Jada Pinkett Smith was a proud mom watching Willow Smith's recent art exhibit.
The 19-year-old teamed up with her musical collaborator, Tyler Cole, for a 24-hour performance about anxiety at the Museum of Contemporary Art's Geffen Contemporary in Los Angeles earlier this month. Willow and Tyler went through eight stages of anxiety during the exhibit; Jada walked in just as Tyler was shaving Willow's head.
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"The first time you shaved your head [was] when you were 12 years old. But this time, you came into a womanhood," Jada told her daughter on Wednesday's episode of Red Table Talk. "So, kudos to you."
"I feel like I was just shedding a lot history and emotional baggage. Six, 7, years of emotion, I just let it go," Willow explained.
Though the exhibit had been planned for "a while," Jada said it was really representative of what people are feeling now amid the coronavirus pandemic.
"The coronavirus pandemic is causing great fear, anxiety -- even panic... You put yourself in a box, dealing with eight stages of anxiety in 24 hours," Jada said. "It was really timely, even though you'd been planning this for a while. But the fact that it was this isolation, confinement we're experience now [was relatable]."
On Wednesday's episode, motivational speaker Jay Shetty and psychologist Dr. Ramani Durvasula joined Red Table Talk hosts Jada, Willow and Adrienne Banfield-Norris, for a candid conversation about managing anxiety and fear during the COVID-19 outbreak. The group took questions from fans, including one about how to tell your partner you need space while quarantining together.
"If you're just seeking more space in your relationship, I think one of the bigger mistakes we often make is that we express what we want but we don’t explain why we want it," Jay said. "So, if you just go up to your partner and say, 'I want space' or 'I need space,' they don't know why you want it and so now they're confused. Now they're filling in the text of going, 'Oh maybe he or she doesn't like me.'"
"If you explain why you want what you want then someone has the opportunity to say, 'Oh I get that, I wanted it too,'" he added. "Because often you find that both of you wanted the space."
Jada agreed. "I think that’s true because if you say to somebody, 'I need space,' sometimes that's a trigger for one step towards divorce. And it doesn't necessarily mean that. It just means, 'Hey I need two hours, please.'"
Red Table Talk airs Wednesdays on Facebook Watch at 9 a.m. PT / 12 p.m. ET. See more in the video below.
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