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Dineo Ndlanzi, or Gogo Dineo as her students call her, lives on the fault line between tradition and the modern world, bringing her calling as a sangoma into boardrooms and training sessions where she works as a coach and facilitator. She has a lesson for every one of us who still believe that our view of the world is the only one that is valid. We talked in Johannesburg in August 2016.

Ruda: Dineo, let’s go right back to the beginning. At school you wanted to be a chemical analyst. What did you study finally, and where did that take you for your first job?

Dineo: Growing up in Alex [Alexandra township in Johannesburg], I knew that the only way out of that life was to study and work hard, but unfortunately I didn’t even study anything after high school because my calling started when I was at school. I got a scholarship to go to a private school, and my teachers actually came and spoke to my mum, saying that they were worried about me because I was taking it too far. I used to study the whole book in advance – by the time my teacher got there, I was, like, “No, that’s not how it works.”

Ruda: You were every teacher’s nightmare.

Dineo: Yes. They probably thought it was because of that that I was having episodes . . .

Ruda: Episodes?

Dineo: Yes, I would say, “I’m seeing things,” and I would be pro­phetic in class, but I don’t remember those episodes. When I went to the private school, it became worse because I was far away from home, from my family. I actually had to be sent off to an institution for six months in my matric year. Everybody thought I was crazy, I thought I was crazy, and at church they thought I was demonic or possessed, so it was really a difficult time.

Ruda: Heavens, Dineo, how did you experience that, to be put in a psychiatric institution at age eighteen?

Dineo: It was very difficult because you are in an institution with people who almost committed suicide, have heavy depression, anorexia and also, it was at a time when Satanism was rife. So I was caught between . . . I didn’t know: was I being called by something else or was I mentally sick? The psychiatrist could not find a thorough diagnosis for what was happening to me, because in conversation I sounded proper, and all the medical tests that they ran came out negative, so they gave me the closest diagnosis that they could think of.

Ruda: Which was what?

Dineo: Temporal lobe epilepsy. The medication they gave me actually made me worse, so they realised that was not it. And then one day [having left the institution and started in a job] I took a group of business people to Wits, to the Origins Centre, and we were speaking to a scientist about the birth of innovation and where we come from. He spoke about the role of healers and African shamans, and about how science fails to understand [the difference between] when you are birthing into the call and when you are psychotic. So I was sitting at the back of the room and I cried, because he said a lot of people find themselves in mental institutions and they should not be there.

Ruda: And suddenly you thought, “I’m not mad, I’m not!”

Dineo: Ja. But I was still experiencing extreme depression, extreme mood swings, so there was a part of me that knew that I was not mad, but . . . my schooling was all about logical thinking, and this was very illogical. So when I had those episodes, because it didn’t make sense at a logical level, I would think maybe I am mad.

Ruda: But a number of people in your family, the earlier generations, were healers. Did healing not attract you?

Dineo: Well, I was raised by my maternal family, not by my paternal family.

Ruda: Oh, I see. Did you know that your father’s family was working in this tradition?

Dineo: Yes, but I was a born-again Christian, so I did not associate with those practices, because in the belief system to which I belonged, they were demonised. The healers were talking to the dead, they were talking to ancestors. The word “ancestor” was taboo in the church, so I didn’t want to associate with that. I grew up with my maternal family, who were not very strong in traditional practices. My mum went from one church to the other, so that’s what was familiar to me. I told my dad I was not going to be praising demons and the devil. I was quite resistant to that.

Ruda: So what finally facilitated the change?

Dineo: Knowing who I am, that I’m always striving towards greatness and doing better, I was struggling. It seemed as if no matter what I put in, I was not getting anywhere. I’m the one who is always hungry for wisdom and seeking understanding, so I ask a lot of questions. So I started to ask God questions and I said, “Well, God, I’m a good young person, I go to church seven days a week, but nothing is coming forth, I’m still stuck. I can’t further my studies, I can’t be in a good healthy relationship, nothing I hold seems to last. What is really going on?” The answer was that we were called to sign up for Bible studies. It was the most beautiful thing – I went there thinking that I will know Genesis to Revelation, but it really taught me who God is. God is not in the church. God is within you.

Ruda: How did you get to that understanding from Bible study?

Dineo: I asked God and God showed up, right? Because we had a Bible study teacher who taught us a spiritual understanding of who God is, not a religious understanding, not God as a figure who only lives within the four walls in which we worship and praise.

Ruda: You were lucky to come across someone like that!

