I love and adore being a mother. It's the greatest gift I've ever been given.
Motherhood definitely took the focus off of my work. And I didn't mind. I had a few panics when I thought that if I wanted to work I couldn't get a job anymore and then I would get one once in a while and it would make me feel better.
I used to be more paranoid and stressed, constantly worrying about my Plan B. But the truth is I don't have one.
I've learned that every working mom is a superwoman.
I had to go to a mirror and look at it. I couldn't picture myself in my own head. I had no image beyond a stick figure. I wasn't a mean person as a kid, or dumb, and something has to be said to justify excluding you.
Fun wouldn't be the right word... it was the most difficult, challenging, physical, extraordinary stretch I've ever had to make, in all those wild regards.
Before I had my child, I thought I knew all the boundaries of myself, that I understood the limits of my heart. It's extraordinary to have all those limits thrown out, to realize your love is inexhaustible.
I spent the first fourteen years of my life convinced that my looks were hideous. Adolescence is painful for everyone, I know, but mine was plain weird.
My washing machine overwhelms me with its options and its sophistication.
Tall, sandy blonde, with sort of blue eyes, skinny in places, fat in others. An average gal.
Even, today, when people tell me I'm beautiful, I do not believe a word of it.
I would love to do something like Austin Powers to show off my comic timing.
Buddhism has had a major effect on who I am and how I think about the world. What I have learned is that I like all religions, but only parts of them.
Desperation is the perfume of the young actor. It's so satisfying to have gotten rid of it. If you keep smelling it, it can drive you crazy. In this business a lot of people go nuts, go eccentric, even end up dead from it. Not my plan.
I guess somehow I got a reputation of being able to dance.
But I think it is always difficult to have high expectations of yourself or anyone else.
It's hard sometimes if you think a character should look a certain way and you're being pushed to do it differently. I've had fights over that. That's why it's so important that you work with good people.
When asked if I consider myself Buddhist, the answer is, Not really. But it's more my religion than any other because I was brought up with it in an intellectual and spiritual environment. I don't practice or preach it, however.
I'm lucky to have been raised in the most beautiful place - Amherst, Massachusetts, state of my heart. I'm more patriotic to Massachusetts than to almost any place.
It is better to have a relationship with someone who cheats on you than with someone who does not flush the toilet.
I'm very happy at home. I love to just hang out with my daughter, I love to work in my garden. I'm not a gaping hole of need.
I was an escapee of childhood. I always wanted to grow up.
I grew up in a mostly Buddhist environment.
We never left a set until we'd trashed it.
But I had a very traditional background as well. My parents are neat people.
I was not particularly bright, I wasn't very athletic, I was a little too tall, odd, funny looking, I was just really weird as a kid.
I'm an actress and mom, and I probably don't have enough of an active spiritual life. And I don't know why people run around calling themselves by the names of religions when they don't actually practise them.
There are so many ebbs and flows in life, but when you're raising small children, your family means everything.
And also I think particularly as a female, you're taught to be defensive your whole life. You're taught not to be aggressive.
Modeling is basically 'Buy more stuff! Don't you want some more stuff? It will make you look ten years younger and men will like you!' If I'd wanted to be a salesperson, I would have got a job selling.
And I haven't read a lot of blogs but if someone writes about what they care about I'm sure it's interesting.
For a writer, they say write what you know. As a performer, you find it in yourself, in your heart. You relate to the character. You try to live it, try to have it be real for you.
I don't feel famous.
I'd like to classify my life as a romantic comedy. Unfortunately I feel it's probably more like a TV reality show.
So, you know, parenting is a very intimate and amazing experience and one of the best experiences of my life.
I never ever slept again after my first pregnancy.