STAR HORSE WOMAN AND GIA, HER GRANDDAUGHTER. Cynthia Lindquist Mala, also known as Ta'Sunka Wicahpi Winyan, dances at powwows whenever she can. Photo courtesy of Cynthia Lindquist Mala

I am now a “baby” elder of my tribe, and I have come to realize my blessings. I not only have a large extended family but also have had many professional opportunities over the course of my lifetime.

I have seen Indian health and Indian education from many different perspectives – as a tribal health director, regional administrator, teacher, political appointee, and more recently as president of Cankdeska Cikana Community College (CCCC) in Fort Totten, ND.

These perspectives always have been tempered by my roles as a daughter, sister, auntie, mother, and now as a grandma. I see a promising and hopeful future for our people, connected by education and good health.

Like most people, my life path has been chaotic with stumbles and mistakes. However, Wakan Tanka (Creator or Great Mystery) has been good to me and has put me where I was meant to be, contributing to my community.

In my personal healing and learning journey as a Dakota winyan (woman), I have come to understand wodakota from which the word Dakota is derived. Dakota means “friend” or “ally” and is the proper and preferred identification of our people. Wodakota is a condition of being at peace with oneself and in harmony with one another and with our surroundings — family, extended family, nature and the environment, and the universe. Wodakoda implies harmony or balance and is a lifestyle patterned after the natural order of Mother Nature, which must be acknowledged to live a healthy life.

In my learning journey, I have come to understand how brave, strong, smart, and healthy Indigenous people were when this country was colonized. Our nomadic, free, ecologically efficient lifestyle included fresh foods that were lean and “green”; people ate smaller, healthier meals when hungry.

Unfortunately, the colonization process and its coercive assimilation policies led Native people to become sedentary and somewhat place-bound. In addition, our diet was changed significantly due to the forced reservation lifestyle. Commodity food rations (such as canned meat, with very high sodium) became the basic food staple for most all reservation Indians.

Many of today’s health issues in Indian Country are caused by behavior and thus preventable. For example, the heavy use of tobacco in the Northern Plains is linked to the high incidence of cancers and heart disease.

Cankdeska Cikana Community College offers at least one physical education course each semester – usually a jogging class. This course had to be modified to a walking class, however, because our students could not jog without being winded and out of breath!

Our college’s efforts are now focused on behavior changes based on traditional concepts of health and well-being (wodakota), so we continue with the walking class, promote smoking cessation programs, encourage healthier food choices, and provide water at all college events.

I believe students have to have some sense of health or well-being to be here. Students come to our doors wanting something better for themselves and their families.

It is our responsibility as Indian educators to provide opportunities for understanding the health issues of our communities. We also have the responsibility to promote healthy living and to promote health careers. This in turn strengthens educational outcomes.

To fulfill this responsibility, we must be role models, practicing what we teach, changing our own behaviors. Most significantly we must understand and convey the traditional cultural values of our Indigenous communities – to live in balance and harmony with each other and Mother Earth.

Information sharing, i.e. education, is a powerful tool that we sometimes take for granted. Cankdeska Cikana Community College has been a partner in a national initiative to develop a diabetes education curriculum over the past five years. During pilot testing of our segment of the curriculum with eighth graders at two reservation schools, students told us they wished they had been told before that processed food snacks were harmful. Subsequently they “negotiated” with their schools to have the vending machines changed to include more healthful choices.

The Diabetes Education in Tribal Schools (DETS) initiative is a collaboration sponsored by the Indian Health Service and the National Institutes of Health as part of a national effort to decrease the incidence and improve the care of Type 2 diabetes among American Indians and Alaska Natives.

Eight tribal colleges (Fort Peck Community College, Keweenaw Bay Ojibwe Community College, Stone Child College, Haskell Indian Nations University, Northwest Indian College, Southwestern Indian Polytechnic Institute, Cankdeska Cikana, and Leech Lake Tribal College) have been partners to develop a K-12 diabetes education curriculum for Indian schools across the United States.

We have created a free curriculum that weaves together inquiry learning, exposure to science and health-related careers, and American Indian/Alaska Native cultural and community knowledge. I believe the DETS curriculum will become a powerful tool for Indian people as we seek to find and maintain that balance and harmony for living life in a good way (wodakota).

Physical health is as relevant and important as mental, emotional, or spiritual health and well-being. Each is a part of the circle of life. Dakota concepts of well-being are rooted in our understanding of this circle and those parts being in balance and harmony – wodakota.

Let us all continue our healing and learning journeys in a good way with our families, friends, and allies. [Let us do this] on behalf of our students, our grandchildren – our future.

Mitakuye oyasin (all my relations).

Cynthia Lindquist Mala, Ph.D., is also known as Ta’Sunka Wicahpi Winyan (Star Horse Woman). She is president of Cankdeska Cikana Community College and a member of the Spirit Lake Dakota Nation from Fort Totten, ND.