How Paloma Elsesser deals with her insecurities | Pretty Big Deal with Ashley Graham

Hello everyone, I'm Ashley Graham and this is very important, where trust is clean. In each episode, I get to pick the brains of brilliant, inspiring, honest, very important friends new and old. Today we are talking to the incredible Paloma Elsa, sir. I can see her on the catwalks and working with brands like Nike brighter and 50 Beauty ladies and gentlemen boys and girls we have Paloma Elsa sir with us sir with us today I said it right, we said it right and I'm very proud of You're okay, first of all nothing, the debacle about your last name, I know, I know it's a lot, honestly, it's just syllables LS s er, yeah, and it seems like that's how it's spelled, I just think the S really stresses everyone out the way I feel. that they will be like the rest, I don't know where that is from, but okay, I'm going to take literally every employee of the bank.

Hi Miss L sir, you could just tell that I can't like it, it's essentially that I might give up. in the middle but okay okay so I'm terrified because my grandfather is Swiss and there's a French county county in Switzerland called otherwise ass so that's where a company is interested yeah well just I want to start with something you said when we were together and we were talking in 2008, a teen fashion thing about the forces of fashion and it was about how different but how much common ground you and I have and one of the direct quotes was Ashley and I are. very different women, we have different identities, different experiences, but we have a connection and it really struck me because it is true that you cannot put a big girl in one category and that is what fashion has done and I want to talk about that with you today and I want to talk about tokenism and I like what that all means to you, yeah, I mean, I think it's especially fresh out of Fashion Week.

It's alarming to know that they posed in front of most of the girls that you know were involved in it, like a lot of these big fashion heads weren't. We just get confused, but we think we are the same person, not just you, but like me, and like another curve another thief grows and we could be different. I need exactly what I had in a meeting where the woman was like we had worked. together and I was like I remember it but I didn't want to just say no we haven't so it's like a new microaggression is one that I've interacted with everyone thinking that like everyone you know the role Of the blacks, all Hispanic girls are the same. it was like now because the opportunities are scarcer, not a pun like that, they weren't all the same, you know, but I think historically, especially in the curve market that we're having, it's like a radical change in actually representing four different iterations of what a curve is. or a plus size or fat or chunky girl it may seem like the common theme for us is always how we like to work in the service of allowing young girls, specifically young women, to see themselves because they themselves are all of us, yeah , that's you, that's me, that's ours, everyone. it's your feeling in general I mean work I mean this is one of those questions that I always hate hearing I hate this question do you know how you feel about it I mean and I've said this before just kind of wearing it like armor in a way because a a lot of Plus girls have liked their first season and it's like coming to the studio before the show and checking in and being like hair and makeup, you know, how do you do that?

This happens to me, I know it's crazy and that's why it's like, okay, how do I love myself to not be subject to that weird frown when I say oh, I'm a model who shouldn't have to feel mmm? -hmm, but I shouldn't feel bad when I have to explain it to someone either, so I use it where I am, look, I'm a plus model because it just reduces the margin of discomfort. so for you it's not really about being categorized it's just your armor yeah it's just you'd rather not be on a label of course I'd rather not be on a label like I want because we really work I've worked.

Personally, it's very difficult to just be like producing good work, feeling respected in an industry that for so long I never thought would include me, so it's like I don't want to be devalued or reduced to a label. You know I want the same treatment too. I want the same clothes I want the same experiences as a model I should be able to just say I'm a model, but we still have to experience the full spectrum of the same clothes and the same experiences, so first I want to delve into how you were discovered because, again, stories Complete opposites, yes, I was in a mall 20 years ago when social media didn't even exist, yes, and your story is the exact opposite.

I came to know why I can say I'm like I haven't been discovered in a mall like I literally like to date. Basically, it was like it was something complicated for a fashion editor named Stevie Dance who works at a pop magazine. I was working at a t-shirt store at the time and was just hanging out with a group. of skaters and she would see me around and she would say, hey, he likes it very nice, like she was Australian, you really know, and at that moment I had like never before. I didn't know anything about the plus size industry.

