Motivational Speaking

Keynote Descriptions

Igniting Healing through Storytelling
Many times, on our healing journeys we must pause and ask ourselves: what is holding us back? What prevents us from letting go of past wounds so that we can move forward in a good way, untethered from the pain, hurt, or trauma? Often, the answer is: fear. But fear provides us with an opportunity to pause, take stock, and reflect on the present moment.

Learn how to tap into the power of F.E.A.R by letting your heartwork lead you. Join Tanaya as she weaves resilience and empowerment into her storytelling and performance. Discover how you can use storytelling as a healing tool that allows us to plant seeds of resilience that blossom into ancestral strength and liberation.

Being Brave: The Power of Knowing Who You Are
What does it mean to be “brave?” How do we incorporate those characteristics in a culturally responsive way? In this talk, Tanaya Winder guides students through what it means to honor our vessels with a “six directions” mindset, connecting our emotional, physical, mental, social, spiritual, and environmental selves. Through storytelling, Tanaya will offer tips on put that honor into practice by walking students through what it means to embrace resilience. 

As a result of the Being Brave keynote, attendees will learn:

  • grounding techniques that tap into the strength and resilience of Indigenous communities
  • how to activate mindfulness in your everyday life
  • how to expand on our understanding of bravery and fear

Heartspeak: Honoring Your Voice
Tap into your strength and rediscover how powerful you are when you combine your purpose with passion. In this keynote, award-winning poet, recording artist and activist, Tanaya Winder will share her inspirational journey of finding her path to art which includes changing her career goals from becoming a lawyer to becoming a poet. Tanaya has a unique background in spoken-word and performance, and has studied with such luminaries as Gabrielle Calvacorressi, Eavan Boland, Joy Harjo, and Li-Young Lee. Around the world she helps writers find the courage to speak. Audience members are sure to be inspired to embrace the way creativity shows up in their everyday lives. 

As a result of the Heartspeak: Honoring Your Voice keynote, participants will learn: 

  • the importance of accessing your most authentic voice.
  • the significance of heartspeak in honoring your life’s path

Words as Seeds 
How do words shape and mold us into the people we become? When we think of words as seeds, we become even more aware of the intention behind words that are planted with positivity and those that cause harm.

Indigenous storyteller, Tanaya Winder will offer testimony on the power of words and their impact on our spirit’s traumas and triumphs. This walk through a garden of a lifetime of seeds planted both in her lifetime and intergenerationally will illuminate struggles of seeds that never blossomed and the celebration of the seeds that burst through barriers. Discover how you can overcome obstacles, and turn struggle, pain, and wounds into power.

As a result of the Words as Seeds keynote, participants will learn: 

  • how to apply storytelling methods in your life
  • how to examine the inequities that have impacted you
  • the importance of being grounded
  • how to identify ways to plant seeds of positivity in your life 

The Healing of Heartwork: Harnessing the Fire Within 
In this keynote, Indigenous storyteller Tanaya Winder will talk about the significance of “heartwork” and how embacing that heartwork can be life-changing. Through stories, Tanaya will provide insight into the importance of revisiting our pasts in order to ground ourselves so that we can navigate our futures. You’ll learn more about the power of words and their ability to empower us to honor our heartwork through empathy, compassion, respect, reciprocity, and love. The Healing of Heartwork weaves together experience and lessons that built a person and asks the listener to do the same: search for building blocks and burst through barriers. Audience members are sure to leave this talk with their passion reignited. 

As a result of the Healing of Heartwork keynote, participants will learn: 

  • the concept of “heartwork” and identify ways you engage in practicing “heartwork” in your own work/profession/life
  • how storytelling can be a lifelong processing tool
  • what it means to use your gifts to ignite sparks of healing in others. 

W(hole)heartedly
We continually try to exist, live, and love in a world that doesn’t always reciprocate or show its love for us. So how do you show up knowing your strength, creativity, and overall well-being are crucial to your continued growth?

Showing up authentically and w(hole)heartedly requires learning to un-learn unhealthy coping mechanisms; learning how to turn past historical, ancestral, and personal traumas on their heads, upside down, and inside out to then lift it up as something changed and transformed.

This transformation can only happen when you prioritize making time to check-in with yourself; this is a revolutionary act of self-love. Ask yourself: what does it mean to show up fully and w(hole)heartedly each day in this journey of life.

