Healing continued
by Duduzile Mathonsi
Avuxeni, Sawubona, Molo, Dumela, Throbela, Ndaa Aa, Lotjhani, Hallo, Heisann, Buorre beaivi and Hello. My name is Duduzile Libazisa Sfiso Mathonsi. What I’m about to write or say has probably has been written or said about before. My artistic work is centralised in empowering and attempting to help heal the Black woman and girls.
I am but one of many Black women who have written and spoken about their processes and experiences, who have investigated and continue to be the voice of many. I am not the voice of healing, I am not the voice of Black women, but I am the voice of my own healing and my own Blackness and, if my voice can echo others’ voices, then my voice is part of the many voices of healing.
The existential feeling of being seen, of greeting and acknowledging each other's existence especially in these times of an existential crisis, is the most human thing we can do for one another as a continued thread of ubuntu - umuntu ngabantu -
direct translation (you are human because of others).
I was recently on a long-distance bus in South Africa, in the middle of the trip, the bus stopped and on hopped the ticket examiner who zealously began by greeting everyone in all the 11 official languages and proceeded to introduce himself. He then checked the tickets as he chatted and laughed away. Before his departure, he stood by the door and asked everyone on board to check on the person next to them and that we “need to ask our neighbours how they are doing especially in these times” and reminded everyone to be kinder.
I found myself smiling and feeling seen and cared for by a complete stranger. The culture I have missed and loved was being reintroduced to me all over again. In Norway, the culture of minding your own can be cold (metaphorically and literally), isolating and a common factor of the cause of mental health issues. As humans, we are communal beings.
Diaspora
As a South African, forming and meeting part of the diaspora, The constant attempt of being part of the healing of a Black diaspora removes the agency of just being able to be, especially as a Black woman in the world. Relating to the archives of many others while desperately holding on to your own archive, not only distorts your reality but also confronts the ancestral imprint within that is fighting to exist in its entirety.
Living in a homogeneous western society has been like fighting quicksand and the only way to survive is to pull yourself out with everything you have. Living in such a society has been said to create different mental health issues among immigrants. In my life, living in Africa, I have not suffered from mental health issues before, until, the last few years living in Norway. Where I have since suffered two episodes of depression and anxiety and during the second one, my white male mental health practitioner stopped treating me. He blamed it on his inability to fully understand my struggles as a Black woman in the world, my ability to function and my strength. All this bleeds into medical bias, which is an urgent conversation that needs to be had. More so the damaging image of the strong Black woman!
I am not strong. I am a marshmallow, I hurt, I cry, I bleed, I am weak, soft and vulnerable. Some of the mental health issues have been induced from a feeling of longing for home, otherness, dehumanisation and a homogeneous society that does not value us or our opinion and what we can bring to the table and the inability to exist in our entirety, and I, I am an opinionated Black woman!!! We as the Black diaspora bring different injections of knowledge, ways of seeing and practices that could and does contribute to evolving any society and further developing a civilization.
Now the more important question during a pandemic is how do we foster healing?
Black woman
Black women have been a pandemic and continue to be a pandemic. If it is not for pop culture that feels entitled to our bodies and talents, it’s the killings of Black women and the socio-economic inequalities we face in our everyday environments. The enormity of our existence as Black women is almost beyond reach, only accessible through our own lived experiences, meaning moving and creating safe spaces of being and community in a world that does not consider us deserving, worthy, equal or human. The continuous investment in our healing process and a traumatic archive that has continuously fuelled Black women to out-let on each other, in turn obstructing our longing for a space of healing.
The ‘Strong Black’ woman is an armour we wear, like the many masks, to shield ourselves against racism, sexism, discrimination, colourism, exoticism and so much more. I refuse to internalise the projection of not being enough. And I aggressively send it back to the sender! Because there is an inferiority complex at play.
( this is poetry and rap that I wrote before this text and was contracted for a song that is already streaming )
Enough Duduzile Mathonsi
I am enough.
We are enough.
Enough is enough.
We carry the wait on our shoulders while you get to relax
Imma wear my crown
imma claim the space
move aside the time is near
Our voices won’t be silenced
It's time for us to be elevated
Not backing down you can’t hold us down
we’ve lost enough
you better feel our power
depleted but not defeated
you better know my name
You better say our names
You better taste our pain break the system
Re- define Blackness
Protetect Black women
The adultification of Black girls is something we have to consciously choose to fight against and allow Black girls to just be girls. Black girls are perceived as promiscuous and hypersexual, less sensitive to pain, not needing protection, having to protect Black men even when they fail us. Black women are treated like recyclable waste, not worthy of nurturing, gentleness or care.
Jennifer Marquez (2020)
Healing
Returning to lost rituals or creating new rituals is a form of healing. Healing can be through music, dance, movement, voice, earth, wind, fire and water - my mother used to say water is medicine and medicine is healing. Find your way towards your path of healing and divine purpose.
Insert
“Ritual is called for because our soul communicates things to us that the body translates as need, or want, or absence. So, we enter into ritual in order to respond to the call of the soul.” ... Our souls aspire toward growth, that is, toward remembering all that we have forgotten due to our trip to this place, the earth. We need ritual because it is an expression of the fact that we recognize the difficulty of creating a different and special kind of community. A community that doesn’t have a ritual cannot exist.
― Malidoma Patrice Somé, Ritual: Power, Healing and Community
In African spirituality we believe that by connecting to our ancestors we become part of creation, through this connection we find healing. Healing is a journey but it is also hard work. We fail to listen to the call of our soul because we are deeply wounded. Because we don’t only carry our own wounds we carry the inherited wounds of our ancestors. You have to be willing to want to heal and be part of the healing process. We don’t only live our experiences, we are also the co-creators of our experiences. Life doesn't just happen to us it happens with us. We need to take responsibility for our healing because we are cannot be defined by our past or present but by our future.
― Dineo Ndlanzi, TEDx Cape Town: 4 Lessons from my journey
By taking responsibility for our healing, you heal yourself despite what needs to be done structurally or systematically. We cannot wait on our growth and peace, from a system that is deliberately designed to not consider us or our processes.
The healing process is a long and sometimes complicated process that varies according to our archive and trauma. Mine comes with a harsh colonial imprint of being born in apartheid and being a Black woman. And I refuse to be defined by that. We have to create boundaries of how we allow others to treat us. Creating boundaries is central to our healing process because if there are no boundaries to who we are, we cannot give ourselves space to heal or space to exist in the world. We as Black people need to learn our history, I cannot stress that enough. Our history was destroyed to remove any claim of identity and if your identity is removed the very ground you are on is destabilized. So in order to heal and live in all our divine glory, we need to know on whose backs’ we were carried on in order to be able to embrace that generational archival umbilical love.
As humans, we are a resilient species and we need to offer ourselves self-compassion and kindness which is part of something I forcefully practice:- “Joy as an act of resistance”. Especially as Black people where our joy is a threat. Acting in intention, striving for peace and happiness and while resting in gratitude.
Duduzile Mathonsi
is a writer, performance artist, voice artist, and public speaker. She has extensive experience in South African television, film and radio production, as a producer, director, screenwriter, presenter, and actress. Duduzile is also a certified journalist who has worked for some of South Africa’s biggest media houses.