Actress Anne Hathaway is explaining her decision to keep her sons out of the spotlight.

“It’s something I feel is not just essential for my health – I’m on a team, it’s my family, and it’s not just about me,” the actress explained.

She shares two sons — Jonathan, 7, and Jack, 3 — with husband Adam Shulman.

“My family has needs, and one of the needs of children is that they need to be able to define their own lives,” Hathaway continued. “It doesn’t even occur to me to link the two up, except through gratitude that they serve each other so beautifully. But they serve each other through me, and not through a space that’s outside of myself.”

Hathway has previously said that having children “re-prioritized everything” when it comes to choosing projects.

“It’s actually made me a bit choosier because something really has to be so excellent to spend time away from them because they’re so precious to me,” she said of her sons. “They’re the most sacred part of my life by a long shot. And then when I do accept something, it puts greater pressure on me to make it worth the time that I’ve spent away from them.”

When it comes to her high-profile career, Hathaway recently revealed that her sons don’t know what she does for a living.

“Right now, my son thinks I’m a librarian and I work at a library,” she laughed. “So, I will let him know at a certain point that…I’m a different kind of storyteller.”

Movieguide® previously reported on Hathaway’s hopes for her children:

The actress also shared that she hopes her kids stay out of acting — at least until they’re adults. 

“I would probably take the same tack that my parents did with me, which is: You have all the time in the world to be a professional actor; you can only be a child once,” she shared.

“So I would encourage them to study, to go to classes, to read, but I would strongly discourage them from starting too young,” Hathaway concluded. “I think that they’ll be in a position where they’ll be able to go to college and figure out where they want to go from there.”