Charlize Theron quotes: A-list actress and one of Time’s most influential people – here are Theron’s theories on success and life.
“Life is what you make it.”
“I don’t think you can create anything interesting from a comfort zone. You have to work from a place of fear and failure.”
“In life we want to challenge ourselves.”
“There are these moments when you can’t back down.”
“You have to keep evolving.”
“One thing can make many other things happen.”
“We all understand situations where it’s swim or drown. Sometimes we surprise ourselves when we start swimming and see how well we can do it.”
“I was raised with the idea that you can feel sorry for yourself, but then, get over it, because it doesn’t get you anywhere. There was always this awareness that you have to be responsible for yourself in order to have what you want.”
“You get yourself out there and you work hard, and you hope that word of mouth carries and one day somebody will actually step up to the plate and say, ‘I believe that you can do this.'”
“What most people don’t realize is that no matter how others see you, you have to wake up to yourself every morning.”
“Looks alone won’t get you that far. It may get you in the door, but there’s always somebody younger, somebody prettier. You have to rely on something else.”
“I like hard work. I like putting the effort towards it and then being able to look at it and go, ‘All right, I did that.'”
“My whole concept in life is if you’re not using it, you should give it to somebody else so they can use it.”
“As you get older, you get wrinkles and your boobs sag. But you get wisdom, too. So it’s not all bad!”
“I don’t believe in charmed lives. I think that tragedy is part of the lesson. You learn to lift yourself up, to pick yourself up, and to move on.”
“Think bigger than society lets you think. And find mentors. My life is filled with people who knew me when I was 19 and had a horrible South African accent and bleach-blonde hair and who believed in me in a way that was brutal. They were just unbelievable and consistent and smart. Find mentors who, every time you’re with them, you’re being schooled. Just absolutely schooled.”
“There’s only so much you can do, but if somebody doesn’t give you a chance there is nothing you can do.”
“I do have a sense of fear every day going to work, but I think it’s something that I like. I mean I do like the feeling of waking up on my own, having this moment of like: ‘Oh, f*ck, I hope I can do this today!’ Because it makes you realize that you’re working with material or you’re working with a director or you’re working with a cast and they’re keeping you on your toes.”
“You can never get to a place of comfort in this business. As soon as you hit that little cushy spot, somebody’s gonna kick you out. So I have a constant need to do it better.”
“It’s definitely given me a new belief that if you hang on long enough you don’t have to compromise; there’s going to be someone out there that sees you in a truer way than other people do. If you just hold out you’ll actually get to do the things that matter to you and that prepare you for climbing Mount Everest.”
“My mom has made it possible for me to be who I am. Our family is everything. Her greatest skill was encouraging me to find my own person and own independence.”
“I think of myself as a highly sexual creature. I have to use that. I have no choice. I like it. I didn’t grow up with a mother telling me what was under my clothes was bad or evil.”
“You choose the life you want for yourself, and then you just shut up and go about it. That’s how I’ve lived my life.”
“I want my son to grow up with a mom that he could see and look at her life with all the mistakes and with all the failures and all the flaws and say, ‘My mom lived an authentic life. That was the life she wanted to live.'”
“I make a real effort to try and live in the real world and not just the dream world.”
“I don’t want to live in a world with blinders on.”
“I know that I’m only as good as I am because of the things that I allow into myself and into my soul, because that’s the stuff that I project back out.”
“I like being a cog in a wheel. I like being a small aspect of a much bigger thing, and I think my interest in that takes the pressure off of myself.”
“Yet there’s a hunger in me still. I’m like only beginning. I feel like I still have so much to learn.”
“Marriage equality is about more than just marriage. It’s about something greater. It’s about acceptance.”
“Men are like fine wines – the older they get, the better they get.”
“When a person lives a very happy life they become beautiful.”
“Beauty is more than skin deep.”
“There’s an instant access to luxury that I think women really appreciate.”
“The idea of stuff just hanging in my closet and not being used – there’s a little bit of the African in me that gets bothered by that.”
“I grew up in South Africa and I would look at maps and we were at the bottom of the world. There was this whole thing up there. I was always reading encyclopedias about the world. So travel was something I was always attracted to.”
“I can’t live in a bubble and expect to come and work with Dior or go work on a movie and not have some kind of an evolution within myself and my own thought process and a passion about things or what’s happening in the world. All of those things are the elements that make you who you are, and those are the things that sincerely come across in a photo or a commercial or in an interview. That’s a constant thing for me.”
“I have been working a lot, and I like it. And you know, it’s hard for me not to. I guess I’ve been working a lot because I get to play with brilliant people.”
“I’m always willing to try anything. You got one life to live, why not?”
“I like what I do, and I’m very fortunate now to be in a very nice place. Which is that I don’t have to work anymore. So the work that I do now is purely because I really want to.”
“If they ever do my life story, whoever plays me needs lots of hair color and high heels.”
“I’m very lucky, I have a great job.”
“I’m an Academy Award winner. I’m serious.”
“You just don’t know if you’ll be around tomorrow. You just don’t.”
“I think that’s a good way to view the quality of life, to realize how valuable and how short it is for all of us. And it doesn’t matter what your occupation is, it’s your choice to live your life well, and make time for the things that are important to you.”
