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

[Music] hey everybody I'm Ashley Graham and this is pretty big deal where confidence is clean every episode I get to pick the brains of brilliant inspiring honest new and old friends who are a pretty big deal [Music] today we are talking to the amazing Paloma Elsa sir you can catch her on the runways and working with brands like glossier Nike and 50 Beauty ladies and gentlemen boys and girls we have Paloma Elsa sir on with us sir on with us today I said it right we said it right and I'm so proud of you okay first of all the debacle about your last name I know I know it's a lot it's honestly just syllables LS s er yeah and it looks it's that's the way that it's spell I just think that the S is really get everyone's stressed like I feel that like they'll be like else nur I don't know where that's from but okay I'm gonna take literally every bank person ever hi miss L sir they just could notice like I can't like it's essentially I could give up in the middle but it's okay okay so I'm terrorized you my grandfather's Swiss and there's a County of French County in Switzerland called else ass so that's where a company interested yeah well I just I want to start off with something that you had said when we were together and we were talking at 2008 a teen vogue fashion forces and it was about how different but how how many commonalities 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 are we have a connection and it really hit home for me because it's true you can't put a big girl in a category and that's what fashion has done and I want to talk about that with you today and I want to talk about tokenism and like what all of that means to you yeah I mean I think it's especially coming fresh out of Fashion Week it's alarming to know that like posed against the majority of girls that you know were sprinkled into that like a lot of these major fashion heads like not only like confuse us but like think we're the same person not just you but like me and like another curve grow another crook and we could it be different I need exactly like I had in one encounter where the woman was like we've worked together and I was like I remember but I didn't want to just say like no we haven't so it's like a new of microaggression was one I've interacted with everyone thinking that like every you know black role every Hispanic girls the same was like now because opportunities are slimmer no pun intended like that weren't all the same you know but I think that historically especially in the curve market that we're having it's like radical shift in really just representing four different iterations of what a curve or plus size or fat or chunky girl can look like the common theme for us is always like how do we like work in service of allowing young specifically young women to see themselves because themselves is all of us yeah that's you it's me it's ours everybody what is your feeling on the whole I mean the work I mean this is one of those questions that I hate always I hear I hate this question you know how do you feel about it I mean and I've kind of said this before I just kind of use it as an armor in a way because a lot of Plus girls who's had like their first season and it's like coming up to the studio coming up to the show and like checking in and being like hair and makeup you know oh how does that happen to me I know it's insane and so it's like okay how do I love myself not to be subject to like that weird like furrow of the brow when I'm like oh I'm a model which I shouldn't have to feel mmm-hmm but I also shouldn't have to feel badly when I have to explain to someone so I kind of just use it where I'm just like look I'm a plus model like because it just kind of reduces the margin of discomfort so for you it's not really about being categorized it's just it's your armor yeah it's just you would rather not be in a label it would just of course I would rather not be in a label like I want because I we work really I've worked personally really hard at just being 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 that I also want the same treatment 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 have yet to experience the whole spectrum of the same clothes and the same experiences so I want to first dive into how you were discovered because again completely opposite stories yeah I was in a mall 20 years ago when social media wasn't even around yeah and your story is the exact opposite came to know why I can say I'm like I wasn't discovered in a mall like I literally like find quotes I was essentially like it was it kind of compounded a fashion editor named Stevie dance who works at pop magazine I at the time was working at a t-shirt store and like just would hang out with a bunch of skaters and she would see me around she was like hey he like really pretty like she's Australian really you know and I at the time had like I never I didn't know anything about the Plus Size industry I didn't know that it was lucrative in my lifetime I didn't really wear the clothes just cuz I was already wearing like men's clothes and just kind of like finding things that worked from a really young age so I didn't really know about the breadth of like everything that was happening you know I saw like the crystal wrens of the world but even then I was like that's so sick but that wasn't like me so when Stevie was like you should take some pictures and I'll set you up with people and like you can make money like there's things happening like there's things changing there's this girl Ashley Graham