Rihanna: Concern over Chris Brown's career

Sometimes you just can't win, even if you're four-time Grammy Award-winning and multiplatinum-selling pop star Rihanna.

"You can never please people," she says of her agreeing to allow a relaxing of the order of protection against former boyfriend Chris Brown, who'd pleaded guilty in 2009 to felony assault for beating her. "One minute I'm being too hard, and the next minute I'm a fool because I'm not being hard enough," she says in excerpts released Wednesday from her interview in Rolling Stone.

She remains adamant she did the right thing. "What he did was a personal thing -- it had nothing to do with his career," she notes. "Saying he has to be a hundred feet away from me, he can't perform at awards shows -- that definitely made it difficult for him."

The original order of protection actually called for 150 feet except at public events, where it was only 30 feet, according to TMZ.com at the time.

"It doesn't mean we're gonna make up or even talk again. . . . We don't have to talk ever again in my life."

After what happened with Brown, "I put my guard up so hard," she says. "I didn't want people to see me cry. I didn't want people to feel bad for me. It was a very vulnerable time in my life, and I refused to let that be the image. I wanted them to see me as, 'I'm fine, I'm tough.' I put that up until it felt real."