Jennifer Lopez needed to find herself again after divorce from Affleck

After her highly publicized divorce from Ben Affleck in 2024, Jennifer Lopez did what many people do when a relationship they’ve put so much of themselves into falls apart. She took inventory of her life, her choices, her intentions.

“After my last divorce, I just sat there, canceled my tour, and sat there thinking, ‘I have to figure it out. What’s going on with me? Forget about everyone else. In a way, there’s no one to blame here but me,'” Lopez said to herself during an appearance on the SmartLess podcast on Monday, June 15.

The singer and Office Romance star told hosts Jason Bateman, Sean Hayes and Will Arnett that the past few years have been eventful, from her divorce to her twin 18-year-old children, Emme (who recently changed her name to Oscar Jacob) and Max’s recent graduation, to moving into a new home.

“Everything in my life has changed in the last few years,” she said of buying a house and a few horses to bring her children home. “The past 20 years have been one thing. The last five years have been tumultuous. And the last two years have been like a healing process where I’ve really gotten to know myself through that turbulence. I’m so different now than I was two years ago, it’s crazy. And now I can really look at my life and appreciate who I am and what I’ve created for myself and be truly happy.”

Actor and producer Ojani Noa from 1997 to 1998, dancer Cris Judd from 2001 to 2003, and singer Marc Anthony from 2004 to 2014 (who also has twins). Lopez, 56, who was briefly married to Affleck from 2022 to 2025, alluded to a time when she felt like her “life was blowing up before my eyes,” without revealing his name. Name, incident, etc.

“It was because of the choices I made, but it was also because of the fact that I needed to change things about myself that I didn’t understand or realize, and that was attracting certain things and attracting certain experiences into my life,” Lopez said. “There comes a point where everything is so baffling that it’s wrong to have to sit there.”

Lopez and Affleck began dating in 2002, got engaged and then broke up, but they got back together in 2021 and married the following year. The two appear to be on good terms, with Affleck attending the premiere of the Kiss of the Spider-Woman remake he co-produced with Lopez in October, and Lopez telling Jimmy Kimmel last month that he realized what the problem was. “I’ve been doing everything wrong!” she told the late night host about dating and marriage. “I’ve been doing it wrong this whole time, believe me.”

Neither of them went into details about what caused their marriage to break up, but Lopez told Smartless that while her divorce from Affleck caused her to do some self-reflection, she doesn’t believe it was all her fault. “It’s not that people don’t do bad things, but [I asked myself] ‘what are you doing? what is happening? “And that was the turning point for me. That was a few years ago now.”

Listen to Lopez’s music on SmartLess below and watch Office Romance on Netflix now.