Safety Keeper
If you find yourself traveling through South Africa, you should also explore the Bushveld—the local name for the low-altitude northern side of the country, mainly covered by abundant shrubby and often thorny vegetation. Here is where you will find the larger natural reserves, which offer the magic of being out in the wild, tracking and spotting the “big five,” “small five,” and all the creatures in between still living in the wilderness. Obviously, the rookie European tourist (me) would not survive these wilderness walks without being accompanied by a well-prepared guide. These Bushveld Protectors often describe themselves as teachers, storytellers, and safety keepers. While the first two aspects are quite self-explanatory, the third one provided introspection material for long nights at the campfire, lying under a sky full of stars or hiding away from some unchained thunderstorm.
While safety keeping might have a quite practical and straightforward aspect—keeping the unknowing tourist safe from the beasts and the wilderness safe from the intruders—there is way more to it. Safety is an attitude. And this attitude holds space for ultimate trust. As a visitor in this environment, you entrust your life and the lives of the animals that might eventually have to die if you don’t behave, to the guides.
I do not think of myself as being one of the most trusting individuals. It takes time (lots of it) for me to trust somebody. Many will probably never get to be on the receiving end. Entrusting myself to somebody involves a whole different level of trust, little to not known to me outside of my family. And the attitude of safety was in the Bushveld so high, that it only occurred to me that I had just fully and completely entrusted somebody with my life, when at a break, sitting under a tree, the guide smiled and whispered to me, “Turn around really slowly.” I did what he told me, scared of my courage, terrified of being carried away like this by the magic of the wilderness. Around 7 meters away, I saw a group of young zebras gathered around, looking at us. While I was in awe, staring back daunted at the unexpected visitors, he told me the story of watching them sneaking up to us for the last couple of minutes, at first shy, then letting curiosity get the best of them. He waited, while patiently answering all my questions and “securing the perimeter,” for the zebras to get so close that I could see them clearly.
Many of the things I thought I knew so well about myself, about the world, and about other people fell apart. Right there and then, under that tree, somewhere in Africa. I trusted somebody enough to let my guard down, sat under a tree (in a big five reserve), asked wildlife questions and obviously not watched my back for the last couple of minutes. The audacity of it!!! There go the carefully built trust issues, including all the related protecting walls, trenches, and armors!!! Panic settled in. Lots of it. Then bargaining came along— “Can I still blame this on the zebra???” Or “What kind of voodoo is this??? They have this stuff in Africa!!!” Or “Maybe, am I too tired today??? It must be the wilderness noises keeping me up at night!!!”
After everything crumbled and the dust settled, an empty place cleared of certainty took shape. Being on the receiving end of the safekeeping, and now being aware of how it feels, left me wondering if I would have recognized the safekeeping that might have already happened in my life before this? Left me asking if I am a safety keeper? For others, for myself? The answers coming up into that space were little satisfying…. I would have probably not recognized it before because safekeeping is subtle when done right. It is free and accepting. It leaves space for being, exploring, learning, and enjoying life while using founded decisions to make sure that the risks of being harmed in this process are low. It is, again, more of an attitude, obtained either through hard work or just naturally being available to some of us. And, I still have a lot of hard work to do in learning how to be a safety keeper for myself and for others.
The next question was if I could become a safety keeper myself? And the answers came as clear as the Bushveld air before dawn: my fire and fierce determination can and will hurt myself and others if left unchanneled and untamed. There is a very thin line between passivity, aggressiveness, and assertiveness, and this thin line is filled with patience, grace, and compassion. Strength might be the pause in the middle of a heated argument, softening the position to make room for the question “What else could be true?” Power could mean holding space for someone who cannot contain their fire, thus allowing them to ground themselves through that space. Wisdom will also hide in a smile. Courage is key when asking somebody how they are doing and listening with genuine interest and wholeheartedly hearing what they say. No fixing, no blaming, no fighting. Just making it safe for others (and for oneself) to be in the (sometimes messy) process of life. With all of what it might be bringing up at that moment—zebras, demons, or bushfire. This space of acceptance, curiosity, assertiveness, grace, and compassion is where the true magic of the safekeeping happens.
Here and now, with Africa being thousands of miles away, and the excitement of the adventure fading, I find myself left with the awe, the memories, and the invitation to recognize and pay the safekeeping forward. I am trying to do what I did under that tree in the Bushveld: accept the challenge, allow myself to be surprised by my courage, let all that I have thought to be certain in life crumble and make space for what must reveal itself for me to properly show up for this. And I will also add a touch of that South African magic, entrusting it in guiding and pulling me through the process of becoming…