Jada says 'friendship' with Will Smith is what has made their marriage last

Jada says ‘friendship’ with Will Smith is what has made their marriage last

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While celebrating her 50th birthday recently, Jada Pinkett Smith opened up about her life, particularly her equation with husband Will Smith.

The actor, who turned 50 on September 18, answered a question asked by George Clooney, who was a guest during an episode of Red Table Talk. He jokingly asked, “How do you put up with Will?”

“Now, they tell me that you’re turning 50, which – that’s not possible – because that would mean that I’m 60, and that’s not possible,” Clooney quipped. “So you’re 39. Happy 39th. And I’m 49. I like it a lot better.”

The actor went on to say that he had a question for Pinkett Smith that he had wanted to ask for a “long time”. “It’s pretty simple. How do you put up with Will?” Clooney asked, as Pinkett Smith, her daughter Willow and mother Adrienne Banfield-Norris laughed.

“You’re intelligent, talented, successful and beautiful and you have all these qualities that, quite honestly, Will doesn’t have and I want to know how, after all these years, you do it. How do you do it?” the actor continued.

Pinkett Smith, who married Will Smith in 1997, went on to explain that the most important thing is to learn how to have a “friendship”. “I think that what you really have to learn is how to have a friendship,” she was quoted as saying. “You know, ’cause really, how do you put up with anybody? How do you put up with yourself?”

As quoted in an Independent report, she also reflected on the “emotional maturity” that she had to reach before being able to dedicate herself to her relationship. The actor and host said she “really had to take the time to learn how to love”. “Because, how we love ourselves is how we show people how to love us.” Further in the episode, Pinkett Smith was asked by talk show host Trevor Noah about how she and her husband learnt to “inspire each other’s happiness”. “So, how do you know when you’re expecting Will to make you happy and how do you know when Will is adding to your happiness that you’ve already created?” Noah asked.

Pinkett Smith responded: “The idea of when you’re expecting someone to fill your happy place and be your happy place versus you creating your happy place within, you have to be your cake.”