Justin Bieber admitted that he had an "emotional breakdown" after realizing that his marriage to Hailey Baldwin Bieber could not solve his personal problems.
The pop icon spoke about his experience during an interview with Apple Music's Ebro Darden, which was shared with People, while also opening up about his faith.
"It's a journey. I remember when I first got married, I hit a little bit of an emotional breakdown because I thought marriage was going to fix all my problems and it didn't," Bieber told the radio host. "It just kind of was a reflection of like, man, you're a bit of a hypocrite man."
Bieber said he ultimately realized he was experiencing a culmination of his past trauma and life circumstances — something which was hard to fathom.
"You want your wife to do something that you're not doing and it's like, it's hard sometimes to look in the mirror and really have to realize, man, maybe you're not the person that you necessarily thought that you were," he said. "And that's just a result of trauma and life circumstances."
Faith, he said, has positively impacted his life and helped him through the dark times he was experiencing.
"I've been so just very public about my faith journey and how my relationship with Jesus has helped me to just not be so hard on myself," he said. "Just the idea that I'm forgiven and that he's walking me through this journey and day by day, I get to just get better and better and not be too hard on myself."
Bieber has been open about his mental health, and the struggles he has faced as a result, in the past. In 2019 — a year after marrying Hailey — he announced that he was taking time away from music to focus on "deep rooted" mental health issues.
"I have been looking, seeking, trial and error as most of us do, I am now very focused on repairing some of the deep rooted issues that I have as most of us have, so that I don't fall apart, so that I can sustain my marriage and be the father I want to be," he wrote in an Instagram post.
He added that although "music is very important to … nothing comes before my family and my health."