Introducing exercise scientist and inspirational speaker Asha Holland

At just 24 years old, she is the founder and chief executive of her own company, Alternatively Healthy - an online hub teaching girls around Australia to love and accept themselves exactly as they are.

With a focus on inspiring and empowering her audiences, and legion of Instagram followers, Asha has been named one of Australia's Top 50 Small Business Leaders as well as one of Girlfriend Magazine's Top 25 Female Leaders Under 25.

Backed by extensive training in science, exercise, wellness and nutrition education, Asha is only just getting started.

Asha is the next profile in the Mandurah Millennials on a Mission series, as we meet the young people from around the region helping to shape a new narrative.

The series aims to provide an insight into some of the fresh new talent who have grown up in our great city, and are just getting started making a name for themselves.

I have followed Asha on Instagram for so long, I remember when Alternatively Healthy officially began back in 2018.

I even did a story with her on the launch of the online hub and membership program, supporting girls across the country on their personal journeys to feeling confident.

It resonated with me - another twenty something who has obsessively compared herself to others and wishes instead she could just be comfortable in her own skin.

Just like my colleagues. My best friends. Almost everyone.

I couldn't wait to interview Asha again for the Millennials series to dig deeper into how she turned a passion for helping girls develop positive mindsets and feel good, into a career.

From the moment we sit down to chat, I can almost see the room fill with this incredible aura of empowerment and good vibes - even a sense of calm contentedness.

But Asha shared with me a journey plagued by toxic desires, eating restrictions and excessive exercise that led her to becoming a highly sought-after speaker and inspirational influencer.

There's one particular quote from Asha that stuck with me well after our interview.

I couldn't quite find the perfect place to put it in the profile where it would have the same lasting impact on readers that it had on me, so I thought I'd just leave it with you here before we delve into the life of the inspiring Asha Holland.

"No matter whether it's self love, body image, business or just life - it's all a journey."

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Asha grew up in Tom Price - a tiny little mining town of just 3000 people, often dubbed the Top Town in WA for its claim to fame as the highest town above sea level in the state.

She moved to Perth after high school to study Sport Science, Exercise and Health at the University of Western Australia, after just missing out on the grades to get into medicine.

Asha moved into a college but quickly discovered she didn't enjoy that and headed on down the freeway to move to Mandurah with her then-boyfriend (who she now calls her husband!).

"I thought [Mandurah] was like this huge city because I had grown up in this tiny little country town," she said.

"It took me a long time to get used to because Tom Price didn't even have traffic lights and everyone knew everyone.

"It was kind of overwhelming at the start but now that I've been here for five years, I know it isn't a big city. We settled in quickly and it became home."

Asha had thrown herself into learning all about the body and how it works during her degree with work experience stints at Peel Thunder and extra training of her own.

But she quickly started pushing her body to extremes, developing a toxic desire to achieve the "perfect body".

"I got mixed up with the difference between pushing your body to help it perform better compared to the way that it looked," she said.

"I didn't want to just improve, I wanted to achieve perfection."

She started training for a fitness model competition, embarking on an intensive 12-week program that saw her counting "every single calorie you ate" and exercising "up to three hours a day.

She would stop at nothing to achieve what she thought healthy looked like from the outside, with a life defined by comparison, restriction, guilt and self-doubt.

The look on Asha's face shifts as she explains just how health obsessed she became, leading her on a dark path to orthorexia and anxiety.

"I always believed that once I stood up on that stage then I would have achieved perfection," she said.

"I competed and won some shiny awards and when I looked at the photos, I had the body that I wanted that I thought was going to bring me happiness.

"But as soon as I stepped off that stage, I had this wake-up moment of probably being the unhappiest I've ever been.

"I had sacrificed all these precious years of my life constantly trying to change who I was and achieve this unrealistic expectation."

It took hitting rock bottom, and losing her own love for life, for Asha to see a need for change.

"I didn't know what my goal was anymore - I didn't know how was I going to feel happy and healthy if it didn't come from that," Asha said.

Battling a personal struggle with body dysmorphia, an eating disorder and burnout, Asha was also faced with the daunting task of deciding on the next step of her career.

She was tossing up to apply for medicine and go on to achieve her lifelong goal of becoming a pediatrician or studying her masters, but admitted she just felt "stuck".

So she packed a suitcase with her partner and travelled around Europe for three months in the hope of finding some clarity.

"I never went back to uni or got a real job after that," she laughed.

"It gave me the space and freedom I needed to not be so fixated on my body and how it was looking, but actually enjoying where I was.

"It was definitely hard at the start because I was forced to stop and I didn't go to the gym once in three months. I definitely had a few break downs.

"But I came home and I knew I wanted to do something on my own. I felt like I was meant to do something bigger, I knew there was something else for me but I had no idea what it was."

Asha's first attempt at what she thought was the path she wanted to pursue went by the name 'Glow with Asha'.

She laughs as she remembers her first photoshoot for the business, surrounded by fruits and vegetables in a kitchen.

"It still just had this real focus on nutrition and the science of the body," she said.

"I was coaching and doing a lot of talks with sporting groups.

"But it just wasn't it. It wasn't what I was meant to be doing."

