Meghan Markle

I'm a sucker for a compliment.

Be kind to yourself.

If we treated ourselves as well as we treated our best friend, can you imagine?

I'm deeply and passionately involved in the design process. I'm a brash American, and if my name is going to be on something, I'm going to have my say.

I was not a girl who grew up buying $100 candles. I was the girl who ran out of gas on her way to an audition.

I'm an actress, a writer, the editor-in-chief of my lifestyle brand 'The Tig', a pretty good cook, and a firm believer in handwritten notes.

My dad is Caucasian, and my mom is African American. I'm half black and half white. Being biracial paints a blurred line that is equal parts staggering and illuminating.

It was the late '70s when my parents met. My dad was a lighting director for a soap opera, and my mom was a temp at the studio. They moved into a house in The Valley in L.A., to a neighborhood that was leafy and affordable.

Growing up in Los Angeles, obviously it's a really fashionable city, but it has a really relaxed quality to it as well. So, my fashion education came while working on 'Suits'.

People don't need to feel scared about a leather pant. Think of it as a jean alternative: it's the same thing. It's almost like they're your yoga pants, but they look chic.

Put on a sweater and really great sneakers with a big scarf, and you'll look so stylish. For me, they are an everyday essential.

I've always shopped on the sale rack, and I've always been the girl flipping through the hangers trying to find the best deal.

There couldn't possibly be a more label-driven industry than acting, seeing as every audition comes with a character breakdown: 'Beautiful, sassy, Latina, 20s'; 'African American, urban, pretty, early 30s'; 'Caucasian, blonde, modern girl next door'. Every role has a label; every casting is for something specific.

Being 'ethnically ambiguous', as I was pegged in the industry, meant I could audition for virtually any role. Morphing from Latina when I was dressed in red, to African American when in mustard yellow, my closet filled with fashionable frocks to make me look as racially varied as an Eighties Benetton poster.

To describe something as being black and white means it is clearly defined. Yet when your ethnicity is black and white, the dichotomy is not that clear. In fact, it creates a grey area.

Just as black and white, when mixed, make grey, in many ways that's what it did to my self-identity: it created a murky area of who I was, a haze around how people connected with me. I was grey. And who wants to be this indifferent colour, devoid of depth and stuck in the middle? I certainly didn't.

I can't stand it when men are snarky.

I like it when a man puts thought into the kind of restaurant we're going to. That doesn't mean it needs to be fancy - some of the best meals of my life have been having a taco on a street corner.

The best job a man could have would be a chef. They'd understand the long hours I work and the drive and ambition it takes to succeed.

I'm really big on day dates. If you go for a stroll, have a picnic or lunch with a glass of wine - it doesn't get better than that.

My parents came from little, so they made a choice to give a lot: buying turkeys for homeless shelters at Thanksgiving, delivering meals to people in hospices, giving spare change to those asking for it.

On my face, I use Creme De La Mer The Eye Balm Intense and Tatcha Deep Brightening Serum.

I don't tend to go totally bare, but on non-filming days, I will only wear tinted moisturiser, mascara, blusher, and a ChapStick for my lips.

If I have to do a red carpet, and there is a whole team, then it is an hour with the hair and make-up. But if I am just going out with friends, it is 15 minutes max in front of the mirror. A quick five minutes on my face, and I always wear my hair up.

I love Ralph Lauren. As I travel so much, I prefer to shop online.

Once you develop a comfort level with someone, that translates on camera.

When I'm traveling, I won't miss an opportunity to try great pasta.

French fries and vino are my vices.

I never thought I would become an actress. I always wanted to get into politics, and I moved to Argentina and worked for the U.S. embassy for a bit. It sort of happened upon me when I was home for the holiday - acting, that is - and I stuck with it.

