Top 117 Quotes & Sayings by Shailene Woodley

Explore popular quotes and sayings by an American actress Shailene Woodley.
Last updated on December 26, 2024.
Shailene Woodley

Shailene Diann Woodley is an American actress. Born in San Bernardino, California, Woodley was raised in Simi Valley, and started modeling at the age of four and began acting professionally in minor television roles. She first gained prominence for her starring role as Amy Juergens in the ABC Family drama series The Secret Life of the American Teenager (2008–2013). She subsequently made her film debut in The Descendants (2011), winning a Cannes Trophée Chopard and receiving nominations for the Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actress – Motion Picture and for three Critics' Choice Movie Awards. She went on to star in the coming-of-age film The Spectacular Now (2013), for which she won a special jury prize at the Sundance Film Festival.

I like to think of myself as a fairly educated human being, but I'm a very uneducated actor when it comes to movies, directors, producers, actors for that matter.
I had never been to Hawaii, and now I say that my body is from L.A. but my heart is from Hawaii, because I'm in love with it and it's home on every level, from a spiritual, soulful place.
Alcohol is a big part of high school. I went through my little phase. I don't know one high schooler that doesn't. — © Shailene Woodley
Alcohol is a big part of high school. I went through my little phase. I don't know one high schooler that doesn't.
I think there is a point in every teenager's life where they are forced to come into themselves.
I went to public school my whole life, graduated high school with my class. Growing up, I'd go to an audition, my friends would go to soccer practice and we'd all reconvene and hang out in our neighborhood. When I would book something, I would never tell my friends. Acting was just fun. I was a kid, I wasn't jaded.
A quarter of my life has been spent on 'Secret Life.' I'm 20 and I've been doing it for five years, so I think the best moments have been when all the cast members get to work together and we get to collaborate and share experiences. We all grew up together.
For me, acting is about the art of it and it's about being on a film set and doing your thing, painting a blank canvas.
For me acting is a passion and an art, and always will only be that. I don't have any rules when it comes to acting. I'll do anything. But it depends on the script. Either I'll have passion for the project or I won't. It's got to fuel me.
When I started acting, my parents gave me three rules: I had to stay good in school, stay the kid they always knew I was, and I had to have fun. If I wasn't doing those three things, then I couldn't do acting anymore.
George Clooney is a super-human, he's just such an amazing human being, he taught me how to be a better person and a better actor!
There aren't a lot of films about adolescents or quote-unquote coming-of-age films that are realistic nowadays.
I'm already the most fortunate girl in the world, so I have zero expectations for what the future will bring.
Every family is dysfunctional, whether you want to admit it or not.
I think there's a lot of work to be done with our societies. My biggest passions are the environment and health. And when I say 'health' I mean the secrets behind health and our food system.
To be honest, I never went to school for acting, and I never learned to break down a script. I took acting classes my whole life, but they never taught me anything about acting. They just taught me about myself.
There's been times when I've had heartbreaking moments and I'm like, 'I can't believe you said that,' or 'I can't believe you did that'. And it hurts, it still hurts, and it'll always hurt, but I've never had somebody that I truly cared about just walk out on me, whether it was a boyfriend, or an aunt, mom or dad.
I feel like a turtleneck dress that's long-sleeved and covers your entire body but is tight fitting is so much sexier than boobs spilling out, you know? So I guess I'm more into being classy sexy versus apparent sexy.
I'd like to be like a hummingbird. You see them every now and then. You don't see them everywhere. — © Shailene Woodley
I'd like to be like a hummingbird. You see them every now and then. You don't see them everywhere.
George Clooney sort of lost his 'George Clooney-ness' the first day I met him. He's not George Clooney in my eyes - he's George from Kentucky with an awesome, awesome heart.
You forget that you do choose your life and there are so many things to be grateful for and I feel like society has gotten to that point where we're always looking for the next and the better and we lose sight of what's actually in front of us.
I think you get the most honest performances when an actor shows up to set with their lines memorized. That's a very important thing that a lot of people seem to forget. You have a pre-conceived notion of what you want the scene to be, but once you get there, that goes out the window and it turns out to be a way that you never imagined.
I would like to do something dark or small. I love independent films. I love emotional scenes. I love people who are struggling with something. I think it's just the juxtaposition to my incredibly happy, positive demeanor.
When I read a script or I see a character, I don't necessarily see the arc of her, that by the end she is this person, she's different from she was in the beginning. I guess it's more a subconscious understanding of that arc.
For me, my rule in this industry is I've got to listen to my butterflies. So if I got butterflies, then those are the scripts I go after.
My favorite movies are movies that I go in and I leave deeply affected. Whether I laugh really hard or whether I cry really hard, I just want to feel really affected in that moment.
I was always the frugal kid growing up because I was saving for college. Or I was always that kid that was like, 'I'm going to save my babysitting money so I can eat an expensive dinner when I go to Europe.'
