Welcome back to another video.
This is going to be a Q&A, as you can probably tell by the title.
Very excited about this video.
I know you all have been looking forward to more sit-down style videos, kind of going back to what I was doing at the beginning of my YouTube journey.
I'm going to be making a lot more of those videos going forward and thought it would be fun to kick it off with a QA.
I hope you guys enjoy.
I'm going to start with this question.
What are your tips for maintaining your physique?
I find myself either committed to a workout plan, slash diet or not at all, and want to find a healthy in between.
This is such a good question and I think it's more relatable than people think.
I actually relate to this a lot too, especially when I think back to my first few years living in New York.
And I think I've shared that before in videos too, how I fluctuated a lot during that time.
And I think part of that was because I was either very focused and very motivated, working towards a goal because I wasn't in the best shape that I could be in as a model or I finally had reached that goal and then I didn't really know what to do and I was kind of just letting myself go.
Obviously, when I say let myself go, I'm talking about a relatively small amount of weight, and I know that means different things to everybody.
When it comes to tips and things that I've learned over the years and I'm not an expert by any means, but This is kind of my line of work.
The first thing I think is really important is creating a routine, and people talk about routine so much nowadays, but I do think it's really important and realistically, this is going to look different for everyone.
Some people can have a very rigid, structured routine and other people are more like me probably, where it has to be flexible, because they don't really know what their week is going to look like.
For me, for the most part, I try to prioritize three Pilates workouts a week.
Sometimes I do four if I can, but other weeks, you know, sometimes it's just two.
So I try and make that happen and I'm not really strict about what days of the week that's going to be.
Sometimes it's three days in a row because it's the only thing that works for me.
And other weeks it's more split up.
So I'll go on like a Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday.
You kind of have to figure out what it's going to look like for you and what it's going to take for you to stay accountable but also keep it manageable at the same time.
You don't want to be unrealistic about it and say okay, I'm going to go to the gym like seven days a week.
I'm going to wake up at 5am.
If you're not doing any of those things already, you know, it doesn't really make sense.
So you want to be realistic about it, and the second thing that I would say and this is like less of a tip but more of just a fact and something that I've really seen within myself too is that ultimately, it's way less about exercise than it is about food.
Diet is 80% of this.
Maybe even more for some people.
And so exercise is obviously important.
It's really good for your health, your longevity, bone density, all of those things.
It's good for cardiovascular health.
You have to exercise and stay moving.
But when we're talking about physique specifically, just the way that you look and maintaining that that is mostly diet,
For me, the 80-20 rule works really well.
It allows me to eat intuitively and, you know, eat healthy foods most of the time, but also incorporate my pint of ice cream that I want to eat on a Saturday on the couch, you know.
Or the dinners that I have out with my girlfriends or with Avery.
That kind of covers the more logistical things and the everyday things.
But I think with this question too, it's about letting go of the yo-yo lifestyle and going into more of a maintenance lifestyle.
And I think that that can be really challenging for people, especially if you feel like you constantly need to have a goal in terms of fitness and health.
I don't know if it has to be like that all the time.
I think, actually majority of the time, especially if you're not doing this for work and you're really just doing this for longevity and vitality and living your healthiest life as possible.
It has to be more about maintenance.
And so you kind of have to reframe that in your mind too.
Like, what does this really look like?
Do I need to have specific physique goals?
Do I need to have specific goals in the gym?
Or am I?
Maybe it's not about being, it's more about do I need to kind of think about this differently and make this more fun for me too?
And that's a big part of it as well that I've noticed for myself is like, okay, this is my life.
Yes, it's for my job.
And obviously I want to look my best and feel my best, but it's also about making it something that I can do for many decades to come, and I think part of that is having more fun with it and trying new things.
Okay, this next question is about dating, and this is not a laughing matter, but the way that this person phrased it is just so funny.
She said, just dating advice, LOL.
I'm 28 and feeling really discouraged.
I feel for you and I have to say I'm not in this position, but I totally understand how you must be feeling and I have heard that from all of my single friends and also people that I work with that it's just really challenging to date right now.
I have a lot of thoughts on dating in general and I don't know if I'm gonna be able to share everything in this video, but I will definitely talk about it more in the future.