In 2018, she came up with the name Alternatively Healthy - an community platform that aims to empower, educate and inspire young women to accept and appreciate themselves just as they are.

"I had finally got to this point in my life where I felt really happy, and my body felt healthy," she said.

"I stopped to reflect on my journey and asked myself what helped me to get here.

"The confidence I gained in myself, which replaced worrying about how my body looked, came once I realised I wasn't the only one, it came from talking to people about it."

In an effort to open up the conversation between women who felt like they weren't good enough, Asha started organising small, monthly coffee catch ups.

Girls got together to talk about their experiences with body image and self confidence and listen to the stories of others.

But these sold out quickly, prompting her to officially launch the brand in December 2018 with an epic community event of more than 100 girls.

"Since then, last year was a lot of figuring out the direction of Alternatively Healthy," she said.

"I had to be clear with the kind of girls I want to help and, once I committed to that, the community grew a lot stronger.

"We host events and now I'm speaking at schools and we have the Alternatively Healthy journal."

Asha said the most rewarding part of her business comes from speaking to young girls at school - something she was driven to implement after starting Alternatively Healthy.

"I found that my passion was mainly relating to girls who were just stepping out of high school because that's where it all started for me and that's where there's a lot of pressure," she said.

"You're going from this safe environment where you have the same routine and your teachers look after you to being on your own.

"And yet there are expectations to move out, figure out your career, find a partner, get married and then there's worrying about how your body looks on top of that and doing well in every area of your life."

"I just love helping girls to break down what that 'perfect image' in their head is that they don't even realise their whole life is revolving around.

"I think if I had heard a story like that, it might have stopped me going through all of those things.

If you've ever checked out Alternatively Healthy's social media, you'll know Asha doesn't hold back when it comes to showing every side of who she is online - real and raw.

With more than 6000 followers on Instagram, she posts everything from her greatest achievements to her darkest hours online.

Given that I can't imagine ever posting a photo that I'm not 200 per cent happy with, complete with thought-out filters and quirky captions, I ask Asha how she came to be so comfortable with showing her best and worst sides on the highlight reel that is Instagram.

She said it wasn't always easy.

"Being vulnerable still scares me and I still have to push myself outside of comfort zone every time I do that," she said.

"But I do it because I think about what would've helped me when I was really struggling.

"I know there are so many girls out there who see enough perfection on social media but it's quite rare to see someone jump on social media and say they are feeling bad today."

Despite the challenges of social media, Asha said it had created more awareness around self love and body image recently - a positive change she welcomed with open arms.

"I have definitely noticed a shift on Instagram stories of people being able to show up a little more real and raw," she said.

"I've had the chance to interview so many role models and influencers and I've never met one that hasn't struggled with something.

"Every single person has insecurities - no one has the perfect life because it doesn't exist so just keep taking the next step and you'll figure it out in your own time."

This year, Asha launched her favourite project to date - the Alternatively Healthy journal.

Released quarterly, the book is full of tools and activities that helped Asha achieve

"You just fill it out every day and it's only small and very simple," she said.

"It breaks it down so it's not overwhelming but it forces girls to take that time out for themselves."

And the journal, along with all of Asha's projects, has been well received by her dedicated following.

"I can't express how grateful I am every time someone reaches out to me and says nice things to me," she said.

"It's not easy to start your own business or try something new.

"So for me to pour so much time, energy and money into these projects when I never know how they're going to go - it just takes one message of a girl saying it changed her life for me to keep going."

As for her favourite self love tips?

Asha said to remember that the journey can be long but will always be worth it.

"Just start by reading positive quotes or writing positive messages to yourself," she said.

"You won't believe them at the start but stick them up where you will see them, like up on your mirror, and you will start to say them out loud and then eventually you will start to believe them.

"And pay attention to how you speak to yourself - don't say anything you wouldn't say to your mum or your sister or best friend."

"I've still got more to give," Asha said, as we start to wrap up our chat about how she got to this point with Alternatively Healthy, and move to her future plans.

But for right now, she's focused on delivering a healthy baby in May and looking forward to the next chapter of her life - motherhood.

"Being pregnant has taught me a whole new aspect of listening to my body, especially when I couldn't get out of bed for the first 20 weeks," Asha laughed.

She goes on to tell me about the awful morning sickness she endured in the first half of her pregnancy and, my goodness, becoming a mother is not for the faint hearted.

"But it gives this whole new strength to my journey because, at one point, I was told I would never be able to have kids because of the damage I had done to my body.

"I've proved that by listening to your body and looking after yourself, you can achieve actual health and happiness."

As for Alternatively Healthy, she isn't planning on slowing down anytime soon, with a focus on building up the education side of the business.

"I want to be able to give the girls a toolkit to keep working on their own mindset so that's what I'm developing at the moment," she said.

"I'm also creating more of a structured school program that I hope can spread wider. I want to teach the teachers how to connect with their girls and spread that self love message."

For more information about Alternatively Healthy, or to follow them on social media, check out their website, Facebook or Instagram page.

The next Mandurah Millennials on a Mission profile will delve deeper into the life of one of the Peel region's most dedicated volunteers, brightest minds and the latest winner of the Youth Volunteer of the Year award.