Philosophy

Our experience–and more importantly, research–has confirmed the vital nature of a culturally relevant approach when assisting and educating Native American individuals and families.

For this purpose, NAFFA’s approach is based on a culturally rich model that inspires and motivates fathers and mothers to devote their best efforts to teaching and raising children to develop their potential and the attributes needed for success in life.

In our efforts to help people, we often move away from two important necessary elements:

• Truly loving the people whom you serve.
  Why love? Love starts the healing process. It repairs relationships, bonds and unity become stronger, and positive change happens for growth and development.
• Loving what you bring to the people you serve.
  Love is the power that initiates, motivates, and inspires change. It starts feelings of understanding, respect, and tolerance.

These elements are absolutely essential in strengthening the desire for positive change. But don’t just take our word for it. Decades of scientific evidence have discovered what we all intuitively know: that all human beings have the need to feel loved and respected.

It is also just as important to understand that real and lasting change must come from within.

Again, studies and our own experience confirm that outside pressure rarely changes a person. For example, let’s take a young person who may start using alcohol and drugs as a teenager. Their parents and family ask, plead, demand, and even threaten them to try to make them stop, but their behavior continues. A few years pass and now this young person has a spouse making the same request. Again, the behavior continues and a few more years pass. Now the children are the ones making the request, but still, the behavior continues. How often have you seen this scenario played out?

So, how is real change achieved? Filling life with hope, gratitude, and understanding has a powerful effect on changing attitudes and behavior. There is no better way. Our program inspires and ignites self-motivation through natural techniques in bringing change to a person.

NAFFA’s approach is simply bringing back an old message for a happy life that emphasizes the true need for families and the critical importance of loving and devoted parents. Numerous studies demonstrate that understanding one’s self-worth and the value one brings to their family will change their very nature, drawing them closer to loved ones.

The Fatherhood Is Sacred and Motherhood Is Sacred® Program is about change and improvement in one’s self. Self Worth, Identity, and Purpose are the three pillars. These pillars’ primary purpose is to strengthen families, keep families together, and reunite families.