Everyone has at least once heard the story “The Tortoise and the Hare,” but in Native American folklore, there’s a similar story: “The Bear and the Turtle,” the story of a bear that continually brags about how he is the “king” of the forest, and no other animal can beat him at a race. But a turtle does, and by wits alone.

Kids are taught by Aesop’s fable that a tortoise could get lucky and win a race if he just keeps going, versus the reality that the underdog turtle needs both perseverance and smarts to succeed. Native American folklore’s logical stance is the reality of this world compared to the more fantastical tales of Aesop that American children learn about when they are young. The lesson of the turtle should be what kids carry into their adulthood.

“Each time a story is told, it breathes life into the culture, cultivates their verbal language. It gives meaning to the tribe’s history and also teaches life lessons about things like love, leadership and honor,” explains All Good Tales, a Dublin-based promotion agency that uses traditional storytelling techniques to elevate modern communication strategies.

This is what Native American folklore has done for all that read it… but not many people do.

“Myths help to balance individual psychologies and connect them to the greater wholes of the Tribe, natural environment, and global community. Myths ‘resound’ the spiritual essence of religion and ritual in life-related terms,” Gregory A. Cajete said in his journal, titled Children, Myth and Storytelling: An Indigenous Perspective.

When I read myths like “The Bear and the Turtle,” and I see a turtle in nature, I think of this creature as a symbol of wit and intelligence. People underestimate the turtle. We called my grandfather the turtle, and we didn’t mean he was slow (though he was), we meant he was a canny survivor.

In a New York Times interview with Métis author Cherie Dimaline about her book based on a “werewolf-like monster called the rogarou,” she said she used this creature to describe real threats in her life. She turned her monster “into Empire of Wild, a genre-bending novel whose modern Indigenous characters confront environmental degradation, discrimination and the threat of cultural erasure, all while battling a devious monster.”

This “devious monster” could also be a struggle in your life just like in Dimaline’s life, or it could be a struggle of the world you are concerned about. While reading these different stories in literature, you can express your feelings, relate to others, and find a way to solve a problem.

Trust me, try and read a tale, and you may learn a thing or two you didn’t know before. You may come across a time in your life in which the reality of Native American folklore helps you.