I didn't know it was lucrative in my life, I didn't really wear those clothes just because I already wore like men's clothes and I just liked finding things that worked from a very young age, so I didn't really know about the breadth of everything that was. It happened, you know, I looked like the glass wrens of the world, but even then I thought that was so sick, but it wasn't like me, so when Stevie said, "You should take some pictures and I'll put you in touch with people that you like." can make money like things are happening like things are changing there's this girl Ashley Graham who's doing real things yeah and I was like what and I remember seeing you in Love magazine it was Stevie and then I was gone on a bus tour. with one of my best friends I was managing it on tour because he was like wait, you were on tour.

He was helping manage the tour with my friend Earl Sweatshirt. He's like one of my oldest friends. He's like my brother's best friend. So it was something like that. That's a lot of my personality, let's try it, let's see what happens, so I won and then I remember getting an email from someone who was like Patton Groff, a legendary makeup artist who wants to photograph you for her makeup line, so I said, Okay, I guess I had to leave Lollapalooza or wherever it was and I got on a train. How I paid for my train back and we drank Gold Zero Zero wine.

Why did the first person who really likes me do my makeup professionally? I had no idea, no. Landmark, so you show up on set and you've never been on a set like that mall in my life. Were there other people who weren't models or were you surrounded by supermodels at the time? It was also just me, what? It was just me if she had never met you and she chose you, yeah I literally walk in and I'm nervous, I don't know about expressions or movements, I'm just like, hey, I've never done makeup before. so and it's actually been an incredible reference point for me, is that like my first big session with her, she didn't change anything about me, you know, she didn't want to do anything, so who are you like.

You are here because you are literally not because you are more because you are like a beautiful canvas for my makeup and that is why I want you here. I didn't know that wasn't normal, it's like it wasn't, it isn't and it still is. It's not normal, yes, the way you were discovered is incredibly unique, yes, I think it's very definitive, other times it's also like before yes, I think she had seen my Instagram. I always used Instagram to talk to that. in some way or like, you know, whatever, like wearing the outfit or whatever, just like weird stuff like to this day, I still post weird stuff and that's why I did it.

I was like, oh, let's get into something like, yeah. Like I don't know, I was just cool, it'll be like me and some Dickies or like me with a red lip like I was honest because I wasn't performing for anyone at all so you had no idea about that. your social media was like your calling card at this point, I had no idea, absolutely no idea, but then little things would happen the night before that I had done like, you know, a couple of little takes, but it was like people said, "I'm going to give you $350," so I thought, "I'm rich.

I'm rich. Who wants dinner? Because I got $350 in one day like I was a deer in the headlights. I had no idea, so we can add a lot of zeros your salary I'm doing it, I'm doing it very well, thank you Vina, you know, which has also been an incredible teaching moment about self-esteem and understanding how to take care of myself like when you don't have any. kind of financial knowledge where they throw you in like something you know, when it's not the most important thing in finance, getting into modeling, yeah, because some people are really lucky that you think they can call their parents about all these things like It's not necessary, yeah, okay, so let's go back to when you were 11 or 12 and you really wanted some embroidered gap jeans, but I have similar experiences, but I want you to tell me yours and about that day yeah, I mean, I remember I went to Kids Gap I was 11 I was a kid hmm at the time I had something like I guess now looking back at it like I had a body like I already had a body it was already happening I had I look at the body like everything is happening and I go to space because all the girls in my class have embroidered clothing like boys' jeans and I go and there is simply nothing that fits me like it was nothing, it is a flared embroidered jean and not elastic.

I remember the lighting I remember exactly what that dressing room was like and I remember being in it then it's also like I was shopping with my dad, which is like right? I don't think I knew how to navigate it and I frantically remember this poor saleswoman. running and then like oscillating between like the gap of the adult trying to find and like nothing fits small clothes wouldn't fit not at that point when you're 11 like obviously I've experienced lower points of my life but that's how I felt like one of the lowest points, I felt like I already felt his extreme isolation and my identity since I was a child for a multitude of reasons, like my mom is African American, my dad is Chilean and Swiss, but in the UK and he has footprints, so which is like her identity was mixed up and then my mom is like black as well as Buddhist and like we grew up super hippies so I ended up going to a

pretty

prestigious school surrounded by no one likes me at a class level that I could relate to and then I was fat like God help me like I felt really alone in my body like really alone and then that physical representation of just not fitting in literally felt like I couldn't see any further down, look, that's why that memory is so clear for me because I remember that feeling that I'm never going to fit in, it's never going to work for me, you know, it's crazy, what's up girl?

