Though there is fear, I will continue to walk 

MY TESTIMONY

Ahakoa Te Wehi, Ka Hikoi Tonu Au

Though there is fear, I will continue to walk.

Tauparapara — Opening

Ka tō te rā, ka hāpara te ata,
Ka ao, ka awatea.
Tihei mauri ora!

I am a daughter.
I am a sister.
I am a mother.
I am a wahine Māori.
I am a kaiako.
I am a mokopuna.

I am a descendant of my tūpuna.

My whakapapa connects me to Ngā Puhi, Ngāti Rahiri and Ngāti Kawa. I carry a connection to Te Tii o Waitangi, to Pouerua, and to the Waitangi awa.

These connections are more than just names to me.

They are part of who I am.

They remind me that I come from somewhere.

I belong to something.

I did not begin with myself, and I will not end with myself.

I am one link in a long line of people who came before me and those who will come after me.

When I think about my tūpuna, I think about the strength, resilience, love, courage and struggles that have been carried through generations.

I think about the things they endured and the paths they walked so that I could be here today.

I carry their blood.

I carry their stories.

I carry their strength.

And I am learning what it means to carry that whakapapa forward.

My Valley

For much of my life, I have carried things that have been heavy.

I have experienced hurt and trauma.

I have walked through seasons where I struggled with my mental health and struggled to see my own worth.

There have been times when I felt lost, broken and overwhelmed.

Times when I felt like I had lost the person I once was.

There were moments when I wondered if I would ever truly feel whole again.

There were times when I questioned my purpose.

Times when I questioned my strength.

Times when I questioned my faith.

But when I look back now, I can see something that I couldn’t always see at the time.

God was there.

Even in the moments when I couldn’t feel Him.

Even when I questioned Him.

Even when I didn’t understand why I was going through the things I was going through.

Even when my prayers felt like they were falling into silence.

I believe God was still there.

I believe He saw every tear I cried when nobody else knew.

He saw the parts of my story that I couldn’t put into words.

He knew the battles I was fighting inside myself.

And He knew the strength it took just to keep going.

There were times when I didn’t have the strength to carry myself.

But somehow, I kept going.

And now I believe that God was carrying me.

I don’t believe faith means that we will never experience hardship.

My life has taught me that faith doesn’t always mean the storm disappears.

Sometimes faith means believing that God is still with you while you are standing in the middle of the storm.

And I have walked through some storms.

But I have also learned that storms do not last forever.

My Whakapapa, My Strength

My whakapapa has been a source of strength throughout my journey.

When I feel lost, I remember who I am.

I remember my tūpuna.

I remember my whānau.

I remember the whenua.

I remember the places and people that have shaped me.

I remember my connection to Te Tii o Waitangi, my maunga Pouerua, and the Waitangi awa.

These connections remind me that I have tūrangawaewae.

I have a place where I belong.

My Māori identity is deeply connected to my healing.

I am learning that I don’t have to choose between my whakapapa and my faith.

I can honour both.

I can stand in the strength of my tūpuna while reaching towards God.

I can carry the wisdom and strength of those who came before me while trusting God with the path ahead of me.

My whakapapa reminds me where I come from.

My faith gives me hope for where I am going.

And somewhere between the two, I am learning to understand who I am.

My Tamariki

Being a mother has been one of the biggest parts of my testimony.

My five children have been some of my greatest reasons to keep going, even during the times when life felt too heavy.

They have given me a reason to keep growing.

A reason to keep healing.

A reason to keep becoming.

Each of my children has their own place in my heart and their own place in my story.

Being their mother has taught me a love that is difficult to put into words.

It has also taught me that the choices I make today can impact generations to come.

I want my children to know who they are and where they come from.

I want them to be proud of their whakapapa.

I want them to know that they carry the strength of generations before them.

I want them to know that they are deeply loved.

And I want them to know that they don’t have to carry the pain of those generations forward.

One of the greatest things I have learned through my own healing is that we can honour where we come from without allowing our past to determine where we are going.

We can break cycles.

We can choose something different.

We can heal.

And I hope that my healing becomes part of my children’s healing too.

I hope that one day, when my children look back at my life, they won’t just see the things I struggled through.

I hope they see a mother who chose to keep going.

A mother who chose to heal.

A mother who chose to find her faith.

A mother who chose to stand in her whakapapa.

A mother who chose to break cycles and create something different for her children.

The Pastures

For a long time, I didn’t understand why I became numb.

I knew I was depressed.

I knew I was struggling.

But somewhere within me, I also knew I wasn’t ready to face everything I was carrying.

My mind and my body knew before I did.

They knew there were things I could not yet process.

So they protected me.

I became numb.

And for a long time, I thought that meant something was wrong with me.

But I see it differently now.

Perhaps that numbness wasn’t weakness.

Perhaps it was survival.

Perhaps I was being given time.

Time to breathe.

Time to survive.

Time to build strength.

Time to become ready.

Psalm 23 says:

“He makes me lie down in green pastures.”

I understand those pastures differently now.

Maybe I wasn’t stuck.

Maybe I was resting.

Maybe God was giving me somewhere to rest before I was ready to walk again.

The pastures gave me time to become strong enough to face what I had been carrying.

And now I am beginning to understand that healing isn’t about rushing through everything.

Sometimes healing is resting.

