Uncovering the life of one of the fashion industry’s most prolific faces and discovering what prompted her spiritual awakening.

When you picture glitz, glam and fashion icons, who comes to mind? We have the fabulous former supermodel and television hostess Lisa Butcher on our minds.

Deemed the “Face of the ’90s,” this fashionista has a rich history in the entertainment world, from strutting down the runway in her teens to presenting and hosting network television shows and designing custom jewelry for her line, SAKTI.

To many of us, being on the covers of magazines is a feat that may seem unattainable. Yet Butcher has taken these by storm and has used them to springboard her life into new achievements and endeavours.

“It didn’t really seem like a big achievement, to be honest. It’s just how my life has been and how it’s evolved,” says Butcher. “I can’t imagine being in the same job forever; I’m not one of those kinds of people. I’ve gone back to school, so in the past two years I’ve been studying. Now I’m an energy worker and I’m a therapist,” she says.

“So going through from my jewelry, which I designed in order to heal, it helped. I’ve gone down a different path, which is to help people. My life has evolved in a miraculous and beautiful way, and I couldn’t be happier than doing the job that I’m doing at the moment.”

Butcher humbly mentions that she was incredibly lucky to have gotten to where she was in the prime of her modelling career. She says that what she is doing now requires a different kind of focus, and although going back to school had it challenges, she gets a great sense of fulfillment helping others.

Stemming from her modelling and entertainment profession, Butcher shares a valuable lesson she has taken from the industry and has passed along to her children. “I think what it’s taught me, what I hope to instill in my children, because my eldest, Oil (24), is still modelling and studying to be a therapist, and my little one, Amber (22), modelled for a little bit and is now a singer-songwriter, is that you have a voice and you can say no. If something doesn’t feel right, say, ‘No.’

The other lesson is gratitude. “Like I said, I was very, very lucky. Th ere are so many other girls out there who are extremely beautiful and who could’ve had the opportunity, but maybe fate gave it to me. So I was very, very grateful, and it has brought me to where I am today. So I have buckets of gratitude.”

Along with all of the successes from Butcher’s professional career, she’s also had to learn the ways of being a single mother at an early age. Having to raise two children on her own, Butcher shares that it is no easy task, and that there were times that she had to take modelling or entertainment jobs in order to pay the bills and have her own time. For her, something had to give, and it was not going to be her children.

On top of this, Butcher not only braved being a single mother, but she also lost her former partner at the same time as she lost her father. The death of her former partner was completely unexpected, as she received the phone call the day of her father’s funeral, igniting a fight-or-flight instinct in Butcher for her children and herself.

“My life has evolved in a miraculous and beautiful way, and I couldn’t be happier than doing the job that I’m doing at the moment”

Butcher believes that you cannot control these things in life, and you must move on and be strong. It is easy to become defeated and ripped apart through the tragedies that happen, namely the loss of the two men who helped form her direction in life and adulthood.

“When you go through these things, you just manage, and I just got through. The people I needed around me disappeared. The first thing, when I got that phone call, I thought it was a joke. I thought it was a sick joke.”

Butcher says that she was concerned for her children and how it would affect them emotionally and their lives in general. This led Butcher to the life and career path that she has taken today. She allowed the burden and heartache of these horrific events to motivate her to inspire and build up others. This is why she has been led in the direction of therapy and counselling.

How does spirituality tie in to Butcher’s life, one may ask? By enlightening herself and her spirit, she says it has given her the opportunities to reach new goals and go after something she feels is much greater than that of her previous career and life accomplishments — selflessness.

Along with personal growth, the spiritual elements that have become present in Butcher’s life can also be seen through her jewelry line.

She says that when she saw beautiful, comforting and inspiring things, she cast her feelings and emotions on to that object, to help with the inner healing from the losses she has experienced. Her jewelry line is also not meant for mass market buyers, since Butcher creates bespoke pieces that help individuals on their own personal life journeys.

This comes from the art of healing, where Butcher was gently reminded that it is important not to rush life and take things for granted. She takes the time to meditate, reminiscing on how she started her new practice of energy therapy, which includes hypnotherapy and reiki.

To assist in being a successful energy therapist, she has drawn from her previous roots in Asian culture, where she spent a great deal of time in Bali. The reason this is a great point in her life and stepping stone is that it spurs spiritual culture within her and her professional practice. She pulls lessons from various religions, and these allow her to understand, respect and learn the backgrounds of her patients and how they may respond to specific situations.

“The gift in that is that it’s opened up my spirituality and turned my life into something complete and has much more meaning to me. There’s always a gift in every tragedy, and that is the gift that I got from it — that now I am able to help other people deal with it.”

www.sakti.co.uk

@lisabutcherofficial

WRITTEN BY SHAUN MELADY

INTERVIEW BY VICTORIA SCOTT