CMCL Interview: Kara Richardson Whitely

All right, welcome back to another Changing Minds, Changing Lives podcast. My name is Julie Sowash. I am the executive director and co founder of Disability UM Solutions. You can learn more about us by visiting disabilitytalent.org. Um, so I want to say first, thank you to our last guest, excuse me, Franz Prasad, for his awesome and frank discussion about better inclusion, uh, in clinical drug research specifically, and sharing his perspective as the administrator and having so much experience managing large cancer fighting networks.

Um, and we got really great reception. Franz, you have an amazing, amazing network. So thank you again for sharing and being a part of our conversation a couple weeks ago. Uh, and also, uh, just for everyone's notice, a little shout out to Dana Farber. Um, this week, Franz just sent me, um, a press release that they are now offering inclusive oncology, care and empowerment program for people with developmental disabilities, um, and intellectual disabilities, which, as part of being a part of this community, we know that those individuals in that group is most frequently left out of conversations, whether it's about employment, inclusion in drug trials, consumer, um, opportunities.

So I'm so excited. Thank you, Dana Farber. We will share the announcement, um, on our socials, if you haven't seen them already, we will put the link to our show notes or the link in our show notes. So that's that. Thank you, Franz. You're amazing. Um, I want to welcome this week's guest, Kara Richardson Whiteley, uh, who I had the opportunity to be on a panel with, uh, during Transform 2024 in March, which is a fantastic conference, and I did not get to spend enough time with Kara, so I invited her on the show.

Kara is a plus size adventurer and the CEO of the gorgeous agency, and she is an author. Her book, my journey up Kilimanjaro at 300 pounds, is being made into a movie, which I just learned today, produced and starring. This is us actress Chrissy Metz. Kara's, uh, partnered with brands such as peloton ll bean to, uh, showcase diversity and inclusion and build positive brand sentiment in the plus size community.

Her mission is to encourage people of all sizes and ability to get out and get active. And I am so excited to welcome Kara Richardson Whiteley to the show today.

Oh, thank you so much, Julie. It was such a pleasure to meet you. And just, you know, transform was such a wonderful opportunity to have public conversations about things like inclusion. Um, but it's great to even delve a little bit deeper here.

Yeah, no, thank you. Thank you. So tell us a little bit. Give me the twitter bio of, uh, Kara. Obviously, you do all of these amazing things, which I'm reading from your bio now. But what does Kara do on the weekends? Kind of give us a little bit about you.

What do I do on the weekends? Well, as I was just saying to a friend, it's like we're navigating the lives of three young humans, although one of them is not so young anymore. I do have a 16 year old daughter, um, who is, you know, bracing herself for adulthood.

Uh, it was funny because yesterday was, um, take your child to work day, and all of them opted, or two of my younger kids opted to go with my husband, um, which makes sense, because they had a much better program. And then I thought about it. I'm like, it doesn't really matter because every day is take your child to work day in our house, because we live and breathe inclusion, um, in whether we're going out and creating content for a brand, um, at a travel destination, or just talking about things that have come up in my day at the dinner table.

And, of course, um, our whole team at the gorgeous agency is remote. So, um, they're in my office at my workplace all the time.

I was going to say my kids would have chosen me so they could just hang around the house all day because I obviously also work for mom. So tell me about the gorgeous agency. What do you guys do, and what kind of prompted you to say, it's time for this?

We need a service like the gorgeous agency?

Oh, that's such a great question. I think the simplest way to put it is the gorgeous agency helps brands navigate body inclusion. Uh, so that means everything from working with Peloton to training their communications team and their instructors and holding a private event, kind of putting a stake in the ground that body inclusion is important to them.

Um, and it always has been. But, you know, how do you talk about it in a way that is welcoming to all bodies? Um, we also create content. So we've done a number of engagements to help brands, um, become more welcoming to the 65% of Americans who are in larger bodies.

Um, and then, of course, we work on ad hoc projects, such as the one that I'm working on right now, which is to help get the word out about your fat friend. The film. This is about Aubrey Gordon, who's the host of maintenance phase, and, um, she's somebody incredibly dear to my heart.

And Jeannie Finlay made this incredible documentary about her. And so we're helping to tap into our network of influencers to make sure that the people who are really, really excited about this film get to see it and then share it with their communities.

Is it out yet, or is it.

Coming out very soon? It's coming out very soon. On May 3.

