South African actress and media personality Palesa Madisakwane has opened up about her deeply personal spiritual journey, reflecting on a period when she was told she had a sangoma calling before ultimately choosing to return to her Christian faith.
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Palesa recently spoke to Lungelo KM on Engineer Your Life, where she got candid about her experiences, the challenges she faced during her spiritual journey and what ultimately led her to reassess the path she was on.
‘I was in hell’
During her conversation with Lungelo KM, Palesa reflected on the difficult experiences that shaped her spiritual journey.
The actress spoke about a period in her life when she was searching for answers and trying to understand what was happening around her. She described the experience as feeling like she was in hell, opening up about the emotional and spiritual turmoil she went through.
Her story comes after she previously made headlines for revealing that she had been told she had a calling to become a sangoma.
Her journey began during a difficult period
Palesa has previously explained that her journey into traditional healing happened during one of the most challenging periods of her life.
She had lost her job at Generations, gone through a divorce and lost her house and cars. As she searched for answers, people around her encouraged her to consult traditional healers.
“I needed answers, but my mistake was that I moved away from God and I didn’t seek the Holy Spirit,” she previously told Drum.
Her consultations eventually led to her being told that she needed to undergo thwasa because of what was interpreted as a spiritual calling.
I saw hell.
Palesa Madisakwane Opens Up.
#EngineerYourLife https://t.co/6M5SzWKOnT
— Engineer Your Life (@EngineerYLPod) October 6, 2026
‘I was told I had to thwasa’
Palesa has been clear that she was never a fully initiated sangoma.
Instead, she said she was told she needed to undergo the initiation process after experiencing dreams and other events that were interpreted as signs of an ancestral calling. She previously spoke about dreams involving sangomas, drums and water, among other spiritual imagery.
“I want to clarify also that I was never a sangoma,” she said in her 2023 interview with Drum.
While she started exploring the process, she ultimately did not complete it.
Also see: WATCH: Palesa Madisakwane details why she regrets divorcing her husband
Questioning the journey
As Palesa continued exploring the spiritual path, she began to question whether it aligned with her personal beliefs.
She previously recalled an incident during a cleansing ritual when she raised her hands towards heaven and thanked God, only to be stopped from calling on the Holy Spirit.
The experience left her questioning what she was being asked to do. She also previously described feeling pressured when she questioned certain practices.
“I felt bullied,” she said at the time.
Returning to Christianity
Palesa eventually decided to step away from the journey and return to Christianity.
She has said she became a born-again Christian at the age of 16, although she acknowledged experiencing periods when she drifted away from her faith.
Around 2021, she said she began watching sermons online and returned to reading the Bible.
“I heard the voice of God telling me that this was not me,” she previously told Sowetan.
Her decision to leave the journey later became public when she shared footage of herself cutting and burning the traditional cloth she had acquired during the process.
‘I am going the Jesus way’
Palesa has stressed that her decision was about her own personal faith and was not intended to shame people who follow traditional healing.
“I am not fighting, shaming or looking down on anyone who has chosen that way. God has given us a choice,” she previously said.
She has described choosing to follow Christianity as a deeply personal decision.
“I have taken it upon myself to say I am going the Jesus way,” she said.
Now, through her recent conversation with Lungelo KM on Engineer Your Life, Palesa is once again giving audiences a glimpse into the experiences that shaped her spiritual journey and the difficult road that ultimately led her back to her faith.
Also see: Palesa Madisakwane shares her struggles of being a firstborn
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