This is Jennifer Lopez … post-divorce.
The “Let’s Get Loud” singer and “Hustlers” star did not have a brat summer or hot girl summer, for that matter. No. Her “whole f— world exploded” during that tumultuous but transformative season in which she was dogged by speculation about her marriage to Ben Affleck, called off her concert tour and filed for divorce from the Oscar winner after two years of marriage.
Opening up for the first time since the split, the pop superstar said that she’s been working on self-love and figuring herself out.
“It’s looking back at the feelings underneath and the belief systems that we have about ourselves that make us make certain choices and create certain patterns in our life,” she told comedian Nikki Glaser in an Interview magazine sit-down published Wednesday. “And so, when you get to a point where you think that you’ve learned the lessons, and then it blows up in your face again, you realize, ‘OK, I haven’t, so what is it that I need to look at right now?’ I would say, never stop looking inward, because it’s so easy to blame everybody else.”
The Grammy Award winner did not mention Affleck by name, but she alluded to the split and her past relationships throughout the talk. She also kept it introspective, noting that after the January release of her Prime Video film “This Is Me… Now” and completing her latest film, “Unstoppable,” she felt good. Then, her world “exploded.” She canceled her summer tour and her fourth marriage ended in divorce, not to mention the internet pile-on on Bennifer 2.0 that put it out there for public consumption.
But she does not regret the pain — “not one second” of it — even though it almost took her out for good, she said. Looking back, she thinks it is “exactly what I needed.”
“[Y]ou have to be healthy. You have to be complete, if you want something that’s more complete,” she said. “You have to be good on your own. I thought I learned that, but I didn’t. And then, this summer, I had to be like, ‘I need to go off and be on my own. I want to prove to myself that I can do that.’”
Lopez, 55, admitted that that’s been “f— hard,” as well as “lonely, unfamiliar, scary, sad… desperate.” But since those feelings haven’t killed her, she said, she realized she is capable of joy and happiness by herself.
“Being in a relationship doesn’t define me. I can’t be looking for happiness in other people. I have to have happiness within myself. I used to say I’m a happy person, but was still looking for something for somebody else to fill, and it’s just like, ‘No, I’m actually good.’”
“The Wedding Planner” and “Maid in Manhattan” star explained that she used to feel that she had to be perfect to be loved, but now she feels “somebody who truly loves you will help you heal those parts of yourself.” The admission appeared to be a departure from the hopeless romantic she presented herself as in many of her projects.
“That’s what I’ve learned about love, that it is a secure thing. You make me feel safe, and when I fall short of the glory, you understand me and you help me to grow to be better, because you have your boundaries and I have my boundaries. And I go, ‘Here’s where you’re falling short for me and here’s where I’m falling short for you.’ And so, we get better at those things together,” she said.
Lopez said that she learned a long time ago that everything written or said about her or “conjecture of who I am as a person, is not who I am.”
Meanwhile, the “Waiting for Tonight” singer also said she can’t wait to get back to performing for her fans, whom she felt she let down when she canceled her tour.
“I just needed to be with my kids and myself and really dig down deep into things that were happening in my life. And I’m glad I did, because it was a really difficult time for me. Probably the hardest time of my life, but it was also the best time because I got to do that work on myself.”