We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Sharon Clawson. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Sharon below.

Sharon, appreciate you joining us today. We’d love to hear the backstory behind a risk you’ve taken – whether big or small, walk us through what it was like and how it ultimately turned out.

Working anything outside of your typical 9-5 wasn’t even a thought for me, especially coming from a Southeast Asian background. All my mom ever worried or cared about was having a sense of stability and to her, that meant working anywhere in the medical field. She was an LVN nurse majority of her life, therefore inspiring me to pursue a similar path. I was a nursing major for four years before I decided that it ended up not being for me and switched over to psychology. After a semester, I realized school overall wasn’t the path I wanted to take; however, after some reflection, I wanted take a chance on something that I genuinely love.

Sharon, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

I technically started with modeling when I was as young as 11 years old. Coming from Sacramento, CA, we didn’t have the easiest of access to opportunities. So I took advantage of what I was available, which was local pageants. I remember when I received my first pageant letter in the mail, I was ecstatic and begged my mom to let me go for it. It was for Miss Pre Teen Sacramento and that’s where it all started. From there on, I got into more pageants for Hawaiian Tropic and soon enough, decided to take commercial acting classes. Realizing I was doing all these things for the wrong reasons (the praise and the validation of being enough), I took a long break to work on my self esteem.
Soon enough, 2016 came around the corner and one of the most iconic moments in history happened: Ashley Graham being the first plus size model to make it on the cover of Sports Illustrated Swim. Seeing someone with my similar body type in the media made me realize that space was being created in the industry for women like myself. Not too long after, I decided to dip my toes back into modeling to see how I enjoyed it. 2019 came around and I decided to take the leap to move to LA and pursue my dream full time. From working food service jobs, warehouse jobs that required me to work 60+ hours a week, to moving all over the place, I just knew I was willing to do everything it took to make my dream work. Here we are, in 2024, and I can gratefully say I get to pursue my dream full time.

What do you think is the goal or mission that drives your creative journey?

Being a Southeast Asian woman in a curvier body, I was always encouraged to lose weight for the sake of it “not looking good.” That I wasn’t deemed pretty by society because I didn’t fit the mold of the typical beauty standard. With the work that I do, not only do I hope to inspire woman to embrace the bodies they’ve been blessed to be in; to take priority of their health over the size of their vessel. I continue to do what I do in the hopes of inspiring the next girl to go after their dreams. That no dream is too big to accomplish and when moving with love, authenticity, and drive, anything is possible.

We’d love to hear the story of how you built up your social media audience?

Consistency is the name of the game. Social media is constantly changing and the key would be to keep up with what’s new. It can be difficult since what’s popular one moment would be considered old news the next. But other than consistency, I think creating content that feels genuine to you also attracts the demographic you want to build.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/sharontheclaw?igsh=OGQ5ZDc2ODk2ZA%3D%3D&utm_source=qr
• Other: https://www.tiktok.com/@sharon.clawson?_t=8j8Dt6eJCIh&_r=1

Image Credits
red leather dress: @savannarruedy red satin dress: @marcuscooper white tank: @bonnienichoalds denim outfit: @chriseanrose