Zadie Smith Quotes

I do feel kind of like I have a split identity in that there's Van Jones, who has this big public role and tries to inspire millions of people to do new stuff together. And then there's just me: a pretty quiet, shy, retiring person.

We have to recognize that it is a very, very painful thing for people to be exposed to their social community, to be exposed in the world, as not what they would have wanted to be seen as. This is very painful and difficult for people.

It's vital to remember who you really are. It's very important. It isn't a good idea to rely on other people or things to do it for you, you see. They always get it wrong.

Suddenly people were saying I was cocky because I'd done a Steven Spielberg movie and thought I was better than everyone else, which surprised me at first. I suddenly started feeling like a freak because everyone was treating me differently. It was confusing, and I did wonder if acting was for me anymore.

I don't really see myself that way, as some typical sexy young ingénue. I've never been that way. And, for a while, there was a disconnect between who I am and how I present myself on a public platform. That was because I didn't necessarily feel comfortable sharing that much of myself with other people who I didn't know.

I would just like to be real and be me. It's just really hard to do walking around and everyone knows who I am.

The thing about being catapulted into a whole new life--or at least, shoved up so hard against someone else's life that you might as well have your face pressed against their window--is that it forces you to rethink your idea of who you are. Or how you might seem to other people.

I would often go on as myself, when I wasn't working. And the first time I went on as myself, two people came up and asked me what I was doing and who I was.

I think the level of criticism you're under is never healthy. I think that's why lots of people in Hollywood end up in rehab. There are the ups and downs. I was never a fan of the attention.

I got stopped in front of the bras in Victoria's Secret; I get interrogated in airport bathrooms. I went to South Africa in January to see my family, and even there people would stop me and ask, "Sasha, who's A?" Even my grandma.

Its harder for people to seek retirement from themselves than from the law

Unless, of course, you insist on identifying yourself with the people and things you love; and thereby seriously disturb yourself.

I don't enjoy going out anymore It's such a pain. It's everyone saying, 'Let's do a deal! Can I have a picture?' I'm just, like, 'These people are such losers. I can't believe I used to love doing this.

He often felt that too many people lived their lives acting and pretending,wearing masks and losing themselves in the process.

I never thought that I would be labeled something like Generation X because of that movie ( Reality Bites ). I had no idea going into it, and it wasn't a label I could relate to.

I don't want my children to be at a disadvantage, growing up in the limelight, because then they have to live up to an identity already cut out for them, relating all the time to being so-and-so's daughter or so-and-so's son.

I'm trying to find myself as a person, sometimes that's not easy to do. Millions of people live their entire lives without finding themselves. But it is something I must do. The best way for me to find myself as a person is to prove to myself that I am an actress.

What ends up happening is people form images and the image they form is, in some ways, what they want it to be. The idea of trying to correct the image is something I'm not interested in doing.

My mom would leave her job, and there would be throngs of people screaming and banging on our car. I come from a very private family, but I was born into a public family.

For most women, whether you're an actress or whatever you do, there is this pressure in society and within the world to look a certain way, dress a certain way, act a certain way, say certain things, and be this idea as opposed to being a person.

Maybe that's why people take pictures of themselves, to avoid being described.

I'm 48. For a while after 'The Jerk' (movie) I had a feeling of failure. I was a little scared. First people discover you and they love you. You get big and then you fail. And people are glad that you fail. But I've always come back and I've started to trust myself.

I would encourage people to realize that you don't have to panic if you're not part of a mainstream, or if you find yourself outside the flow. If it doesn't suit you, don't go along with it. Just sit it out and get your stuff done. Don't just sit moaning or getting drunk—I spent some years doing that. But if you can just come up with something of your own, however minor it is, that's going to be easier to live with when you're at the end of your life.

I just have to remind myself that my daily quotidie in life has almost nothing to do with any aspect of my professional life as a public figure. And I think a lot of people get to that point - specifically, sort of getting comfortable looking out for yourself and taking care of yourself and defining yourself based on healthier criteria, and not criteria that's established by complete strangers that you've never met.

By the very fact of public life, one seems to lose humanity in people's eyes.