who's doing things real yes and I was like what and I remember seeing you in the love magazine it was that it was Stevie and then I had gone on a tour bus with my one of my best friends I was tour managing him because I was like wait you were tour I was helping tour manage my friend Earl Sweatshirt he's like my one of my oldest friends he's like my brother's best friend so it was kind of just this like that's very much so my personality just like let's try it out like let's see what's up so I won and then I remember getting an email from somebody being like Patton Groff like legendary makeup artist wants to shoot you for her makeup line so I was like okay I guess I got to leave Lollapalooza or wherever I was and got on a train how I paid for my train to go back and we shot gold zero zero wine why does the first person who like professionally really done my makeup I had no idea no point of reference so you show up on set and you've never even been on a set like that mall ever in my life was there other people that were not models or were you surrounded by supermodels at that point it was also just me what yeah it was just me if she had never met you and she casted you yeah I literally walk in and I'm like nervous I don't know about expressions or like move I just I'm like hey I've never done my makeup before like that like and it's actually been this incredible point of reference for me is that like my very first like major shoot with her like she didn't change anything about me you know she wasn't like do anything then who you are like you're here because like literally not because you're plus because you're like a beautiful canvas for my makeup and that's why I want you here I didn't know that that's wasn't normal it's like it's not it's not and it still isn't normal yeah way that you were discovered is incredibly unique yeah I think it's very much so like definitive other times it's like also leading up to it's like yeah I think she had seen my Instagram I just always used Instagram to kind of talk to it kind of in a way or like you know whatever like wear the outfit or like whatnot outfits just like weird things like to this day I still post weird things and so I did that I'd be like oh we're gonna get into like yeah like I don't know I just was like cool it'll be like me and some Dickies or like me with like a red lip like I just was like honest because I wasn't performing for anybody at all so you had no idea that your social media was kind of like your business card at this point I had no idea absolutely no idea but then there would be like little things that would happen in the night before that I had done like a you know a couple little shoots but it was like people are like I'm gonna give you $350 so I was like I'm rich I'm rich who wants dinner cuz I got $350 in one day like I was a deer in the headlights I had no idea so we can add a bunch of zeros your salary I'm doing I'm doing great thank you Vina ye know I'm which is like also just been such an incredible teachable moment in self-worth and understanding how to take care of myself like when you don't have any like kind of financial foreground like you're kind of launched into like a thing you know when it's hardly the biggest thing finances getting into modeling yeah cuz some people are really lucky you think they can call their parents about all these things like not need that yeah okay so let's take it back like way back to when you're like 11 12 years old and you really wanted some embroider jeans from the gap but I have similar experiences but I want I want you to tell yours and and about that day yeah I mean I remember I went to kids gap I was 11 I was a kid hmm at that point I had kind of like I guess now looking back at it like I had body like I already had body it was already happening I had a observe body like it was all happening and I go to the gap because every girl in my class has usek embroidered like kids gap jeans and I go and there's just nothing that fits like nothing it's a non-stretch like flared embroidered Jean I remember the lighting I remember exactly what that dressing room looks like and I remember being then it's also like I'm shopping with my dad who's just like doesn't I don't think he knew how to like navigate it and I remember this poor saleswoman frantically running around and then like oscillating between like the adult gap trying to find and like nothing was fitting it little clothes wouldn't fit no at that point when you're 11 like obviously I've experienced lower points of my life but like that felt like one of the lowest points that I just was like I already felt his extreme isolation and my identity since I was a kid for like a multitude of reasons like my mom's african-american my dad is Chilean and Swiss but like up in the UK and he has treads so it's like his identity is like all mixed up and then my mom it's like black like also Buddhist and like we grew up super hippie so and then I just ended up going to quite like prestigious school surrounded by nobody that like on a class level I could identify with and then I was fat like I just was like god help me like I felt really alone in my body like really alone and so just that physical like representation of just like not fitting in literally felt like I couldn't go lower look that's why that memory is so clear to me because I remember that feeling of just like I'm never gonna fit in it's never gonna work for me you know it's crazy what have you girl no I mean like there's just I mean it's it's like I can identify because at 11 12 years 12 years old when I started modeling