Lerato, who is a traditional practicing healer, told Trending SA this week that before her call, she used to walk around as if she was “an empty tin”.

Actress and singer Lerato Mvelase had to go through her fair share of difficulties while taking the journey towards being a traditional healer but said the worst part was the feeling of emptiness she had before embracing her gift.

“Before I got into that space (traditional healing)…there was a sense of emptiness. A lot of us walk around and we’re feeling empty, and you can’t even explain what it is. People can be like ‘you have a job, but you are pretty, but you have this’ But you are empty. That was me, I used to walk around, I was an empty tin. I knew there was so much more to me.”

She said it was also difficult to speak to people who she had never met before but had dreamt about. She added that she was often seen as unchristian because of her gift when she, in fact, embraced both sides of herself.

In an interview on Metro FM last year she revealed that she was a little shy to embrace the call at first because, as a Christian, she thought that it was connected to dark magic.

“I also didn’t want it because of how it was introduced to me. It was always represented as dark and dirty and evil. So, I stayed far away from those things because, for me, it was not what I wanted. I wanted something beautiful. My energy must be clean.”

But the journey also took its toll on her children, who struggled in the first six months while she was away while training.

“It was very hard on my kids. I mean my kids sleep with me, even today. So for them to wake up and mommy isn’t there….It was very hard for my kids after six months of me being away but kids are very understanding actually. We don’t give them enough credit.