EMINEM on judging people:
“…you gotta learn to judge people for the individuals that they are.” Cosmo Girl
Category: Self Worth & Esteem
Julianne Moore
JULIANNE MOORE on imperfections:
“I think imperfections are important, just as mistakes are important. You only get to be good by making mistakes, and you only get to be real by being imperfect.” Glamour
Cher
CHER
“I’m the girl who everyone said was never going anywhere. I guess I shocked a few people, but deep down I don’t feel like I’m there yet either.
I’m still just going day to day. I’m just doing my thing.” Chicago Sun-Times
Sally Field
SALLY FIELD talks about her low-self-esteem:
“Many people must have looked at my life and thought I was quite fortunate. But I felt lousy about myself–and as you now know, I didn’t come from a place where I had a lot of self-confidence. In my late 50s I began to embrace myself in a way that I hadn’t been able to before. I find that I’m not as worried anymore about what other people think. That’s a comfortable place to be. And I’m starting to let go of the feeling that I need to push myself to do things. I don’t want to do–an impulse that has always been linked to the feeling that I’m not enough. If you’re busy thinking, Gosh, I’m not pretty or smart enough, your spirit is undernourished. The minute you tell yourself, I’m never going to feel those things again, you stop growing because you’re too busy armoring yourself.” O Magazine
Cindy Crawford
CINDY CRAWFORD
“…I am my true self in my marriage. I don’t have to act or pretend I like football. I’m secure enough that if Rande wants to go out and I don’t, I say ‘Go and have a good time.’ Before, I might have either wanted him to stay or else I would go just to keep an eye on him.” Lifetime Magazine
Christina Applegate
CHRISTINA APPLEGATE
“I’ve seen things written that are really hurtful to me and very painful. I like to look on our ABC blog for feedback on the show. It is supposed to be [a place for people] to talk about the episodes, not about whether I look old. I had one person say I needed to start wearing a bra, and now all I’m doing is thinking about my boobs and if they’re saggy. But I just think, Oh, c’mon, Christina! You have to let go and know who you really are. I don’t mind my flaws. When you’re younger, it feels like the end of the world if you make a mistake or if you have a zit. Now it’s like, Who cares? Just try to be happy. Be kind to yourself. Be kind to other people. Do good work. Be professional. All those things are really important.
I’m a big yes-I-will-do-whatever-you-want, people pleasing person, which I think is left over from my youth. I grew up really quickly. I had to be incredibly responsible and show up to work on time and be focused and clear. But now I know what’s going to push me too hard, and I don’t want to be taken advantage of. In this business, you’re treated like you’re a superwoman who can do everything, and you can’t. You’ve got to be able to take time for yourself. So I definitely try to say ‘No’ more. Recently, one of my friends said, ‘You need to get out of your house.’ But why? I’ve got everything I need here. I have my animals. I have a refrigerator. I have my pool. My favorite thing to do is play with my dogs and cats. I think it’s important to have time to reflect and be quiet and just think. I enjoy my alone time. Self
“The truth is, I was the ugly, dorky duckling growing up. Even when I would do the show [Married With Children], I would walk away wearing baggy clothes. I was just so under-confident in what I looked like. I never looked in the mirror and never thought that I was a pretty girl. Boys never hit on me. I really wanted to be that hoochie mama in the club, the one that guys all wanted to look at and grab, but I just could not be that person.”
Alfre Woodard
ALFRE WOODARD
“When I was growing up in Tulsa, the kids called me bubble lips and frog eyes. My mama always said, “Oh, you’re such a pretty girl,” and I believed I was, thanks to her encouragement. Still, this was before the “black is beautiful” era of the 1970s, and everything around me seemed to negate my particular look – especially movies. The screen is one of the most influential tools in our lives, and if you don’t see yourself represented it’s almost as if you don’t exist. As I got older, I was drawn to the power and possibility for healing that cinema and the theater offered the world, and even though I didn’t resemble the typical actress – or maybe because of it – I moved to Hollywood. At auditions I was constantly told that I looked too much like an African and not enough like an African-American. I thought, this is as African-American as you get – my family has been here for 400 years! The hues of America were not being celebrated. Instead, everybody was trying to fit a homogeneous image. Then in 1986, I traveled to Zimbabwe for the first time to shoot the TV movie Mandela. I felt as if I’d been given a pure shot of oxygen. Suddenly, I was part of the dominant culture. I saw people like me. They had round faces and large eyes, with skin so warm and lips so full that I almost wanted to kiss strangers. I’d been living in Los Angeles, a world full of cubic zirconias, and here I was in the land of deep, rich-colored, genuine gemstones. I felt organically beautiful for the first time in my life. It may sound immodest, but I realized that my presence in movies gives that same validation to other young black women. They can feel free to walk their walk, swing their hips, and flash their smiles because they see themselves up on the screen. Everybody has a part of her body that she doesn’t like, but I’ve stopped complaining about mine because I don’t want to critique nature’s handiwork. There’s no such thing as imperfection. My job is simply to allow the light to shine out of the masterpiece.” O Magazine