Anne Hathaway reflects on achieving success in her career while being a chronically-stressed young woman

LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA: Anne Hathaway has learned to keep calm and adjust herself with her hectic life as she has gotten older.

While discussing the characters she played earlier in her career and the fragility of life with David Marchese on The New York Times podcast 'The Interview', the actress said that it's likely she played "chronically-stressed out young women" because she was "a really stressed out young woman" off-screen in her personal life.

Anne Hathaway opens up on being a 'stressed out young woman'

"I was a really stressed out young woman. And as a formerly chronically-stressed young woman, which leads to, you know, all manner of things, I just remember thinking one day, 'You are taking this for granted, you are taking your life for granted,' " Hathaway said, reflecting on the success she was having in her career at the time.

"You have no idea. Something could fall through the sky and that will be lights out for you. So when I find myself, like, the old instincts rising, I just tell myself, I'm like, 'You are not gonna die stressed,' " Hathaway said, as per People.

Anne Hathaway reveals what was stressing her out

Asked by Marchese what was stressing her out, the 41-year-old said, "I didn't know how to breathe yet. And that was really complicated. That was really, really complicated not knowing how to breathe." In simple words, the mother-of-two said that " literally everything" in her life as a young woman in Hollywood stressed her out at one point.

"I was just very, very, very in my head, about a lot of things. I guess maybe that's the easiest way to put it," she went on to clarify. Hathaway said she felt "somatic" stress at the time, meaning she felt physical symptoms of the tension in her body as opposed to just in her mind.

Anne Hathaway recently revealed she's five years sober

In a recent Vanity Fair interview, Hathaway revealed that she's about five years sober and also mentioned her sobriety on 'The Interview' where she admitted that she "probably" drank alcohol to cope with her stress.

"My personal experience with it is that everything is better. For me, it was wallowing fuel. And I don’t like to wallow," she explained to Vanity Fair of her relationship with alcohol. "The thing that I have faith in is that everybody else is going to have one or two drinks, and by the time everybody gets to two drinks, you’ll feel like you’ve had two drinks — but without the hangover," she added.

Anne Hathaway opens up on the key to her life transformation

On the podcast, Hathaway told Marchese that the key to her transformation into a more relaxed person was that she learned to become settled in her life in a positive way that made the idea "a beautiful...concept of surrender." She also said she's learned to practice gratitude more frequently.

Although she didn't go into specific details, she said that "a light went on" in her head when she realized that being hard on herself wasn't going to help her achieve more in life.