AR Rahman Talks Depression: ‘I Had Suicidal Thoughts Till 25’

AR Rahman has spoken out about being depressed when he was young.

(Photo courtesy: Instagram/@iifa)

Oscar-winning composer, loved by one and all, and a global star AR Rahman has spoken out about being depressed when he was young.

Rahman’s biography ‘Notes of a Dream: The Authorized Biography of AR Rahman’ was launched on Saturday. He has talked about the tough times he faced and the major events that shaped the person he is today.

The singer-composer told PTI:

Up until 25, I used to think about suicide. Most of us feel they are not good enough. Because I lost my father, there was this void... There were so many things happening. (But) that in a way made me more fearless. Death is a permanent thing for everyone. Since everything created has an expiry date, so why be afraid of anything?

He added that his father’s death affected his work too. “Because of my father’s death and the way he was working, I didn’t do many movies. If I got 35 offers, I did two movies.”

Everyone wondered ‘How are you going to survive? You have everything, grab it’... It’s like eating everything. You become numb. So even if you eat small meals, make it fulfilling.

AR Rahman

Rahman was 9 years old when his father passed away. This led him to take to music at a very young age. “I finished everything between the age of 12 to 22. It was boring for me to do all the normal stuff. I didn’t want to do it,” he says.

He adds that things got better and he moved on when he opened his own recording studio later.

Here’s a video to understand what depression really feels like.