Jessica Alba Explains Why She Started Going to Therapy With Her Daughters

For someone who’s been in the public eye a looong time, Jessica Alba remains a bit of a mystery, somehow both wide open and very private. You have a sense of who she is: An accomplished actor since her teens, she got her major break in 2003’s hit dance-a-thon Honey. You’ve certainly caught a few of her films since—there were a couple of Sin City movies, some visits to the Marvel Universe, umpteen rom-coms. These days, you mostly know her as the founder and public face of the Honest Company, which she launched and grew into the baby-beauty-home-health juggernaut it is today. (This before every celeb was doing it, no disrespect to Gwyneth, Kate Hudson, the Kardashians, etc.) But who is she behind all that? And, because this is our Feelings Issue, how is she? Read on to find out.

LAUREN IANNOTTI: So how are you feeling today?

JESSICA ALBA: I just came from therapy, and I’m feeling more clear about a pattern I’ve been re-creating in various dynamics and settings over the years. I’ve been told I tend to feel a feeling, then I go to my brain to understand how to process it, then I decide how much I’ll allow to take over or not.

LI: OK. Is that a good thing?

JA: It depends. I do think that, with maturity, you develop the ability to read a room or situation or circumstance and know when it’s appropriate to fully express how you feel. Some people put too much of a lid on it because what’s underneath might be too scary to open up. I tend to want to go into my shadow work, because I feel like I’m only going to feel better when I face the things that feel like barriers to joy. The more mature I’ve gotten, the more I’ve tried to make space for my feelings.

LI: I love how open you are about therapy. Tell me why you go.

JA: I think it creates a more compassionate container for people to live inside, and I think it can allow for more conversation where there are misunderstandings or misalignments. I go to therapy so I can be kinder toward people I don’t always agree with, because I want to be happy. I still want to coexist, and I don’t want to live angry, irritated, or upset with people who don’t think like me. I want to be able to live in harmony with all.

LI: That feels extra hard these days.

JA: Yes, and many of us are empaths, and we take on the feelings of others. I am, and I have to try to create a safe space for myself so I can be OK with things that are out of my control. Current events are just so dark right now. Ultimately, we all want the same things: We want to experience love and joy and feel valued and safe. If we could agree on that, then we could work on what needs to happen to make that true for all. But not everyone has the idea that everyone deserves these things, and those people are the ones who make it hard.

LI: You’ve talked a lot about how your two daughters—Honor, 15, and Haven, 12—go to therapy. How’d that get started?

JA: Honor was probably 11, and we were arguing all the time about dumb stuff. And I was like, I don’t want to live like this. This is not fun. I didn’t want us to have a wedge between us. As her mother, when I say something, she’s going to hear it as an argument or as me trying to control her. I wanted there to be someone who could explain things in a way I couldn’t. What I said to Honor was, “I want to be a better parent to you, and this is your forum to basically talk about everything that gets on your nerves that I do.”

LI: And it helped?

JA: Yes. It put me in check. Like, “Yeah, I totally do that. And I’m sorry. I’m going to work on that.” It gave her a little bit of perspective too—that I’m not the bad guy; I’m just being a parent. She’ll come out the other side of it, and I’ll still be here. I just wanted to get to that point, and it worked. And the therapist allowed me to see that it’s natural for kids to disagree with their parents, and as a parent it’s not always about being right or rational in that moment. I’m not gonna front, it’s a process and I’m not perfect.

LI: Wow. I have a 16-year-old, and I feel like we need to do this.

JA: It’s such a valuable tool to help you process your feelings. It’s what this issue is about! Therapy gets you talking about what’s going on with you and unearths the things that aren’t feeling the best or might be confusing, or things that make you happy. And just unpacking it allows you to process it, and then you can repeat good behavior and find the behaviors you want to redirect. What a great tool for anybody.

LI: You’ve long been trying to change the game for health, wellness, and baby products with Honest. Only using certain ingredients and being socially responsible were part of the model from the start. Why is it so important to you?