and I was considered a plus-size model at that time yeah and and you go I mean similar situation is like you can only shop at a few different places but now you have identity in your style and before you got here I was telling my whole crew I was like you don't know cool until you buckle up man there's just always something about how you carry yourself and I want to know how you got there because being the young girl at Gap who hated that experience and it in some ways maybe felt like it defined you at that time but now you can walk into a room and regardless if you're insecure walking into the room you you have this aura about you that is like I am Who I am and you're unapologetically yourself and I want to know how you got there a lot of our experiences are just anybody who was operated as any kind of minority are different from the norm that all of those insecurities become ultimately your strength my biggest strength and my people that how do you know how to shop and say because I've been chunking my whole life like that's how I know you know and I just had an attitude shift and not to say that like every day is like easy in that but I've always like to express myself through style and all of those things have now formed how I get dressed today in that like just knowing my body and having holding space for it and how I'm feeling and so if I hold space for it but that's where like the confidence kind of comes through or it's like if today I'm hoody and baggy Parrikar hurts and a boot like that's who I am today and that's it and that's like the common thread and then on top of it yeah like knowing what I feel good in I'm normally if I'm gonna do a tight top I'm gonna do like a baggy bar or something you know just me but I've done that's been my recipe for so long because it was like my tools for some survival all the girls were not in middle school are wearing what would like the jeans like Frankie B and like paper denim and colonics old seven jeans you know do you remember 31:26 I mean it's not enough because I grew up in the brows in LA there was this huge phase of like these $250 jeans I could for a bunch of different reasons couldn't look out there was just not would've been able to afford them but then I was at oh but I could afford maybe like the tank top that of the brand that the girls weren't so it's like okay I'm gonna wear a Dickey with this tank top and all what you know so I just always kind of like and I don't know you can ask any of my oldest friends like Oklahoma always just dressed how she wanted to dress you know like given I think there was a there was definitely a prickly period where I was like I felt that my body was like my sexuality hasn't connected like I felt my body was too sexual when I wasn't even really like overtly sexual so it made me uncomfortable like being 11 and 12 and having grown men looking at me like I wasn't a dull that's the other thing yeah so I just was like yeah like I want to cover it up not because I felt I didn't feel uncomfortable in my body but I felt more uncomfortable and like being subject to other discomfort mm-hm and then slowly then there was like this kind of like unapologetic version of my body with sexuality you know and it's just all a byproduct like today how I like move to the world or just like a byproduct of like heart Alex struggles that have now just informed it's amazing yeah I'm so glad you explained that I think it's also really important for our industry because you know it's not about like being like you know like a blogger or like a style but it's like it is hard for us to find the clothes that represent us well mm-hmm like it's truly difficult it's important for young people to see women like us dressed how we really actually want to dress mm-hmm not how we're supposed to job exactly so even when I feel like oh like whatever have to be you know subservice in some way because I was like damn I really do wish that I had a better example growing up well I just I had to just make all the mistakes my girl like yeah like that miniskirt and that little spur tank top looks different on you and it does your friend of course always and I had to like figure that out the hard way be the girl you didn't have yes tell us what that means I know what it means I you know what I mean because I live it I want it yeah I just I just never not only like saw myself but I just you know it's very important for me to as I say constantly just cater to the nuances of the identities that we can all represent you know I didn't see a girl who like dressed the way that I wanted to I felt always very like that I had to be somewhat performative sexy girl that like I didn't ever actually feel entirely comfortable and until like the last few years of my life so just you know that you can be intelligent like you can have a critique like you can be uncomfortable you can be transparent and I also remember being younger and being very ashamed of like thinking the way that I did or you know I remember literally having a memory of being like some timer like just like be a girl could just like giggle and like like that you can be loud that you can I take up space like I always felt just cuz my physical body took up so much space that I kind of wanted to shrink and that like I wanted to see more because all of like the most incredible icons to me are women now that just like unapologetically taking up space in the ways that were just like who they were that's kind of what I will try not go through be the girl you that he'll I didn't have I love that so much yeah you've had your own experiences