No, I mean, there's just, I mean, it's. it's like I can relate because at 11 12 years old 12 years old when I started modeling and I was considered a plus size model at the time, yeah, and you go, I mean, a similar situation it's like you can only shop at a few different places, but now you have identity in your style and before I got here I was telling my whole team that you don't know, it's great until you buckle up, there's always something in how you carry yourself and I want to know how you got there. because being the young woman at the Gap who hated that experience and somehow felt like it defined you at the time, but now you can walk into a room and no matter if you feel unsafe walking in, you have this aura. you are like I am who I am and you are unapologetically yourself and I want to know how you got there many of our experiences are of anyone who was operated as any type of minority are different from the norm that all those

insecurities

Become, ultimately , in your strength, my greatest strength and my people, how do you know how to buy and say?

Because I've been fragmenting my whole life that's how I know you know and I just had a change of attitude and I don't say that like every day. The day is easy in that, but I've always liked to express myself through style and all those things have now shaped how I dress today in that, like just knowing my body and having space for it and how I feel and so if I have room for it, but that's where the confidence comes or it's like today I have a hoodie and baggy Parrikar hurts and a boot like that is what I am today and that's it and that's like the common thread and then Also, yeah, it's How to know what I feel good about.

Normally, if I'm going to make a fitted top, I'll make it like a loose bar or something, you just know me, but I've done it, that's been my recipe. so long because they were like my survival tools all the girls that weren't in high school wear what they would like jeans like Frankie B and paper jean and colonics old seven jeans, you know, do you remember? 31:26 I mean, it's not enough because I grew up in Las eyebrows inLos Angeles, there was a big phase where these $250 jeans I could, for a lot of different reasons, I couldn't look at, I just wouldn't have been able to afford them, but then I was like Oh, but I could afford maybe like the tank top in the brand that the girls weren't so okay I'm going to wear a Dickey with this tank top and everything you know so I always like and I don't know you can ask any of my oldest friends like Oklahoma, He always dressed how he wanted to dress, you know, since I think there was a there.

It was definitely a thorny period where I felt like my body was like my sexuality wasn't connected, like I felt like my body was too sexual when it wasn't even overtly sexual, so it made me feel uncomfortable like I was 11 and 12 years. and having grown men looking at me like I'm not boring, that's the other thing, yeah, so I just said, yeah, like I wanted to cover it up, not because I felt like I wasn't uncomfortable with my body, but I was more uncomfortable. and like being subject to other discomforts mm-hm and then, little by little, a kind of unapologetic version of my body emerged with sexuality, you know, and it's all a byproduct like today, how I like to move into the world or simply as a byproduct. similar at heart Alex fights who now just reported that it's amazing yeah I'm so glad you explained that I think it's also very important for our industry because you know it's not about being like a blogger or a style but it's like it's hard for us to find clothes that represent us well mm-hmm like it's really hard, it's important for young people to see women like us dressed how we really want to dress mm-hmm not how we're supposed to work exactly like that, even when I feel like, oh, anything that has to be, you know, a side service in some way, because I was like damn, I really wish I had a better example growing up, well, I just had to make all the mistakes that I told him. my girl likes them.

Yeah, that miniskirt and that tank top with spurs look different on you and of course they always do on your friend, and I had to like finding that out the hard way, being the girl you didn't have, yeah, Tell us what that means, I know what. it means you know what I mean because I live it, I love it, yeah, I just never not only saw myself, but you know it's very important for me, as I constantly say, to attend to the nuances of the identities that we can all represent. You know, I didn't see a girl who liked to dress the way I wanted.

I always felt like I had to be a somewhat performative sexy girl that I never felt completely comfortable with and until the last few years of my life, so you know you can be smart, you can have a critique, you can be uncomfortable, you can be transparent and also I remember being younger and being very embarrassed to think like I did or You know, I remember literally having a memory of being like a stopwatch, like being a girl, I could just laugh and like that, you can be loud, you can, I can take up space like always.