Oh, wow. That is really soon. So, yeah, if you want to send us some info, we'll definitely share. Uh, we love to support diversity, um, and diverse conversations, um, that are not used to what we're talking about day in and day out. So this is very exciting. Um, so tell me what you guys then.

So is it mostly pr type, like, consumer facing activities? Is your background in PR? I guess, yeah.

Well, I have, you know, I wrote the book Gorge and had a ton of lived experience, kind of intertwined with my, um, life as a journalist. And then, of course, like many journalists, switched over to marketing and pr. And I also had some incredible influencer experience. Cause that's how I kind of held down the fort during the pandemic when nobody was having speakers come in.

And so I intertwined all of those, along with training and, um, destructor, um, strategy, um, and used it to create the gorgeous agency. What we really felt was that there was this gap between companies that wanted to be body inclusive and not really knowing how to go about it, and also recognizing that corporations are such a key factor in cultural change.

And so if you look at marketing internally and externally. So I'm talking about the HR kind of, you know, pamphlet for your company. You know, the 65% of Americans, or the average woman is a size 16. How many of those folks are represented, and are they really reflecting back the workforce?

And so our work is both on that communications side and, you know, uh, for helping people grow in this market, that is often ignored. But also, when it comes to the internal work, how do you attract and retain talent? Make sure that there isn't unconscious bias going on in the workplace, because this is incredibly common.

Uh, so much of diet culture has seeped into corporate culture where it's okay. Like, it's not okay, of course, where people think it's okay to make comments about people's bodies, about other people's bodies, and all sorts of focus around someone's shape of their body.

So I want to just tap back to one thing that you just said is one of. One of our main kind of goals or strategies around disability solutions is that we see how corporate America changes the world. Um, when they decided LGBTQ inclusion was a thing, you see the hill rapidly move, um, and things rapidly change to greater inclusion.

Um, and so I do want to call that out. I think that's such a critical point, and we're talking to allies and advocates and people who are members of diverse communities, understanding that the government's not going to change the world for us. It's a really culture, it's really branding, it's really that communication and the visual representation that starts that movement towards greater inclusion.

So I thank you for sharing that.

It's a really important point, the power that a corporation has. Um, and our work at the gorgeous agency isn't just about apparel. I'm going to give an apparel example in just a second. We work in the spaces of finances, because people in larger bodies are typically paid less than their standard sized colleagues, they're less likely to be advanced in their career.

Um, we work in the travel space because a lot of people are concerned about traveling and wondering, does an airline have a person of size policy? And is the resort going to have options for them, um, when they get there? Like, are the kayaks going to be too small?

So there's all sorts of things, things to work on. But to kind of go back to that comment about the power that corporations hold in inclusion, and when it comes to body inclusion, I mean, not only can you do an incredible amount of good, but if you're doing it wrong, you can do an incredible amount of damage.

I mean, there's one company in particular that comes to mind, I won't name names, but you could easily google it, that has one size. One size. And, um, I have a teenage daughter, as I just mentioned, and I'm horrified to think that she and all of her peers, when they engage with this brand, are measuring themselves on what is basically a size small.

Mhm.

And if they fit in or they don't fit into that pair of pants, I know they've got oversized this sweatshirts and blah, blah, blah. But I mean, that measure is in the store of the one size that is expected of them. It's horrifying to think that. So not only do you harness great power to do good, you harness great power to do harm.

And it's really important that you start to bring that awareness, whether or not you're in the apparel space, um, to bring it to bear and try to see how not only can you engage people in a better way, but also grow, because there's a lot of room for opportunity here.

Yeah, I think that's such a good point. And I mean, you mentioned earlier too, diet culture, and you know, as a woman who grew up in the eighties and nineties, um, I know how my, um, mom's association of her value based on her current weight, um, at any given moment, or just the perception even of her current weight, whether it was 110 pounds or 160 pounds, um, drove how she taught me to see my body.

Um, and so I would be interested in one. How are we doing at overcoming diet culture? Are we making progress towards sentiment of better body, inclusive inclusivity? Um, and you mentioned your daughter. What are some maybe specific things that a, ah, mom could do to help teach and train a young mind, uh, to accept and love herself just as she's made?

