The 31-year-old Texas-born pop star, actor, and chef Selena Gomez can do it all. Whether she’s garnered hundreds of millions of song streams on singles, cooking on HBO, or acting with the likes of Steve Martin, Gomez is a powerhouse.
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But what does the popular star have to say about her life outside of her songs? What are Gomez’s thoughts on life and love, her career, her craft, starting out on Barney as a kid, and much more?
[RELATED: Selena Gomez on Her Documentary: “Hard for Me to Watch”]
1. “There’s such an emphasis on people being the perfect thing and then destroying them because it’s good press.”
2. “I’ve been working since I was 7.”
3. “I love what I do, I can’t imagine doing anything else, but ultimately, my goal is to be happy and have a family. That’s my life.”
4. “It’s awful walking into a restaurant and having the whole room look at you, knowing what they’re saying.”
5. “It’s insane how much press my Instagram will get. It’s weird, in a way, that I can dictate the agenda—but I love being able to have a say in all of that.”
6. “My happiness is not dictated on this business. Once I realized that, everything kind of changed.”
7. “P. Diddy gave me his valet ticket once… because he thought I was the valet lady.”
8. “Ever since I was 16, I’ve had this lower register, what I thought was a very manly voice, and I was insecure about that. But once I started acting more, I realized it was an asset, and I didn’t want to force myself to aim for the highest note possible.”
9. “I don’t really have a structured path of wanting to say, ‘This is what I’ll do next.’ I’m just going to read a bunch of scripts and see which one I love. There are so many things I would love to play, in all different genres.”
10. “Everywhere you go you hear things that are untrue. You’ve just got to learn that if I don’t say it, physically out of my mouth, on camera, it’s not true.”
11. “My family and I want to start our own organization to work on global warming and a couple of other things.”
12. “I think it’s healthy to gain a perspective on who you are deep down, question yourself, and challenge yourself; it’s important to do that.”
13. “People are so terrified of other people. I see it in my generation a lot. There’s so much anxiety and angst, and the pressure just keeps getting worse.”
14. “A lot of people would be embarrassed to admit that they were on Barney, but I embrace the fact. I just had such a wonderful time doing that show. I learned what a camera and prop is, and all that. I learned my manners too, so I guess that’s a good thing!”
15. “Every day, I start with a workout; I do vocal lessons, I do piano lessons.”
16. “Disney is a machine, and I’m grateful for it, but I feel like being part of that environment made me crave the reaction from other projects even more.”
17. “I was diagnosed with lupus, and I’ve been through chemotherapy.”
18. “This is a very superficial job. I sit in a chair for two hours and get hair and makeup done and talk about myself in interviews. That’s a very vain thing to do. And I do get caught up in it sometimes.”
19. “I realize everybody wants what they don’t have. But at the end of the day, what you have inside is much more beautiful than what’s on the outside!”
20. “Success is nothing if you don’t have the right people to share it with; you’re just gonna end up lonely.”
21. “I want people to really be inspired, to believe they can do whatever they want.”
22. “If you have three people in your life that you can trust, you can consider yourself the luckiest person in the whole world.”
23. “The older I’ve gotten, the more I’ve learned that I have to open myself up to all opportunities. Maybe I’ll get burned and not meet the right people, but I won’t know until I do it.”
24. “You can’t shut down. You can’t say, ‘What can I do to make this go away?’ You have to let it be painful and get through it. Every day gets better. Because when you’re in love, you kind of give everything and make that person your life. So every day, you get more and more of yourself back, and it feels better.”
25. “My mom always told me if I love what I’m doing, and I’m having fun, then just continue to do it. But if it’s not fun for me anymore, and I’m miserable, then I’m going to go back to Texas and quit it all, to be honest.”
(Photo by Kevin Winter/Getty Images)
