Shakira has been "reborn as a woman" after a difficult two years.
Shakira's new album has helped transform her
The pop star split from footballer Gerard Pique - the father of her two sons - in 2022 and she has poured her pain into her new album 'Las Mujeres Ya No Lloran' - and Shakira believes the suffering she endured has changed her as a person and made her more resiliant.
She told Allure magazine: "I was in the mud. I had to reconstruct myself, to reunite all the pieces that had fallen apart. Making this music has shown me that my pain can be transformed into creativity.
"The songs are full of anecdotes and some very intense emotions I have experienced in these two years. But creating this album has been a transformation in which I have been reborn as a woman. I have rebuilt myself in the ways I believe are appropriate. No one tells me how to cry or when to cry, no one tells me how to raise my children, no one tells me how I become a better version of myself. I decide that."
She went on to insist she now feels more in control, adding: "In the past, when women went through a difficult situation, they were expected to mind their manners, to hide the pain, to cry in silence. That's over. Now, no one will control us. No one will tell us how to heal, how to clean our wounds."
Shakira previously described the new record as an example of turning pain into success. She told 'Extra': "I think that this album is not only the materialisation of all those ups and downs and also the process, the alchemical process, of transforming pain into resilience and strength, but I also think that my fans have been there sustaining a dialogue with me, you know?
"It’s been amazing, because I don't think I only sing for them and they listen, I think that they also speak to me."
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