But what I will say is I feel like is again going back to what i was saying with the previous question but i feel like the fun has kind of been taken out of dating and i think it's almost become an industry it's it's like dating is like a business you know there's there's so many experts giving you advice left and right telling you what to do telling you what not to do and it just makes the whole experience so unnatural i'm totally sensitive to the idea that Not everybody has access to new people all the time.
People have to use apps.
I think that that is part of meeting people nowadays.
I'm not necessarily against dating apps either.
I think it's just the way that people think about dating.
And maybe that's also like a North... I keep falling off this table.
I think it's maybe also like a North American thing a little bit.
That's how I feel about the dating climate right now.
It doesn't feel very organic and spontaneous and fun.
When it comes to your question, I have two things that are coming up for me.
The first one is that I'm wondering if you're just maybe dating fatigued a little bit.
If you've been going on a lot of dates and not seeing any results or really meeting anybody that you're connecting with.
That can get discouraging over time and I think sometimes it's good to take a little step back and prioritize dating less.
Taking a break can be a good time to not only just get yourself out of the scene, but also to reevaluate what you're looking for and maybe find a new energy towards dating that can make you seem even a little bit more fun and excited.
The second thing is that I'm wondering how much clarity you have around what you actually want out of a relationship.
And the reason I bring this up is because I notice this in coaching a lot actually, where people are, you know, wanting to have a relationship and they're not having a lot of success, and then oftentimes there's something else, there's something underlying, that's stopping them from having that.
The other component is that they just have no idea what they're looking for.
And I'm not talking about height, I'm not talking about looks, I'm not talking about what kind of job they have.
None of those things.
I'm talking about things like how you want to feel in the relationship.
What kind of character does this person need to have?
How flexible is this person?
How emotionally generous is this person?
There's so many examples that I can give, but really figuring out what is important to you and what is the experience that you want to have in the relationship, because it's really less about the package of the person and more about really like what is the experience you want to have with this person and the person that you want to share your life with.
Like what does that look like?
How do you want to be treated?
I think that that could be a good place to start and I think it can also be a fun exercise.
I love these exercises where people are just really taking the time to sit down and almost daydream about how they want this experience to be, and you can do this with every aspect of your life.
You can do it for a relationship, you can do it for friendships, you can do it for work.
The last thing that I think I also think about this, I clearly think a lot about this.
So much of this is about timing, and I know that that is so annoying for a lot of people, but There's so little about all of this that we can actually control.
And when I think about my relationship too and the timing of when I met Avery and all the things that kind of led me to meeting him, I don't know if I was really ready before then to meet him.
And I don't know what that could have looked like if we had met even, you know, six months or a year before we actually did meet.
And so I think this is one of those things that's really easy to see in hindsight and very difficult to accept and trust in when you're in the moment.
But trying to have some sort of faith in that it's going to happen when it's meant to happen and having an objective perspective on you as an individual.
I really should have written down where I heard this.
It was a podcast with a host and an astrologer and essentially the astrologer was reading the host's chart and they were talking about dating and the astrologer said, like this is just not your time to date, because if you were to meet your future life partner right now, you wouldn't really be compatible.
And basically hinting at the fact that the host still has things to work through, things to figure out within herself, and it would almost be a shame for them to meet right now, because it truly wouldn't work out.
Again, I think this can be hard to hear sometimes because we have timelines and we have ideas of how it's maybe supposed to happen or ways we've always wanted it to happen.
But if we're able to at least relinquish some of that control and try and like, let things be more organic and just happen for us, I think ultimately our experience will be better.
And then we also bring the focus back a little bit on ourselves too.
Okay, when will you make a career pivot and how do you know when it's the right time?
This is a good question.
I don't know if there is a right time.
And I think that this person is referring to me eventually focusing more on coaching than on modeling.
Whereas right now I'm still focusing like 100 on modeling and maybe the extra, like five or 10, on coaching.
To be truly honest with you, I don't know You know, there is a right time.
Sorry, I'm like moving my glasses around.
Like, I don't know if it's going to be 100% a smooth transition when that day does come.
What I do know is that if I try my best now and just use my time as wisely as possible both modeling and coaching, you know and focusing on the career that I've spent so many years building, maxing that out and taking as many chances and risks and opportunities as I can,
I'm going to at least know that I've done everything, while also taking courses and building up my coaching hours and getting myself to a place where I could potentially transition into something new.
Like four or five years.
My battery's gonna die.
Basically, if I'm doing those two things, then that's, that's all I can really do, and that's the best that I can do, and for me right now, that that's enough.
