5 beliefs that kept me stuck (and probably keep you stuck too)
On limiting beliefs at UNPFII week 1 and lessons for week 2.
Happy Saturday,
Someone came up to me at lunch on Wednesday.
Young delegate. Second time at the UNPFII. She’d done everything right. Prepared her intervention. Coordinated with youth caucus. Delivered it well. Sat down.
Then she asked me: “Did any of that actually do anything? Or did I just talk into a room that forgot me five minutes later?”
I didn’t have a comfortable answer. Because I remember asking myself the same thing.
Your first time at the UN, you’re just trying to figure out where the rooms are. You find your caucus. You deliver your intervention. You meet people. You go home exhausted and proud. That’s how it should be. First time is about showing up.
Second time is different.
Second time, you start asking harder questions. And if you’re asking those questions, good. That means you’re paying attention.
Here are five beliefs I carried into rooms for way too long. They felt like wisdom. They worked like cages. You’re probably carrying some of them too.
“If I explain our situation clearly enough, they’ll act.”
You walk into the room. You testify. Land taken. Rights violated. Communities destroyed. You make it vivid. Undeniable. You sit down.
Nothing happens.
Not because they didn’t hear you. They heard you. They just didn’t move.
The room doesn’t move because you described harm. The room moves when you give it something to act on. A recommendation it can adopt. A paragraph it can include.
If your intervention ends with “this must stop” and nothing else, you described the problem. You didn’t give anyone a move.
“If I can’t control how this ends, I shouldn’t get involved.”
You’ll feel this when something big comes up. A new treaty. A court process. Something where you don’t know how it plays out.
The fear makes sense. We’ve been burned. Processes that promised inclusion and delivered extraction.
So the instinct kicks in: If I can’t control it, stay out.
But that’s paralysis. Every arena worth entering has risk. The question isn’t whether there’s risk. The question is whether you’ve prepared for it.
“Our rights are safer if we leave them vague.”
This sounds protective. That’s why it’s dangerous.
The Declaration exists. States call it aspirational. Non-binding. They use the vagueness to avoid doing anything.
Some of us think: At least the text is intact. If we push for clarity, we might lose what we have.
But the vagueness isn’t protecting us. It’s protecting them.
States are using it right now to water down FPIC. To shrink self-determination into cultural autonomy. To lump Indigenous Peoples in with stakeholders and local communities.
The rights are eroding while we hold still.
“The Permanent Forum can’t really do anything.”
You’ll hear this in the hallways. “PFII just makes recommendations.” “Nothing here is binding.”
All true. So what?
No single institution does everything. PFII can create a signal. A signal lets diplomats take something to capitals. Capitals start conversations. Conversations build coalitions.
If you wait for the perfect institution, you wait forever. And while you wait, people who don’t wait are moving.
“If we move fast, we’ll divide ourselves.”
This one is real.
We’ve seen what happens when a small group moves without consulting. Elite capture. Regional exclusion. Processes that claim to speak for everyone but don’t.
So the instinct becomes: slow down. Wait for full consensus.
But consensus can become a cage too.
Moving fast doesn’t have to mean captured. You can build a process that’s regional, multilingual, transparent, hard to capture.
The answer isn’t paralysis. The answer is better architecture.
Before you go.
You’re getting ready for week 2. You want this time to count. Run through this:
I have a specific outcome I want this session. A sentence. A seat. A procedural change. Not just an issue.
My intervention gives the room something to act on. A recommendation. A paragraph. Not just harm described.
I know who decides what I care about. Not who speaks. Who decides.
I’ve talked to at least one of those people before the session starts.
I’m not avoiding something because it’s hard. I’ve looked at the risk and prepared.
If any box is unchecked, that’s the gap. Fix it before you travel.
Second time should be different. Make it different.
See you next week!
P.S: What is one recommendation you would put into the permanent forum report if you had the chance?
P.P.S: Did you know that I upload daily briefs here?
Here is what 5 days at the permanent forum covered:
I pitched the ICJ advisory opinion on Indigenous rights from the floor. People are still asking for copies of the statement two days later.
I showed four questions that write your UN intervention for you. Outcome, process, decision makers, what moves them.
“All protocols observed.” Four words that save you fifteen seconds every time you speak.
I prepared two statements for one speaking slot. Primary and secondary. I showed the Google Doc system my SG uses to sign off before I deliver.
I turned one existing statement into a Pacific caucus intervention without rewriting it.
Since January, UN staff and member states have asked me the same question at least ten times: What would you sacrifice to protect your mechanisms? I showed why I refuse to answer.
I brought up UN80 as the elephant in the room during the interactive dialogue. Nobody else did. Afterwards, people who were not tracking it started asking me for briefings in the hallways.
A UNPFII assessment document dropped on Monday. I explained why the timing makes it dangerous and how I decided in real time whether to address it publicly or handle it behind the scenes.
I facilitated a three-hour ICJ workshop with post-it notes. Made a sequencing mistake. The barriers exercise should come before the presentation, not after. That one change makes all the difference.
I shared the full ICJ FAQ: will it reopen the Declaration, will it divide the movement, is it too early, is the forum the right place, what if states use it against us. Ten questions, ten answers.
The expert mechanism on the right to development is meeting across the hall. AI. Durban programme of action. Nobody from the movement is going.
I explained why protecting the three mechanisms without protecting the mandates and the human rights pillar is setting them up to fail. You cannot protect the door if the house is gone.
One delegation called for a convention on Indigenous rights. I explained why that opens Pandora’s box.
Cookie cutter position papers for 476 million Indigenous Peoples do not work anymore. I showed what to do instead.