There is so much buzz on spiritual social media, which is already something that should not exist. Keep in mind that spirituality is something that should not be taught or learned from random strangers online because there is no way to verify validity. There are an alarming amount of people who are just making things up or reading a random book and rewriting what they read and then passing this off as valid. That part is already an issue but there is so much discussion about the roads and road openers but next to no understanding as to what the roads are, how they work or why its even called the roads.
First off, lets explain what the roads actually are. In the old days there was a spiritual understanding in Palo Mayombe that the living are just wayward wanderers, nomads even, just moving about from one experience to the next. It is because this understanding that Palo Mayombe elders started discussing “paths” that one takes in life. A path is a metaphor used to define a specific experience or condition that one has or meets in life. The reasoning behind that specific naming is because of the belief in Palo Mayombe that all things are connected and a single decision or experience can lead to another that leads to another, like deciding to take a left on a sidewalk and continuing the sidewalk to find that there are benches and fountains. Much like Palo Mayombe, many African Traditional Religions held the same or similar beliefs and had language barriers. The usage of “path” may have been replaced for “road” due to issues in translation and gained in popularity due to widespread adoption. There is also another instance where the word road is specifically used, when discussing the crossroads. This is a completely different spiritual concept, not to be confused with the roads.
The Crossroads is something unique, something that has a completely different meaning, understanding and origin. The Crossroads is something that is both geographical and spiritual. It is the meeting between two paths or roads in such a way where they intersect each other. It can sometimes be understood just in a limited geographical sense in that some people will believe the Crossroads to be an intersection or 4-way stop. More traditionally even two walking paths intersecting is a Crossroads and spiritually they can also exist as points in which life changing events can occur because there can be drastic shifts in which direction a person and their spiritual team is heading in. This naming is specific to more modern times and is largely accepted because it is the common word for these in almost all contexts. In short think of the Crossroads as where decisions and changes are made that can lead down other paths, but they are not the paths themselves.
How paths are worked is often something that is specific to the African Traditional Religion being practiced. In Palo Mayombe we have an understanding of more than just opening the roads; we can close them as well. While some may believe it to be possible to destroy roads, it is simply not a thing in Palo Mayombe. Think of the roads as more binary, you are traveling them or you are not. When you are not, you may not even be aware of them existing. This could lead people to believe they have destroyed previously known roads but they are simply just not aware of them because they are not traveling on them. In Palo Mayombe most workings to open the roads are done either at the Crossroads or with a spirit from the Crossroads because to embark on a road, one must enter from an intersection or a junction.
Opening the roads is the act of opening possibilities to choices and changes in a person’s life, not making those choices or changes for them. Oftentimes people speak of opening the roads as if this is a ritual they need to have someone else set them on the right track, when it is not true at all. The ritual is specifically to give them the chance to change their track to the one of their choosing. A person that implies they can open the roads and put you on the right path is a person that does not fundamentally understand how opening the roads works and therefore likely to not be able to actually open the roads for you. Discernment is key in spirituality, there are a great many people claiming a great many things and most of the things claimed are all posturing and nonsense. It is up to you to understand spiritual concepts and understand that someone who doesn’t understand concepts can’t possibly act on something they don’t understand to provide something they don’t know.
Closing the roads is the act of closing possibilities to choices and changes in a person’s life. This can be done for many reasons but to give an example, a person can have issues with self-control and need dire help in stopping themselves from going down certain dark paths. An elder of an African Traditional Religion can in essence, close the roads to that path to help this person have a fighting chance at traveling down more favorable roads or paths. This is a largely unused practice for a reason, like love spells it can be abused and used in all the wrong ways and cause a world of trouble in peoples lives. The concept exists because the opposite exists but it is more favorable to open roads than to close them. This is not even mentioning that most elders of African Traditional Religions have refused to teach many things that are dangerous based on how certain things they did not believe to be dangerous have been misused and have become dangerous, looping back around to love spells here.
While there is more to discuss on the subject of roads, one could argue that not everything is meant for public consumption and breaking with a tradition of secrecy is an egregious act. Due to the serious nature of these concepts and standpoints of Palo Mayombe, which is the tradition we are speaking in terms of, the rest of this conversation can only be had with people qualified to have it and I am fairly positive that even your favorite spiritual social media influencer isnt qualified for this conversation.
Thank you for reading, appreciate you.
