It is often said, for one to walk through the gates za se phehlweni ( healer initiation school) life would have shown you flames. You get there humbled by life in all aspects, in preparation to submit to your ancestors and guide, god forbid you enter into a place that emphasizes your struggles through the rotten treatment you get, which is not a step closer to healing you. Then, when an initiate is not submissive, we’d often say it is because they haven’t been through enough struggle. Life needs to teach them a little bit more to bend them to shape…
Isn’t it sad ? That we accepted ukuba one needs to be shown flames by life to prepare you for a life of flames anyway? Andazi no ba ni ya ndiva na..but should the journey to healing not start with healing the self before being taught to heal the next? It feels like as a black child we’ve become so accustomed to suffering and struggle that we believe it is our right of way. I often wonder sometimes what the point to it all is…
E neneni there are no guarantees that after initiation and graduation your life will be smooth as a healer, on the contrary mtasekhaya. So my question stands, why do we have to go through flames only to get into flames ? How different are we then from those who just run away from the calling and suffer the consequence, because ke we accept the calling and endure the consequence too.
Ku thiwa phahla until something happens, heee uyalazi wenaidlozi ? Uzo phahla, uphahle, u phahlulule, u de u phahluke kuthe tuu ncweeee, ho se na nko e tswang le mina. And that, cuts across all human u thwasile, unga thwasanga. Many healers will tell you we face challenges that makes you just want to burn your ndumba , drive you to alcoholism and depression and move to another life as in literally reincarnation vibes.
I hear kuthiwa mjolo the pandemic, kodwa heyi idlozi lizakophula intliziyo, it will break your heart to a point of beyond repair. Yazi growing up I never used to believe in I zangoma I suppose partly because I was raised in a church environment, but also because it was rare, I mean very rare to find i Sangoma that is well off financially and clean. It seemed their lives were sacrificed for the betterment of others. Hayi maan, coming to think of it, not even their families would shine, instead be ostracized. They were weird and scary maybe even respected…..a little. You were special to be the chosen one, hayi kodwa salute to those who took it up back then, it was not an easy plight.
Then we evolved, now healers get on stage and sing, DJ, act. Now healers have 9 to 5 jobs, are educated and are entrepreneurs living in suburbs and rarely found in the mountains. Now it has become less scary to socialise with healers or their family members. We wear pants, short skirts, and weaves, not obligated to do dread logs on our heads. But have our struggles changed ?
These are not the things we as healers talk about. We parade client praises on social media platforms, we parade “power”, we parade “knowledge”, ngu lowo na lowo who wants to canvas their gift. We teach connection and alignment to ancestors, but get connected and aligned and then what ? We teach about vibrations and how low vibrations will not get you closer to alignment, basically saying try very hard to detach from life’s struggles as it lowers your vibrations….but honestly how easy is it ?
I can’t help but ask myself if this evolution of I zangoma is going the way our ancestors want it go. Are we interrogating why we have so much struggle? U thwasile unga thwasanganditsho ku sithwa u aligned there’s often something out by one foot or one finger. Ku ze ku thiwe you don’t finish u siSangoma because you are faced with new challenges all the time. But because we have become so accustomed to struggle and challenge, we say it is better just because we can recently afford to buy white bread instead of brown with challenges still coming fast and furious.
Listen I Sangoma still has marital problems, boyfriend/ girlfriend problems, affordability problems, baby daddy/mama drama, just like any other person without a calling. Actually double the struggles for one with a callingbecause you cannot tackle challenge like an ordinary person, there are rules and regulations…dude you have no idea. Oh please make no mistake though, protection we have, wisdom we have, light we have, you will have something to eat, somehow there will always be a means to a way just enough to keep you humble, or thrive. Kodwa u nga phaphi because it will be snatched away not withstanding the difficulty it came by, very quick
Then guys why do we do it, why do we still teach connection and alignment, wait even better are we teaching connection and alignment? Because should it not get easier then when connected and aligned ? Is the plight of a black child really just struggle, challenge and overcoming one after the other ? Until when ? When do we get to a place of black privilege and entitlement ?
We continue to do it for those who come after us, so that the path walked by us can be a little more smoothed to enable them to walk barefoot and not be pricked by ameva. We continue to do it for our kids, grand children and great grand children to create a road map so that they can speak of what they have seen, experienced and can reference to.
Are we teaching connection and alignment ? You bet your R1000 weave we are. Our ways might be a little suspect but remember we come from a place of almost zero reference, due to all the impressions projected of being a healer. Healing back then was a huge mystery and often something that meant you have no life but to serve other.
Is the plight of the black child to continuously overcome struggle ? It certainly seems that way doesn’t it ? Granted, we get ourselves in situations we really have no business being in, then turn around and say idlozi…I however still want to get to a point of black privilege, where my ancestors favoursme just because I am black and proud ! Where I do not have to call them from afar (Phahla for months) to get something I really need and not get into politics of whether it is a want or need. Why can’t I just have because I work, not eventually have because I struggled.
Hayi bef’wethu maybe we just need to live…. cleanse, connect, align and live. Let our ancestors worry about raising our vibrations through not only hearing our cries each time siphahla, but having a 10111 response to it.
Maybe, just maybe in that way they might just come to tell us what we are missing in our journeys that will eventually lift the moratorium on black privilege
