- Giada De Laurentiis shared how aging has liberated her of certain insecurities on Bobbi Brown’s podcast, The Important Things.
- “In the last five or six years, I’ve said, you know what, ‘I’m OK with who I am regardless of what people think of me,’” she said.
- After serving people from the spotlight for years, the 51-year-old Food Network star is embracing living to please herself.
At 51, Food Network star Giada De Laurentiis has only recently learned to let go of what other people think. The Italian chef has spent quite some time in the spotlight, and recently told Bobbi Brown on her podcast, The Important Things, that “the wonderful thing about getting older” is, well, not giving a… care.
The mom of one said that only in the last few years has she been 100% committed to pleasing herself, her 14-year-old daughter, and no one else. “I think for a long time I tried to be who everybody else wanted me to be, whether it was my family or my fans or whatever,” she admitted. “In the last five or six years, I’ve said, you know what, ‘I’m OK with who I am regardless of what people think of me. And I’m OK with the choices that I’ve made.’ Have they all been wonderful and perfect? No, but they made me who I am.”
She continued: “I’ve sort of made peace with everything that’s happened in my life—with my divorce, with anything that’s happened. I have made peace with the mistakes. And I think I feel a lot calmer about myself.”
She added that this newfound freedom has improved her close relationships with people because previously, she would “try too hard to please them.”
Brown herself has shared similar musings about aging—that there’s a certain bold energy that comes with having been on Earth longer than others. “There’s some confidence that comes with age,” Brown told Goop at age 60 (she’s now 65). “You know who you are. I’m five feet tall, and I wear sneakers, but if I wear high heels, I’ve now realized—I’m still five feet tall. What did that person say? It’s okay to be you because everyone else is taken?”
She continued: “I mean, I’ve always been there to talk to women about self-esteem, about looking like yourself, not some ideal. So I’m not 40 years old anymore, that’s okay … But I feel good and I look good.”
And feeling good truly is the most important thing.
Kayla Blanton is a freelance writer who reports on all things health and nutrition for Men’s Health, Women’s Health, and Prevention. Her hobbies include perpetual coffee sipping and pretending to be a Chopped contestant while cooking.