Sometimes healing is asking for help.

Sometimes it is setting a boundary.

Sometimes it is choosing yourself after years of putting everyone else first.

Sometimes it is learning to say no.

Sometimes it is crying and praying and saying:

“God, I don’t know what to do anymore. I just need You to carry me.”

And sometimes healing is simply getting out of bed and deciding to try again.

Sometimes healing is realising:

I am still here.

The Turning Point

I have walked through the valley for a long time.

But the valley is not where my story ends.

I am beginning to understand that I don’t have to be fearless to move forward.

I don’t have to have everything figured out.

I don’t have to know the whole road.

I only need to take the next step.

And that is where my hikoi begins.

Te Pāo — My Hikoi

E te rangi e,
Whakatakata te hau ki te awaawa,
Ka hau ki runga o ngā maunga tapu e.
Ruru ana ngā wai o te moana,
He wai mārie taku e kimi nei,
Ahakoa te wehi, ka hikoi tonu au e.

Though there is fear, I will continue to walk.

My Hikoi

That pāo speaks to where I am now.

My first testimony is about where I have come from.

This part of my testimony is about where I am going.

I am learning to hikoi again.

I am learning to move toward the calming waters.

Toward peace.

Toward restoration.

Toward healing.

Toward becoming whole.

I know I will still experience fear.

But fear does not mean I have to stop.

I can feel fear and still hikoi.

I can be uncertain and still take the next step.

I can have moments where I need to rest without believing I have gone backwards.

Because now I understand:

I am not walking this valley alone.

My Shepherd is with me.

God is with me.

My whakapapa is with me.

My tūpuna are with me.

My whānau are with me.

And I carry my tamariki with me.

I don’t know exactly what the future holds.

But I know I don’t have to walk into it alone.

Becoming

I am still healing.

I am still learning.

I am still becoming.

I am not the same woman I was before my pain.

But I am learning that I don’t have to be.

My experiences have shaped me, but they do not define me.

My trauma is not my identity.

My struggles are not my identity.

The things that happened to me are not the end of my story.

I am a daughter.

I am a sister.

I am a mother.

I am a wahine Māori.

I am a kaiako.

I am connected to my whakapapa.

I carry the strength of my tūpuna.

I carry the love of my whānau.

And I carry my faith.

I am a woman who has been through storms and is still standing.

I am a woman who has been broken and is learning to heal.

I am a woman who has felt lost and is finding her way home.

I am a woman who has questioned God but has never completely stopped reaching for Him.

And maybe that is part of my testimony too.

My faith hasn’t always been perfect.

My journey hasn’t always been easy.

But God has never stopped being there.

I believe He has been present in the moments I recognised Him and in the moments I didn’t.

I believe He has been working in my life even when I couldn’t see what He was doing.

I believe that every time I thought I couldn’t take another step, He gave me enough strength for the next one.

Not always enough for the whole journey.

Just enough for the next step.

And maybe that’s all I needed.

The Valley Is Not My Home

I am beginning to understand something.

The valley was part of my journey.

But it is not my home.

Ko te awaawa ehara i taku kāinga.

The valley is not my home.

It is a pathway.

And I am walking through it.

I have rested in the pastures.

I have cried in the valley.

I have questioned.

I have feared.

I have survived.

And now I am learning to walk toward the still waters.

I don’t know what waits for me there.

But I know I want to walk toward it.

I want to walk toward peace.

Toward healing.

Toward purpose.

Toward the woman God created me to be.

Toward the future I want for my tamariki.

Toward a life where I don’t simply survive—

but live.

My Declaration

My whakapapa tells me where I come from.

My faith gives me hope for where I am going.

My tamariki give me reason to keep walking.

My tūpuna remind me that I carry strength.

And God reminds me that I am not walking alone.

My story is not that I have had a perfect life.

My testimony is that I have walked through things I thought would break me—

and somehow, I am still standing.

I have been lost,

but I am finding my way home.

I have been broken,

but I am healing.

I have been afraid,

but I am learning to be brave.

I have questioned my faith,

but I am still reaching for God.

I have struggled to know who I am,

but my whakapapa keeps calling me home.

I am my tūpuna’s mokopuna.

I am my parents’ daughter.

I am a sister.

I am a mother.

I am a wahine Māori.

I am a woman of faith.

I am healing.

I am becoming.

And I believe that the same God who carried me through my darkest days will continue to walk beside me into everything that is still to come.

My story is not over.

My healing is not over.

My purpose is not over.

God is not finished with me yet.

Ka Hikoi Tonu Au

So if I leave you with anything today, let it be this:

I don’t need to be fearless.

I don’t need to know everything.

I don’t need to have the whole road mapped out.

I only need to take the next step.

And when fear comes—

I will remember my whakapapa.

I will remember my faith.

I will remember my tamariki.

I will remember that I have walked through valleys before.

And I will remember that I am not alone.

Ahakoa te wehi, ka hikoi tonu au e.

Though there is fear, I will continue to walk.

Kāore au e mokemoke.

I am not alone.

So I will hikoi.

One step at a time.

Toward the still waters.

Toward restoration.

Toward peace.

Toward becoming whole.

Ka hikoi tonu au.

Ka hikoi tonu au.

Ka hikoi tonu au.

Ahakoa te wehi, ka hikoi tonu au e.

Tihei mauri ora.