River Phoenix Quotes

I was never the cool kid in school, and loads of people told me that I was weird, that I dressed uncool and did uncool things, that I was too nice, too happy.

At school, I felt out of place. I was bullied. I would think, 'These kids don't like me, they don't accept me,' but I felt like in the entertainment industry, I would fit in.

It's the all-American girl gone bad. Initially, the name callings from 6- and 7-year-olds was tough. My heart was in my stomach. But it is more fun to play someone that you are not.

At a young age, I was very aware I was different and not perceived in a good way. For a lot of my adolescence, I struggled with that, trying to identify where I belong and who my real friends are.

You have to be mentally strong to withstand the ridicule of other children and the stares of adults.

Growing up, I was picked on a bit; I was pretty heavy-set, and then I was a theater kid. I just felt unpopular and uncool, so I think in my mind I had this idea of fame and being popular and how nice that would be. The reality of it is sometimes it's not nice.

You know, I used to be made fun of as a kid for being really articulate; it was sort of like a strange thing.

I was a fat girl growing up and had to change schools because kids were so mean.

It was tough for me at school... trying to blend in and get along with other kids. I was an oddity and kids are scared of things they don't understand.

I was teased up until high school about my hair, being short, my high pitched voice, and just anything you can think of.

What starts the process, really, are laughs and slights and snubs when you are a kid. If your anger is deep enough and strong enough, you learn that you can change those attitudes by excellence, personal gut performance.

At school I was always taller than the rest of my class, and because I was an only child, I was comfortable with adults but shy and awkward with other kids. I was quiet, bookish, and in spite of my size, hopeless at sports. In short, I was different. And even in the earliest grades, I got pounded for it.

Even a lot of kids who are gifted can be kids who feel like wimps or nerds.

I was actually a really sort of nervous, shy kid. In high school, it was one of those things where I wasn't popular or a loser; I just don't think many people really knew who I was.

I was quiet in high school and relatively unpopular, so being noticed is not something that I'm used to.

Kids used to pick on me because I was quiet, I was an easy target. But I wasn't quiet because I was scared.

Even as a kid, classmates asked pointed personal questions about my family. I have conditioned myself to handle it with maturity.

An introvert as a child, I spent most of my younger years being bullied for my name. It took its toll on me, and by Class VI, I couldn't even have a proper conversation with anyone.

At school, I got teased because I was so thin and awkward-looking.

I was bullied a lot as a kid in school from kindergarten up to third grade. I know what it feels like to be left out and to want to be different - more so, to want to not be different and want to just fit in.

I don't tend to think of these characters as losers. I like the struggles that people have, people who are feeling like they don't fit into society, because I still sort of feel that way.

I think a lot of young kids at school are very conscious of trying to keep credibility in case they kind of stand out in a crowd and get bullied by trying to stay cool and stuff. And my whole thing, all the way through school, was I was just a goof... I didn't care.

I was very average in the social label scale going through school. I was neither the coolest person in school, nor did I suffer the slings and arrows of being made fun of to such a degree that I couldn't get through the day.

I made sure that instead of people making fun of me, like every comedian probably says, I made fun of myself first so they would get distracted and just laugh. I was pretty brutally picked on for a while growing up. It was always the really pretty girls, the hot girls and then there was me. So I had to do something to get any sort of attention.

You know all those models who say, 'I was so tall and lanky and everyone picked on me at school' - I was not that girl. I hear that and I'm like, 'Oh, you poor thing!'