​​In this episode I chat with Wilhelm Verwoerd, a leading researcher in the field of reconciliation, apology and more recently, “white work” in SA. He was a researcher in the Truth and Reconciliation Commission and has since dedicated his life to exploring and facilitating forgiveness, apology and reconciliation.

Wilhelm is also the grandson of Hendrik Verwoerd, who is widely regarded as the architect of apartheid. He experienced this very unique incarnation of being born into a family at the political, social and spiritual center of apartheid, and then he managed to transcend the limitations of his cultural conditioning to become a leader in the field of reconciliation. For me, he provides us with a hopeful example of what white people in SA can do to finally start healing our own trauma as well as all the trauma we’ve caused with our heritage of slavery, colonialism and most recently, apartheid.

Links to some of Wilhelm’s work:
Books
Research: Dismantling Whiteness
Research: Black Christ

Link to my work

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Vuyiswa shares an experience she had with psilocybin mushrooms. She gives an important warning about the sustainability of plant medicine if we allow the global capitalist machine to turn it into a commodity. I ask her why non-western spiritual paradigms from the east have become so popular, while belief systems from Africa don't seem to get the same attention. Why isn’t African spirituality trending? Finally, Vuyiswa contextualises the role iSangomas currently play in SA. She speaks about how pre-colonial African communities weren’t as dependent on iSangomas as we are today. Family members like parents used to play some of these roles for their children. We end speaking about Sex Love and Goop, which I definitely didn’t expect. Vuyiswa’s shares how she’s trying to heal her relationship with her mother by simply asking her to do her hair.

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This is a tough one for me. If you listened to the intro you’ll know that this is a very important and personal issue I have. And it’s difficult to ask this question because of the racial history we have in SA. But I try anyway. I often wonder how iSangomas think about the afterlife, and what they think happens to the souls of the colonisers. In the end, I’m mostly relieved to learn that as a white man, I can also consult iSangomas.

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I learn that again, spiritual healing practices don’t need to be in opposition to western medical science. Vuyiswa explains how we should keep an open mind and pull wisdom from various healing practices to help us manage challenges like Covid and HIV. We look at the placebo effect as a phenomenon and how it appears in her spiritual practice. I open up to Vuyiswa about my own struggles living in this industrialised, capitalist world and ask her how she manages it.

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I tend to draw hard lines between different spiritual paradigms. In this short excerpt, Vuyiswa helps me see that although there are big differences, she’s learning to embrace christianity and work with what religion can offer her spiritual practice. This conversation has helped me think a bit more holistically about my own spiritual practice and motivated me to draw from different worldviews to support my healing.

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My first guest is Vuyiswa Xekatwane, a writer and iSangoma based in Johannesburg, South Africa. In this part of the conversation she shares what it was like to receive the calling, how she tried to resist it at first but eventually accepted it as her journey. She shares some details about what the initiation process was like for her and we explore how different things are for young initiates now, living in this modernized and industrialized world.

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