This spoken letter is in response to the Executive Summary of the Final Report of the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls. It was with a heavy heart that I read and tried to understand the injustices that thousands of Indigenous women, girls and LGBTQ2SQIA people have had to endure over the decades. While my words may offer little to change the outcome of this report, I do hope they are strong enough to help change the future. I start the letter by stating eight truths that I uncovered while reading the report. I think finding these truths and being able to articulate them to others is an important part of starting to rewrite the dominant narratives of colonization. My hope is that these truths will shock, inspire, or enrage people to uncover their own truths about Canada’s history of assimilation. Finding a starting point for reconciliation can sometimes be difficult, so throughout the letter I give suggestions of starting points that are achievable and attainable to everyone. I want those who hear my letter to be given images of strength and resiliency, to help ground them while they listen to the truths I have uncovered. I am grateful to have been recently given the Seven Sacred Teachings from an elder. I decided to use images for the first seven truths that corresponded with these teachings. These teachings represent the traditional concepts of respect and sharing. They promote a healthy lifestyle where we are in harmony with nature, our family, and our community. I also chose to use images of circles in many of the slides. This is a reminder that life is continuous, with no beginning and no end. It is a reminder that we are all connected. The last several slides are of images that have a strong connection to the Indigenous culture and their traditional teachings. I hope that these images will help ground and guide listeners while they hear the rest of the letter. I wanted to end with images of traditional medicines as a reminder to take care of oneself. As a settler, I have a lot of work ahead of me to try to understand the depth of harm that has been done to the Indigenous populations of Canada. My goal is not only to understand this depth, but also to uncover ways in which it is still happening, and ways in which I can challenge it. I hope this spoken letter will inspire others to look at the ways in their life that they can be an ally and start working towards reconciliation. SOCW 421 Student