We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Olivia Simmons a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Olivia, appreciate you joining us today. When did you first know you wanted to pursue a creative/artistic path professionally?

I was one who was always writing and excited when the opportunity was given to write for a column, blog or any type of platform.

I started off by writing encouraging Facebook Posts around 2014 and by 2016, I had my first blog entitled “LibFiles”. By 2017, I knew that I was called to be an Author.

I released my first book in 2018 entitled “8 Minutes With God: Intimate Moments With The Father” followed by “My Sister’s Keeper: The Joy Of The Journey” in 2023.

Olivia, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

Hi! Let me just first say how honored and excited I am to share a little bit about who I am with your amazing audience and platform! My name is Olivia Simmons and I am a published Christian Author of two books: “8 Minutes With God: Intimate Moments With The Father” (published in June 2018) and “My Sister’s Keeper: The Joy of The Journey” (published in October 2023). I’m also the Brand Ambassador for XPlusWear (May 2022) in additional to being a Motivational and Inspirational Speaker.

Growing up as a child and also while in college, I absolutely loved writing essays, short stories, research papers you name it. If it had anything to do with writing, I was all in! Going into adulthood, I never thought about becoming an Author until 2017 in which I was inspired by my Pastor regarding increasing my prayer life with God. Through the journey of becoming closer to God in prayer, God allowed my first book, “8 Minutes With God: Intimate Moments With The Father” to be birthed. My newest book release of “My Sister’s Keeper: The Joy Of The Journey” is about my sister, Joy who passed away September 12, 2019 and how my life has been since she said see you later.

Not only am I an Author but God brought the amazing opportunity to me to be The Brand Ambassador for XPlusWear in May 2022. Through this beautiful blessing, it has afforded me the opportunity to be a shining light and example to women all over this world that they should love the skin that they’re in for they are fearfully and wonderfully made in God’s sight (Psalms 139:13-16).

Let’s talk about resilience next – do you have a story you can share with us?

As a child growing up, and to be honest up until a few years ago, I was so timid and insecure of who I was. If you were to look at my social media platforms, you would think that I wasn’t telling the truth because that’s no longer the case. Now to be honest, there are moments in which I have to speak affirmations to myself (this is something that I do daily and I highly suggest to anyone who reads this article to do the same) to remind just how far I have come and the amazing blessings that God has waiting for me to experience.

February 2022 was the moment in which things began to shift in my life. I decided to have a photoshoot (shoutout to my AMAZING Photographer, Gabrielle Hicks) to celebrate my 45th birthday and in this shoot, I decided to wear clothing that I normally wouldn’t wear. I wore fringed leather pants with a mesh top as one outfit and a tulle skirt with a sequin crop top as my second outfit. I tagged the two companies whose clothing I was wearing and to my greatest surprise, one that I had been wearing for years reached out to me asking if they could use my photo as a customer spotlight in which I immediately said YES! What I didn’t realize was that photo was about to catapult me into the destiny that awaited me.

I began to experience Cyber Bullying from those who looked exactly like me. The comments that were made took me back to my days of being bullied in school (elementary to high school) and although I wanted to respond back, God told me to BE QUIET! I had others around me who did the talking for me. I asked God, why were these people being so hateful to me and they didn’t know me? He responded back that He knew what I was walking through because He was PERSECUTED by His own people. My obedience in remaining quiet opened up so many doors for me which included becoming the Brand Ambassador for XPlusWear, sharing my story with various Podcasts, Ministries and with AMAZING Platforms such as this one!

What do you find most rewarding about being a creative?

Since releasing my latest book “My Sister’s Keeper: The Joy Of The Journey”, once of my greatest rewards has been the TESTIMONIES of those who have read my book. The book is about my only sister and sibling, Joy, who The Lord called home to be with Him. Through this book, I shared her life from childhood, motherhood to my nephew Ethan, calling upon her life as an Atmosphere Changer (Worship Leader), Family Life, The Love of her life to the day that she transitioned home. The second part of the book is about my life since she said see you later. The second half talks about how Jesus + Therapy healed me, Finding Confidence in the midst of Chaos, Gracing Myself to be Loved and so much more.

I have had people to call and inbox me telling me how much my story changed their perspective of sibling relationships. I had one of my friends (who is a male) tell me that he had been praying to God about mending his relationship with his brothers and through my book, it gave him revelation in how to become closer to his brothers. I’ve had others to come and say that reading the book gave them closure about my sister’s death (many did not realize just how sick she was) and just reading about the strength that God gave me, encouraged them in their walk with Christ.

The entire time that I was writing this book, I kept asking God was He sure that He wanted me to share the intimate details of the journey and He answered it by allowing people’s lives to be encouraged and impacted by me sharing my story.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.iamoliviasimmons.com
• Instagram: i_am_oliviasimmons
• Facebook: Loving The Skin You’re In, Olivia Simmons Plus Size Influencer

Image Credits
Photographer: Gabrielle Hicks