As a result of the W(hole)heartedly keynote, participants will learn: 

  • techniques for filling your cup
  • the importance of gifting yourself time to assess and harness your energy
  • how to build your capacity for self-love

Examples of Previous Talks

  • TEDxABQ – Igniting Healing. Popejoy Hall at University of New Mexico.
  • What’s Fear Got to Do with It? – 26th annual Basketball Against Drugs and Alcohol (BAAD) Tournament. Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation. Pendleton, OR.
  • Keynote Speaker. Inter-Tribal Council of Nevada, Inc. 48th Annual Convention. Reno. NV.
  • Featured Artist. COLORES KNME New Mexico PBS. Albuquerque, NM
  • Keynote Speaker. YWCA New Mexico Women in Leadership. Albuquerque, NM.
  • 2018  –Keynote. MMIW Awareness Week, University of South Dakota, Vermillion, SD
  • 2018 –Keynote. Urban Native Education Conference, Chicago, IL
  • 2018 – Keynote. American Educational Research Association’s Indigenous Peoples of Americas (IPA) and Indigenous Peoples of the Pacific (IPP) Pre-conference, NYC
  • 2018 – Keynote. American College Personnel Association (ACPA), Houston, TX
  • 2017  – Escalante Canyon Arts Festival, Escalante, UT
  • 2017   –Building Bridges, University of South Dakota, Vermillion, SD
  • 2017 – Poetry Out Loud State Finals, Bismarck, ND
  • 2017  – Native Education Raising Dedicated Students (NERDS), Jackson, CA
  • 2016 – Native American Community Academy, Albuquerque, NM.
  • 2016  – Annual Tulalip Wellness Conference, Tulalip, WA.
  • 2016 – Native Education Forum, Colorado State University. Fort Collins, CO
  • 2016 – Symposium of the American Indian, Northeastern State Univ. Tahlequah, OK.
  • 2016 – Building Bridges Conference, University of South Dakota, Vermillion, SD.
  • 2016  – Las Vegas Higher Education, Las Vegas, NV.
  • 2016  – St. Louis College of Pharmacy, St. Louis, MO.
  • 2016  – Indigenous Book Fair, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, NM.
  • 2016  – American Indian College Fund. Denver, CO
  • 2015 – Humboldt State University. Arcata, CA
  • 2015 –  United States Department of State. Washington, DC
  • 2015  – University of Illinois-Chicago. Chicago, IL
  • 2015  – Fanshawe College. London, Ontario, Canada
  • 2015  – Western University. London, Ontario, Canada
  • 2015  – Cal Poly Pomona. Pomona, CA
  • 2015  – National Indian Education Association. Portland, OR
  • 2015  –  Montessori in the Mountains. Estes Park, CO
  • 2015  – Keynote, STEAM-H, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, NM.
  • 2015  – Keynote, 3rd Annual Prevention Conference. Tulalip, WA
  • 2015  – Presenter, Youth Event. Leech Lake, MN
  • 2015  – Panelist, Indigenous Writers Caucus, Association of Writers and Writing Programs Annual Conference. Minneapolis, MN
  • 2015 – Panelist, Diversity in Publishing, Association of Writers and Writing Programs Annual Conference. Minneapolis,MN
  • 2015  – Presenter, Beyond Bars: Working With and Against the Carceral System through Creative Writing, Color of Violence 4 Conference. Chicago, IL
  • 2015 – Featured Presenter, Basketball Against Drugs and Alcohol (BAAD) Tournament. Mission, OR.
  • 2015 – Featured Artist, Red Lake Middle School. Red Lake, MN
  • 2015  – Presenter, Sing Our Rivers Red, NDSU Fargo, ND.
  • 2015 – Keynote Speaker, Native Education Raising Dedicated Students (NERDS) 2nd Annual Conference. Jackson, California
  • 2015  – Keynote Speaker, Nevada Department of Education Annual American Indian/Alaska Native Education Summit. Reno, NV.
  • 2014  – Keynote Speaker, Gates Millennium Scholars Leadership Conference. Virginia.
  • 2014 – Keynote Speaker, Nixyaawii Community School Graduation. Pendleton, OR.
  • 2014 – Keynote Speaker, Native American Graduation. University of Colorado at Boulder. Boulder, CO.
  • 2014  -Guest Speaker, Southwest Writers Meet Up. Albuquerque, NM.
  • 2014 – Featured Artist, COLORES KNME New Mexico PBS. Albuquerque, NM.
  • 2014   – Guest Speaker, 26th Annual Basketball Against Alcohol & Drugs (BAAD) Tournament. Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation. Oregon
  • 2014 – Keynote Speaker, YWCA New Mexico Women in Leadership Brunch. Albuquerque, NM.
  • 2013 – Keynote speaker, Inter-Tribal Council of Nevada, Inc. 48th AnnualConvention. Reno, NV
  • 2013 – Proceed with Conviction Nixyaawii Community School Umatilla Reservation OR