The powerful life lessons Jameela Jamil wishes she could tell her younger self

Jameela Jamil - Stylist cover star

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The powerful life lessons Jameela Jamil wishes she could tell her younger self

By Megan Murray

7 years ago

Of late, Jameela Jamil has been lifting women everywhere up by getting real about periods, depression and everything else. Now, she’s dispensing some invaluable advice.

Jameela Jamil, how do we love thee? Let us count the ways… Well, for starters, Stylist’s cover star is hilarious, honest, hardworking, outspoken, empowering, galvanising, kind, un-apologetically feminist, talented and individual…need we go on?

We couldn’t have been more thrilled and excited to interview The Good Place star back in June, not only because we’ve followed her career from the quirky T4 presenter who always had star sequins stuck to her face (some of us are still trying to recreate that look) to internationally known actor, but also because 2018 has seen Jamil set social media alight with her body positive campaign I Weigh.

After calling out an editorial article that measure the Kardashian family by their weight, Jamil challenged her followers to dispel the idea that a woman’s worth is reduced to what she looks like, and weigh themselves in achievements, career goals, loved ones and interests.

Her powerful voice on female empowerment has seen her inspire a generation of women online, which got us to thinking. If Jamil could bestow some of the wisdom she has now on her younger self, what would she say?

From friends and love to health, we questioned Jamil on how she would advise young women struggling with these areas of their lives. Here’s what she had to say.


On friendships

“There’s a whole world out there, outside of your school and outside of your family home, and there are people out there who are more like you, who are going to be interested in you for the person that you are,” she says.

She continues, “I promise you it gets better.” Before quipping, “sometimes it gets a bit worse for a while and then it gets better again.”


On sex

Jamil lost her virginity at the age of 21, something which she says was “not actually out of choice.”

“No one wanted to have sex with me,” she muses, before collapsing into a peel of laughter and continuing, “But that was fine, life carried on and went well and eventually I did actually have sex.”


On health

“Respect your body,” she starts, firmly. “Look after it and be grateful for everything that it does. Don’t hate on it, Don’t starve it of food. Don’t put bad things inside of it.”

Speaking about her own experiences with substance, she says, “I didn’t ever drink or do drugs and I still don’t. Because of that, I haven’t had to spend loads of money on skin care procedures or medicine to undo all of the damage that those things do. If you do that’s fine, but I would say don’t, it’s much cheaper.”

If you want more of Jamil (and who wouldn’t?), you can watch the full video above and check out our cover star interview with her, here.

Images: Getty 

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