Analyses of youth stories and photos revealed complex processes of and navigations between contexts of distress and strategies of resilience and well-being. The photos included places and spaces in their urban environments (buildings, youth centers, schools, street corners), people (family, friends, partners), and ceremonial or cultural objects (traditional medicines such as sage and sweetgrass, drums, powwow dresses). Although the stories and photos that youth generated were diverse and covered a wide range of topics, a central theme that emerged in both the youth photos and stories were aspects of and relations with nature or the “land.” The findings explored here focus on “meaning-making” and context-person engagements with and connections to nature, either by way of being present in nature or by connecting with land in their local urban context, and how such connections fostered resilience and well-being in various ways [43, 54, 55, 62]. At the same time, we highlight how these connections helped young people cope with various stressors or difficult situations they may encounter and navigate on a day-to-day basis. Here we focus on three of the main themes and processes that emerged from the youth photos and follow-up talking-circle interviews: (1) nature as a calming place; (2) building metaphors of resilience; and (3) providing a sense of hope. Selected photos from the youth participants (Figs. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 and 8) that correspond with and emphasize their thematic excerpts from the interviews are interspersed throughout.
Nature as a calming place
For the youth in this research, nature generally involved aspects of their local environment unaffected by human intervention, design, or technology—the trees, plants, water, different seasons, animals, birds and other natural elements. Nature was primarily a positive force in the lives of these young people that was seen to drive away or protect them from negative experiences that they had to deal with at different points in their lives. When they are in the presence of nature or absorbed by natural environments within the city, the youth spoke about how it helped them to reduce stress, be distracted from pain or discomfort, and made them feel a deeper connection with their loved ones. In this way, the presence of nature brought about perceptual and emotional shifts towards a more calming and positive state of being. As one youth expressed, “When I’m upset, I think about stuff, like the water. To me, this kind of reconnects me. And at times, I let off steam by going for walks by the river…and here I feel happy, happy with Mother Nature.” As another youth similarly shared,
Whenever I’m like feeling really down or I just need to get away from everyone and just focus on myself, I go for long walks. And it’s really nice because I really appreciate nature and everything. So, it’s really calming.
Similarly, while many young people provided rich descriptions about the beauty and sight of nature, the sound of nature was also expressed as comforting. As another youth described,
When I am mad, it is nice when I just come down here by the river, ‘cuz like I said earlier, like it cools me down since my dad left. And sometimes I just take my shoes off and walk in the water, and then just listen to the water—splash in it sometimes like that’s what my dad and I used to do. So, it calms me down (Fig. 1).
To this young person, living without a father figure and not having a close family structure was the root of much anger, stress, and worries in life. As a kid, his dad used to take him by the river and play with him while going for long walks. Since his dad passed away, life has been harder for him. This youth expressed deep struggles at school, with other family members, and being teased and bullied by other youth. As a result, he regrettably at times takes out his frustrations on those around him, including family members, his girlfriend, teachers, or other students. Amid all these life struggles, connecting to nature and being by the river, in particular, was described as an important calming natural place that provided a sense of peace and positive memory. This sentiment was not unique, but was reflected in several youth narratives and photos. As another youth outlined,
I really like that I took pictures by downtown and by the river landing, because that’s where I like to go when I’m stressed out or just like my alone time. I just really like it. The sky itself is really blue and it gets like lighter. It’s really beautiful and calming (Fig. 2).
These experiences and narratives expressed by the young people we worked with reveal deep connections to nature—represented often by the land and river—and thereby illustrate how positive, meaningful relationships between their interactions with natural environments and their well-being can occur within urban contexts. The feelings of calming serenity which nature offers cannot be derived by attending support programs alone, socializing with friends or family, or even participating in cultural activities and school initiatives. Rather, it is the person-context interactions of young people with nature and the "land" in their urban contexts that animated meaning-making processes and emotional shifts towards more positive and calming affective experiences.