I felt, just because my physical body took up so much. There's a lot of space that I wanted to reduce and that I wanted to see more of because all the most incredible icons to me are women now who just unapologetically take up space in the way that they were like who they were. What I will try not to do is be the girl you didn't have. I love that. Yes, you've had your own experiences personally, good, bad and ugly, but now you're here on set and you have other people. dressing yourself and you know that as a model we can't choose what we wear hey, what have those experiences been like for you?

I mean, I've had kind of a variety of experiences. I also think you're still like that. encountering discrimination and me right where you encounter discrimination, it's discriminatory to come on set and like our rock is this big and it's like clothes that we would never wear, it's not mainstream fashion and then the other girls have like black and blacks. Prada Miu Miu and McLaren like all these things as if they were passively discriminatory. I mean, I feel really lucky to now be in a position in my career where I have more say than I ever thought I would have over my response. in, for example, a powerful tool and that also represents who you are, on a visual level like the stylist, that people can also see that, yes, I know how to like.

I find things, so you should mm-hmm and then it's like they come in and say oh, like you're so cool, we love your outfits, we love your spare, don't you hate it? And they ask you to bring clothes. I said, I would say I had to be towed on my back, I say. No, yeah, but I've had some, yeah, like passive microaggressions around our body, I bought my body. I remember being on, we were shooting the cover of Vogue Arabia, oh my gosh, we were in upstate New York, we did some doubles and then we did some singles and I had You change back and you came back and you had this look on your face like If something had just happened and I said: Paloma, is everything okay?

He said no, everything is okay now. I just don't, I don't like what just happened. What happened was that the suit didn't fit me well, yes, and it didn't fit me well, yes, and then they said: oh, we'll put it on Paloma, yes, and uncomfortable, yes, as if we were always naked and oiled or ready to destroy us. in that it just doesn't look good it's like improvising mmm it's also like let's not forget that we are also trying to sell clothes so then you feel this I felt at that moment this overwhelming responsibility to do something that was 'It doesn't work and it wasn't going to work it works mm -hm mm-hm and in many situations I can make it work with it it's not like it's like that lining like they don't understand it like the lining is exact rolls literal nightmare everything everything was like other stylists or other people on set were They saw well, you didn't know they were lying, I knew they were lying and it bothered me, I felt dishonest and I didn't feel like you knew. it was a collaboration that now not now and not always, but lately and in a lot of jobs that I've been in I felt like it really is a collaboration it's how you feel do you like the way you like the way you look would you wear this?

I know and thank God we are where we are in our career but it really sucks for the girls that are up and coming right now that don't have a voice and I always tell models to stand up for themselves, who cares if do you hate? Say something now if it's just about the style that's one thing but it's like if you're really uncomfortable with something get up and talk about it hey I had a really great stylist who really grabbed the side of my butt right here , Justin my husband, he calls it side, but this is my part, but I couldn't fit into these wraps, him and the pants, and she grabbed that part of my butt, my hip, and said, honey, if you would get rid of this, then you could fit into this.

It was a year ago as a lady, you know who I am, you know what I stand for and you know that I am not going to lose weight to fit into these pants and those experiences, no matter what level we are at. I'll always be there and I feel a responsibility to constantly stand up for myself and the people around me because when I was younger I didn't have that, I didn't know that that was okay mm-hm and we have to do it. I have to say it's funny because you have to get into those situated, the effect of me being there or what happens behind closed doors, like how it will affect someone else's experience, in fact, I was talking yesterday, like with Jeff Ament, who bought yet. no blood, she's like a beautiful, she wears hijab, we were both on the same plane coming back from Nigeria and we had like we followed each other on Instagram.

I mean, she's like a baby deer, like born to model, like born to model. We're talking and then I was just able to say with real sincerity that don't let anyone affect your faith and who you are. Just because he's gay doesn't mean you can change in front of them because he's nice. Peace of mind doesn't mean you have to show your hair to anyone, no matter how many shoots you can take, as long as you want for Ramadan, because putting your foot down will create that space for everyone. A Muslim girl after demanding the same thing every time, I say: I will challenge a stylist and say: where are the things?