Everyone today is like, 'Shailene, you're getting so much buzz. How does the feel?' It's the most odd question because it's like asking a kid who got into Cornell how it feels to be the top of your class at one of the Ivy League schools. How do you answer that? You just go, 'I don't know.'
I really respond to human scripts, scripts that are raw and real and risky. I love playing scary characters - not horror film scary, but vulnerable scary.
I love arguing. I always say that I'll never win a physical battle, but I can always win a mental battle. I mean, not really, because I never really argue with anyone.
I would love to act for the rest of my life, but I also know that it could be taken away in a day. It's something I've always loved, but it's nothing I've ever revolved my entire life around. I have many other passions as well.
So often, I read scripts and am like, 'This would never happen in real life. It's not trying to be funny. It's trying to be serious.'
I think the most important thing in life is self-love, because if you don't have self-love, and respect for everything about your own body, your own soul, your own capsule, then how can you have an authentic relationship with anyone else?
I think every teenager goes through their angst. People who are like, 'No, I had a perfect adolescence,' make me wonder how that is possible.
When it comes down to it, I'm just a girl who wears those five-finger weird toe shoes.
I'm not really fond of the trails left in the sky and a lot of chemicals that are being pumped through factories and even in the clothes we wear.
I'm always like 'I'm too skinny, I can't gain weight, even when I try.' I'd like to try to not let that get to me.
Every single journey that I've embarked on, I've learned something new.
Acting is fun and I refuse to get involved in the semantics and the politics of strategy and breaking out of something or doing something because you need to do something else. For me it's all about what fuels my soul and if I'm passionate about a screenplay then that's what I'll do next.
The reason I keep acting is that it fuels some kind of passion in me, but the day that those butterflies stop, is the day that I'm gonna quit because I could care less about the magazines or being famous or the money or the awards.
I live my life with a lot of integrity based on what I want for my life and who I am. — © Shailene Woodley
I live my life with a lot of integrity based on what I want for my life and who I am.
I feel like at the end of the day, as entertaining as movies are, when you're part of them in a way, it's this beautiful art form and that's what it feels like for me. I'm not a painter, but I can express myself visually in a way that allows me to artistically create.
Everything is out of your control, and you can only be truthful about how you feel.
This earth is exciting. There are so many things happening.
My religion is the Earth, man. I believe in trees.
I choose to surround myself with happy human beings. I went through the angsty period. I think every single person does. I think it's a rite of passage to hate the world and feel like the victim.
But in these few moments that we have here on Earth, are we going to torture ourselves? Or are we going to allow our lights to be dimmed? How do we expect men to respect women or women to rise to more power when we don't respect our queendom in the same way that men respect their kingdom?
Have you thanked your body today? Be grateful, stay positive.
Every single character in the world, every creature in the world has something to give and something to learn.
I think everything everything about my lifestyle is fairly alternative. I gather my own spring water from mountains every month. I go to a farm to get my food. I make everything from my own toothpaste to my own body lotions and face oils. I could go on for hours. I make my own medicines; I don’t get those from doctors. I make my own cheese and forage wild foods and identify wild plants. It’s an entire lifestyle. It’s appealing to my soul.
I'm done living for other people. I'm done being a people pleaser. I'm done thinking about what people think about me.
I fall in love with human beings based on who they are, not based on what they do or what sex they are.
I think you have to love yourself and you have to have a strong sense of self-love in order to really show up for other people, because if you love yourself, you're not questioning your own mind any more and you are really able to be present and available for others.
As a teenager, my struggle was how do I balance being empathetic and compassionate towards my peers, while also living my life for myself and not basing my decisions on those around me, and really living a life where I receive my happiness from my own experiences rather than from people pleasing.
Worry is the product of a future that we cannot guarantee and guilt is the product of a past we cannot change. — © Shailene Woodley
Worry is the product of a future that we cannot guarantee and guilt is the product of a past we cannot change.
Every single morning you wake up with the opportunity to be yourself, or be the idea of someone else. For me it is all about... my favourite mantra is: "You do you. I do me. They do they."
You forget that you do choose your life, and there are so many things to be grateful for. I feel like society has gotten to that point where we're always looking for the next and the better, and we lose sight of what's actually in front of us.
I think you get the most honest performances when an actor shows up to set with their lines memorized. That's a very important thing that a lot of people seem to forget.
I think the future of food is in insects.
The thing with labels is they're not for you, they're for other people. Like labels are just a word for other people to understand you and that's it.
I'd always wanted to do a film than TV show because film is always where my heart has been. I like diving into the character for a few months, and then leaving it behind. I love the idea of that.
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