Meet Ashley
Ashley moved from feeling unhappy with her body image to gaining the confidence to become a boudoir model that loves her body both inside and out!
Group Coaching Program
Transformation Story
"I needed something radical. I needed something like this [program] because I wasn't feeling like me."
"It's more than a weight loss journey. You're dealing with those mental blocks too."
BEFORE
Ashley’s low self-esteem about her body image had started to impact other areas of her life, including the areas that gave her a sense of self-worth.
DURING
Ashley believed she needed a weight loss program that improved her outer image to grow her confidence but soon started realizing she couldn’t feel truly confident in her body unless she worked on her mindset and inner confidence first!
AFTER
Ashley feels love for herself, empowered and appreciates every aspect of her body as she is!. Never before would she have found validity in her body, but now, her confidence has grown so much she’s become a model!
A Giving Heart
“I'd definitely noticed a weight increase and so then I think I just got into a weird funk. I needed something radical. I needed something like this program because I wasn’t feeling like me.”
Before joining the Program, Ashley had been gradually feeling worse and worse about her body image. She had noticed that, over a period of 12 months, her weight gain was leading to feelings of depression and of being stuck in a rut.
Even though Ashley felt like she was just going through the motions, without really enjoying her life, she continued to do so because at least that gave her some sense of purpose and value, particularly in her work in the non-profit and education space.
Then, due to budget cuts, Ashley lost her job and then Covid-19 struck.
Now, not only was Ashley feeling unhappy in her own skin, she was now without the job she’d known for years and had become isolated from family and friends. She struggled with feeling like she was not valuable, consumed with a heavy negative energy that saw her sinking deeper into a place of sadness and low self-esteem.
For a while, Ashley was in denial about the impact her low self-confidence was having on every aspect of her life. She admits to trying multiple diet and exercise programs in the past but would always give up, telling herself she wasn’t “doing it right”. Ashley denies her feelings, stuffing them down so she can appear strong…and as a certified life coach herself, coaches herself out of them! But self-help didn’t help with the increasingly low self-esteem, depression, and panic attacks, and so Ashley knew she needed to seek out more help. She couldn’t do this on her own.
Why Julie as a Coach
"I've seen Julie's personal journey, and it's like, okay, she's been there; I can trust her versus other coaches."
Ashley knew Julie and had seen over their relatively short relationship the transformation Julie had made in her own life, both in her body image and inner self. When it came to being able to change the things that didn’t make her happy in both her personal and professional life, Ashley knew that Julie had made many conscious changes that saw her leading a life she now loves, feeling confident and fulfilled both inside and out!
She also knew that Julie did this for her 1 on 1 coaching clients, helping them to grow and transform in so many ways, so when she saw that Julie was offering a group program for women to do this while participating in a safe, welcoming community, right when Ashley needed it, it seemed like fate.
Ashley will admit, she had reservations about the financial commitment. But, because she knew Julie and how successful she had been in helping women just like her, she decided to make the investment, feeling incredibly confident she would have the results she wanted under Julie’s guidance.
In Her Own Words
Ashley shares her story.
Ashley shares...
What happens when you have a loving community of women on the same journey.
The Community
“I'm not coming out of this program to be like, Oh yeah, join this program and you can lose 20 pounds. It's like, I feel like I've gotten so much more out of it.”
Ashley will say, even though she joined the program focusing on losing weight and trying to build her external confidence, it became more than a weight loss journey or a weight “release” journey as Julie puts it. This was a labyrinth walk through her own emotions and insecurities, coming out the other side with a deeper appreciation of herself.
In the Program, students are encouraged to uncover the beliefs they have about themselves that keep them in the loop of self-sabotage. This meant Ashley had to take a hard look at what she’s been telling herself, her negative self-talk, then break it down to identify the core beliefs behind it. Once she became aware of the “not enough” beliefs that have been running her she could then challenge that belief, and rewrite a new one that best supported her - and the woman she is becoming.
Through meditation exercises, affirmations and vision work, Ashley reduced her weight but more importantly was able to connect to her inner self. By participating in a group program, Ashley was able to find accountability and support to give 100% of herself to this transformation.
Inside the group, it was incredibly powerful to witness that other people were experiencing similar insecurities to her and that she wasn’t alone in feeling the way she was.
Initially, Ashley found it a struggle to enter the group with the knowledge that she would be expected to share deep and intimate personal struggles and beliefs with what was essentially a room full of strangers! But, once she did though, the camaraderie of the group and the accountability it offered made it all so valuable - and that surprised Ashley.
“It took one person to be vulnerable and open and Julie set it up pretty well...she set it up by sharing about herself first. She told us to share whatever we wanted to share. Gradually we opened up, shared what came up for us, what went well and our struggles. It was a great group.”
The End of the Journey, the Beginning of a New Chapter
Ashely truly had a renewed sense of self throughout the program. What she initially thought of as a journey to improve her body image became so much more. Every aspect of her life was impacted for the better as she was able to realize her value and gain confidence in herself.
As a confirmation of her renewed sense of self, Ashley applied to be a model for an open-casting photo shoot in Austin, TX. Just applying to be a model was a big leap for Ashley. It required her to believe that she both: has value to give both inside and out and has a body worth showing off.
Ashley secured the photoshoot! That’s right, Ashley was invited and will model in December 2020 for the session. For this personal win, Ashley gives credit to Julie’s program; with the radiance and life-giving encouragement that Julie and her community gave to Ashley, she was able to give of herself in such a beautiful, self-affirming way.In other areas of her life, Ashley now realizes that her value doesn’t stem from her image or her work but from the person she is inside and she’s not the only one noticing the change!
“Even my husband was saying, ‘you're just a lot happier’. I was like, was I just a complete monster before? My goodness, but he was just like, ‘you know you just seem happier’. So I think it kind of brought it out - how this program helped, this program came at a beautiful, perfect time for me. I think it was God's answer for me."
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