Building metaphors of resilience
For the youth in this study, nature is also seen as a spiritual force that can guide people to do or not do certain actions in life. In most cases, the youth described such images, stories, or teachings coming to them from nature as a lived and embodied metaphor [55]. This notion is also expressed by Gregory Cajete as a “nature or metaphoric mind,” wherein he suggested that “as the rational mind develops, the metaphoric mind slowly recedes into the subconscious” where it lies dormant until “its skills are called upon by the creative play and imaginative reverie, or in dreams and stories” ([25], p. 28). Interactions with and connections to nature here thus become one such meaning-making process to awaken the imaginative stories and creative interplay supporting youth well-being within their inner-city environments. Metaphor thus involves a process of discovery or invention, and is essentially a creative meaning-making process that can become a tool for working with challenging experiences [55]. In this way, metaphors can also be thought of as being embodied insofar as they provide idiosyncratic ways of acting on representations and of making presentations to others that link individual acts with collective sense-making [54].
Reflecting this notion of embodied metaphor, one youth for example felt that the season of fall—with the brightly colour leaves falling from the trees—represented new beginnings and an opportunity to start over or “re-do” previous hardships or negative life experiences. This metaphor, at times, offered peace to her mind, made her feel rested, and gave her an inner sense of strength, despite unexpressed anger from a disturbing childhood. As she shared,
In this photo, I wanted to show how the leaves have fallen and now they are resting, and I was just sitting there and resting with them and feeling at peace. Because I am settled here, kind of like how the leaves are settled. I feel more connected to myself. I don’t feel lost and angry, like how I did as a kid. Seeing this in nature helped me see this in myself (Fig. 3).
Meaningful person-context engagements with nature and the different transformations of the seasons of the year were often seen and expressed as powerful metaphors and guides informing particular cultural practices and ways of action. When the time of the winter solstice appears (often a time of reflection in Cree culture), for example, young people often interchangeably felt more “closed,” “dark,” and “cold,” as the snow covers their environment. Yet, no matter how dark and cold the winter may be, the youth outlined and recalled how “there will always be a springtime to follow.” Drawing on this imagery, the youth often connected how in life there may be high points and low points, but Natural Law continues to advance and “things will work out,” that “life continues to move forward,” and “changes and grows.” The spring, then, can often embody and reflect metaphorically the flux of life as experienced by youth, and how to prepare or act with hope to the future amidst such aspects of change and transformation. In this spring season (often known as the renewal time of year), the leaves are growing back on the trees and there is more light and hours in the day. In this way, spring can be a reminder that any darkness in one’s life is always temporary and to be ready and adjust in such a way to explore and maximise the long hours of the day in order to accomplish goal. As another youth expressed,
In the spring, when you see the leaves budding, it’s the preparation for change. Preparation for change...it just means new growth, new opportunity. So, it’s like the beginning of these goals that we intend to do through this stretch of time where the sun is closest to us (Fig. 4).
Again, for this young person, seeing the trees change with the onset of each season shows that the world around him is regenerating and resilient. Natural Law and spiritual interactions with nature then teaches him to be resilient and to know that change and renewal are a natural cyclical aspect of life. These embodied metaphors of seasonal change have helped this youth adapt to changes and “go with the flow” of the seasons. As another youth similarly elaborated,
Seeing the trees change shows change in life because it identifies the seasons … A tree changes or dies out in the winter or these cycles that make life evident, and shows us that regrowth is possible because it comes back every year … Just that comfort in knowing that the nature around me is resilient, so I must be resilient.
Herein, just like an Elder that guides and gives youth spiritual teachings and lessons in life, relationships with nature, represented by the seasons, is also acting as a teacher for these young people. The teachings learned through person-context contact with and meaning-making observations of nature within an urban landscape are seen as important for these young people—as they can guide and support youth that face and cope with the daily struggles of inner-city life.
As mentioned, although youth engagements with land and nature support aspects of resilience and emotional well-being, there is also a complexity in such human-nature relations that can have negative influences as well. Given the cyclicality of seasons and the changing patterns of vulnerability or adversity reflected therein, many young people described the physical burden of colder Canadian prairie seasons on the body as well as the emotional burden of family grief in the winter. “Winter is a hard time for me” as one youth shared, “it’s a time where everything slows down, and we can become isolated and lonely sometimes” (Fig. 5). Or as another expressed, “The cold outside sometimes makes the people cold inside, less willing to stop and say hi, you know.” Despite these expressions, however, youth again described a capacity to act when referring to how colder seasons prompted a shift into an embodied “survival mode.” In this way, youth displayed processes of “surviving” or resilience that can protect or support them from the physical, emotional, and metaphorical burdens or experiences of winter, while also providing imagery of impermanence inherent within life’s challenges.