So there's a tremendous amount of diet noise right now, especially in the age of ozempic, um, and wagovi. And it's a complicated time because there's a lot of messages, especially coming from some pretty powerful influences our life, such as social media. And so for me, in my own home, really, about just kind of sharing these messages of where you are is a great place to be and that you're making sure that your body gets enough nourishment on a daily basis to fuel the things that you want to do.

But it's not about what other people's bodies are doing, because we all kind of ebb and flow in this world. Um, you know, we went to. I'll just give a strange example. We went to Costco the other day, and as one does when they go to Costco, you end up buying a lot of things that maybe you wouldn't normally buy.

And so our house was full of, like, things that aren't normally in the house, and. And we find ourselves just kind of nibbling on this and nibbling on that. And the next day, one of my daughters was like, ugh, I don't feel so good because, you know, like many of us, we just kind of over indulged.

And I'm like, oh, wow, now you know how that feels. And maybe the next time you'd make you choose a little differently or, you know, you just move on from that. It's not like there's no way to punish. There's nothing to punish. There's nothing to, like, making a sharp adjacent turn.

It's just really about. It's truly about just kind of like, oh, I'm listening to this feeling, and then I'll course correct from there.

Yeah, I love that. A couple things that you just said really stood out to me. One is ebb and flow. I think as. As women, we're taught that our body should always be the size and shape that it is when we're 18. Um, and that it does change. We're both moms.

That is a dramatic change. Um, I am in better shape than I was in my twenties because I didn't know how to exercise then, and that's something I didn't learn until I was an adult. And I never really appreciated, um, or I never was really taught about that ebb and flow.

Um, and then as well as the punishment phase, um, I think, again, if we go back to the basics of diet, culture is a splurge day, then becomes a beat down for the lack of, um, discipline that we seem to have, or that we are taught that if we're not thinner, then it must be because we lack some sort of basic discipline or self motivation.

And to tie that kind of back to. And I would love to do a whole podcast on the ozembic conversation, 100%. But to kind of tie that back is that when we see influencers who have clearly been taking the drug, whether you take the drug or not is, at least to me, as a bit indifferent.

But it's the, uh, the fact that they're not revealing it, that they're, you know, like, oh, I've been doing pilates. I got, uh, a peloton. You know, I did all these things when in reality, they probably are exercising more, but they have something that is supporting their weight loss, but for some reason, they're shamed, um, into even talking about the fact that they need, um, or have decided to use some medicine to change their.

Their body composition. Right.

And it's. And it's so complicated either way. I'm not. I would never judge someone for making that decision or not. It's just, uh, it's just noisy. It's just there's a lot of, you know, back and forth is this is a good idea? Is this not, you know, and it also makes expectations, uh, just askew.

Right. Of, uh, you know, and then what happens if you stop taking it. Right. And also, you know, in that kind of world of expectations, I think what's important for my kids to know and what I hope for, to make the world know through working with corporations. It's like the average woman is a size 16.

You know, there's not a problem with your thighs. They're probably pretty normal.

Um, you know, I really love that, that song by Jax about, I know, Victoria's secret. I mean, there's just so many beauty standards that we kind of measure ourself against that are just. They're not real. They're not real at all. And so the more that we can show bodies that are even average.

Right. It's just. It's remarkable what that can bring to reflecting back the culture that you're trying to attract.

This.

This obsession with optics and, you know, us, uh, only wanting to have a certain look in our brand, it's just. It's doing a disservice. Let the numbers, you know, um, let the. The market show you the value of this market. You know, like, there's $40 billion in buying power in the plus size market.

Wow.

So, um, a ah, fellow influencer just shared something about express going into bankruptcy. Well, you know, just a few years ago, they stopped having size 18 jeans on their website. They just eradicated this size m when, you know, most stores sell large and extra large clothes, that's the highest selling thing.

So why would you not expand that top level a little bit knowing that there's more business to be had there?

Right.

There's more brand connection to be had there.

Anyway, no, it's such, such a great point, and I get nerdy about these things, and I could talk about that kind of stuff all day, but I want to switch topics because you've been so generous with your time. Um, so I told you just before we started recording, my husband, Chad, is going to be climbing Kilimanjaro in 2025.

And I'm not going to lie, I'm freaking out about it. I will not be doing that, but I will be freaking out while he's doing it. So tell me about the decision to climb Kilimanjaro. Um, and really what that meant to you on your journey of better acceptance and just getting out there and doing something incredibly that 99% of the world will never do.

