Shaughna Phillips, the Love Island star, influencer, and fitness maven, is no stranger to posting swimsuit photos on Instagram. She’s on vacation in beautiful Jamaica this week, which naturally means she had another one locked and loaded. “A Sunday well spent,” she captioned it, tagging Negril, Jamaica. How does she stay do fit? Read on to see 5 ways Shaughna Phillips stays in shape and the photos that prove they work—and to get beach-ready yourself, don’t miss these essential 30 Best-Ever Celebrity Bathing Suit Photos!
While you’d think working out is directly linked to body image, it isn’t for Phillips. She says that for her mental health, she separates the two, and that it helps her out. “I separate exercise and working out with my body image,” she told Cosmopolitan. “I do it more so because it’s an outlet for my mental health. It makes me feel better.
Phillips told Cosmopolitan that she doesn’t always feel happy when she loses weight. She says that she works out to stay healthy and be happy, and not to lose weight. Phillips also wants others to think the same. “I don’t want people to think that by dropping weight, you gain confidence because they’re two different things. I’ve felt my most unconfident and my most unhappy when I was skinnier than I’ve ever been. All I could think about was being skinny, and I thought that as soon as I am skinny, I’ll be happy. But it took for me to get to that point to realise ‘oh my god, no, that is not what happiness is.’ You need to separate your happiness and your body image.”
Phillips is open about her struggles with her mental health. She says to Cosmopolitan that she is learning what her struggles are, and works to avoid them. “Realising the things that trigger me has been a big part of my journey,” she says. “Even now, I’m still unlearning things.”
Phillips tells Cosmopolitan that she isn’t obsessing over her body and her appearance, as she knows that her body changes all the time. “Our appearance is one thing in our lives that’s constantly changing, so why do we base our self worth on that? I always remind myself that the way I look is the least interesting thing about me. There’s so much more to me than that, so why am I obsessing over what I look like?”
Phillips enjoys working out, and she wants others to do the same. She launched her own fitness plan, and announced it on Instagram. “This is exactly what I’ve been doing this year to help me feel my happiest, strongest, sassiest self. This is about actually enjoying your workouts, rather than it feeling like a punishment, not restricting ourselves, and working on our mindsets.”