While from an outside perspective, this coexistence could seemingly be classified as syncretism, it can however be more accurately described as polyontology. According to McIntosh, polyontology is an attitude “of religious plurality that recognizes the mystical power of more than one set of religious or cosmological forces; marks these religious ontologies as distinct; and regards all ontologies in a matter as capable of being propitiated or embraced by the same person” (McIntosh 189). This concept is distinct from syncretism, because it does not merge religions, but rather causes participants to oscillate between practices. Religious authorities prevent true syncretism from occurring because they define the official boundaries of religions. While practitioners are constantly moving between religions, the religions themselves are stagnant. McIntosh discusses that Muslim spirits and Giriama do not get along saying, “they don't stay together in the same place, so Muslim spirits and indigenous spirits each have their own space in the cave” (McIntosh 181). Likewise religions themselves cannot occupy the same spaces and people must oscillate between them. Instead of combining practices into a single cohesive tradition, practitioners must create “bridges” between traditions, traveling between them when necessary