Jamie Lee Curtis, 63, on why she doesn't look in the mirror much: 'I am trying to live in acceptance'
Jamie Lee Curtis has a few strategies for not overthinking her appearance — including limiting time in front of the mirror.
The Halloween actress, 63, appeared alongside Vanessa Williams and Maria Shriver at The Radically Reframing Aging Summit, in partnership with Sounds True and Shriver Media, which has a mission to change the way we age and how we talk about aging. Curtis spoke about how she copes in a world that puts emphasis on looking youthful. She explained that she doesn't like to look at her body in the mirror because it makes her more critical.
"When I brush my teeth, of course, I look in the mirror. When I pluck my eyebrows, of course, I look in a mirror. But when I get out of a shower, I just don't stare at my now 63-year-old body in the mirror," she shared. "I'm not denying what I look like, of course I've seen what I look like. I am trying to live in acceptance. If I look in the mirror, it's harder for me to be in acceptance. I’m more critical. Whereas, if I just don't look, I'm not so worried about it."
Curtis, who is stepping behind the camera to direct a horror movie about climate change, also spoke about how she is concerned with the pressure put on the current generation to look a certain way — especially when it comes to the images of themselves they share online.
"I am an advocate for natural beauty because I do feel there has been a genocide of natural beauty. It is perpetuated by the media, it is perpetuated by magazines big time, and it is even in our life," she explained. "There is a Zoom setting where it says, 'touch up my appearance.'"
The Scream Queens alum added that while she doesn't judge people for altering their appearance through filters or plastic surgery, she thinks it’s important to speak out.
"My concern is that we have a generation of young people who believe they have to alter their appearance to post anything, anywhere," she noted. "That then becomes a baseline of that's what that is, and we're never going to be able to go back to looking like natural women."
Curtis, who last year told Irish broadcaster Lorraine Keane that getting plastic surgery made her feel "worse" about her appearance, has long talked about the pressure society puts on people, and especially women, to fall in line with a certain look.
"The current trend of fillers and procedures, and this obsession with filtering, and the things that we do to adjust our appearance on Zoom are wiping out generations of beauty," she told Fast Company in 2021. "Once you mess with your face, you can't get it back."
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