieving, coping with loss and discussions about why we are losing our youth to violence, drugs, alcohol and suicide. We will also build a platform to begin the strategy of taking action within our communities and rebuilding ourselves so we can help each other to grow. Participants will leave this event feeling motivated, inspired, and holistic which would help them begin the process of healing within. We will create a working group to target various issues that impact our communities and provide solutions by taking a unified approach. This event is open to all Indigenous Women that want to make positive changes and create an atmosphere of working together to improve the quality of life at their communities, organizations or regions. The gathering is designed to build participant's personal resilience and expand their support networks among them.