personally good bad and ugly but now here you are on set and you have other people dressing you and you know as a model we don't get a choice what we're wearing hey what have those experience has been like for you I mean I've had kind of like an assortment of experiences I also think that are you still running into discrimination and and I just where you running into discrimination it's discriminatory to get onto set and like our rock is this big and it's like all like clothes that we would never wear it's not main fashion and then the other girls have like blacks and blacks Prada Miu Miu and McLaren like all these things like it's passively discriminatory I mean I do feel actually really lucky that now I'm in a position in my career where it's like I have more of a say than I ever thought that I would my answer in for instance a powerful tool and also representing who you are where it's like on a visual level like the stylist that people can also see that like yeah like I know how to like I find the things so should you mm-hmm and then it's like they come in and like 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'd say [ __ ] I've had to tow on my back I say no yeah but I've had some yeah kind of like passive microaggressions around our bought my body I remember being on we were shooting vogue Arabia cover oh my god we were upstate New York we did some doubles and then we did some singles and I had gone back to change and you were coming back and you had this like look on your face like something had just happened and I was like Paloma is everything okay he said no now everything's okay I just I don't I don't like what just happened it was the outfit that didn't fit yeah and it didn't fit me yeah and so they were like oh we'll put it in Paloma yeah and uncomfortable yeah like we're always like naked and oiled up or or willing smashed into [ __ ] that like just doesn't look good it's like jamming jamming mmm it's also like let's not forget that we're like also trying to sell clothes so then you feel then this I felt in that moment this overwhelming responsibility to make something that wasn't working and wasn't gonna work work mm-hm mm-hm and a lot of situations I can make it work with it not like I was just like this lining like they don't get it like lining is exact rolls literal nightmare everything everything it was just like other stylists or other people on set being like it looks good it doesn't you knew they were lying I knew they were lying and it upset me it felt dishonest and it didn't feel that like you know that it was a collaboration which now not now and not always but lately and a lot of jobs I've been on I felt really it's a collaboration it's a how do you feel do you like the way you like the way you look would you wear this I know and thank God we are at the place where we are in our career but it really sucks for the girls who are on the rise right now who don't have a voice and I always tell models stand up for yourself who cares if you hate something say it now if it's just about the style that's one that's one thing but it's like if you really feel uncomfortable in something stand up and talk about it hey I had a really big stylist actually grab my 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 pants and she grabbed that part of my ass my hip and said darling if you would just get rid of this then you could fit into it this is a year ago as a ma'am you know who I am you know what I stand for and you know that I'm not gonna lose weight to fit into these pants and those experiences no matter at what level we're at there will always be there and I feel a responsibility to constantly stand up for myself and for 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 we have to I mean it's funny because you have to walk into those situated the effect of my doing being there at all or what behind closed doors goes on like how will affect someone else's experience actually I was talking about yesterday like to Jeff Ament who bought yet no blood she's like she's like a beautiful she wears hijab we were both on the same plane flying back from Nigeria and we had just like we had 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 just like was able to just like with real sincerity be like don't let anybody rock your faith and who you are just because they're gay doesn't mean you can change in front of them because it's kind of quiet doesn't mean that you have to show your hair to anyone it doesn't matter how many shoots it is you can take as long as you want off for Ramadan because you putting your foot down for yourself will create that space for every Muslim girl after to demand the same thing like every single time I'm like I'll challenge a stylist and be like where is the things like how about there's a tailor over there why don't we open it up you know or just like no I don't personally want to be having my hair and baby hairs and like door knockers you know because that will create space for another brown or black or a bit I'm I'm not cool with that mm-hmm is there a black or brown person shooting it no is there a black or brown person doing my hair no which is also the new thing that it's like the as you can see the majority of my crew is women and now you're seeing majority of crews being POC yeah of color like it's happening it's really able to demand it now absolutely absolutely take me back yeah not as far back as this is just a few years ago 2017 glossier you're nude you're on set take us back to that morning of that shoot and what you thought walking into it I honestly thought that like I