Providing a sense of hope
Building on these ideas of an embodied metaphor and meaning-making processes, another theme of nature-person interactions that emerged from the youth photos and stories involved providing a sense of hope. The notion of “hope” here was primarily about a future time orientation where youth looked beyond current challenges to hoped-for positive opportunities [18]. For one youth in particular, nature in the form of a bird reminds her that life is not a straight road, but that obstacles and challenges will always exist, but can be overcome. As she illustrated,
But when I see these ducks being in relationship, I’m all like oh, they are living life, being all cute. I think ducks mate for life, and they are just happy little ducks here in this photo They have like this positive little bond of being cute little ducks swimming along, just living life (Fig. 6).
For this youth, she had been in previous unhealthy relationships, which constitutes the primary reason for her ups and downs in life. During her high school days, she got into her first relationship at 17 years old. As she explained, her boyfriend controlled her life. She was abused mentally, emotionally, and eventually it got to the extent of sexual abuse. It was a negative relationship which made her feel sad and upset about life, a story not uncommon among the youth in this research. As a result, she lost concentration in school and was completely consumed with her own issues and negativity. Feeling embarrassed and ashamed, she kept these situations to herself, and never spoke about these challenges with friends in school or family members. This was one of her lowest times in life. Despite facing these challenges, however, the thought and interactions with ducks and animals living in nature, gave her a sense of hope to believe that healthy relationships can exist. To this youth, nature became a model or teacher for healthy relationships, which brought an important sense of hope and positivity into her life.
In a similar way, other youth described a sense of hope through the imagery of a tree. Just as the tree grows by branching out and expanding, these youth expressed that they should not give up in the face of difficulty but let their experience “branch out” to avoid hitting a “bump” in the road of life. As one youth explained,
The tree grows with you. Like, as you’re going along with life you may hit a bump in the road, and you’ll go one way as a result. And then when you come back, like you’ll keep making branches along the way. And since that’s your life, the trees need all those branches to live, so then they go all the way up … So, you need all the bad stuff in your life to just be able to learn and go through … it’s never like the end because you still have a lot more growing personally (Fig. 7).
For this young person and others like him, he had experienced tough phases in life which he termed as “blockages” that prevented him from seeing the future and living the life he wanted. As a young teenager, his one-month old cousin had a stroke. During this entire period of ill-health, the cousin was the focus of everyone in the family. Along with his mom, they would always visit him both at home and at the hospital making sure and providing everything he needed. He was equally the babysitter that would take care of all the other children around the home. Constantly thinking about the cousin’s situation, whether he was alive or if the night before was going to be last time he was ever going to see him, he lost focus on school and on other aspects of life. He felt extremely upset at the situation and eventually stopped building friendships or even hanging around friends. About a year after the cousin’s birth, he ultimately passed on. This was the hardest time, indeed, truly a rough and hectic period for him. As much as it was difficult, this experience was seen and interpreted as an important life lesson and meaning-making process. Having the knowledge and imagery of the tree in mind and how it grows through “bumps” and “struggles” was really important for this youth, as it made him more at peace with the negative experience, feeling less angry, and allowed him to focus on his future. Even though he went through a rough path, he chose not to give up, but instead “branched out” and, like the different branches of the trees, moved out and grew in different directions.
Along these same lines, another young person illustrated how cultural teachings of hope for the future reinforce human-nature embodied relations through a sacred turtle shell gifted to him. The turtle shell also connected this youth to processes of gift giving, traditional dancing, expressing cultural pride, and learning more about the “land”:
This is my shield for my outfit – this turtle shell. It was given to me as a gift because I didn’t have a shield and a lady recognized it. I use it a lot. It’s a very nice gift. I like dancing [powwow] with it. I get a lot of good comments about it. A lot of people admire the turtle because, Turtle Island represents our mother, you know like Mother Nature, and I’m just going to take care of it and keep it close because it was given to me for a reason (Fig. 8).
Through these teachings, the young person’s relationship with nature in general, and the sacred turtle shell in particular, provides “reason” or purpose to warrant renewal, growth, thriving, and resilience. This young person demonstrated how spiritual connections to nature and “land” become embodied through cultural teachings that extend place to include “Turtle Island,” which encompasses not only Saskatoon but the entire North American continent. This extension shows how youth can make or create space for culturally rooted stories, teachings, and conceptions of land and nature to function materially and spiritually within urban cityscapes, and thus becomes an important strategy of identity re-creation and hope for the future [28].