Well, don't worry. Your husband's going to be okay. I just want to clear that up.

Okay.

So kilimanjaro, if you've never heard of it or you're interested in it, is 19,343ft. That means that there's half as much oxygen at the top as there is at sea level. And it is like climbing the side of the globe. You start at the equator, and then you end up in glaciers.

And so, uh, just to let you know and to forewarn you that the folks at Rei or whatever outdoor store that he uses will be his new best friends, because he'll be buying everything, um, that you can, uh, I took on the mountain the first time after a significant weight loss.

It was a three digit weight loss, and I had been climbing and hiking, um, because what I found was, um, you know, I had struggled with binge eating disorder, and binge eating disorder is the most common, um, and often least talked about, um, eating disorder out there. And what it is for me was about pushing away emotions, right?

It was pushing away, pushing away, pushing away, you know, good, good emotions and bad emotions. And so what I found was, as I turned 30 and I wanted to just take on these challenges that were in these glossy travel brochures, like kilimanjaro, the Alps, machu picchu, was that, um, I realized that I kept telling myself, I'll do that when I lose weight.

I'll climb kilimanjaro when I lose weight. I'll go to the doctors when I lose weight. I will buy a new wardrobe when I lose weight. It was. Everything in my life was just followed by that clause and then blocked because my body shape never really changed that much. Well, I went on, you know, uh, we talked a lot about diet, culture.

I went on a pretty severe diet. And I, and I was hiking. And what I loved about the hiking part of it was that instead of that pushing away, pushing away of emotions, being in nature and being on a trail pulled it all in. It pulled in. You know, on a trail, you're experiencing the most joy and beauty that you've ever seen in your whole life.

Because nature just offers itself just this magical showcase of possibilities of what you're going to run into. But with that, there's also the fear, right? You don't know what else you're going to run into on a trail. You know, in New Jersey here it could be a bear. And, you know, out west it could be like a bigger bear.

Um, you know, it could rain, it could, you know, there could be thunder and lightning. You could run into someone sketchy on a trail. There's so many things that could happen and yet you have to keep putting 1ft in front of the other. Even when the trail gets hard, even when, you know, you're not sure if you can continue on.

It's just about putting 1ft in front of the other and facing all of those things. And so that first kilimanjaro, ah, climb was after this significant weight loss. And I thought I was on top of the world. And so I decided to take on the highest peak that you can hike to the top of.

Meaning like no ice axes, no ropes, no supplemental oxygen, assuming everything goes well. And so it was this feeling of uhuru, which is, um, swahili for, um, freedom. That's the name of the peak. Um, um. And I thought, okay, I've got this thing solved. Wait, I'm, you know, I've got this weight thing conquered.

Here we go. For the rest of my life. And a year later, uh, I had a whole other adventure which involved, uh, you know, a whole set of gear, and that was having a baby. And during that pregnancy and the months after she was born, you know, my binge eating disorder kicked back up into high gear.

And we talk about the restrict and the binge. You know, we were talking about how folks kind of just go on a bender after, you know, restricting for so long. And, um, that's what happened to me. I was really triggered by the fact that I had restricted, uh, myself for so long and especially having a new baby and being scared about it and being completely sleep deprived and triggered by things like, um, financial stress and all the things that happen when you become a new mom to my amazing, amazing daughter.

But, you know, parenting is rough. It's a rough go. And so, um, I put on almost all of the weight back on again, and I was feeling incredibly lost. And so I decided to go up the mountain a second time, thinking that it was, if I could just bring myself back to that place, I would get myself back together again.

And spoiler alert, that is not the best advice for, um, getting your stuff back together is just back to the place where it all happened. So that second climb, while I made it pretty far up the mountain, was pretty much a cautionary tale on how to climb kilimanjaro, um, even from the things that I packed.

And you can read all about that in gorge, about all the things that went wrong. Um, and so I came back from that climb feeling pretty defeated, um, you know, when my body wasn't doing, when my legs weren't doing what my brain was telling them to do, I knew that I was in an unsafe space and I needed to turn around, even though the summit was right in sight.

Um, so I came back thinking that I wasn't the hiker girl that I had pronounced myself to be. In fact, why should I even bother showing up in these places? I don't fit in. Maybe I'm just destined, destined to be stagnant and not moving. And it became pretty apparent after a real bout of depression and anxiety and the binge eating disorder really, really kind of rearing its ugly head.

