RIP Ozzy Osbourne (what does this have to do with mental health??)

The death of Ozzy Osbourne feels like the end of an era, and it has a lot of people reflecting, including me (EHT admin Adam Groff). Anybody with any affinity at all for the heavier side of rock and roll owes Ozzy and his seminal band Black Sabbath a debt of gratitude for the uncountable number of subsequent bands that wouldn’t exist if they hadn’t existed.

But in forging a new, edgier, darker path in rock, Ozzy courted a huge amount of controversy in a genre already built on transgression. When I was a kid, Ozzy stood out amid the moral panics of the 1980s as especially alarming and threatening to the status quo. His drug and alcohol abuse and onstage antics were legendary – the stuff of schoolyard whispers – and of course there was the flirtation with satanic imagery and lyrics. He even adopted the moniker “Prince of Darkness”! The mainstream was horrified.

Eventually though, Ozzy became part of the mainstream, with a family-oriented reality TV show in the 2000s and the panic around his threat to society receding.

Even before that, though, Ozzy acknowledged a split between his public image and who he was privately. As early as 1992, he told the New York Times, “All the stuff onstage, the craziness, it’s all just a role that I play, my work. I am not the Antichrist. I am a family man.”

While most of us may see rock stars as people with lives radically different from ours, I wonder how many of us could make some version of that same statement: “All that stuff you see me doing publicly, it’s all just a role that I play, my work. I am not these performances (or that person who some people fear) – my authentic self is different – it’s relatable, if only you knew me.”

The stresses of celebrity are well known – setting and then having to live up to expectations for millions of fans, the stresses of touring, not being able to casually go out in public – many rock stars succumb to the lifestyle long before Ozzy’s 76.

However, the stresses of the public/private split are nonetheless very real for many of us. How many of us pretend to be okay when really we’re not? How many of us struggle in public-facing roles that don’t feel aligned with who we are inside? Probably more people than we know.

There is nothing wrong with playing different roles in life, we all do that – employee, employer, student, teacher, parent, child, partner, friend – but if there is too great a disconnect between who you present as and who you feel yourself to be inside, that is a barrier to long-term happiness and fulfillment. You deserve support around that, possibly from a therapist or coach. 

Ever Human Therapy is here to support you in your journey – reach out any time.

RIP Ozzy.

#OzzyOsbourne #RIPOzzy #MentalHealthAwareness #PerformanceVsReality #Authenticity #EmotionalWellbeing #TherapySupport #EverHumanTherapy

Post Written by Adam Groff