Singer and talk show host Kelly Clarkson is opening up about what she learned in the past year — including some of the dark moments when she split with her husband of nearly seven years, Brandon Blackstock.
On Tuesday, the singer had to answer “I’m grateful in 2020 for the lesson I learned about…”
She replied that she’d learned about herself in the last year.
"Even at 38, I feel like I'm always changing and progressing in a good sense, in a good way. And I always want to make sure I'm being the best version of myself," she said. “I think you are, you know, that thing my mom has been telling me since I was a kid, you are who you surround yourself with. You want to make sure you’re surrounded by people that also want to be the best version of themselves. And also want a good, common goal for everyone, not just themselves right?”
She added that it’s been a good lesson to learn, that people “could be bad for you in a certain time.”
“I think that everybody just goes like, ‘Oh that means they’re bad,” but no, it doesn’t necessarily mean that, it just means like, you’re on different paths. And that’s OK,” she explained. “Everybody’s on a different learning curve and everybody’s learning something different at a different time.”
Clarkson has been fairly open about her divorce from Blackstock. In a September interview with TODAY’s Willie Geist, she didn’t mince words.
"I mean, it's no secret," she said. "My life has been a little bit of a dumpster ... personally, it's been a little hard the last couple months.
"I've been talking to friends that have been through divorce. I don't know how people go through that without having some kind of outlet because it is the worst thing ever for everyone involved."
Clarkson, 38, filed for divorce from Brandon Blackstock in June, citing “irreconcilable differences” and requesting joint custody of their two children, River Rose, 6, and son, Remington, 4
Blackstock has served as Clarkson’s manager for the past several years. Prior to their marriage, his father Narvel Blackstock, was Clarkson's manager. His company, Starstruck, and Clarkson have recently been embroiled in a dispute over the pop star’s payments to the Blackstock family.
The younger Blackstock was also listed as an executive producer for her talk show, “The Kelly Clarkson Show” as recently as this summer.