Common Cultural Characteristics of Native Americans
Respect for family values defines the culture of Native Americans. For instance, values required family members to support one another in solving problems. Moreover, in worshipping and family functions, family values among the natives require them to perform the roles together. In comparison with how I view the world, I believe that both Native Americans and other ethnicities globally have family structures, norms, policies, and beliefs that govern the operations of everyone. For instance, Christians, Asians, and Africans, among other ethnicities, have family values that require them to approach socioeconomic issues with solidarity and unity.
The Native Americans also believe in the sacredness and holiness of nature. This makes the community emphasize the importance of being in harmony and peace with nature. For instance, native Americans have sacred and worshiping places in natural settings such as trees, rivers, and lakes. In addition, the community believes they have sacred roles of conserving the living and non-living components of the environment because of their supremacy. In comparing this cultural characteristic with how I view the world, I believe that people from other cultures also view nature as sacred and holy. This explains why the major social, economic, and political groups worldwide emphasize the importance of conserving the environment for future generations.
The cultural characteristics of Native Americans also include respect for others’ autonomy. The value requires Native Americans to practice non-interference with the affairs of others in the community. This makes the community among those that value independent decision-making among its members. Compared with how I perceive the world, communities globally also value the independence of one another in decision-making. This explains why there is robust respect for stakeholders’ autonomy in decision-making in political, social, and other settings globally.
Common Strengths and Protective Factors for Native Americans
The common strengths of Native Americans’ culture include endurance of suffering, collectivism, and belief in family values. These cultural attributes of the community support members of the ethnic group to value collective decision-making. The values also support Native Americans in solving community problems communicably. These include problems resulting from natural disasters, diseases, death, famine, war, et cetera that the common strengths help Native Americans to solve effectively.
Barriers to Counselling Among Native Americans
The non-interference with others or respect for independent decision-making among Native Americans is among the primary barriers to counseling members from this ethnicity. This is a barrier to counseling since it discourages Native Americans from convincing others to change their mindsets, thoughts, and reasoning about specific phenomena. As a result, the value may also prevent Native Americans from listening to advice provided by their counselors. Moreover, the value may also be a hindrance for Native Americans to apply the advice from counselors to solve major life and social issues affecting them, such as health, sex, marriage, and conflict problems.
Language differences may also be a major barrier to counseling among Native Americans. This is because the community has different tribes and subtribes with different dialects used in communication. The variations in vocabulary and languages used by Native Americans and counselors from different communities may affect the quality of the counseling process. This may lead to misinterpretation of information passed from the counselors to Native Americans. Similarly, the language barrier may prevent counselors from effectively understanding the problems of Native Americans during therapy sessions.
A Counselor’s Actions to Alleviate the Cultural Barriers
A counselor can manage the cultural barriers of the Native Americans during psychotherapy through multicultural counseling training. In this sense, the training will help a consoler develop culturally appropriate counseling skills and self-awareness. This will be key in delivering culturally sensitive and inclusive counseling services to Native Americans. Moreover, the approach will build trust and understanding, eliminating fear among Native Americans during counseling.