I Was Addicted to Text Wins

Perfect UN language means nothing without these things.

Good morning,

Sorry to drop this question before Christmas. But, I need to ask you this.

What if the way we talk about Indigenous rights is actually keeping us from protecting Indigenous lives?

I know that sounds wrong.
But stay with me. Let me explain.

We have spent decades building this language. UNDRIP. FPIC. Self-determination. These frameworks matter. They are the foundation of everything we do in international spaces.

But here is what I see. We have gotten so good at winning text that we forgot to ask: What happens after the text passes?

We celebrate when a CBD decision includes “Indigenous Peoples” not Indigenous and local communities. We feel victorious when FPIC gets mentioned in a climate text after 2 weeks of blood sweat and tears.

And then we go home. We may write a press release, or some fancy post on LinkedIn but then…usually, nothing changes.

Not because the language was wrong. But because we treated the language as the destination instead of the starting point.

The Pattern I Had to Unlearn

I admit, I used to be addicted to text wins.

Dopamine levels spike when you’re seeing brackets around UNDRIP finally drop. When your text proposal survives. When the final document says what you fought for it to say.

That feeling is real. That feeling matters. I am not going to pretend it does not.

But that feeling is also dangerous.

Because while we are celebrating the language victory, our communities are still waiting for that victory to reach them. And the gap between what we won in the text and what people experience on the ground is getting wider every year.

After COP29’s conclusion of Article 6 I asked myself a hard question:

How many of the wins I celebrated actually changed something for the Indigenous Peoples who were not already in the room?

The honest answer made me uncomfortable.

Most of the time, I was winning language that would be useful to people who already knew how to use language. Indigenous leaders who were already connected. Already resourced. Already inside the system.

But the 99,99% that needed protection most? The ones facing conflict, extraction, displacement? They did not even know the process existed. Let alone how to use what we won.

That is when I realized I was building the right building, but without a driveway.

The Wakanda Problem

Here is the metaphor I keep coming back to.

I can build Wakanda. But if there is no way for people to reach Wakanda, then it is just negotiations for ego.

Think about it. Wakanda is the most advanced civilization on earth. Technology that makes the rest of the world look primitive. Protection that keeps its people safe. Sovereignty that is real, not performed.

But what makes Wakanda matter is not just what happens inside its borders. It is whether the people who need it can actually get there.

So I do not negotiate for negotiation’s sake anymore. Going into 2026 it’s all about architecture now.

That does not mean I stopped building Wakanda. I am building it. Every time I fight for Indigenous participation language in a treaty, I am building Wakanda. Every time I push for FPIC to be operationalized instead of just mentioned, I am building Wakanda.

But I am also building its airport. Its road. Its seaport.

Because what good is the most advanced city in the world if the people who need it most cannot get there?

This is the shift I want emerging Indigenous leaders to understand. The text is not the win. The text is the blueprint. The win is when a community that has never heard of the process can use what you built to protect themselves.

The 80/20 That Changed How I Work

Here is what I have come to believe after years of doing this work.

International advocacy is 20% of what is necessary.

The other 80% is building the pipeline that makes it matter for Indigenous Peoples on the ground.

I know this sounds backwards. We are trained to think the UN room is where the action is. That is where the cameras point. That is where the statements get made. That is where the text gets decided.

But the UN room is just the factory. It produces language. What happens to that language after it leaves the factory? That is what determines whether any of this matters.

Geneva can produce beautiful resolutions. New York can pass historic declarations. But if there is no infrastructure connecting that language to communities who can use it, we are just generating content for ourselves.

Content for reports. Content for citations. Content for academics who will write about what we won.

But not content for protection. Not content for survival. Not content that changes what happens when power shows up at someone’s door.

What I Am Actually Building

That is why I am doing what I am doing. Let me be specific.

In BBNJ, I am building a participation pipeline with the High Seas Alliance. Monthly workshops. Building up the Pacific Indigenous caucus for COP1.

We just had our BBNJ 101 call this month. Not a strategy session for people who already understand the process. A 101 call. The basics. What is BBNJ. Why does it matter for Indigenous Peoples. How do you even get in the room.

The next one is in January. And we are building up from there.

This is not advocacy. This is infrastructure. A repeatable system that brings our people into the room prepared, not panicked. A pipeline that does not depend on who happens to know who. A pathway that exists whether I am there or not.

In Article 6, I am developing a journey for Indigenous Peoples to help them understand the 6.4 carbon market architecture and how to navigate it.

Because carbon markets are coming whether we are ready or not. Money is going to flow into Indigenous territories for carbon credits. That is not a prediction. That is already happening.

And if our communities do not have the tools to navigate consent processes before the money arrives, the money will navigate them. Project developers will show up with contracts. Governments will show up with frameworks. And our communities will be asked to sign things they do not fully understand, for processes they did not know existed, with consequences that will last generations.

In the same vein, I’ve developed with my traditional council a handbook that helps a tired you guide a group of Indigenous leaders step-by-step to a very strong FPIC protocol.

The FPIC manual is not a document. It is a journey. A pathway that takes your elders from “I have never heard of FPIC” to “I understand what is being asked of me and I can make an informed decision about whether to say yes.”

That is infrastructure. That is the 80%.

Why This Is Hard

Now, I want to be honest about something.
The 80% work is harder than the 20% work.

Advocacy is visible. You give a statement. You negotiate a bracket. You get quoted in a report. People see you doing the work. People (might) thank you for doing the work.

Diplomacy is similar but different.

But, infrastructure is invisible. You run a workshop that five people attend. You build a manual that sits in an inbox. You answer the same basic questions over and over again because every new person who enters the space needs to start from zero.

Nobody gives you an award for running a Zoom call at 11PM. Nobody invites you to speak on a panel about the FPIC protocol journey you are building. Nobody writes articles about the participation pipeline you are constructing.

But that is where the work actually happens.

I have had to make peace with this. The most important work I do is the work that does not get seen. The work that does not get celebrated. The work that builds something that will outlast me.

As you can tell I’m not an academic.
I’m an operator.

And this is the operator shift. From moments to machines. From wins to systems.
From being in the room to building the road that brings others into the room.

Before You Go

Let me share how I think about what I see. Maybe it will help you think about yours.

I start with vision. What is the world I am trying to build? For me, it is Wakanda. Indigenous sovereignty that is real, not performed. Protection that actually protects. Participation that is structural, not decorative.

At the UN, my purpose is simple: Make Indigenous participation as logical as gravity.

Then I ask: What text do I need to make that vision possible? What language needs to exist in which reports, which frameworks, which decisions? That is the 20%. That is the negotiation work.

But here is where most people stop. They win the text and think the work is done.

I ask a third question: What architecture do I need to build so that people can actually reach the vision? What is the road? The airport? The seaport? Meaning: What systems need to exist so that your friend that has never heard of what we do can use what we won?

That is the 80%. That is the pipeline work. That is what turns language into protection.

Vision. Text. Architecture.

If you are missing any of the three, you are not building anything that lasts.

So here is my question for you at the end of 2026:

What is the 80% work you have been avoiding? What pipeline have you not built because the 20% work feels more visible, more urgent, more rewarding?

Reply and tell me. I cannot write back to everyone, but I read every response.

That is all for this week.

See you next Saturday.