Demi Moore Harpers Bazaar February 2012

Demi Moore is the cover girl for the February issue of Harpers Bazaar where she chats with longtime friend Amanda De Cadenet about their daring new show, The Conversation, which debuts this spring, body image, relationships, and finding freedom from fear.

Check out some highlights:

On body image:
DEMI MOORE: So how about I begin and ask you, how do you feel about your body?
AMANDA DE CADENET: You know, not great. From an aesthetic standpoint, I battle with it. It’s an ongoing challenge for me that I don’t think my body looks how I want it to. If I could wave a magic wand, I would be a size 6 and still be able to eat cake every day. How do you feel about your body?
DM: I have had a love-hate relationship with my body. When I’m at the greatest odds with my body, it’s usually because I feel my body’s betraying me, whether that’s been in the past, struggling with my weight and feeling that I couldn’t eat what I wanted to eat, or that I couldn’t get my body to do what I wanted it to do.
ADC: I think it’s worth mentioning that you love french fries and I love cake.
DM: Sweet and savory. I think I sit today in a place of greater acceptance of my body, and that includes not just my weight but all of the things that come with your changing body as you age to now experiencing my body as extremely thin-thin in a way that I never imagined somebody would be saying to me, “You’re too thin, and you don’t look good.” I find peace when I don’t see my body as my enemy, when I step back and have appreciation and look at all that my body has done for me. It’s allowed me to give birth to three beautiful children, allowed me to explore different roles as an actor, allowed me to be strong. You can’t look at yourself in the mirror and tear your body apart. You have to look at it and go, “Thank you. Thank you for standing by me, for being there for me no matter what I have put you through.”

On fears:
ADC: Infidelity scares me. It scares me when it happens to my friends; it scares me that it’s going to happen to me. And I’m scared of dishonesty. I just really don’t know what to do when people are dishonest. It is alarming to me.
DM: I used to think that what scared me was the idea of being abandoned until someone said to me, “Only children can be abandoned. Adults can’t be abandoned because we have a choice. Children don’t have a choice.” So I started to rethink. “Okay, it’s not that. What’s the underlying thread that really scares me?” I think what scares me is not having the courage to reach my full potential.

On freedom:
DM: Letting go of the outcome. Truly being in the moment. Not reflecting on the past. Not projecting into the future. That’s freedom. Not caring more about what other people think than what you think. That’s freedom.
ADC: I would say, for me, freedom is to not be bound by my wounds. And to be able to eat cake every day.
DM: Somebody wrote something to me that said, “Don’t let your wounds make you become someone you’re not.” That’s really powerful. And not taking life too seriously.

Photo credit: Cedric Buchet for Harper’s Bazaar and to see an exclusive image from the shoot, go to Harpers Bazaar Facebook page.