If you want a role model who isn’t a model or celebrity, I’d strongly suggest considering Juanita Williams. Not only is she a beauty inside and out, but her life journey is one you definitely want to hear. She has been through it all, yet, she’s still as positive as ever, holding herself higher than the sky. She is someone who admitted to having major self-love issues in the past, but is here to tell others that it is possible to surpass that self-consciousness and start loving not only yourself, but also your body and your life.
Name: Juanita Williams
Year in School: Senior
Major: Public Relations
Hometown: Oak Park, IL
Chipotle Order: A burrito bowl with one or two small tortillas on the bottom, topped with white and brown rice, black beans, carnitas, all three salsas (heavy on the medium), lettuce, cheese, corn and half chicken half barbacoa.
Favorite Fast Food: Chick Fil-A, the spicy chicken sandwich with Chick Fil-A sauce and waffle fries.
Favorite Homemade Dish: Shrimp Veggie Pasta with Zucchini and Carrots
Favorite Netflix Addiction: Shameless
Preferred Living Space: In the City
Her Campus: Why do you like living in the city?
Juanita Williams: Definitely better food, and I mean a wide array of food, cheap expensive, everything. The environment in general is a lot more exciting than in the country. I actually kind of like a mix of suburban and city life, and especially in Oak Park, you can go a couple of blocks down and experience the city life, but you also have the opportunity to experience a little bit of that suburban lifestyle.
HC: What was the city life like growing up?
JW: I was born and grew up a block over from Oak Park in the hood. It was just life to me. On New Years, we would have to turn all the lights off and get down on the ground because there would be a lot of shootings that night, but that’s just something we did to be safe, you know. There are definitely certain behaviors you obtain from living in an area like that.
HC: Are you ever cautious going out at night?
JW: Yes, I know when I was little, I would love going to the corner store, because for like a dollar you could get a huge bag of candy or something. That was always our thing that we did, but we always made sure we were walking with a cousin or something, and made sure we were never out too late.
HC: Where did you go to high school and how did you choose ISU?
JW: Well, I grew up in Chicago and was raised in Oak Park. I went to OPRF, which is Oak Parkand River Forest High School. It was a very diverse high school because we were still close to Chicago, people that didn’t live in the suburbs still sent their kids there using a family or friend’s address that they knew. The school was known for having celebrities and famous people, for example, Aman Shampurt, Ludacris, Ernest Hemingyway, Glindelin Brooks, Frank Lloyd Wright, Betty White and the guy who created McDonald’s. It’s just amazing, unreal people so it definitely has an incredible history of extremely talented individuals. I graduated with like 980 people because it was a big school. Fresh out of high school I actually decided to go to Indiana State University. At the time, I wanted to get away and didn’t have quite the academic requirements for ISU, so I went to Indiana, where my mom was familiar with the area. After two years, I transferred to ISU.
HC: Were you always a Public Relations Major?
JW: No, I was actually a business major when I went to Indiana, but quickly decided it wasn’t really for me. I wanted a major that included business and communicating with others yet didn’t include math.
HC: What do you like about the major here?
JW: At Indiana State, I couldn’t get into it too much, but when I got here I really hit the ground running in getting into public relations. There are so many areas in communications that you still have to take and learn, which is super awesome. I love learning about a wide variety of everything in communications.
HC: What are your plans for this summer?
JW: Well, since I’m graduating in December, I’m actually doing an internship in the city working as a PR assistant. I’ll be working as a PR rep to all fitness gyms within the west suburbs and some within the Loop, including Orange Theory.
HC: So, the lifestyle you created for yourself currently, did that kind of inspire you to incorporate working out into your job too?
JW: It most definitely did. Since it’s such a big part of my life now, I’d love to continue to do something PR related for gyms. I really just want to let other individuals know that you know, it’s not as hard as it seems, but you need to really want to make a change in order to do so. I want people to know that the lifestyle change is worth it one hundred percent, and I’d like to walk people through the first steps of kind of getting into that healthy routine.
HC: At what time exactly did you say to yourself, “I need to make a change” and kind of start taking this healthy route seriously?
JW: I decided to make a lifestyle change because I wanted to change. I always wanted to, but just never had the drive or wanted it badly enough. I was tired of not being able to wear what I wanted, I also got tired of being out of breath so easily. I was basically an inactive person, yet I was only 21 and I weighed over 270 pounds. Seeing 270 on the scale last summer was a huge wakeup call for me. In May of 2016, I started working out. I had cut back a bit on food, but I was very self–conscious about going to the Rec, so I would just use the Cardinal Court Gym. I would go on the treadmill and do a few weights, but what you could do was very limited there. The Rec was very intimidating to me at first, especially since I wasn’t very confident in myself back then. Although I was making changes, I didn’t really see any results until I started going to the Rec. The gym opened a lot more doors for me and gave me a lot more options in regards to work outs. My workouts consist of aerobics, cardio, Pilates and what I like to call “an hour swear fest”. It’s where I do all my weight lifting and work out circuits. If you’re not covered in sweat after a work out, you’re not doing it right.
Before May 2016 (above) and now (below, with the same pair of black high waisted jeans).
HC: What does an average day in the life of Juanita Williams look like?
