Student wants to give back to Navajo Nation
Sheena Greenstone grew up on the Navajo Nation. That’s where she learned to listen and be listened to, simple things that would later shape her life and her goals.
It’s also where she realized she wanted to become a counselor so she could give back by sharing that gift with her community.
It wasn’t an easy road. Her dad was an alcoholic, and her parents were divorced. Growing up with that conflict, moving back and forth between their houses, she said, left her wanting someone she could share her feelings with. Someone to be there for her.
Greenstone was lucky. She ended up with not one person but several people who were there for her, a support system that helped her through hard times and set her on her path.
Her aunt, her stepdad’s sister, made her feel comfortable, even if they were just doing chores around the house. She didn’t layer on the advice or even say much — she just gave Greenstone the presence of an adult who could understand what she was going through. That, Greenstone says, was powerful.
And Greenstone’s best friend, whose parents also divorced, showered her with love and compassion born from the similarities of their situations. It was an invaluable comfort to Greenstone, who remains close with her to this day.
Greenstone remembers once, sitting in a classroom after school during their sophomore year, she and her friend were deep in conversation. Someone else nearby, who had overheard some of their discussion, leaned over and said, “Wow, you guys must be really good friends.”
Greenstone said the kinds of conversations they
had were a testament to the lifelong friendship they built.
“We didn’t have, you know, relationship issues or anything like that. It really was about trying to find peace,” she said. “The strength that I got was from her.”
Now, as a Ph.D. student at Northern Arizona University, Greenstone wants to build more skills so she can share that strength with others. She’s already done that through her work in Navajo schools and as a volunteer. Eventually, armed with another degree, she wants to connect her lifelong understanding of Navajo culture to her academic studies, blending them with traditional beliefs and practices so more people can benefit from them.
“I know counseling services are not abundant on the reservation,” she said. “If I could just do some of this on the reservation, that would be really helpful.”
Culture shock in college
After high school, Greenstone knew she wanted to go to college. No one in her family had earned a four-year degree, and as a first generation student, she was motivated to use what she learned when she returned.
But she experienced a deep sense of culture shock when she arrived at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. She had grown up in such a rural setting, and now she was in the heart of a city, among strangers. It was loud, not like the quieter places she was accustomed to.
Her first semester was lonely, she said. She felt isolated, depressed.
Then she found a Native American students’ association, where she met friends from a wide range of Indigenous cultures. That, she says, was one of the most profound experiences she’s ever had.
“I (had) never been more proud of my cultural identity and heritage until that point,” she said. She had never before realized just how much her background shaped her worldview and decisionmaking.
When she finally got her degree, she was excited to head home and do something meaningful.
Back on the Navajo Nation, she started working with students, first at the Shonto Preparatory School and then at NATIVE, the Northeast Arizona Technological Institute of Vocational Education.
At her first school, she assisted the residential director in a dormitory. Then she became an administrative assistant, helping the superintendent at NATIVE enhance Career Technical Education programs. That work fulfilled her, she says, and she still loves seeing the students she worked with.
“Every now and then, if I see these students, it’s such (an) overwhelming feeling of … love, and so much understanding of what they’ve been through and how far they’ve come,” she said. “So that was totally the best part of it.”
That experience also reignited her passion for becoming a fully fledged school counselor, she said, so when she saw NAU’s doctorate program, she applied. When she was accepted to the competitive program, she realized just how far she’d come.
“I was really grateful,” she said. “And I remember talking to a professor, and one of the things I said was, ‘I feel like I’m exactly where I need to be right now.’”
Volunteering and preparing for the future
Now, as part of her course of study, Greenstone volunteers with the Northern Arizona Cancer Support Community in Flagstaff, where she runs one meeting group for breast cancer patients and another specifically for Native American cancer patients.
She loves fostering those discussions, especially in the Native American support group, where she can give people a place to explore cultural similarities, talk openly about their challenges and find others to recognize and bear witness to their diagnoses.
It’s a chance, she says, for people to realize they aren’t alone.
Mirroring her own past, Greenstone says people often don’t necessarily want advice or solutions. They just want to be seen and heard. They want someone to listen.
As someone with an Indigenous heritage, she said she has seen the importance of noticing cultural overlaps between the philosophies she grew up with and what she’s studying now. Practices involving sweat lodges, ceremonies and music, for example, are all ways of practicing mindfulness. Medicine men — like her late father and grandfather — don’t just ask about physical ailments, but mental ones, too. They implicitly value the connection between mind and body.
They might not have used the same terminology as Western psychology, but Greenstone has realized that her elders and ancestors incorporated important tools for well being into their traditions.
That’s something she wants to incorporate into her practice in the future, bridging her experiences with her present expertise. When she eventually becomes a counselor in her community, she plans to do that.
“Having a cultural identity and a cultural knowledge and teaching is not a bad thing, it’s a good thing,” she said. “And it’s a source of pride and it’s a source of strength. It’s a source of endurance.
“It can really guide you through life. And it’s something to be very proud of.”
Melina Walling is a general assignment reporter based in Phoenix. She is drawn to stories about interesting people, scientific discoveries, unusual creatures and the hopeful, surprising and unexpected moments of the human experience. You can contact her via email at mwalling@gannett.com or on Twitter @MelinaWalling.