JA: Giving back is just embedded in what we do. We know that people who live in underserved or Black and brown communities are more affected by toxic environments, and when leadership looks more diverse, there’s more consideration for that. And there are better health outcomes when you make decisions that don’t just consider the bottom line. We care about our solutions—how they affect our bodies, human health, and the planet over time.

LI: What cause is nearest to your heart now?

JA: Baby2Baby is our biggest charity partner and has been since day one. In many of the families we help, the parents have full-time jobs, and they still don’t make enough money to make ends meet. They have to choose between putting food on the table, paying the rent, or putting a clean diaper on their kid. And in a lot of free daycares, parents have to show up with diapers and wipes for the day or they can’t leave their child. So think of the need after any global catastrophe, any natural disaster, and on a local level daily. We work with charity partners across the board to deliver basic essentials to children who need them.

LI: Honest was successful out of the gate. What was that like for you?

JA: I probably have an unnatural amount of discipline. No one can outwork me, and I wore that like a badge and did everything to an extreme. I was new at being an entrepreneur, so I didn’t really know about the ultimate goal or what success looked like. It’s not that I wasn’t strategic—I just didn’t know what strategy to even align myself with. So I was learning as I was doing and head down, grinding. With all the accolades and success, I just put more pressure on myself and felt incredibly fragile on the inside even though I was projecting strength. I’m in a different mindset now. It’s still not easy, but it’s nothing like the stress of feeling like at any moment the rug was going to get pulled out from underneath.

LI: Did you really feel that way?!

JA: Yes. Most industries are dominated by a white male archetype. I am obviously not that and often felt underestimated and undermined. Every room or space I was in I had to fight that feeling, and prove my self-worth, and try to outwork and out-smart those around me. I felt like I needed to be two steps ahead at all times. That’s the work ethic I grew up with and, as an adult, how I became successful. During my formative years, I was acting. Back in the day, you don’t get down days, you don’t get sick days, you don’t get to be tired. You have to be ‘on’ because everyone’s relying on you. I started as a teenager with that level of discipline, working 80+ hour weeks on the regular. And that’s how I learned how to work. To be able to unwind that and find a different flow and still be inspired, creative, and successful—it’s a totally new way of operating that I’m not used to yet but I know it’s more nurturing and much more sustainable.

LI: Was there a tipping point?

JA: Yeah. About seven years ago, I was like, Something’s got to change here. It took me a while to figure out how to operate differently, and I’m still trying to figure it out. I’m working more on self-care, doing my inner work, being more mindful.

LI: Do you still wake up in the middle of the night in a panic?

JA: Sometimes. But it used to be every day.

LI: How do you get back to sleep?

JA: There’s a 15-minute meditation by a woman named Sarah Blondin. It’s called “Sleep. Rest. Reset.” You can find it for free on Spotify. It’s the one thing that consistently works. Sometimes I’ll have to listen to it two or three times in a row, but it’s great.

LI: Say more about your self-care.

JA: I set my alarm before I need to get up, and I usually have a meditation queued up. And I always do some kind of fitness. I spin, run, lift weights and stretch, do yoga, or go for a walk. I like to switch it up. I don’t really push myself as hard as I used to. I listen to my body and try to feel strong.

LI: Speaking of strength, you were one of the first celebrities to start a business. And many have followed. Do you feel like a trailblazer?

JA: When you’re a trailblazer, it’s very isolating and lonely, and you’re often the only person in the room that looks like you. But if my paving the way allows more people to come through, especially women of color, then that’s great. We have enough of what’s already been. And I think the more diversity, the better the outcomes.

LI: What’s next?

JA: I have a new production company called Lady Spitfire. It’s focused on supporting content and narratives around people who aren’t the archetypes of main characters, and bringing forward female-driven stories. I’m passionate about the Latino community, as I am part of it, and supporting its stories and narratives.

LI: So awesome. Can we end on one more feelings-related note? How can we all tap the idea of empathy and compassion?

JA: The more we connect with our breath, and the more we connect with our inner selves, the kinder we’re all going to be. It’s hard to unwind all the brainwashing from an external place. Just breathe and cultivate your own mindfulness, your own relationship with your soul. That, to me, is where peace happens. You have to have peace inside in order to have peace outside, in the world.