was more prepared up into that point I hadn't shot nude like for a huge thing like I've shot nude with like different like friends for like different things up until that point it also was a very insecure about one specific part of my body which were my breasts which I didn't know how they were gonna be photographed like actually my breasts were the one part of my body that really held me back from doing a lot of nude shoots which was like really weird it was the one so going into it I was like how am I gonna be able to like figure this out and then I don't know I got onto set and I felt completely overwrought with like the future instead of the present like I was just like you know what are like my boyfriend's friends and my brothers and like all this thing because I grew up also around a lot of boys and I knew how boys talk so I was just like I just was thinking about every possible wrong and I'm like started getting really frustrated so I started crying I don't really cry on inside I on secret I look hot tear syndrome like I'm like you know at the Delta terminal like okay I could not get all this light like crying not because I'm sad because I'm mad okay so that's what and I just like was spiraling about the future you know but then I had to kind of excuse myself and just like literally bring myself into the present and that the only important part of the future has nothing to do with those that will judge me but those that will feel seen in this you know and so I walked into it like at the time the creative director was like we can do anything that will like make you feel comfortable we got everybody kind of offset we like put like Sade on and they just made me feel like that space was mine and mine only and yeah it ended up being like a very very powerful campaign and on billboards but god like it just really an every anxiety that I was spiraling about the future like literally like file away like it was crazy that like every one of my like skater dude friends like dude that's [ __ ] sick you know like they were so height and then like I don't know I know just I didn't even notice my boobs and even I just was good I just want to say thank you because you expressed yourself in a way that so many of us have felt for so long that photo even though it was a couple years ago through this pregnancy I have felt like in some ways shame because my body is changing so quickly and it's not in my control and I've always had control over my body and I posted a photo from the side similar side as your side for glossier and it was just a selfie with stretch marks new new rolls in 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 it just yeah and it just creates a trip a rippling effect of people feeling confident and did you know that you were gonna have that that effect on other women I didn't realize how important it was how important it is for women like us to be included in beauty for there to be like honest depictions of what beautiful women can look like there was a lot of parts that I just had to like relinquish control over that moment and it was also I guess I didn't get to talk really candidly about the glossier girls brought me into the studio before the photos went out and let me choose ah they did you don't what you don't understand what privilege you just had anybody listening you're watching you do not get to never know 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 never you never get to pick a photo ever but I want to talk about your boobies yeah because we had a very long conversation about your boobs on the phone and it was just the two of us like it was no cameras or microphones and you told me about your boobs and now you've done something to your boobs yeah so I got like ass minor breast reduction butt lifts as I reduce it one it was a very crazy experience so was it that they were saggy and that's what you didn't like about them mainly mainly and I had some looks of your asymmetry okay I kind of developed breasts like really early and not to say that I've ever been like extremely thin but I've fluctuated a lot in my life as you know a lot of us have but yeah so my breasts were like very subject to that you know I would make with leaps and bounds around like other parts of my body like because there was a period of time in my life like when I was young where I could literally find flaw from the top of my other my hair lines weird too like my second toe is weird that I could find something about everything and it's all about this like radical like self-love for me it's around radical acceptance and I say this all the time and it's like yeah like the things that maybe that I'm funky isolated or uncomfortable in when I was younger it's I can't like I can't control that I'm not white or that I wasn't thin or that I wasn't born rich like get rich but like you know but these things and it's like yeah like it's not in my narrative up until this point to be thin or to be quiet right or to be this thing oh that's when you were like okay let me do something about my breasts yeah but the breath like I literally was just like these are things that I can you know and it was the one part of my body that I still felt shame around like in this evening like my stomach I was like okay like it could be cute like you know whatever it would it's like my breasts were the one part and I'm happy that I didn't do them when I had just gotten like my first check cuz that first does it oh I'm gonna do it but I still thought that it would have been kind of a reaction or reflection of like you know how men received me or how the