Lizzo Takes Self-Love So Seriously for This Reason

Lizzo is on the cover of one of Elle‘s October 2019 Women in Music covers.

Here’s what the 31-year-old singer had to share with the mag…

On her early music days in Minnesota: “I miss those days. Not just when Prince was physically with us, but how it felt to be young and excited about music, and life, and not knowing what was next, and not having money but manifesting our dreams. There’s a spirit of adventure that I took away from that—to never let life and music not feel adventurous, and to always push yourself and believe in the magic you’re creating.”

On the inspiration for her songs: “My songs feel happy, but they come from a sad or frustrated place,” she says. “My songs are always the silver lining or the ‘somewhere over the rainbow’ moments.” That’s especially true of “Soulmate,” “Truth Hurts,” and “Crybaby,” all three of which she either wrote or recorded through tears. “Those songs are actual anecdotes, like real stories about real moments in time. ‘Pull this car over, babe’—that is something that happened to me. ‘New man on the Minnesota Vikings’—that happened to me. ‘Old me used to love a Gemini’—that happened!”

On taking self-love seriously: “I take self-love very seriously. And I take it seriously because when I was younger, I wanted to change everything about myself,” she says. “I didn’t love who I was. And the reason I didn’t love who I was is because I was told I wasn’t lovable by the media, by [people at] school, by not seeing myself in beauty ads, by not seeing myself in television…by lack of representation. My self-hatred got so bad that I was fantasizing about being other people. But you can’t live your life trying to be somebody else. What’s the point?”

For more from Lizzo, visit Elle.com.