By the time 'Suits' had come around, I had been acting for maybe six years. 'Deal or No Deal' - I like to call it my very lucrative waitressing job. Most actors find a way to make a living while they're auditioning, and for me, holding a briefcase was an incredibly lucrative means of being able to pursue what I really wanted to do.

I think my dad always saw how happy I was on set.

I've had dates at the nicest restaurants, but when you leave, you're starving, and the best part of the date is having a slice of pizza and a couple of drinks on the way home. I think it's important to be able to roll with the punches and enjoy every minute of it.

I started working at a soup kitchen in skid row of Los Angeles when I was 13 years old, and the first day, I felt really scared. I was young, and it was rough and raw down there, and though I was with a great volunteer group, I just felt overwhelmed.

Make sure you are safe, and never ever put yourself in a compromising situation, but once that is checked off the list, I think it's really important for us to remember that someone needs us, and that your act of giving/helping/doing can truly become an act of grace once you get out of your head.

At the start of each week, I generally cook a box of quinoa, and while it's simmering, I saute onions, garlic and any veggies I have on hand in a separate pan. I season the vegetables with Spike, a seasoning blend my mom always used when I was growing up, or a little Bragg Liquid Aminos. I always add crushed red pepper and chopped fresh herbs.

For dinner parties, I love making an easy cioppino using shrimp, mussels, clams, and a hearty fish that won't fall apart easily.

Mom cooked a lot of turkey when I was growing up. Turkey meatloaf, turkey burgers, ground turkey shepherd's pie - my childhood was the Bubba Gump of turkey. You'd think I would be sick of it, but when I find gems like Gwyneth Paltrow's turkey meatball recipe, it's as though the fowl is no longer foul to me.

I love Nars blush in Orgasm. I use it on and off camera because it gives you a nice glow from within. My favorite mascara is Diorshow Iconic, and then I love the Make Up For Ever HD Powder. It lets your skin look shiny and fresh, but not greasy-shiny.

I'm the person friends come to when they want to find the perfect restaurant or boutique hotel on the outskirts of Paris. As opposed to scouring the Internet for a travel guide, wouldn't you rather ask the people who are really cool who go there? That's what I do.

The one thing that I cannot live without when I'm traveling is a small container of tea tree oil. It's not the most glamorous thing, but if you get a cut, a mosquito bite, a small breakout, no matter what it is, it's my little cure-all. It's inexpensive, it's small enough to carry on, and I bring it with me all the time.

I love getting into people's brains and understanding the creative impetus for something.

I grew up in L.A. in a school that was diverse, but it was not really integrated, so I didn't ever fully fit in with the black girls or the white girls or the Latina girls.

It's really important that young women be reminded that their involvement matters and that their voice is heard. Even if it feels like it's small, it really can make an impact.

I knew I'd end up in show business in some capacity, eventually.

It's all about balance, and I have so much happiness in my career and am fortunate to travel the world and see so many amazing things - it will also be nice to be anchored to something grounded and in the same place. Raising a family will be a wonderful part of that.

My life has changed because my access has changed, and so has the level of privacy in my life, but these are champagne problems, because I wouldn't rather be back auditioning. And change can be really good - as long as your character is intact.

My mother was a free-spirited clinical therapist, and I had the most hard-working father, a television lighting director by trade. My mum raised me to be a global citizen, with eyes open to sometimes harsh realities.

I'm consistently asked how I keep a foot in two contrasting worlds - one in the entertainment industry, predicated on wealth and indulgence, and the other in humanitarian work. To me, it's less of a question of how can you do this, and more a question of how can you not?

I rarely saw my Grandma Markle, as she hailed from New Hampshire and spent much of her life in Pennsylvania and Florida. To bridge that gap, she would always send scrapbooks, care packages, and boxes of treats made from family recipes.

Make a choice: continue living your life feeling muddled in this abyss of self-misunderstanding, or you find your identity independent of it. You push for colour-blind casting; you draw your own box. You introduce yourself as who you are, not what colour your parents happen to be.