{"id":2132001,"date":"2025-11-03T10:20:48","date_gmt":"2025-11-03T10:20:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/?p=2132001"},"modified":"2025-11-03T10:20:48","modified_gmt":"2025-11-03T10:20:48","slug":"i-was-probably-successful-because-i-had-so-much-anxiety-reese-witherspoon-says","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/i-was-probably-successful-because-i-had-so-much-anxiety-reese-witherspoon-says\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018I was probably successful because I had so much anxiety\u2019 \u2013 Reese Witherspoon says"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Reflecting on her acting and producing career, the Legally Blonde<\/span> star (49) said she is \u201cstarting to relax into the idea that I\u2019m enough\u201d.<\/p>\n

She told Harper\u2019s Bazaar UK<\/span>: \u201cThose at the beginning of my career were incredibly encouraging, but also gave me a lot of real-world advice about how to behave, how to carry myself, what not to do: not to move to Los Angeles.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey said, \u2018stay in Nashville, be a child for as long as you possibly can\u2019. I was really friendly and bubbly and smiley. People thought I was faking it.<\/p>\n

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I didn\u2019t understand the sharp elbows and competitive nature of what I did<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\u201cThe perception of being from the south was that I didn\u2019t belong to the coastal-elite communities.<\/p>\n

\u201cI wasn\u2019t part of the art world, or the cool kid club. It was a culture clash. I didn\u2019t understand the sharp elbows and competitive nature of what I did.\u201d<\/p>\n

The actor, who was born in Louisiana in March 1976, is known for her roles in Cruel Intentions<\/span> (1999), American Psycho<\/span> (2000), and Walk The Line<\/span> (2005) which won her an Academy Award for best actress.<\/p>\n

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Reese Witherspoon. Photo: ‘Harper’s Bazaar UK’<\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

Witherspoon was a producer on thriller Gone Girl<\/span> (2014) and adventure drama Wild<\/span> (2014), which also earned her an Oscar nomination, and she is producing a Legally Blonde<\/span> prequel series through her media company Hello Sunshine.<\/p>\n

She said: \u201cI was probably successful because I had so much anxiety \u2013 they go hand in hand.<\/p>\n

\u201cI had pressured myself to extreme levels to show up at work in a perfect way.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe all now know \u2013 perfect is not attainable. It\u2019s not sustainable.<\/p>\n

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I\u2019m getting older and am starting to relax into the idea that I\u2019m enough<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\u201cI stressed myself out in service of my job, and it got me really, really far.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m rewarded for my anxiety and perfectionism, but I\u2019m getting older and am starting to relax into the idea that I\u2019m enough.<\/p>\n

\u201cI mean, I\u2019ve had an abundance of good fortune, great work opportunities and worked with some of the greatest people on Earth.\u201d<\/p>\n

In 2016, Witherspoon co-founded Hello Sunshine, now part of Candle Media, which aims \u201cto shine a light on where women are now and help them chart a new path forward\u201d, according to its website.<\/p>\n

She said: \u201cI advocate for storytelling that is inclusive and more reflective of the entire female experience, because it\u2019s been shrouded for hundreds of years.\u201d<\/p>\n

Her company also produced Apple TV drama The Morning Show<\/span>, which has won three Emmys and stars Witherspoon and Jennifer Aniston as co-anchors of a news programme.<\/p>\n

Reflecting on her 50th birthday next year, Witherspoon added: \u201cI like getting older. I think it\u2019s great to be wiser and understand your place in a business.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve worked really hard to get to that place … I feel like I\u2019m living my purpose, for sure. I love my job. I love my fans. I\u2019m the captain of my own destiny.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\u2018 The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n

\u2018 Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.independent.ie \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Reflecting on her acting and producing career, the Legally Blonde star (49) said she is \u201cstarting to relax into the idea that I\u2019m enough\u201d. She told Harper\u2019s Bazaar UK: \u201cThose at the beginning of my career were incredibly encouraging, but also gave me a lot of real-world advice about how to behave, how to carry […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2132002,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[25177],"tags":[25317,26741,344473,36639],"class_list":["post-2132001","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-celebrities","tag-apple-tv","tag-jennifer-aniston","tag-oscars","tag-usa"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/\u2018I-was-probably-successful-because-I-had-so-much-anxiety.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2132001","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2132001"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2132001\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2132003,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2132001\/revisions\/2132003"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2132002"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2132001"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2132001"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2132001"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}