What if there is a tailor there? Why don't we open it? Know? or I just like it. no, I personally don't want to have my hair and baby hairs and I like knockers, you know, because that will create space for another brown or black or a little bit. I'm not okay with that mm-hmm, is there a black or brown person who shoots it, no, is there a black or brown person who does my hair? No, which is also the new thing, is as you can see, the majority of my team are women and now you see that the majority of the teams are POC. yes, colored, like it's happening, it's really able to demand it now, absolutely, absolutely, take me back, yes, not as far back as a few years ago, 2017, brighter, you're naked, you're on set, take us from I go back to that morning of that.

Shooting and what you thought going in I honestly thought I was more prepared up until that point. I hadn't photographed nude for something as big as I had photographed nude with different friends for different things up until that point. I also felt very insecure about a specific part of my body, which was my breasts, and I didn't know how they were going to be photographed, like actually my breasts were the only part of my body that was really stopping me from doing much. of nude shoots, which was really strange, so at the beginning I was thinking how am I going to be able to figure this out and then I don't know, I walked on set and felt completely overwhelmed with the future. instead of the present, it was like, you know, how my boyfriend and my brothers' friends are and I like all this because I also grew up with a lot of kids and I knew how kids talk, so I was like I was thinking. about every possible mistake and I started to get very frustrated so I started crying.

I don't really cry inside, secretly, I look like hot tear syndrome, like I was, like you know, in the Delta terminal, like I was fine, I couldn't understand it. all this light, like crying, not because I'm sad, because I'm angry, okay, that's what I like and I just like to dwell on the future, you know, but then I had to apologize and literally bring myself to the present and that The only important part of the future has nothing to do with those who will judge me but with those who will feel seen in this, you know, so I went into it like at that time the creative director was saying that we can do anything we like .

We make you feel comfortable, we have everyone sort of compensated, we like to put like Sade and they just made me feel like that space was mine and mine alone and yeah, it ended up being like a very, very powerful and billboard campaign, but God likes it. really and every anxiety that was hanging around about the future like literally like a file like it's crazy that like every one of my friends like skaters like guy who's sick, you know, like they have that much height and then like they don't. knew. I just want to say thank you because you expressed yourself in a way that many of us have felt for so long in that photo, even though it was a couple of years ago.

Throughout this pregnancy I have somehow felt ashamed because my body is changing so fast and it is not under my control and I have always had control over my body and I posted a photo from a similar side to yours to make it brighter and It was just a selfie with stretch marks, new rolls on my body that I have and I thought of you when I posted it because it was a very vulnerable moment for me and it's so beautiful and all these girls then and just yeah and it just creates a trip, an effect domino where people feel safe and did you know you were going to have that effect on other women?

I didn't realize how important it was for women like us to be included in the beauty there. To be like honest representations of what beautiful women can look like, there were a lot of parts where I had to give up control over that moment and also I guess I couldn't speak very candidly about the brighter girls that were brought to me. I went into the studio before the pictures came out and let me choose, ah, they did it, you don't know what, you don't understand what a privilege you just had, someone listening, you're looking, you never get to meet a model on the face of this earth.

I mean, I don't even know if we asked Cindy Crawford if she ever got to pick a cover, you can never ever pick a photo, but I want to talk about your tits, yeah, because we had a really long conversation about your tits on the phone and we were just the two of us like there are no cameras or microphones and you told me about your breasts and now you've done something to your breasts yeah so I got like a minor breast reduction, butt lifts while I reduce it one. It was a very crazy experience, so they were droopy and that's what you didn't like about them mainly and had some looks at your asymmetry.

Well, I developed breasts very early and I don't want to say that I have had them. I have once been extremely thin, but I have fluctuated a lot in my life, as you know, many of us have, but yes, my breasts were very subject to that, you know, I would take leaps and bounds like other parts of my body.because there was a period of time in my life like when I was young where I could literally find flaws on top of each other, my hair lines were weird too, like the second toe, it's weird, I could find something about everything and it's about This is something radical like self-love for me, it's about radical acceptance and I say this all the time and it's like, like the things that maybe that I felt weird or isolated or uncomfortable when I was younger, I don't like it, I can't control that I'm not white or that I wasn't thin or that I wasn't born rich, like getting rich, but like you.

I know, but these things and it's like, like it's not in my narrative up to this point to be thin or to be quiet, right, or to be this thing, oh, that's when you said, okay, let me do something with my breasts, yeah, but breathing like I literally thought these are things I can know and it was the only part of my body that I still felt embarrassed about like tonight, like my stomach. It was okay, like it could be cute, like you know anything. it's like my boobs are one part and I'm glad I didn't do them when I just got my first check because the first one does it oh I'm going to do it but I still thought it would have been like that.

