Meghan Markle was the keynote speaker at the Time100 Summit in New York City this afternoon, and she shared a big confession to the group: She has never been happier. The Duchess of Sussex discussed her kids, 5-year-old Archie and 3-year-old Lilibet, and Prince Harry during her Q&A, along with how she handles negative comments.
Meghan’s big reveal about her mental health happened at the middle of the conversation—and earned her applause.
She told the crowd, “A confession for you today that I can very comfortably say is I’m the happiest I’ve ever been. And that part, to have a partner and a husband who’s just so supportive and to have healthy kids that are so joyful in the freeness of their life and the safety of the life that we create for them, I never... Of all the things that have happened in my life, I never would have imagined getting here at this point. I feel just so happy and grateful, I really do.”
Meghan spoke about her life as a working mother, saying that as she launches her three projects—her show With Love, Meghan, business As Ever, and podcast Confessions of a Female Founder—“really at the same time,” she has spent the last year and a half being “incredibly busy and ambitious.”
As she watches it all “come to life,” she has made a point to give herself “the space and the grace to make mistakes, to know that you’re not gonna get it right every day.”
Her business milestones and decisions are “as equally important to me as Archie losing his first tooth this week, which is about to happen and I just hope I’m back home in time for it,” she shared. Meghan added, “It all matters. And when you look at your life from that perspective, which frankly, being a parent is the most illuminating perspective because what is so, so big somehow becomes microscopic in importance to what’s happening with your children. That’s certainly how I feel. You just make time to do it all, and I think maybe that’s what is the dream.”
When asked how she handles scrutiny from the public and the press, Meghan recalled a famous quote about how going online is the best way to feel bad about yourself. “So I don’t do that,” she quipped.
“I’ve made a very, very conscious effort to create boundaries for myself and for my mental health and my wellbeing and certainly to role-model that as well for my children. I’m conscious of not just raising a very strong and confident young woman, but also having a son, I think is it’s just as paramount of importance for young men to be raised with a confidence and sense of self that is going to empower the women around them, too.
“So I try to model that behavior, but again, it starts with whatever is going on internally. And when I am able to, not even just tune out whatever that noise is but to really not give it any credence, that has become so much of a part of my day-to-day life. And things will get brought to my attention on a need-to-know basis. Outside of that, I’m kind of late on the boat for a lot of things going on, and I’m OK with that. That’s part of what I find to bring me peace.”
Creating healthy boundaries has benefitted her work life, too. “It also helps me have a very, very strategic focus on the intention of the products, the creative and the producer work that we’re doing that I want to bring to the table,” she said. “So if it does give me a lot of space to focus because I’m not in the same world that a lot of us find us in.”
