Kate Upton is proving she's just like any one of us.
In Glamour's October issue (on newsstands Sept. 13), the newly engaged 24-year-old gets candid about everything from her childhood to her career.
Upton's journey in the modeling industry hasn't been an easy one.
Growing up in Florida, she was picked on at school for having long legs and bushy eyebrows. "Kids can be cruel," Upton says. "My mother would flip through magazines and say, 'Look, all these models have that, too.'" It was then that Upton says she "decided I wanted to be a model." The Michigan-born, Florida-raised beauty explained these aesthetic differences helped her foray into the fashion industry at a young age.
As Kate gained momentum modeling, criticism circulated around her body again. "At first I tried to diet to become their image, but eventually I realized that it wasn't realistic—that this is just the shape of my body," she tells Glamour. "So I had to block them out."
Having graced the covers of Vogue and Sports Illustrated, the supremodel clapped back at the those who critiqued her body, saying, "I think that the people who are the loudest about wanting to change you are the people with the least amount of vision and creativity."
"Where I grew up, it was considered a great thing to have a curvy body to fill out a bathing suit," she says. "For that to be a negative was so confusing to me. And besides, when I started working, I was booked constantly, mostly for catalog work. So when people were saying, 'Oh, she doesn't have the right look for a model,' I thought, 'Then why am I working every single day?' There are so many different directions you can take in the modeling industry, so many ways to be successful."
The Other Woman star also shared her opinions on body positivity, explaining, "I wanted to show that you shouldn't conform, you should be the best you, the healthiest you. You shouldn't always try to change yourself, because then how are we going to tell anybody apart?"
In order to keep such a healthy toned physique, Upton shared her most sage fitness and lifestyle tips. "I used to work out to have my hips be a certain size. Now I do it for myself, because I want to be strong," she says. "Oh, and I want a nice butt, and if it's a quarter inch bigger than the modeling-world standard, that's fine."
Upton often posts pictures and videos of her workouts on social media. "I really try to use it in a way that doesn't affect my entire day so that I can have a conversation or be with people without constantly thinking about it," she says. And though some people send "hurtful" messages, she's learned to ignore her haters. "I have to say, the other day I was reading some negative comments, and I was thinking they were really funny. So I guess they don't [hurt me] anymore."