I don’t always understand it, but I’ve come to accept that I see things before they happen. Sometimes, it comes in dreams, vivid, detailed, and impossible to shake. Other times, it’s just a knowing, a deep, undeniable sense that something is about to unfold. I used to find it strange. Now, I treat it with reverence. There was a time when I went a whole month unable to focus. The dead wouldn’t leave me alone. Every night, they came to me, not with fear, but with urgency. Faces I’d never seen, voices carrying messages that weren’t meant for me. They pleaded with me to find their loved ones and speak for them. It was overwhelming. I tried to carry on with normal life, but my spirit was somewhere else straddling two worlds. I’ve looked at people and simply known. I knew that something was coming, good, bad, life-changing. In the beginning, I’d be consumed by fear. But over time, I learned to pray. I realized that perhaps knowing wasn’t just for knowing’s sake. It was an invitation to inter...
When I think of prayer, I remember that the African way was often through calling on our ancestors. Long before formal religion came to our lands, our people believed that those who had gone before us still walked with us, standing at the threshold between the living and the divine. Ancestors were not distant shadows but custodians of wisdom, protectors of families, and intercessors who carried our cries to God. Whether through libations poured on the earth, whispered names in the quiet of the night, or ritual gatherings around the fire, prayer in Africa was deeply relational, a way of keeping the bond between generations unbroken. I never imagined I would one day find myself reaching for that path. But when my niece lay in a hospital bed, and doctors struggled to find a clear diagnosis for her discomfort, I felt powerless. That night, my sister sent a message saying the doctor suspected a heart defect. My younger sister and I had just left Gertrude’s Children’s Hospital around 3 a.m.,...