Emilia Clarke is sharing some pearls of wisdom with her 18-year-old self.
In an interview with Teen Vogue, the Game of Thrones star reads a letter to her younger self that includes lessons about relationships, career goals, and telling herself, "You are not as fat as you think you are."
Clarke, who only had two film credits on her résumé before landing the breakout role of a lifetime as Daenerys Targaryen on the HBO series, has certainly come a long way. In the video, she guides her younger self on some important topics.
"This particular journey that you are on is unlike any one of your friends' that you're with right now. What they're doing is going to bring them joy and happiness, and what you're doing is also going to bring you, maybe a little more struggle, and some joy and happiness as well," she says. "There's going to be times where someone says that dream that you've had, your entire life... the moment when someone says, 'that's not possible,' it is."
Regarding love, she says, "There are the things that come along with relationships. You think that they're inspecting everything, and kinda looking at you in a way of sort of, that makes you feel uncomfortable or judged or whatever it is. Chances are they're not. Chances are they're just super happy to be there."
Clarke follows up the advice about relationships with some thoughts about heartbreak. The star, who is familiar with a breakup in the public eye, split with Seth MacFarlane in 2013 after less than a year of dating.
"You're gonna feel some serious heartbreak...And the reason it's gonna hurt so much is because that heartbreak is gonna make you doubt yourself. You put yourself out on a plate and you bare everything, and somebody says they don't really like that," she says. "So that makes you feel like you're not worth it. But you are! And there's lots of people who are going to tell you you are."
The actress, who was named Esquire's Sexiest Woman Alive, also shares her feelings about body standards, telling a younger Emilia, "I know you know it, you are not as fat as you think you are. There are some women who look some way, and there are other women who look another way, like a whole other way. And the way that the other way people look, people love. Because they look like women."
It seems like the 29-year-old has figured out a lot since she was 18. Her parting words?
"Little Emilia, I'm just gonna say, it's Autumn right now, but...Winter is coming."