Jennifer Lopez has given an honest new interview about her life right now with Interview magazine, following what has been a difficult year in her personal life, which has included filing for divorce from Ben Affleck in August.
The award-winning singer sat down with Nikki Glaser, where she spoke about everything from her "beautiful kids" Emme and Max, 16, to her excitement at getting back out on stage after postponing her This is Me.. Live tour over the summer.
JLo loves nothing more than being a mom, and shares her two children with ex-husband Marc Anthony.
Emme and Max have been rocks for the singer during the year and have helped keep her grounded. She admitted that she often reflects on the good things in her life during times of negativity. "How can I pay attention to that when I have these beautiful kids and all this amazing stuff going on in my life? I can't," she said.
© InstagramGetting deep, she said during the interview: "It's not until you go through incredibly hard moments and huge disappointments that you never could have imagined, that these things start becoming crystal clear.
"But the journey for me started probably when I had my kids, and that was 16 years ago. You start slowly chipping away at different things - 'This is not right and this is not right' — and learning how to be on your own, and you start putting the pieces together and then you think, 'Oh, I did it! I've got it!'"
© InstagramWhile Jennifer is incredibly confident, she opened up about feeling the need to prove herself at all times, which stems from her childhood growing up as a middle child.
This has influenced her own parenting style as a result. She explained: "Being a middle child, having a very outgoing mom and a dad who worked all day and worked all night and feeling like you weren't important, like you weren't a priority. That embeds in you, and I think your parents are doing the best they can.
© Instagram"Even now being a parent, I have much more empathy for what they've been through. I love my parents, but I do see the effect of who they were and how they were raised, on me."
JLo shocked fans after postponing her much-anticipated world tour earlier this year, and addressed it for the first time in the interview, revealing she just needed to be with her children.
© Instagram"I was so devastated to let anybody down, but I just needed to be with my kids and myself and really dig down deep into things that were happening in my life," she explained.
"And I'm glad I did, because it was a really difficult time for me. Probably the hardest time of my life, but it was also the best time because I got to do that work on myself."