Dineo: That’s true. And then I became curious about my African identity, because I started to question: If I call on the God of Abraham, and I have no idea who he is, but I denounce the God of my people, you know, of my grandfather – I was raised by my grandfather, a great honourable man, to whom I attribute a lot of who I am today – it didn’t make sense, it was a contradiction. The more I was steeped in who I was as an African, all my negatives started to shift. My dad always said I had a calling. He said, “You see, your calling will be very different from mine. You’re going to be a sangoma but you’re going to work differently.” He was right. Yes, I was trained as a sangoma, but I’m trained in other healing modalities as well. I mean, spirit does not have race, does not have gender – those things that humans have put into boxes. I feel my work as a sangoma is beyond just African belief systems; it’s more about trying to have people understand their spiritual identities and that in spirit there are no limitations and there are no boxes.

Ruda: But on a practical level it was a huge commitment. You were basically bankrupt, and one has to pay for the courses, not so?

Dineo: Ja, ja. We were going through a financial crisis in 2010, and when you work for a [leadership and change management] consultancy you are always reliant on clients. So when we didn’t have any big clients my boss said to me, “We cannot renew your contract”, and I had just said that I’m going to do this training. For me this was also a positive thing because, remember, I come from linear, logical thinking, so what this invited me to do was to really believe in the non-visible and surrender to the process.

Ruda: Step into the void.

Dineo: Yes, I stepped in fully. [During the training] I was in somebody else’s face for twenty-four hours out of the day, which was really hard. [As a teenager] you go to school and you come back home. [During the training] school is home. I stayed with this woman for about twelve months, learning and training to become a healer, but a lot happened apart from that. A lot of things were challenged, a lot of things were shifted. I became a better woman, because taking up the healing practice requires huge responsibility. You’re working with big, complex human issues. People come to you, hoping and trusting that you will help them understand what is going on.

I didn’t have money, but money came. It did come. Work started coming. I would bump into people I had not seen in a while and they would say, “What are you doing? What is going on? You lost so much weight!” And I would say, “Well, I’m in this training.” And the response would be, “Oh no, man, give me your bank account and I will help you out.” So I had to trust that there is an energy that works for me, that’s out there, and the more I put in the work, the more I would get out of the work, so it was really beautiful. I think it was important that I lost my job, because I don’t think I would have believed in the way that I do had I not gone through all those experiences. I would still be very sceptical because, remember, this other world does not work with logic. It does not work in the way that we have been taught as human beings.

Ruda: You have also said that being only a sangoma was too narrow, and you wanted to expand that.

Dineo: For me change is very good, because what was yesterday and what is today might not really speak to each other. I’m not a big fan of experts, because sometimes we cannot see our blind spots when we think we are experts, so I’m always for experimenting, realising what’s new, what has shifted. That way we become relevant. Training in being a sangoma . . . it’s never enough. When dealing with people, you tell them things, and they break down because you’re triggering old wounds, so I had to go and study something else. I had to go and do life coaching, because somebody comes to me and they think their problem is ancestral, but it’s not. You need clarity in your life and you need somebody who is trained and skilled to help you find that clarity. That requires no medicine; it just requires somebody to facilitate that. So that’s why I believe just being a sangoma is too narrow. If we are holistic healers, at least let’s have basic skills and understanding of other modalities and practices, psychology, health. I’m a big fan of nutrition and health. Sometimes people come to us and I tell them, “You actually need a medical doctor” or, “You need to go and seek a psychiatrist because this seems like this is something deep. I can help you at this level but I cannot go deeper than that, because I’m not skilled to take you there.” So it’s an act of integrity for me.

Ruda: And humility.

Dineo: Ja, ja.

Ruda: Because not everyone can say, “I cannot do this.” People usually want to own the space.

Dineo: Yes. Being a sangoma is a calling, and honouring the call is also recognising where you are limited.

Ruda: Against this background, are you a planner? Do you have a five-year plan or a ten-year plan? You cannot really, if you’re constantly open to things that happen that are not logical and linear!

Dineo: Ja, it is not my strength. I have aspirations and I send my aspirations out there for what I would like to be. I want to facilitate spiritual wellness for people; that is my plan. How is not up to me, because this work has taught me that there is divine power out there. When you focus on the details you get disappointed, because you want things to happen your way, because you have planned it so much, but that’s not how it works. I have got children, I’m married, so there have to be systems and structures, but . . . rather than vigorous planning, I’m more about allowing for the present moment to show itself. I know what I want, I know what I’m hoping for, but holding to the plans in my work would . . .