industry who received me and so I'm happy that I did it now at 27 or I've been a committed loving holistic honest relationship for almost five years but he loves me unchanged you know and then like my career wasn't affected it was truly for me I wanted to be able to move in the world and not have to go to work was three different bras and I did tape my boobs up every day like I just it was literally not even about just like how it looks is about the mental and emotional like taxation like I just wanted that freedom and are you happy now with your boob it's never perfect but I definitely feel grateful that it's not something that dictates how I feel every day that's good yeah that's incredibly important I developed like a zine and the book when I partnered with one of my one of my close friends is an amazing photographer with four really honest photos of what the experience really looks like you know and I don't have anything to hide I mean it's definitely not like screaming 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 normalized that's like not only what like a body should look like but also like oh but I could look like that if I got enough money hmm and like people have willingness and freedom to do whatever the [ __ ] they want with their body and their money and anything I have no judgment so it's a photo series of the progression after your breast augmentation yes okay got it oh and there's like some writing stuff it was also the first time that I had to take like any kind of painkiller in a very long time because I don't drink or anything so I wrote like a bunch of pieces on when I was like hot like it's a very like raw and honest thing yeah I think because I mean being pregnant right now I'm like so the breast lift is gonna come my life it's it's a part of that it can be it's been remarkable how you've shared your mental health story a little a little bit with us on social media yeah and anxiety and and how how social media can be a trigger I want to talk about it with you a little bit because I think there's a lot of young people listening who go through similar situations what are some of those things that that you're going through that you have been through and how have you gotten through them yeah I've struggled with mental illness since I was very young I was put on medication I think around 11 Wow yeah which and that was even after a kind of a series of trying to find they're like homeopathic remedies like I said my mom is like super happy and even by 1112 I was really really struggling I had a very very anxious child and I also was intelligent but then I would operate at this like very like dogmatic dark place like it's hard to be like a child and think that like nothing good Wow you know and so I was I felt very trapped in my own head and so medication definitely acted as a remedy and now I was in shock therapy CBT therapy two other different forms you know acupuncture like a whole spectrum of different kind of agents to help with those experiences of like isolation uncertainty powerlessness a lot of stuff that like we're very adult feelings to be feeling at a really young age and not just and I would also like to echo that like it's not things that are quiet today for me mm-hmm and then I use the kind of drugs and alcohol it's a kind of like remedy that that fear like I didn't really have the tools and so throughout my adolescence and my early adulthood it was always trying to like grab but just like finding how to have like agency over something that it's like not totally in my control that gets truly like a chemical imbalance and having to like put one foot in front of the other and just constantly have empathy for myself and not you know so I feel and then it was hard because then it's like then I stepped into an industry which isn't exactly like a mirror of like holistic mental health practice is not so I really had to rapidly adjust into a place that like made me feel like sane at a certain point even o'the meds for a while now and you're sober now too right yeah and I've been sober for a long time all of these things have played like huge huge roles in what my version of like I don't say happiness but like content looks like today and gratitude because and I think that also comes lot of transparency and a lot of honesty you know it's always been something that I'm like willing to talk about in the effort to like let everyone who may also feel that way so the National Alliance of mental health estimates that 48 million u.s. people actually suffer from anxiety yeah it's not easy being a young girl today it's not like it was not easy 50 years ago it's not easy being a young girl at all or a woman like as you know and I think that it comes with a lot of other like tyrannies so it's like yeah of course we're depressed of course we're anxious and I think holding space now for like I am an anxious person but like what am i doing physically to like aid that you know in a way that feels safe for me you know and it's that from just like waking up making my bed reaching out to another person making sure that someone you know like these things that when I was younger I didn't have so of course I went to other coping mechanism so you've created your own kind of rituals yeah totally that's so important so this is like yours you have a support system 100% and you also have your rituals yeah and can you walk us through what those two things look like for you my support system is a whole network of people like just keeping in contact with my family a lot your boyfriend my boyfriend you know and also my boyfriend my