JW: I wake up around 9 a.m. and I make myself a water apple cider vinegar mix. It basically contains protein enzyme molecules that create an internal and external health tonic. It’s great for a pick me up because it gives you a ton of energy for the rest of the day. It’s also used to keep your system clean and maintain or control weight. Then, since I’m kind of running out the door to my first class, I grab something to go, usually fruit or a fiber bar of some sort. Throughout the day, I try to drink at least 10 water bottles a day, if not more. I’ve learned that water is extremely important to your overall health and I felt a dramatic change when I dropped soda and switched to just drinking water. Now, I’m not sure why I even drank soda as much as I did back then, and I’m addicted to drinking water with every meal. I go to the gym either midday, around 3 or 4 p.m., or very late at night, but normally I like to be asleep by 10 p.m., so the earlier the better.
HC: What do your gym workouts look like?
JW: I start with an hour of cardio, which is normally around five miles for me now. Then, I do 100 reps of torso rotations at 100 lbs. I follow that with 100 leg presses at 80 lbs and 30 lat pulls. I do back extensions, normally 20 sets of 30, at 120 lbs. Then I always try to do both of the hip machines at 20 sets of 30 as well. For hip abduction, I lift 110 lbs. and for the hip adduction I lift 150 lbs. After I’m finished, I take a hot shower, to cool down my entire body from the intense workout I just had. I also normally have a protein shake before and after. It’s always the same routine every time I step into the gym because for me, it’s just easier to go in knowing what I’m doing every single time then switching it up. As I get more used to this routine, I may switch it up a bit, but I’m seeing a lot of results with this right now. I go about four to six times a week, and the week before spring break, I went every day.
HC: Do you stretch at all?
JW: No, I know it’s really important to working out, I just haven’t incorporated it into my routine yet. I plan on starting to stretch every single day soon.
HC: What are a few of your favorite dishes you make for yourself and how do you make them?
JW: Well, as I said earlier, the Shrimp Veggie Pasta with Zucchini and Carrots is one of my favorites to make because it’s fast and simple. It only takes twenty minutes for the meal preparation and cooking time. You need one zucchini, one carrot, organic four-cheese pasta sauce and a bag of frozen shrimp. I use a veggie noodle maker I got from Walmart and push the veggies through the cutter for a thick spiral cut. After they are cut, you boil the veggies for only five to seven minutes. Make sure you watch the time because you don’t want the veggie noodles to be mushy. Then, in a skillet, you take a dash of olive oil and sauté the shrimp. I season mine lightly with garlic and pepper. Then you just warm up your pasta sauce in a pot, and dig in!
The other one takes a little longer, but is definitely worth the wait. It’s my sweet potato quinche with spinach, peppers and feta cheese. Both the preparation time and cook time take about 45 minutes to an hour. You need three large brown eggs, one to two cups of egg whites, one bag of spinach, two medium or large sweet potatoes, one yellow bell pepper and one red bell pepper.
First, you boil and cook your vegetables so they are easier to cut. I boil the potatoes and peppers for a little bit, then I cut the potatoes into aout half an inch thick per slice. I just dice up the peppers with the potatoes and leave them cooking together. In a separate pot, I cook and season the spinach lightly. I usually use light salt and pepper. Then, in a separate bowl, I mix botht he eggs and the egg whites together. I take a pan and align the bottom of it with slices of potatoes. For the second layer, I add the spinach and then the peppers as well as the egg mixture are added as the third and final layer. As I’m doing this, the oven is pre-heated at 375 degrees, and when I finish prepping, I put the quiche in the oven for about 45 to 50 minutes. I then take it out of the oven to cool off a bit, as I add some crumbled feta on top. Then, it’s all set to eat!
What’s great about both of these recipes is that you can make large portions and have them for a good couple of days.
HC: What are the benefits of developing a healthy lifestyle?
JW: It makes you feel better, like on the inside. You’re not as lethargic, you’re more motivated, there are just so many benefits. There’s nothing bad about working out and eating good, but so many bad things with not eating right and not working out. The only plus to not doing those things would be not having self-control, I guess. You can just eat whatever you want because you don’t care, but with eating right and working out you literally have to care about yourself and not only your body, but also how you feel about yourself. It’s been a huge confidence booster for me. Not even that, but just learning how to treat your body, both physically and mentally, is so important and will make you feel ten time better than you did previously. One thing I learned during this process other than how to eat right and work out was how much sleep I needed. It’s incredible how much eight to 10 hours of sleep a night can really make you feel. It’s like I had never known what truly feeling energized and awake felt until I developed a healthy sleeping pattern. Stuff like that really changes your life, for the better.
HC: What are you specific goals for your body, regarding BMI, etc.?
JW: As far as BMI/Lean goals go , I would like to be about 85% lean and less than 15% fat. I am currently at 30% fat, 70% lean when I checked this month.
HC: Do you have any other hobbies?
JW: I have my blog site, which is a big thing for me recently, and I like to read. I started my blog last summer but I didn’t publish my first post until October of last year! My goal for my blog is to provide a casual and fun perspective view for current young adult readers. I don’t just cover health and body information but I also love to raise ideas about self. My biggest target is to get readers to relate or just simply think. But ultimately, working out is my number one passion and hobby and always will be.
HC: What do you focus on for your blog?
JW: I focus on image, girl power and self-realization.
HC: What plans do you have for the future? Do you plan on joining anything here at ISU?
JW: I haven’t gotten super involved on campus since I transferred here a few semesters ago. My main focus has been preparing for graduation this fall and securing an internship. I was blessed enough to go alum for my sorority at Chi Omega this semester, but I have one more semester until I graduate so I’m considering doing PRSSA for my last semester here at ISU. Really my mission right now is to keep impacting people and evolve my story through my blog.
To follow more of Juanita’s story, and why her blog is titled “Bullet Proof Babies”, check out her blog at https://wearebpbblog.wordpress.com.