It's a kind of reaction or reflection like: you know how men received me or how the industry received me and that's why I'm happy I did it now at 27 years old or I've been in an honest, holistic, loving and committed relationship for almost five years , but He loves me unchanged, you know? And then, like my career hadn't been affected, it was really for me. I wanted to be able to move around in the world and not have to go to work. There were three different bras and I covered my breasts with tape every day. Like it's literally not even about how you look, it's about mental and emotional taxes like I just want that freedom and are you happy now with your breasts?

It's never perfect, but I'm definitely grateful that it's not something he dictates. how I feel every day, that's good, yeah, that's incredibly important. I developed it as a magazine and the book when I teamed up with one of my closest friends is an amazing photographer with four really honest photos of what the experience really looks like, you know? I have nothing to hide, I mean, it's definitely not like shouting it from the rooftops, but I also think it's important because we live in a time where we see really modified bodies and we just normalize it, that's not just what a body Should have. look like that but also like that oh but I could look like that if I had enough money hmm and people have will and freedom to do what they want with their body and their money and whatever, I have no judgment so it's a series of progression photos after your breast augmentation, yes, okay, I got it, and there are some things written.

It was also the first time I had to take any kind of painkiller in a long time because I don't drink or anything, so I wrote like a bunch of pieces about when I was horny like it was something very raw and honest, yeah, I think because I I mean being pregnant right now, I think breast lift will come into my life, it's part of what it can be. It's been notable how you've shared a little bit of your mental health story with us on social media, yeah, and anxiety, and how social media can be a trigger.

I want to talk a little about it with you because I think there are many young people listening who are going through similar situations. What are some of those things that you're going through, that you've been through, and how you've overcome them? Yes, I have struggled with mental illness since I was very young. They medicated me, I think around 11. Wow, yeah, and that was even after kind of a series of attempts to find that they were like homeopathic remedies. Like I said, my mom is super happy and even at 1112 she was really struggling. She had a very, very anxious child and I was smart too, but then I operated in this very dogmatic, dark place, like it was hard to be like a child and think that it was no good.

Wow, you know, and so I felt very trapped. my own head and so the medication definitely acted as a remedy and now I was on shock therapy, CBT therapy, two other different forms of, you know, acupuncture, like a full spectrum of different types of agents to help with those isolating experiences. , uncertainty, helplessness, many things. that we are very adult feelings that we feel at a very young age and not only and I would also like to repeat that they are not things that are calm today for me mm-hmm and then I use the type of drugs and alcohol.

It's kind of a remedy for that fear that I didn't really have the tools, and so throughout my adolescence and early adulthood, it was always trying to grab, but just figuring out how to have agency over something that's not quite there. under my control, that becomes really like a chemical imbalance and having to put one foot in front of the other and constantly have empathy for myself and not, you know, that's how I feel and then it was difficult because then it was like I went into a La industry, which isn't exactly a mirror of holistic mental health practice, isn't, so I really had to quickly adapt to a place that made me feel sane at a certain point, even on medication for a while and you.

I'm sober now too, right, yeah, and I've been sober for a long time. All of these things have played a very important role in what my version of I'm not saying happiness, but content, looks like today and gratitude because and I believe. That also entails a lot of transparency and a lot of honesty. You know, it's always been something that I'm willing to talk about in an effort to let everyone who feels this way too, the National Mental Health Alliance estimates 48 million. us. people really suffer from anxiety, yes, it's not easy to be a girl nowadays, not that it wasn't easy 50 years ago, it's not easy at all to be a girl or a woman as you know, and I think it comes with a lot of others like tyrannies so it's like yeah of course we're depressed of course we're anxious and I think now I'm holding space like I'm an anxious person but what am I doing physically to like the help that Do you know a way that feels?

