“Every day that we wake up, every day that we have another opportunity to walk on this beautiful gift, which is our mother the Earth, to experience life, we give thanks.”  – Biindigegizhig Deleary

This week, as people in the United States prepare to gather with their loved ones for Thanksgiving, I reflect on the complexities of this holiday that are at the forefront for many. I write to you from Snuneymuxw territory in British Columbia, Canada, where we honored Truth and Reconciliation Day in September, Louis Riel Day on November 16th, and many celebrated Canadian Thanksgiving last month. I am Red River Métis, with Swedish and French settler roots. Iskwew Otipemisiwak, aen femme Michif niya. Mii noon de faamii si Pelletier, Aymont, LaPierre, pii Gagnon, ekwa parantii a St. François Xavier ooschiwuk. My Métis roots, as with all Métis roots, are born out of a unique and reciprocal relationship between First Nations people and, typically, French settlers. We are a people with a distinct history, culture, and language, with our historic homelands centered in the Red River Valley of Manitoba. From our genesis, the Métis have always had one foot in the Indigenous world and one foot in the settler world – though we would say both our feet are definitively and 100% Métis! The Métis are federally recognized Indigenous in Canada, along with the various First Nations and the Inuit people. While we are not recognized (or very well known) in the United States, modern-day Red River Métis communities still exist along the routes we followed during the Buffalo hunts from Minnesota to Montana. 

On November 16th, we remembered the great Métis leader, Louis Riel, who was executed on this day in 1885. Riel’s death halted any potential for Métis recognition, land rights, or acknowledgement under a developing Canadian government. This moment changed everything for our people and continues to reverberate in Métis families and communities to this day. Our First Nations or Native American cousins, including the Wampanoag people who are part of the “Thanksgiving story”, have their own histories relating to colonial and settler developments that continue to have a very real impact on communities, families, and individuals. There are hundreds of Indigenous nations across North America, each with their own distinct cultures, histories, and perspectives. 

The Harvest Time

At the root of it all, this is a season that offers us all a natural moment to pause, reflect, and reconnect. Across the Northern Hemisphere, autumn festivals, from Haudenosaunee harvest traditions to Samhain, Sukkot, and the Mid-Autumn Festival, people celebrate gratitude, mark a time of preparation, and honor the seasonal cycles. This season invites us all to connect in community, reflect on our relationship with land, water, and the beings who sustain us, and reminds us that giving thanks and preparing for winter are ancient human rhythms shared across cultures. 

Holding Difficult Truths

In North America, this season carries a wide range of meanings: for some, warmth, food, and family; for others, this time is a stark representation of the continued impact of colonization, land theft, broken agreements, and systemic erasure. Many have chosen to reframe Thanksgiving as a National Day of Mourning – a movement established in 1970 by Wampanoag elder, Wamsutta Frank James. James was uninvited to speak at an event in Massachusetts because the Indigenous side of the “Thanksgiving story” was too “inflammatory.”

In an article for the Washington Post, James’ granddaughter, Kisha James, says, “we are not against giving thanks or family gatherings… we are taught to give thanks every day. But we will not give thanks for the invasion of the Pilgrims and other Europeans, nor for the ongoing colonialism and genocide that our communities continue to face.”

Reciprocity & the Thanksgiving Address

In ‘Decolonizing Thanksgiving: Celebrating Generosity Towards All, Not Abundance for a Few,’ Ashley Dubois says, “The holiday, as popularly celebrated, risks reinforcing colonial myths: that settlers and Indigenous Peoples sat down as equals, that colonization was benign, and that history has neatly resolved itself. She goes on to say “by listening to Indigenous voices and re-centering traditions of reciprocity and community, we can begin to rethink Thanksgiving – not as a token holiday, but as a practice of living respectfully with land and people.”

Robin Wall Kimmerer offers insight into this reciprocity in Indigenous worldviews. Weaving story, Indigenous wisdom, and environmentalism, her popular book, Braiding Sweetgrass, introduces the Haudenosaunee Thanksgiving Address – a protocol known in the Onondaga language as “Words That Come Before All Else”, or Greetings and Thanks to the Natural World. 

“This ancient order of protocol sets gratitude as the highest priority… I am told that the Thanksgiving Address is at heart an invocation of gratitude, but it is also a material, scientific inventory of the natural world… As it goes forward, each element of the ecosystem is named in its turn, along with its functions. It is a lesson in Native science… You can’t listen to the Thanksgiving Address without feeling wealthy. And, while expressing gratitude seems innocent enough, it is a revolutionary idea.”

Recently, I had the honor of meeting Monique Gray Smith, who wrote the young adult adaptation of Braiding Sweetgrass. We met on Snuneymuxw territory in British Columbia to record a conversation for Regeneration International’s The People’s Food Summit. In the interview, linked below, Monique muses that teachings of gratitude and reciprocity are not limited to any one culture; they are a vital part of the human experience. 

“In these times, those teachings are so important because they bring us back to ourselves, and they bring us back to the kindness that we are as human beings, and in that gifting and gratitude, it changes our brain chemistry… and it just changes the frequency, so there is more kindness in the world. And I think we are really in need of a lot of kindness in this world right now, and generosity, and care, and gifting, and gratitude.”

Smith emphasizes the importance of understanding where you come from, your own lineage, and your ancestral connections to land, as well as the histories of those Indigenous to the land you’re on.  She thinks Indigenous wisdom and land teachings resonate so deeply for so many because, as human beings, we all have a connection to land in one way or another. “There’s a resonance for people, because somehow they see themselves, maybe not through some of the experiences, but there’s the wisdom, the care, the love, those teachings around respect, honesty, courage, humility, they resonate with people.” She adds that Indigenous wisdom can be available ot everyone when approached with respect. 

Gratitude & Impact

Kimmerer said above, “while expressing gratitude seems innocent enough, it is a revolutionary idea.” She also connects gratitude with consumerism, another topic worth considering this season.

“In a consumer society, contentment is a radical proposition… Gratitude cultivates an ethic of fullness, but the economy needs emptiness… Gratitude doesn’t send you out shopping to find satisfaction; it comes as a gift rather than a commodity. That’s good medicine for land and people alike.”

So, while we take this season to connect to the land practices in our own lineages, educate ourselves about the Indigenous history of the lands we live on, and practice gratitude and reciprocity, we are also invited to consume with care. Supporting small businesses, Indigenous makers, and ethical producers helps strengthen local economies, reduce environmental harm, and align our spending with the relationships we want to nurture.

In this way, gratitude becomes more than a feeling – it becomes a lived practice of care and responsibility.

Find out more about the Indigenous Nations, Languages and Treaties for the land you’re on

Read about the National Day of Mourning

Watch Monique Gray Smith’s Interview for the People’s Food Summit

Read Decolonizing Thanksgiving: Celebrating Generosity Towards All, Not Abundance for a Few