A lot of secrecy eating and the real, real red flags of the disorder. A friend asked if I wanted to climb Kilimanjaro, uh, with her. And before I, you know, I wanted to think about how could I say yes to this opportunity? I needed to change the boundaries and the rules of the game.

Like, this wasn't a punishment. This wasn't a, ah, weight loss initiative. This was about returning to the place where I felt strongest. This is about returning to a place knowing that I would be successful even if I didn't lose a single pound. So how could I say yes? And those are the boundaries that I put into place, realizing that movement should be welcome to me in the body that I was in at the time.

I needed to train to get there. Like, make no mistake, like, I trained and I did. Like, I walked a half marathon. I did this boot camp in the park. I, you know, I even went to Telluride the week before just to get a little bit of altitude training in me.

Um, I trained and I trained and I trained. But it wasn't about the number on the scale. It was about the miles that I was walking. And so I changed the equation, knowing that I needed to love myself from where I was and go from there and stop looking at myself like this before and after picture.

Because I think the world was set up in that way that we look at each other like, before and after pictures. And I think that, you know, that's the biggest challenge in the corporate world, is that you look at a candidate and it's like, oh, or a team member and think, well, if they just, if they just ate a certain way, if they just followed what my cousin Jen just lost 40 pounds, they'd be fine.

You know, it's like you kind of make these assumptions and narratives about someone's body, simply looking at their body. And that's where, you know, not only did I have a successful. I'm not going to give you all the details because I want you to read Gorge and I want you to see the movie ultimately.

Um, but, yeah, it was a successful climb simply because I changed the narrative with myself and other people about my body.

That's amazing. So tell us, where. Where do we buy the book? And when is the movie coming out?

Okay, well, the easier question is where to buy the book. You can buy the book at all major bookstores. You can find it on Amazon, of course. Um, but, uh, independents are really a great place to order the book as well. Um, and the movie, you know, just like a kilimanjaro climb, it's poly pole, which is slowly, slowly in Swahili.

Um, it's a slow pace. I, um, have a meeting with Chrissy, uh, on Monday just to touch base about the project. And so hopefully we will get things in motion again. It's. There's a lot of stops and starts, especially the actors strike, kind of put, um, the brakes on things for a while, but we're getting back into it and slogging our way through to success.

Promise you'll let us know when, uh, a release date is coming. And we will put a link to the book, um, also in the show notes and on our YouTube channel. Um, so, last but not least, um, we always kind of end the show with a, uh, changing mind, changing lives kind of two set question.

So the first is, tell us one thing today to help change our minds, um, to drive better inclusion of people who live in larger bodies in our everyday lives.

Right. Um, I think the one thing to think about is, is your attitude about weight or unconscious bias costing you business or costing, uh, you and talent, because you don't know the narrative of somebody's body just by looking at them. And a lot of the attributes that have been assigned, negative attributes, for example, um, are just stereotypes.

And what is one thing that someone did for you that helped change your life?

Yeah. Um, I think in body inclusion, it's the simple things that make the biggest difference. And so I recently shared how, um, I was in France visiting, uh, some of our former au pairs. We were in Lyon, uh, with two of our former au pairs, and they went into the restaurant before us, and I didn't realize what they did was they switched out the chair where I'd be sitting just to make sure that there was a chair without arms and I would feel comfortable.

I carry most of my weight between my navel and my knees. And it was just such a beautiful thing where they knew me so well that they, they knew me so well that they knew they wanted me to be comfortable during this beautiful lunch that we were about to have, instead of feeling like I needed to squeeze in or ask myself, um, and so just think about those little ways to just ask people who are in larger bodies how can you better serve them?

How can you make them more comfortable in the worlds that they exist in? And so, um, just know that the smallest difference can make a world of difference.

Amazing. Kara Richardson Whiteleaf, thank you so much for joining us. Can you tell our audience how they can connect with you?

Yes, of course. Um, the best way is, uh, via our website, which is thegorgeousagency.com. You can also find me arichidsonwhiteley on Instagram. We also have a gorgeous agency account there. And, um, the best interaction on business stuff is via LinkedIn. Find me there, find the gorgeous agency, and let's see.

Connect.

Awesome. Well, that does it for another. Changing minds, changing lives. Thank you so much for joining us. We'll see you next time.