🌙 When the Bayou Whispers Back🌙

Kateb-Nuri-Alim
2 minutes ago
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✨ A Soul-Shaking Reflection on Shifa, Dis-Ease, and the Creator’s Unpredictable Mercy

By Kateb Shunnar

You know, sometimes I think the Creator be looking at us like, “Lord have mercy, these children done lost they everlasting minds again,” because we walk around like we’re self-healing superheroes while we’re actually just patched-up humans trying to outsmart our own dis-ease. And every time I say “dis-ease,” I mean exactly that discomfort, disconnection, discombobulation, that deep-down spiritual static that feels like you swallowed a whole thunderstorm sideways. I ain’t talking ‘bout no cold or rash or nothing Walgreens can fix. I’m talking about the emotional limp we try to hide under fancy clothes. The spiritual thirst we try to drown in busyness. That mental heaviness we pretend ain’t sittin’ on our shoulders like a fat cat that refuses to move. That kind of dis-ease.

Now, I done made a little acronym for it too, because sometimes creativity helps me remember my own foolishness:

D.I.S.E.A.S.E —

Drifting,

Ignoring,

Swimming in ego,

Entertaining chaos,

Avoiding accountability,

Staying stuck,

and Exhausting our spirit.

Ain’t that us on a Thursday afternoon? We be out here drifting from the Creator like He live too far to call. Ignoring our spiritual needs like we can run on fumes forever. Swimming in ego like we Olympians in a pool full of denial. Entertaining chaos like it’s our side hustle. Avoiding accountability like it’s COVID. Staying stuck because it’s comfortable. And exhausting our spirit until we collapse and say, “Lawd, I’m tired,” knowing full well we did it to ourselves.

And the funny thing funny as in “I should laugh or I might cry” is that even when life is chewing on us like a po-boy we didn’t consent to becoming, we still tell everybody, “I’m good, I’m good,” like we’re trying to convince our own reflection. Baby, sometimes we so good at playing strong we fool our own spirit into thinking it’s wrong for being weak. Down here in New Orleans, we got a way of pretending everything’s fine even when our roof leaking, our heart cracking, our soul limping, and our pockets trying to escape to another dimension. But pretending ain’t no treatment plan. Denial don’t cure nothing.

What does cure something what brings that deep-down healing, that Shifa restoration that slips into the spiritual cracks like warm light at dawn is connection. Not Wi-Fi. Not 5G. Connection to the Creator. Connection to the One who made the universe hum, who made the river flow, who made our breath move before we even knew what lungs were. And baby, if there’s one thing I know, it’s that the more disconnected you get, the more your spirit starts feeling like it’s operating on low battery with no charger in sight.

I remember this one afternoon I don’t know if the heat was cooking my brain or if destiny was trying to tap me on the shoulder but I found myself wandering into Armstrong Park. You know the way the air over there be? Heavy but welcoming. Like somebody’s warm hand on your back telling you, “Come on baby, sit down a minute.” I plopped myself on a bench by Congo Square, mind swirling like the inside of a second line umbrella. And I guess I must’ve looked like a tired crawfish crawling across a hot sidewalk, because one of the griots who always drift around there one of them elders who look like they know stories older than the river walked right up and plunked himself next to me.

He didn’t ask to sit. Griots don’t ask. They appear.

He looked at me and went, “Baby, you look like you wrestlin’ with something that ain’t got a body.”

And I nearly choked because that was too accurate.

I just kinda nodded like, “Yeah, something like that.”

He smirked, like he been knew, and launched into this story the way griots do slow at first, then suddenly faster, like a pot of gumbo starting to boil.

He told me about this river down deep in the swamp. A little ribbon of water that got sick of following its natural path. Felt restricted. Felt unappreciated. Felt like it was too grand, too important, too something to keep flowing in the same old direction. So one day it said, “Bump all this,” and decided to carve its own trail, ignoring the call of the ocean like a teenager ignoring chores.

For a hot minute, it felt free.

Liberated.

Self-sufficient.

Like, “Look at me! Big boss river!”

But it ain’t take long before the river started shallowin’ out like a cheap kiddie pool. Fish gasping. Mud cracking. Spirit drying up. Because water disconnected from its Source ain’t water trying something new it’s water dying slowly.

“See baby,” the griot said, leaning back like he owned the bench and half the park, “everything that forgets where it came from gets thirsty eventually.”

And he ain’t say nothing else. Just stood up and walked off like Yoda in a Kangol hat, leaving me sitting there confused, convicted, and spiritually exposed all at the same time. And you know New Orleans folks we pretend we ain’t bothered, but inside I was like, “Dang. This man just called me a dehydrated river in public.”

But he wasn’t lying.

I was thirsty.

Not ‘cause I needed water, but because I needed the Source.

And that’s the kind of thing most of us don’t admit. We’ll confess to being tired, stressed, or irritated, but thirsty in the soul? Oh no, we downplay that like it’s optional. But everything in creation is connected. Trees. Rivers. Humans. Even the mosquitos I swear have personal vendettas against me. Everything needs that spiritual tether to stay alive.

Sometimes I get sick physically, mentally, emotionally, spiritually, financially (because yes, financial illness is real, don’t argue with me) and somehow the Creator keeps patching me up in ways no doctor ever could. I can’t explain His process. I can’t predict His timing. I can’t even take credit for having patience about it. But something always shifts. Something always eases. Something always whispers, “Get up baby, we ain’t done yet.”

People have called me clownish for believing like this. They done called me weird, soft, gullible, overly spiritual, too dramatic, too tender, too hopeful, too everything-but-normal. But guess what? Not a single insult ever broke me. Not one. You can call me a fool all day, but this fool is connected to the Creator, and that’s why I survive storms that should’ve washed me out years ago.

Faith ain’t fancy. It ain’t always poetic. Sometimes it’s desperate. Sometimes it’s stubborn. Sometimes it’s me sitting on my bed at midnight whispering, “Creator, it’s me again. Please fix this mess.” And you know what? That’s enough. Prayer don’t have to sound perfect. The Creator understands stuttering hearts and trembling hands.

Fasting, too it ain’t starvation, it’s clarity. It’s turning down the volume on the world so the Creator’s voice can sound louder. It’s training your spirit to stop being bossed around by cravings and impulses and every little emotional itch. And forgiveness? Ooh Lord. Forgiveness is like unclogging a spiritual sink that’s been backing up for years. It’s messy at first, then suddenly everything flows easier.

Healing ain’t a one-and-done situation. It’s a whole journey. One day you fine, next day you crying over something you thought you buried in 2009. Some days your healing feels like a fresh breeze; other days like a humid storm that won’t let up. But the Creator stays consistent even when we ain’t. That’s the beauty of Shifa truth be told, it’s not even about deserving anything. It’s about a mercy that shows up anyway.

So baby, if you’re carrying some dis-ease right now emotional dents, spiritual bruises, stubborn ego, old heartbreaks, guilt, exhaustion don’t convince yourself you can fix it alone. You can’t. You’re not built for self-healing isolation. None of us are. But the Creator’s got more compassion, more patience, more Shifa than we could ever run out of. You might feel cracked, but He’s the kind of artist who loves repairing broken pottery. You might feel discarded, but He’s the kind of gardener who knows how to prune everything dead so the living parts can breathe again.