Emmy and Golden Globe nominee Chrissy Metz has been very busy since her much-loved NBC show, This Is Us, ended after six years back in May 2022.
With an assortment of projects on her slate, the popular actress recently starred in the movie, Stay Awake. Playing a mom in the throes of a prescription drug addiction, Metz tells HELLO! that she has compassion and empathy for her character.
"Part of the reason why I wanted to play her is because I understand what it's like,” Metz acknowledged in an exclusive interview. "It is so heartbreaking because you see that she wants to change and is trying to, but she just can't quite get her bearings for a long time.”
Every time Metz sees a clip from the film, she gets emotional. "I know what addiction looks like. I have friends who have experienced it," she says. "I have a food issue–I know how it plagues our minds and infiltrates our lives. I want people to know that they're not alone and that it's really important to talk about this stuff. Because once the fear goes away, maybe there could be some healing and empathy in that process.”
Metz also has a new memoir, This Is Me: Learning to Love Yourself for Who You Are Today, which debuted at number one on the New York Times bestseller list — as did her children's book/album from this past February, When I Talk To God, I Talk About You, which she co-wrote with her boyfriend, songwriter Bradley Collins.
At 42, Metz says she's truly comfortable in her own skin, which has helped her career go from strength to strength.
"What I love about this age is that mostly, I really don't care what people think about me!” she enthused. "You realize that people's opinions really don't matter at all. And you do what makes you happy and what fulfills you– and not because someone thinks that you should or shouldn't do something. You are just not really caring.”
Working as a plus-size actress in Hollywood has not always been easy.
"For a long time, I took a lot of things personally, and became a victim and felt very lost…And then I realized that if I don't book a job, if a role is not for me, it's for somebody else, and that's okay. There's enough to go around. Nothing is ever being taken from you.”
Metz says she has a tremendous amount of peace with who she is, physically, emotionally and spiritually and wants others to have that understanding, too.
"If you don't accept yourself for who you are, should you want to change, you're never going to get to that place. Because you're just on this cycle of 'I'm not good enough,' beating yourself up," she explains. "If that's the way that you're speaking, and that's what you're hearing, there's never going to be a positive reinforcement for change. You're never going to love yourself enough to want to change. I think it's really important.”
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In this cookie-cutter world of Hollywood, where beauty often comes with a one-size-fits-all tag, Metz stressed that "radical acceptance” is important to her well being.
"It would be very boring if we all looked alike and had the same story, and the same journey,” she noted. "That is all a part of the whole process of why we're here on this planet; to evolve and to grow; to learn, to change.”
Metz believes there are "reasons” why everybody looks the way they do, for whatever lessons they need to learn in their lives.
"For me, because I'm more accepting of having an unconventional body or whatever they want to call it– the fact that we still even talk about it is hilarious–our bodies are vehicles," she reasons. "And everybody has a different make and model. You learn to love, celebrate and hopefully, embrace it. Enjoy riding in that car, otherwise you're just torturing yourself. Because that allows you to minimize the suffering or hopefully, completely alleviate it.”
She continued: "There's just no reason to compare yourself to other people. Do I do it? Yes, of course, because I'm human. I spent a long time beating myself up and wishing I looked or sounded a certain way or had this or that. What's the point? Is that a way to exist? I've just radically accepted it and learned to really love myself,” she said.
"Also, I'm proud of the things that I've overcome and what I've become, because of that.”
Through Metz's healing via therapy and her work in self-care, and journaling, she works hard to ground herself.
"I have realized that we all have stuff that we're contending with, that nobody is better or worse than anyone else…whatever it is that you might have experienced during childhood. All that stuff will follow you to adulthood if you don't look at it and say, 'Okay, that was my story, but I'm not taking that with me. Not going to carry this baggage anymore.' That really helped to open my eyes to that.”
Metz also has invaluable insight for women who lack confidence.
"If we could see the beauty within or see ourselves the way other people see us, it's really magical. I've looked at someone and said, 'oh my gosh, I love this about you!' And they're like, 'I hate my teeth, I hate my smile!' And I'm like 'what?!' If you could just give yourself a little grace and love and treat yourself the way you would treat others. That's really, really important.”