Russell Means Quotes

Solutions will not be found while Indigenous people are treated as victims for whom someone else must find solutions.

It's time to bring dignity, honor, self-reliance, and self-government to people that have been held, not necessarily in bondage, but certainly as supplicants under an Indian Act that is archaic.

I think the Conservative Party has a great story to tell when it comes to relationships with First Nations. I want to be part of the solution-identifying process, talking about, 'What are the practical things that we can achieve that the Conservatives can offer?'

I always had a dissociative disorder. But I healed from it over the course of 14 years of big-time therapy. But, you know, I mean, everybody's kind of loony now. So I was kind of a pioneer in the mental illness thing, too.

We are seeing healing among the stolen generations, and initiatives which are enabling Indigenous people to make their distinctive contribution to our national life.

When the last red man shall have perished from the earth and his memory among the white men shall have become a myth, these shores will swarm with the invisible dead of my tribe. The white man will never be alone. Let him be just and deal kindly with my people, for the dead are not powerless.

Colonialism deprives you of your self-esteem and to get it back you have to fight to redress the balance.

Too many people have been analyzing their pasts, their childhoods, their memories, their parents, and realizing that it doesn't do anything-or that it doesn't do enough.

Being sectioned was the best thing that ever happened to me.

The achievement of independence for my own country will be fragmentary and incomplete so long as one square inch of African soil remains unfree.

I would rather die as an Indian than live as a white man.

Forgiveness isn't just a blessing you deliver to another human being. Forgiveness is also a gift you give yourself.

It will take 150 years or seven generations to heal the wound of the residential school.

By healing the internal issues that we can heal as a people, our children don't have to suffer the same agony and pain that we put each other through.

The First Nations Financial Transparency Act insulted the integrity of the very people in our communities who guide our economic policy and act as our mediators with provincial and federal governments.

I went through some stuff. And I got very depressed at times. It was like a marriage breaking up suddenly, violently, quickly. And I was just trying to figure out what happened. When we started putting this tour together, I started to feel better almost immediately. And then this there is this, there is almost no better antidote to what I"ve just been through than to do this every night.

Many people feel they are powerless to do anything effective with their lives. It takes courage to break out of the settled mold, but most find conformity more comfortable. This is why the opposite of courage in our society is not cowardice, it's conformity.

The study of History is the best medicine for a sick mind.

Healing means accepting all parts of ourselves, not just the parts we like, but all of us.

You've been told that you're broken. That you're damaged goods ... there is also Post-Traumatic Growth. You come back from war stronger and more sure of who you are.

You have to start looking in the mirror and saying, 'this is who I am, this is what I am and this is how I'm going to be' and start demanding more from yourself. In spite of everything that this system has thrown at us, we still have to live at the end of the day. We still have to find purpose and find ways to prosper and make a profit so you have to find ways to stand on your own two feet and fulfill your potential as a black man or black woman on this planet no matter how marginalized or oppressed you may be.

Healing takes time, and asking for help is a courageous step.

Forgiveness indeed heals memories

The purpose of psychotherapy is to set people free.

And it can be a way of healing.