It doesn’t get much more American than Bruce Springsteen. The iconic music legend is beloved by many and one of the best selling artists of all time. If the 1984 classic album Born in the U.S.A. doesn’t tug at your patriotic heart strings, I don’t know what will. Also, I’m pretty sure you’d be arrested immediately if you ever tried to utter a negative word about him in his home state of New Jersey. But despite so much adoration and so many accolades, the man we also know as “The Boss” has had a serious battle with The Beast: clinical depression. According to a Vanity Fair cover story, in his forthcoming autobiography Born to Run (Simon and Schuster, release date September 27, 2016), Springsteen openly discusses his own checkered past with mental illness, and the history of mental illness in his family.
Darkness on the Edge of Town and His Mind
It’s always difficult to imagine tremendously successful people having crippling sadness. I know there is a lot of debate on the definition of “success.” But I think in the case of massive financial earnings (his net worth is estimated to be $200 million), well-received artistic endeavors (120 million records sold worldwide and 20 Grammy awards) and worldwide popularity (a forever loyal and continuously growing fan base with repeatedly sold-out tours), empirically speaking, Bruce Springsteen is a colossal success. He’s also getting significantly hotter every decade—check out the photos in that Vanity Fair article. Lookin’ good, Boss.
Yet despite all of this prosperity, Springsteen recounts significantly long periods of crushing depression. I guess all the money and fame in the world cannot buy a light at the end of the tunnel some days, or even years. He references full years of his life—as recently as his early 60s—that were overshadowed by “freight train bearing down” depression. He counts on his wife of over 20 years, musician Patty Scialfa, to help him snap out of it and also regularly sees his doctor for a reboot. He says both medication and therapy have been his go-to for treatment.
It irked me a little when his wife told VF that she wasn’t “completely comfortable” with the part of the book where he talks about the depression. For her to tell the press that she’s wary of him talking about it seems counter productive. He’s helping so many people by being honest about all this. She does acknowledge he in some ways worked through it by writing this book, as he did with so many of his songs over the years. Luckily for us, the depression never kept him from creating incredible music.
Staying in Lucky Town
I think what makes Springsteen so endearing to so many people is his ability to always embody and acknowledge his roots. With a classic blue collar upbringing, he didn’t come from money and he doesn’t seem to live under the delusions that often envelope someone who has been so famous for so long—they’re typically out of touch with the real world. He told the reporter, “One of the points I’m making in the book is that, whoever you’ve been and wherever you’ve been, it never leaves you.” That sentiment certainly shines through in his music, album after album.
Springsteen said his own father was plagued with mental illness and he has always worried that he would have a similar fate. It seems as though Springsteen’s father and their relationship, which he’s written several songs about, has clearly shaped a lot of his work and his life outlook. I’m sure it has also helped him to be proactive with his own depression, having witnessed the struggle and understanding that the propensity for it in his genes is very, very real.
High Hopes for an End to the Mental Illness Stigma
When celebrities talk about recovery and mental illness, the mainstream starts to view the topics as a little less taboo. The 21st century has seen a lot of strides with people being more open about their problems in general (that’s something for which we can actually thank millennials). Depression can make you feel like you’re never, ever going to be able to be successful or even just peaceful, so when mega successful people admit they have it too, it gives everyone else who suffers a much needed dose of hope. For offering hope, we salute The Boss, who was clearly born to run and born to inspire.
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