Congratulations To Star Of The Month Dominique Alston

Dominique Leshay Alston is the 25 year old granddaughter of Lazona Gale Spears and the late John Wesley Spears, Jr. of Coats, North Carolina. She grew up as a sweet southern belle becoming a trail blazer in her academics, athletics, and the pageant industry.

The former beauty queen is trained in vocal performance as well as various classic forms of dance, including ballet en pointe, tap, jazz, lyrical, and more. She attended Janice's Fabulous Feet Dance studio and the Barbizon School of Modeling, along with over 30 private and international mentors and teachers. From tapping on the stage of the famous "It's Showtime at the Apollo" to opera at Carnegie Hall, Dominique has worked hard to master her craft.

Over the span of Dominique's pageant career, she has raised over $30,000 for Charities and Hospitals. As Junior and Teen Miss North Carolina, she partnered with the outstanding Masonic Children's Home of Oxford, NC. She competed twice at the Miss North Carolina Scholarship pageant for the chance to win the crown of Miss America. The organization helped Dominique create iAutism, where she helped teach, aid and fundraise for low income families with children who have Autism. The Miss America organization gave her the opportunity to work alongside them aiding the Children's Miracle Network hospitals.

The athletic beauty attended the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, studying Mass Communications with a focus in performance, and African and African-American Diasporic studies. While at the University, she was inspired from the diversity of people, culture, knowledge, and unlimited opportunity. From this inspiration, Dominique was spawned into a true human and animal activist, feminist, and humanitarian. In January of 2015, she moved to California - once again finding boundless inspiration. By 2016, Dominique gave birth to Ihunaanya: Understand Your Impact; giving jobs to over 10 of her closest friends, including co-founder, Kellie Thornton.

Ihunaanya: Understand Your Impact's mission is to increase the participation of minority groups in nature. The events take people hiking, camping, and backpacking with installations of Mindfulness Meditation, yoga, and other workshops that help better the physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual wellness.

The love and time you invest in something can actually turn into a lifestyle. We are not surprise that Dominique's hobbies includes dancing, singing, hiking, camping, backpacking, and creating new projects. Also, one of her favorite things to do is learn. She is in the constant pursuit of new knowledge.

When it comes to making a fashion statement, Dominique is steadfast in wearing how she feels. Her clothing, jewelry, hair, nails, and makeup all go into a piece of art work she can share with the world. Currently, Dominique is obsessed with over-sized sweaters and trench coats, large totes, complemented with as big of hair as you can get - after all, big hair shrinks the waistline. She is also into the futuristic style of Japanese millennials. Her favorite brands are Versace, Gucci, Louis Vuitton, Nike, and Mac cosmetics.

Five years from now - when she will be 30 years old, our multi-talented August star of the month aspires to launched the festival portion of Ihunaanya: Understand Your Impact and surfaced as a major force in the entertainment industry starring in action and horror movies.

Dominique's advice to the world is from poet and philosopher David Whyte explores in Consolations: The Solace, Nourishment and Underlying Meaning of Everday Words, a book "dedicated to WORDS and their beautiful hidden and beckoning uncertainty."

• But no matter the medicinal virtues of being a true friend or sustaining a long close relationship with another, the ultimate touchstone of friendship is not improvement, neither of the other nor of the self, the ultimate touchstone is witness, the privilege of having been seen by someone and the equal privilege of being granted the sight of the essence of another, to have walked with them and to have believed in them, and sometimes just to have accompanied them for however brief a span, on a journey impossible to accomplish alone.

For someone who has been in the entertainment world for the most part of her life, she has seen it all. When asked to define beauty, she simply said "beauty is to me what light you allow to shine through. Live your life in a healthy and spiritually wealthy way, and your beauty will always be beyond this universe, literally."

You are such an amazing person Dominique. We love everything you do and how you inspire everyone around you. We wish you the best in all your endeavors!