seductive
role model
and someone wanted you a size smaller! How did this affect your self esteem?
It affected me in a really bad way. My mind became warped, and when I would look in the mirror I would just cry and think I needed to lose weight. I wasn't really seeing myself and how thin I truly was. I ended up getting down to 108 lbs and still thought I wasn't thin enough. I developed a lot of body image issues.
COB: Why do you think you continued modeling even though it was negatively effecting the way that you thought about yourself?
Kylie: I continued for a lot of reasons... My own pride of being afraid of what others would think if I didn't continue modeling in New York and came home a failure... along with my desire to have attention and be famous. I was basically living for my idols rather than living for Christ. I also thought that if I made it big one day that things would be different, and I wouldn't be critiqued so much about my body.
COB: At age nineteen, you beat out 10,000 other women who all had the same dream, and won a Victoria's Secret modeling contest! You earned your "angel wings" and were offered money, fame, and attention on a silver platter. How did you feel at that point? How did your life change after winning this competition?
Kylie: At that point it was a dream come true and the pinnacle of my career. It was also one of the most insecure times of my life. My life changed completely after winning. My status in the industry was at a whole new level, and I was instantly thrown into a world of craziness.
COB: Over a period of time, God started dealing with your heart and caused you to question what you were doing with your life. He showed you that your lifestyle and career was having a negative effect on young girls. I understand that a young girl in your life, your cousin actually, told you she wanted to quit eating so that she could be "pretty like you." How did her words affect you? Is that what caused your heart to begin to change?
God has used her words in a huge way in my life. He showed me that what I was doing in my career wa causing her and many other little girls to feel insecure and not worthy. He showed me that the type of role model I was being was causing girls a lot of pressure and was promoting the standard of beauty that the media has set. He opened my eyes to all of these things and began to work in my heart over time! Now I want girls to know that everything they see in magazines is just an illusion and an impossible standard of beauty for anyone, and that they don't have to feel the pressures that the media puts on them. This is one of my biggest reasons for writing I'm No Angel.
Something that strikes me about your story and so encourages me, is that once God started showing you that He was calling you to a higher standard of life purity, and to be an example for the girls in your life, you obeyed. You chose to stop modeling in lingerie and participating in provocative photo shoots. You walked away from a multi-million-dollar opportunity, only to be criticized and called crazy by so many people! But you obeyed God's voice anyway! How difficult was it to actually follow through with what God was showing you?
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