The Journey Kwantu

For anyone who is still trying to figure out their way in African Spirituality, the prospect of having to consult with a Healer or Sangoma can be extremely daunting. Part of the challenge with this process is that you are coming in with a lot of misconceptions, a lot of confusion and, to be quite honest, you are downright scared because you don't know what to expect, you don't know how you are goi...

Have you ever had that moment or that period where you wanted where you just wanted to pack up one day and just disappear? To just leave everything behind and head out into the night and go as far away as you possibly can? Let's do that. Tonight, let's just disappear.

In Part 4 of our series on Practicing African Spirituality for Beginners , uMkhulu Mahlalentabeni will be taking us through Understanding Cleansings in terms of what they are and what makes them necessary. I also share a personal story in relation to this topic

The idea of embracing African Spirituality in all its different facets has generally become something easy to talk about. We speak openly about ancestors and the relationship that we have with them. It's all fun and love and light until the topic of umuthi comes up. For many of us, we grew up with a distinct aversion towards African Indigenous medicine, regardless of what form it takes or even how...

Umsamo is one of those extremely vague yet still seemingly integral aspects of African Spirituality. The definitions and understandings of it vary greatly across cultures. In Part 2 of "Practicing African Spirituality for Beginners" Gogo Jebhu takes us through a deeper understanding of what umsamo is as physical structure and what it represents spiritually.

So, here you are. You have developed an interest in African Spirituality or something in you is pulling you towards that direction. You have a basic understanding of ancestors and you are aware that they play a role in your life even though you are not entirely sure what that role is and you find yourself asking "what now?". What's the next step? How do I go from here to a point where I can say I...

We continue the conversation with Gogo Aubrey Matshiqi as we dig deeper into the history of African Initiated Churches. This episode also unpacks what happens historically when two conflicting beliefs crash into each other and we look into African Spiritual aspects such as Isithunywa came to be and what they actually say about Christianity.

African Spirituality and Christianity are seemingly two opposing ideologies. Yet, there are African Initiated Churches such as ZCC and Ibandla Lamanazaretha (Shembe) who are somehow able to situate the African identity whithin Christianity. Historically, how did these churches come about? Spiritually, how do they navigate the realities of the lives of their followers? Then there are also African S...

What is the nature of belief? Why do we, as human beings, have the capacity to believe and what purpose does it serve? In this episode it is just me and you hanging out and exploring the mindboggling concepts that impact on how we engage with our beliefs.

The assumption that we often about technology is that it relates to things like automated electronic machinery and artificial intelligence. But each point of the evolution of human society was pushed forward by what was seen at that time as technological advancements. These advancements impacted not only on culture and how we understood ourselves but they also impacted on our relationship with the...

Most of us aware that social media does affect our psyche even though we not quite sure how or to what extent. But have you ever wondered how it affects your spirituality? For those of us using social media to help us understand African Spirituality better, it can be quite tricky to figure how real are our online experiences actually are and how to make sense of how these platforms influence how w...

As Africans, it is almost a given that the land is an integral part of our spiritual identity but I want to know how. I want look specifically at sacred sites and how they correlate with the cosmology of our beliefs. The reality is also that many of us live in urban areas and cities, this creates a different dynamic to the relationship between land and cultural spirituality, I would like to unders...

The subject of the evolution of African spirituality is a very complex one. Spirituality itself is a very broad topic especially if you want to approach it from a historical point of view. I would actually like to know where our understanding of spirituality evolved from and, more importantly what are the other aspects of this belief that we don't normally talk about? I spoke to Mkhulu Makhanya to...

We as black South Africans, are very keenly aware that our culture is slowly disappearing. Yet, at the same time, there has been a resurgence of interest in African Spirituality. The number of people who are becoming iisangoma has exploded and every other month there seems to be a new TV show that talks about ubungoma. My question is, so what? So what that everyone knows someone who has gone epheh...

How far away are we from a time when we have a health system where western medicine is fully integrated with African Spiritual modalities in such a way that we trust that system not only with our physical health but also our spiritual healing? I figured that the best person to speak to on this topic is Nkholo Seanego who is not only a medical doctor training to become a cardiothoracic surgeon but...

We've been raised to believe that culture and spirituality are synonyms. for the same thing. But as our collective understanding of spirituality grows and so many aspects of our cultural practices being questioned, is culture and spirituality really the same thing? Where do you draw the line? I spoke to Gogo Aubrey Matshiqi to try to understand where these two elements intercept each other and wha...

At times it happens that when we are busy navigating our spiritual journey we can get caught up in making it all about ourselves and the challenges that we face on the path. Parenting can be a jarring reminder that the world does not revolve around us and our problems because oftentimes it forces you to put aside your challenges and to focus on another human being. Yet the idea of spirituality in...

What we rarely talk about when it comes to African Spirituality is the toll that it takes on our mental health.  The belief system that we have inherited is rife with pervasive trauma and leads many people to want to avoid anything with African Spirituality in its entirety.  I wanted to understand the impact of spirituality on our mental health and how this affects the way in which we build our re...

How did we as black men get to such a state of brokeness? How did we end up being such a terrifying threat to the lives of black women? Is it possible to retrace our history from a spiritual point of view to figure out what actually went wrong? In this episode Gogo Aubrey Matshiqi guides us through a journey back in time in order to gain a better understanding of the state of the black man's soul.

Nowadays there's a tendency to believe that the journey through African Spirituality is only reserved for those who have a calling to become Healers. But the reality is that very few people are called to go through ukuthwasa. So what about everyone else? How do they get help and guidance in navigating their beliefs? In this episode, I catch with my first spiritual mentor, Gogo Moyo. We had a frank...

At some point, I think every one of us gets to a point where we doubt our beliefs. It is different for everyone but it is something that we all go through. It could be a nagging feeling of uncertainty that eventually goes away. But sometimes, life can hit you so hard that you not only doubt what you believe but, you doubt belief itself. At times, when the dark storms of life leave you feeling lost...

When you are exploring African Spirituality you are inevitably dealing with different aspects of identity and when it comes to issues of identity, there's no other topic more contentious to black South Africans than the issue of Surnames. In fact, matters relating to surnames have seen entire families disintegrating into animosity, bitterness, and anger. In this episode, I explore what exactly IS...

Covid-19 is here and it is forcing us to approach our entire lives differently. We are in week 5 of the lockdown and the restricted movements have impacted on how I put together the episodes. For one thing, I can't have interviews in person. I've been reluctant to do interviews over the phone on online because I strongly believe that there is such an important energy that is conjured when two peop...

When we think of our spiritual history we tend to lean towards the idea of great Healers who come from a mythical time and possess mystical powers. But much of our reality is not as grandiose. So much more of our spiritual past was built by ordinary men and women who were simply doing their best to get by without losing themselves. The story of the Shebeen Queen and her impact on African Spiritual...

Reflecting on the time I spent in the village I started thinking about the transition that women, in particular, went through. The transition from emakhaya to the newly developing urban areas. Not just the geographic transition but the temporal transition, like the transition through time because they were not only moving to another place. They were also moving into another era entirely. Also, I w...