Ruda: Can restrict it.

Dineo: Yes. I’m not only a sangoma. I train other healers – the term for it is kobela – and that wasn’t planned, you know! And because it wasn’t in the plan or even an aspiration, I struggled to embrace it. It was another big change, because when I train people, they live in my space, so from a family home of five we went to a family home of nine. And having to work with people who are adults, who come from different backgrounds, to really get them to engage with the practice, but also engage in your ethos and your ethics and your home values – it has been a huge challenge, but it has also been a gift.

I can only heal with what you give me permission to heal with and what you allow yourself to be healed of. If I had all the power, Ruda, I would be an alchemist, where I just transform things in an instant, but I believe that I’m a facilitator. That means I require permission from those I am working with. When I am around people who know I’m a healer, they instantly want to know “What do you see about me?” I don’t work that way, I don’t go around like I can see your people [your ancestors] – you have not given me permission.

Ruda: There needs to be a commitment from the other side.

Dineo: Yes, yes.

Ruda: But I want to ask, since you are taking people into your personal space, which is not only your personal space: tell me a bit about your husband. When did you meet?

Dineo: He actually is the one that really helped me embrace African practices because he is a traditional Zulu man, but he is very . . . People say you’re modern. I don’t understand why tradition cannot be modern. I think my husband is an open-minded traditionalist. He is the one who helped me with everything, even embracing being a trainer. He is my support system. He is the one who said, “You know, baby, it is time. You have always known your calling was bigger.” When I’m struggling to adapt to changes, he is that voice that is within me that I’m not hearing well, if that makes sense.

Ruda: And your children, what role do they play in your life?

Dineo: Oh, they play drums for the trainees, they know every ancestral spirit that I walk with. I always say that our children choose us, that they know we will be the parents that we have to be for them to become their higher selves. But we have got a check-in relationship with the family, so I have to check in with them: “How do you want Mummy to be?” “How should I be with you?” Because their time with me also gets shared.

Ruda: So you have that conversation?

Dineo: We have to, because my other work, my consultancy work, involves a lot of travelling. There was a time when I was travelling almost every week, and then I realised that they were struggling at school and it was probably because they were used to a mother who was at home most of the time, because I ran my practice from home, but now my consultancy work was taking me outside.

Ruda: (Nods) Suddenly you were absent. How old are they?

Dineo: My eldest is turning eleven, my middle one is nine and my little one is four.

Ruda: Do they step up, do they tell you what they think?

Dineo: It is not always easy; it is not an adult conversation. They find words and ways to say things, so if I ask, “What do you need?” they say, “Okay, if Mummy can make us pancakes?” That’s important to them. Or we play games. I remember once we were driving and I said, “Oh, let us speak about: ‘I like it when Mummy does this and I don’t like it when Mummy does that.’” It was fun, but they revealed so much painful truth. You know, I’m a very powerful woman, and when they said, “We don’t like it when Mummy shouts at Daddy,” I was, like, yo! And it wasn’t only about me, it was about Daddy, it was about Gogo, it was about everybody else.

Ruda: Sjoe, that’s quite a brave thing to ask.

Dineo: Ja. I come from a very violent and brutal background and I’m trying to make sure that my children don’t experience that. It’s how you become a better mother, when you recognise your own wounds so that you don’t become a wounded parent. So the fact that I am busy all the time may mean that I’m neglecting my own children. Somebody else might see it as working hard for your children and serving them, but then twenty-five years later the kids say, “We actually missed you, we didn’t care about all the money you had to make to pay school fees. We would have been happy going to a basic school, and having you present.” So those conversations with children are important. I ask, “What is important to you?” and if they say, “Well, you don’t make pancakes for us anymore,” then I say, “Okay, if I make pancakes on Sundays, will that be enough? Because if I stay home, Daddy alone cannot take care of (counts on her fingers) one, two, three that’s important to you.” Children are wise in some ways: “Okay, pancakes on Sunday,” they say. “We will be happy with pancakes on Sunday.” And then I make sure that Sundays I don’t work, Sunday is my family time.

Ruda: And tell me a little about your home. Where do you live? How did you choose it?

Dineo: We live in Cosmo City. I think what I love about Cosmo City is you’ve got the luxury of the quietness of a suburb but the openness of a township. I can play the drums, I can have a sangoma slaughtering ceremony and my neighbours won’t complain, but I could also ask for quiet and they can ask for quiet. It’s that kind of neighbourhood. It’s a beautiful neighbourhood.