It has been a few years now since I began my journey into the space of traditional healing and ubuNgoma.

I often reflect on that journey as if it were the furthest thing from complicated and tumultuous. Truth be told, it was hell – the pits of hell, but I soldiered on.

That is largely due to the social support and non-judgement in my non-overlapping friendship duos and trios. Indulge me for a little context.

I have historically struggled to exist in friendships groups larger than three members, myself included.

In the eighth through to the 11th grades I was often confronted, sometimes threatened, by girls I was “friends” with for gossiping.

To be fair, I would often confide in one about the other, my utterances were often compounded, taken out of context and misrepresented.

This often resulted in intimidation, verbal assault and threats of physical violence.

I do take accountability for having the biggest mouth on the smallest body. I mean, I’m only about 1.2m tall now, imagine how much smaller I was then.

In reaction, I would often retreat into myself by spending breaks alone. However, this did teach me a few things about friendships.

First, I learned how to better navigate and regulate myself in intimate friendship circles, which allowed me to better coexist in large friendship groups.

I did this by firstly realising that the relational aspect of friendship is unique across friendship duos and trios and, just because I am close friends with one person in the group, I doesn’t translate to everyone else.

Second, I realised the importance of having and maintaining authentic friendship relations and differentiating them from acquaintances and acquaintanceships.

Third, I learned not to make friendship for the sake of having people to socialise with. Yes, socialising is important but so is seeking valid and genuine connections.

Last, I learned (at the risk of sounding like every rapper) to keep a tight circle.

Practicing friendship in this way is lonely and sometimes tedious I admit, but I believe it was my prequel to becoming the sangoma that I am today.

My strongest friendships all have strong roots in faith and spirituality.

A part of me looks at this as the chance factor but the majority considers it as a careful orchestration by God and my guardian angels - I have needed all of these friendships for the balance that I maintain in my current spiritual practices.

Having been forced to practice organised religion as a child and teen I made the acquaintance of Palesa in church.

I hated church but watching her live in her faith was so fascinating. Her unconditional love for God was and remains admirable. For her church was a step closer to God.

She and my very good friend Thobile share a similar strong adoration and unwavering trust in God.

From Palesa and Thobile I learnt how to talk to God and, more importantly, how to have a relationship with Him. I learnt to cry and rejoice in the lord, which changed my life for the better.

Practically, their friendship offered me support in the form of prayer and non-judgement as I took the decision to be a traditional healer.

You know, given how contentious a matter African spirituality is in the Christianity space, they have always encouraged prayer and conversation with God, even when I was operating in spaces that were uncomfortable due to exteriority to the scope of their beliefs.

For that I am grateful. I am also grateful for how friendship has offered me fluid understandings of God, faith and spirituality.

By this I mean that God became less of an institutional structure and more of a being that I could connect with in nature or anyway that felt natural to me.

Friendship allowed me to think about my spirituality as a gift rather than as a burden and source of shame.

A friend who I am adamant was set on my path by mine and her guardians and who has grown into a confidant, spiritual soul sister and overall BFF (best friend forever) and personal yogi is Asande.

We met at the #RUreferenceList naked protest against sexual violence on campus.

We were young feminist activists seeking justice. We were both topless, she in a bra and me completely topless with the words “my body my choice” painted on my boobs.

She commented, “Nice boobs, girl” and I thanked her. We’ve been friends since.

Later, we would learn that both of our maternal grandmothers were oMaDlamini (descendants of the Dlamini clan).

Her paternal grandmother and my mother are both oBhelekazi (descendants of the Bhele clan).

My friendship with Asande has taught me much about spirituality, including the interconnectedness of indigenous knowledges globally. It has taught me that being an African spiritualist doesn’t always look or sound the same way.

It has taught me to remain open to the validity of people’s practices outside of how I would expect them to conduct themselves from the perspective of tradition.

This is important. Fluidity is important to the potential of a growing spiritual knowledge.

Thank you my friends!

*Gogo Zipho is a feminist researcher and journeying holistic spiritual healer