The way that I'm looking at this is that if I can be as forward-thinking as possible while still enjoying this really cool time where I'm, you know, doing a job that I love, getting to travel, living in New York with my boyfriend, both working and having this really beautiful life together, while also simultaneously like taking little steps towards what will likely be my future job, then that's the best that I can do, you know.
Something that I've learned throughout this process is that, regardless of how well prepared I think I am, or how well I'm trying to plan this out, it's never gonna go exactly the way that you think it's gonna go.
And so yes, I can work towards this thing and yes, I can kind of be forward thinking and prepare myself, but I also have to be flexible with the timeline because ultimately I have no idea when that's going to be.
Like maybe it's going to be in 10 years from now.
Maybe I still want to model full force after I have children and put this off until much later in life, and Maybe it's not like that.
But yeah, ultimately I'm not sure.
But I do think that I will kind of know when it's time to make a change.
Okay.
I'm moving in with my boyfriend and I'm curious to hear about your experience what changed for you and what didn't, et cetera.
First of all, I'm so excited for you.
I love living with Avery.
I'm like looking back as if he's there, but he's not home.
Yeah.
We've been living together for almost a year and a half now, which is crazy, but It's just been so fun.
It's so easy.
Avery's a very easy person in general, but also just such a fun person to live with.
The craziest part about this is that I was one of those people who never thought that they could live with anyone else, let alone a partner.
I love living alone so much.
I love having my own space.
I love being very particular about everything, you know?
And so before we met, I was like, I don't know how I'm ever going to live with a partner.
But now that we do, I like it even more than living by myself.
So, I hope you have that same experience.
And if it's not like that at first, then I hope you're able to grow into that experience.
I will say we also have a lot of independence in our relationship.
And he works in an office, he doesn't work at home.
And then, you know, I kind of half and half i work from home and then i also work away, and so i do think we get a lot of like independent time, which we both really need.
It's not like we're on top of each other all the time in terms of how or what changed and what didn't.
I don't know how much really changed in our dynamic because, to be honest with you, before we officially moved into this apartment, we were kind of living together in my old studio, probably for about three or four months.
And so that was a really good trial run.
And I mean, if you can live in a studio in New York City you can do anything.
Yeah, I don't know if anything really changed that much in terms of our relationship dynamic.
I think the thing that changes ultimately and this really should be happening before you even decide to live together is just the conversations that you have and the openness that you have with each other around finances, around the future, around chores and tasks and roles and expectations, around those things.
I think and this is a good tip too, I think, for anybody who's maybe thinking about moving in together with a partner is like you really have to take that opportunity to talk about all those things and just Lay them out on the table.
I think the reason why it's hard for some people to move in together is because they just maybe haven't addressed certain things, or they realize things about their partner that they didn't see before, and and then you have to address them in the moment, which is uncomfortable for a lot of people.
But starting with things like what's what's a good budget for us and I don't know people do this differently but like, if you're talking about groceries, like what do we want to spend on that?
And like what kind of furniture do we want to get, like what's a good budget for that?
And just having like those kind of conversations I think are really good to have, and this brings up other topics too.
Like you're living together, you're realistically moving towards eventually getting married, and like really building a life together, and so you can talk about you know, any savings goals you might have, or like what kind of lifestyle you want to have living together.
It's just a good opportunity to talk about these things, and i think it's actually a must to talk about these things before you move in together, because once you start living together, you can't really undo it, so it's best to have these conversations beforehand.
The other thing that's coming to mind for me right now is you really quickly learn how differently people load the dishwasher and fold things like tea towels and just towels in general.
It's all.
It's all really funny.
Okay, i'm gonna answer two more.
The first one is do you experience any pressure around marriage kids, etc.
I think even if you try your best not to feel any pressure around those topics, you will somehow still feel a little bit of it.
I really try to manage that well, because I can be very forward-thinking and very future focused and it takes me out of the present, which I don't like, because I never want to get to this place where I was like I should have enjoyed that part of my life more.
I should have lived more, you know?
So I really try not to go there, but I definitely feel the pressure.
Something that I constantly have to work on for myself is not feeling like there's this massive divide between the person before kids and the person after
And I think a lot of this, you know, stems from the kind of work that I do and just knowing that I'm going to have to take time off of work.
Definitely some fear around the unknown and like what my career might look like after that.
