What the Learning Journey is all about with Shawna Serniak

By Laura Mushumanski, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter

(ANNews) – The learning journey is a series of neural networks lighting up every time we get a ‘ah-ha’ moment – a light bulb moment. This understanding taught within Indigenous cultures through Indigenous Ways of Knowing is ‘walking in ceremony.’ It is what healing is – all things that bring light and love into our lives, that nurture us emotionally, mentally, physically, and spiritually. As soon as our Metis sister Shawna J Serniak (an International Indigenous Speaker on equity, diversity and inclusion), started to take a chance on herself and get curious about doing things differently, those ‘ah-ha’ moments kept coming up. This is how Serniak’s learning journey became part of honouring and sustaining the next seven generations.

“While I was working to better myself – a lot of people would ask me to share my gambling addiction story. As I was doing this, I started to look for different resources encompassing single women, single mothers, people with addictions. There was nothing out there that had everything,” shared Serniak. “So, I started the ‘Every Woman Empowered’ group. It educates women about self-love, forgiveness, creating healthy boundaries, empowerment. We also talked about racism, being a single mother. Anything and every possible thing that could pertain to women. It brought me where I am today.”

Being an advocate for Indigenous rights and responsibilities, Serniak saw the importance of teaching through storytelling. These stories include the histories of Indigenous peoples, and how Indigenous teachings honour the sacredness of life, starting with the self. “I am really passionate about Indigenous histories and Indigenous teachings. One of my most asked for topics is called, ‘Which Wolf Do You Feed?’ It’s about making good decisions, and bringing those decisions to the forefront, and talking about the next seven generations, and how what we do today impacts our next seven generations.”

Along the way of Serniak’s own personal learning journey, she had to learn what forgiveness was, and how forgiveness is a process. “One of the biggest things that my mom taught me was forgiveness and self-love. It really was about forgiving myself and asking forgiveness from my son. Realizing I had to start loving myself and appreciating myself, there were no quick fixes. I couldn’t find it in a relationship; I couldn’t find it through gambling – I had to find it through myself and my relationship with my spirituality. It was a journey – it just didn’t happen overnight; it was a process. And that process brought me slowly to where I am today.”

The hardest step for Serniak was the choice she made when she took a chance on herself, sharing that “when you do, it is amazing how the doors just open, and everything just slowly starts to fall into place. …It’s a process. For change to occur, I had to get to this place. I believe that our Creator puts everything in our paths…If I wasn’t a gambling addict, I wouldn’t be here today. I had to go through that journey, and those experiences to be who I am [now] in order to help others and show that they are not alone…Those experiences made me who I am – a better person.”

One thing that evolved over time was patience. It developed into a different way of knowing and understanding for Serniak, and the way in which this learning transformed her ability to embody the knowledge she walks with, while giving others the insights of compassion, understanding, respect, honour, and grace. “Patience has been something that I had to learn,” Shawna shared. “I had to do it on my own, it was not easy. In my younger years I felt like I knew everything, and now it is about just taking that slow ride and seeing where the journey takes me. It has made me realize that I am not in complete control of this. There is a process and procedure, and there is a reason behind it. There is a reason why we go through what we do in order to get to that result – it is all part of the learning journey.”

The process and procedure that Serniak speaks to, “is not selfish – it’s self-help. We are helping ourselves to become better people by eliminating [the people, places and things] around us [that put us in harm’s way].” The analogy that Shawna utilizes is to imagine if we are like a house whose foundation needs repairing. “We have to tear down this house that we created and begin with a strong base. Only when we tear down all those bricks, can we rebuild this house and utilize the proper materials that are going to give us a concrete structure. So that once we build our own house, we can help others build theirs.” This analogy for Serniak is deeply rooted in how we can be good to ourselves, and in turn take care of others in good ways. “It is about reworking ourselves. It becomes a ripple effect and supports the continuation of seven generations…We have to choose positivity and choose that different path. We just have to get back to what our ancestors taught us, ‘our home is your home.’ Learn to forgive and move forward and create positive teachings for our youth and to each other…We can only do that by leading through example and doing this for ourselves first.”

In 2017, Shawna Serniak created the Every Woman Empowered Endowment Fund to raise money for awareness, education, and searching for Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls within Canada.