partner not also not being responsible for every part of my feelings right that was something that was really radical for me to figure out it's okay for him not to be equipped to make me feel the best about like that's okay you know knowing how to ask for help knowing how to voice like I feel scared about this and creating an ecosystem people that know how to how to so we can support each other and not like I texted Mina all last week like I'm afraid of this that in the third and like she gave me tokens that I needed Mina's our agent she yeah and she is incredible when it comes to just like because she's also a big girl yes and she understands the anxiety of like walking into a space where you're either gonna be in lingerie or like live TV or just walking or being in a space where it's skinny people everywhere yeah how has sobriety changed how you feel about yourself today I just have trust around Who I am AB staining from a lot of things that happen for a lot of people in their 20s like it's taught me a lot you know it showed me to trust my gut it showed me how to be a person that people want to be around you know like it's one of my most and when any young model especially asked me like what what some advise Nikki aleck practice like do that but it's really like be a person that people want around it's so trade so like I can't explain how lucky I feel that like despite how dark fashion could can be like I've made some incredible friendships and relationship like how I knew that how much I loved Alister McCain was like the first job we ever did he asked me how do you feel I've never been asked that by stylists Alistair's also such a sweetheart he's an angel you know like he's asked me to be in contributing editor ID because he trusts me and you know yeah you know and it's like it's really beautiful like it's really I feel truly honored social media is a place where you're super candid and you're yourself and it's it's now turned into a business for you yeah how is it managing it like you do it by yourself yeah okay yeah I mean how I know because kind of time back to like the mental health stuff um I got into kind of a dark place where I forgot like why I use social media why I used it specifically the girls or the women that like rely on me like they're there because it's like they like my weird photos of like cars and like railings and like anything there's but it's cool I'm like DoubleTap I don't know what that is but I like it so what is Paloma currently passionate about both two things it's like when somebody if someone once asked me five years ago like what's your five-year plan it would be like a hundred percent about career and today it's about ten percent about career Oh interesting yeah like it's definitely that but I just want that ten percent to be so that it like permeates into the other 90% of my life that like I can live with contented you know they mean because I've learned in this industry that like there is no like top hmm and then there's people at the top who are still very unhappy in a very physical way like I just want to have things that and you've been an incredible role model and just having things sustained in ways where it's like you don't you know that our bodies don't have to always be our trade now you know that like you can represent you know more to us more you know and I think that that's like something that I'm really excited to step into like clothing I just we just constantly a reminder to fish like the lack of it and I don't want to wait I need you to make this John Paul Gautier Agassi she comes in at John Paul freaking Gautier okay so on pretty big deal what we do at the end is a lightning round and I just need you to fill in the blank okay alright I pretty much always I pretty much always lotion my sorry well you guys don't understand her body is so soft I can't go it's like my tick I can't not fellowship we have had to intertwine many times and photos and I'm always like Paloma young skin and you're like I want to take a nap on each always and moisturised girl yeah what's the biggest lesson you've learned in the past year the biggest lesson I've learned in the past year is what I didn't get wasn't for me oh I learned that yeah hardcore yeah isn't it I'm like oh like if that wasn't for me mm-hmm mm-hmm was it a big job a cover comfort or just like yeah I was a few things you'd like different things like last week I'm like it's carried me through this week being like why not you know cuz the first thought is like why not me but like what wasn't what didn't happen for me wasn't meant for me mm-hmm it's a very important lesson that a lot of people need to still yeah realize okay and finally I mean I only have pretty big deals on the podcast pretty big deal but I want to know what is a pretty big deal to you I guess because what I say empathy is a pretty big deal to me it's really it's an important tenet to how I connect with people you know just empathy it's big that's a big why now it's pretty big deal you know people like to forget about it she's deep y'all for many reasons that I love it thank you so much and thank you to all of you guys who are watching pretty big deal 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 for Paloma for me and I mean maybe you're feeling the same way so we'll talk to you guys soon thanks for listening and watching [Music]

Channel: Ashley Graham

Views: 204,224

Keywords: paloma elsesser, ashley graham, supermodel, pat mcgrath, pretty big deal, celebrity interview, podcast

Id: zFfJ48QWI7s

Length: 43min 18sec (2598 seconds)

Published: Tue Nov 12 2019