There's a lot of excitement too, and I look forward to that time, but I definitely sometimes feel like I don't have enough time.
I don't feel any pressure to, you know, get married super quickly.
I like, if it were up to me, I would be fine if that took a little bit more time with being a woman and having the biological clock.
Obviously you start to feel the pressure of that timeline and then start to question like when you might feel ready for that, because right now I don't feel ready for that at all and I, to be truly candid, like I, have friends who already have this feeling of like wanting to have kids and wanting to start that next phase of their life.
And I'm still young too, like I am turning 28 tomorrow, literally tomorrow.
And so in my mind, I still have a good chunk of time.
But sometimes when I hear people talk about having baby fever and this craving for children and for motherhood, I not in that place yet and i don't think it's because i don't want them.
I've always known that i wanted kids and i i just think having kids with avery would be so much fun.
I just think that mentally i'm not in that window yet and there's still things that i want to do, and maybe for a good reason.
Maybe it's going to let me focus on work a little bit more for the next few years and then um, i am sure at some point I am going to be ready to take that next step.
Anyway, those are some of my thoughts.
I think that this is a really interesting topic and I would love to dive into this a little bit more actually, because I think within my specific age range and maybe even a little bit older and a little bit younger, I think that there's a little bit of fear surrounding motherhood too.
It's coming from a couple of different places.
I think part of it is financial, part of it has to do with freedom.
You know, losing your sense of freedom, and huge part of that, I think, is identity loss too and having to find yourself again.
And again like fear of the unknown, like not knowing whether you're ever going to come back to that version of you before children.
You know, and what that means for you.
And I just can imagine that a lot of people who are kind of within my age range feel those things right now.
And it could be a really interesting conversation to have.
Last question for the video is whether I have any goals for 2025.
And I always love this time of year one because obviously it's the holidays, but it's also my birthday.
With my birthday being so close to the new year, this is always just a great time for me to reflect and set goals for 2025.
I'm gonna try something new this year.
This is not like an original idea or anything, but I want to start writing a letter to my future self on my birthday, to open up on the next birthday.
And then I'll write a new letter for the following one.
And so I'm going to sit down at some point today or tomorrow and write that letter.
In terms of goals for 2025, I haven't really thought about this to be honest.
I do have a couple of intentions that I am willing to share with you.
The first one is that I actually want to focus on less.
I think 2024 was a year of many things, but it was also a year of kind of trying things.
And I realized that I'm the kind of person that does best when they're focusing really intensely on just a couple things, like two or three things.
And so my goal or I guess my intention for 2025 is to continue on that track, And so one of those things is obviously modeling, one of those things is coaching and one of those things is YouTube.
I am in a space where I'm figuring out how to sort of like marry two or three of those things together.
I'm not really ready to share more about that, but I essentially just want to go really hard on like two, maybe three things and just leave everything else.
So that is one of my intentions.
The other intention that I have for myself, which is more of like a personal thing, is to be even more authentic than I already am.
And I think that I'm pretty authentic on youtube and just in general.
I don't think that i come across in my videos differently than i do in person.
When i talk about authenticity, i specifically mean more like my opinions and my thoughts on things, and this comes back to making more videos like list like this i don't even know what i'm saying.
My role on social media is not to sell stuff.
I just it's not who i am, it's not what makes me happy, it doesn't excite me like.
That's not the kind of content that excites me.
I get excited about sharing knowledge and sharing experience and talking about things that honestly, might be a little uncomfortable and controversial, and opening up a new way of thinking.
And I feel like we're very much due for that right now.
And the last thing that anybody needs on any social media platform, in my opinion, is another person who's going to try and sell you something.
If I really think about what we need more of right now is people who challenge other people to change their own ways of thinking and become the best version of themselves.
And like that, not to make this like too deep or anything.
That's the kind of content that I want to put out.
That's the kind of focus that I want to have.
That is also what I'm going to be embracing for the new year and letting go of some of the other stuff and types of content.
Anyway, that is all I'm going to share for right now.
I'm sure there's going to be way more videos about this. in the future, maybe even later this year.
With that said, that's gonna be the end of this Q&A.
I hope you guys enjoyed.
If you have any other questions or any thoughts comments suggestions, please leave them in the comment section down below.
I would love to read and I love talking to you guys.
I love hearing your feedback too, so please, Feel free to always share your thoughts with me.
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Don't forget to subscribe if you're new and I will see you in the next one.
