Keke Palmer has been grinding since she was 11, but not without some ups and downs. The star of December’s SELF cover, Keke opened up about some of her struggles, which at one point included handling fame.

“I wouldn’t understand it at the time, but I think when I was younger, I did hold a lot of grudges and it was truly suffocating for me,” she said. “I felt so isolated in my experience and I blamed everyone around me … I never really told anybody. I was just writing it in my journal.”

Over time, Keke learned how to deal with the feeling of isolation by understanding she’s not alone. “How I deal with it is to not center myself,” she says. “I think about all the other people who feel weird in the world, because if we take all the glamour out of it, and all the specifics and uniqueness of what it means to be famous, it just means feeling weird.”

“I think everybody in the world feels extraordinarily alienated,” she continues, “and we feel even more alienated when we alienate others. And that’s what comes with fame.”

Though she knows her journey from humble beginnings was far from easy, Keke clarifies that her struggle made room for her success story.

“Everybody always felt so bad for me, like I was so much better than where I came from—when the reality is, I am who I am because of where I came from. I love my parents. We are doing this together,” she says. “So it’s also a lot of reclaiming the fact that my life may be different, but please don’t pity me and don’t make me feel like I’m some kind of sob story, because I’m proud of who I am.”

Meanwhile, the release of Keke’s buddy comedy with SZA, One of Them Days, has been moved up from Jan. 24 to Jan. 17.

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