Sarah Jessica Parker doesn’t want to be called ‘brave’ for having gray hair

Sarah Jessica Parker is reminding everyone that aging is normal and telling people to stop calling her “brave” for having grey hair. “It became months and months of conversation about how brave I am for having gray hair,” she recalls in an interview with Allure. “I was like, please please applaud someone else’s courage on something!”

When the And Just Like That and Sex and the City star learned that people were applauding her “herringbone hightlights”, which are highlights around natural gray hair, she brushed it off with a simple explanation: lack of time. “I can’t spend time getting base color every two weeks,” she says. “Can’t do it. Nope. Too much.”

Related: 50 thoughts I had while watching the premiere of ‘And Just Like That’

In addition to filming And Just Like That, Parker is also a spokesperson for RoC’s #LookForwardProject, an initiative “dedicated to providing education and resources on the clinically proven power of optimism and its positive impact on mental wellbeing, stress reduction, skin health and longevity.” Qualitative research done by RoC found that 90% of women ages 25-69 feel “anxious” about getting older. While 43% are worried about money for retirement, 60% are worried about their appearance as they age. And more than 50% of women of who are pessimistic about getting older say that society and social media are the main trigger for these feelings.

Parker also calls out the double-standards and unfair expectations put on women when comes to again—expectations that men don’t often face. “We never talk about that with the other sex,” says Parker. “We don’t say to them: ‘Here’s a cream to pretend this didn’t happen.'” 

Related: First-time dads and moms are getting older—but for different reasons

Case in point: a few years ago, a salesperson stopped me on the street to tell me how their produce could help my eyes look younger. This kind of thing just doesn’t happen to men.

When asked what she would do if she could snap her fingers and look 15 years younger, she said she’d pass. “What’s the point? I just… don’t care enough,” she says. “When I walk out the door, I want to feel OK—according to my standards. I can’t even tell you what those standards are. But you know how you feel when you feel most like yourself, whatever that means. I’m not without vanity. I guess I just don’t care enough about everybody else’s opinion.” 

Parker joins other celebrities who are shunning unrealistic and harmful beauty standards, such as Cameron Diaz. “It’s hard not to look at yourself and judge yourself against other markers of beauty,” Diaz has said. “You’re just sitting in front of the mirror and it’s just toxic. You start to pick yourself apart.” 

Stepping away from Hollywood to focus on her family, Diaz shared how was was able to appreciate her body more. “You’re like, ‘Why am I sitting here being so mean to myself?’ My body’s strong, my body’s capable. Why am I going to talk down to it? Why am I going to mean to it when it’s carried me this far?”

Leaning into the power of optimism, Parker also shares some of positives that come with aging—not the least of which is all the wisdom we gain through the years.

“We spend so much time talking about the accumulation of time spent adding up in wrinkles, and it’s the weirdest thing that we don’t say it adds up to being better at your job, better as a friend, better as a daughter, better as a partner, better as a caregiver, better as a sister,” says Parker.

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