It's safe for me, you know, and it's like, from just waking up, making my bed, reaching out to someone else, making sure that someone you know likes these things that when I was younger they didn't, so of course, I turned to other coping mechanisms. You've created your own kind of rituals, yes, totally, that's very important, so this is kind of yours. You have a 100% support system and you also have your rituals. Yeah, can you explain what those two things look like to you? My support system. it's a whole network of people like just keeping a lot of contact with my family your boyfriend my boyfriend you know and also my boyfriend my partner not being responsible for every part of my feelings right, that was a really radical thing for me to discover that it's okay for him I'm not equipped to make myself feel better, okay, you know how to ask for help, know how to express that I'm afraid of this, and create an ecosystem of people who know how to do it. we can support each other and not like I was texting Mina all last week like I was scared of this in the third and like she was giving me tokens that I needed Mina is our agent she is and she is amazing when it comes to just because she's a big girl too, yes, and she understands the anxiety of walking into a space where you'll be in lingerie or watching live TV or just walking around or being in a space where there are skinny people everywhere, yes How has sobriety changed? how you feel about yourself today I just trust who I am AB staining of a lot of things that happen to a lot of people in their 20s like he taught me a lot, you know, he showed me how to trust my instincts, he showed me how to be. a person that people want to be with, you know she is one of my best and when any young model asked me especially what do some advise Nikki aleck, practice like this, but really it's like being a person that people want to be with , it's so commercial. "I can't explain how lucky I feel because, as dark as fashion can be, I've made incredible friendships and relationships, like I knew how much I loved Alister McCain was like the first job we ever did," he asked.

Yo, how do you feel? Stylists have never asked me that. Alistair is also a sweetheart, he is an angel. You know, he asked me to be a contributing editor ID because he trusts me and you know, yeah, you know, and it's like he's really beautiful. I'm really honored that social media is a place where you're super honest and you're yourself and now it's become a business for you, yeah, what's it like running it like you're running it yourself? Yeah, okay, yeah, I mean. "How do I know, because at one point I liked mental health things again.

I entered a dark place where I forgot why I use social media, why I used it specifically for girls or women who trust me like them ". I'm there because it's like they like my weird photos of cars and railings and whatever, but it's cool, I'm like DoubleTap, I don't know what that is, but I like it, so what's Paloma passionate about? currently of both things? It's like when someone asked me once five years ago what your five-year plan is. It would be one hundred percent about race and today it's ten percent about race. Oh, interesting, yes, it's definitely that, but I only want that ten percent. be so that it permeates the other 90% of my life and that I can live content, you know, they mean because I have learned in this industry that there are no better ones, hmm, and then there are people at the top who We are still very unhappy in a way very physical, like I just want to have things that and you've been an incredible role model and just have things held in ways that it's like you don't know that our bodies don't have to.

It's always going to be our craft now you know as you can represent us you know more for us the more you know and I think that's something I'm really excited to get into like apparel we're just a constant reminder to fish like the lack and I don't want to wait. I need you to do this John Paul Gautier Agassi, she goes into John Paul fucking Gautier, okay then, it's

pretty

important, what we do at the end is a lightning round and I just need you to do it. fill in the blank it's okay I almost always use lotion I'm sorry you guys don't understand her body is so soft I can't go she's like my tick I can't not share we've had to intertwine so many times and photos and I I am always like Paloma young skin and you are like I want to take a nap in every girl always and hydrated yes what is the biggest lesson you have learned last year the biggest lesson I have learned in the last year is what I did not get, It wasn't for me, oh, I learned that, yeah, hard, yeah, right?

I'm like, oh, like that wasn't for me mm-hmm mm-hmm, was that a great job? a comfort cover or just like yeah, it was some things that you would like different things like last week. It's like it's helped me through this week being like why not, you know, because the first thought is why not me, but like what was it. No, what didn't happen for me wasn't for me mm-hmm, it's a very important lesson that a lot of people still need to realize, okay and finally, I mean, I just have great

deal

s on the podcast. but I want to know what's really important to you, I guess because what I'm saying is empathy is really important to me, it's really an important principle in how I connect with people, you know, just empathy is big, that's a big why now.

It's very important, you know people like to forget it, she is deep, for many reasons, I love it, thank you so much and thank you to everyone who is watching something very important, make sure you go to Instagram and Twitter. and comment because we want to know what you thought of this interview, we also want to hear your thoughts and comments about Paloma for me and I mean, maybe you guys are feeling the same thing so we'll talk to you soon, thanks for listening and watching