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Angelina Jolie: I’d Be “Less Self-Destructive” If Involved in Charity Early

Angelina Jolie thinks her childhood would have been very different if she'd learned the lessons from her role as a UN Goodwill Ambassador at a younger age.

"I think it would have got me through my youth easier," Jolie said in an interview with Ann Curry that aired on the Today show this morning. "I would have been less self-destructive."

See Angelina Jolie's baby photo

Jolie says she wants her and Brad Pitt's children to benefit like she never did from visiting refugee camps in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Maddox, 8, has already been to one, she says.

"I want them to see it as an area where they can go down the street and play football with those kids and get to know them and, as they grow up, see them as friends they spend time with," Jolie said.

Check out adorable photos of Brad and Angelina's kids

"I hope if I raise them with a more accurate view of the world than I was raised with, then they will naturally be better people. And I'm sure my children will be visiting and learning from refugees in the future," she continued.

Jolie says she relates to female refugees. "I've talked with these women and they were like any girlfriends I've ever talked to," she told Curry. "They were just sweet and funny and kind and great mommies. It taught me a lot about a strength of character that I've found in many, many refugees that I've met and continue to meet."

See photos of Angelina Jolie doing charity work around the world

"And I think about my kids. And I think, God, on a daily basis, for them to go days and days and not have anything to give your children has got to be the most difficult thing as a mother," she went on.

She doesn't plan on giving up her charity work any time soon. "See yourself as an old woman doing it?" Curry asked. Jolie replied: "I hope so."

Curry — who ended up hosting an event for World Refugee Day with Jolie Thursday after Anderson Cooper's plane was delayed — joked that Jolie still looked good despite the nasty weather.

"Pouring rain and sticky humidity still do not make Angelina Jolie have a bad hair day," she wrote on a Today show blog.

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