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7 Wildly Successful People Who Struggle with Mental Health

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Seven of the world’s most recognizable faces open up about hitting rock bottom — and what got them out.

Tom Bilyeu built his reputation asking guests the questions most talk shows skip. For Mental Health Awareness Month this May, his interview series Impact Theory pulled together the rawest moments from seven of those conversations into a single compilation, titled “7 Wildly Successful People Who Struggle with Mental Health.” The idea is simple and pointed: money, fame, and career wins don’t come with immunity from depression, anxiety, or addiction.

• The compilation runs just under 10 minutes and stitches together reflections from seven high-achieving guests who previously sat down with Bilyeu.
• It’s produced under Impact Theory, the media company Bilyeu co-founded with his wife Lisa Bilyeu after the two built Quest Nutrition into a national brand.
• The episode carries a mental health disclaimer directing viewers in crisis to the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline (1-800-273-TALK) or 911, making clear the content is informational, not clinical.

Seven Stories, One Recurring Pattern

The seven figures featured span music, film, sports, and business — Lady Gaga, Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, Adele, Michael Phelps, Demi Lovato, Elon Musk, and Emma Stone. Each appears via clips pulled from their individual Impact Theory sit-downs, describing specific low points: Gaga on living with fibromyalgia and depression alongside chronic pain, Johnson on cycles of depression he’s managed since his early twenties, Phelps on the isolation that followed his Olympic peak, Lovato on bipolar disorder and addiction, and Stone on panic attacks that started when she was a child.

What ties the seven together isn’t the industry — it’s the pattern. Isolation compounds the pressure of being watched constantly. Perfectionism, the same trait that built the résumé, becomes the thing that won’t let up. Bilyeu’s edit leans into that overlap rather than treating each story as a separate case study.

Success didn’t buy any of them immunity — depression, anxiety, and addiction showed up anyway, in Olympic villages and recording studios just like everywhere else.

Behind the Camera: Bilyeu and Impact Theory

Bilyeu isn’t a clinician by background — he’s an entrepreneur who co-founded Quest Nutrition with Lisa Bilyeu before pivoting to media with Impact Theory. That business-first lens shows up in how the compilation is framed: less therapy session, more debrief on what specific habits and mindsets actually got these seven people through their worst stretches. It’s the same practical angle Bilyeu applies across the channel, whether he’s interviewing athletes or founders about eliminating self-doubt or unpacking why high performers burn out in the first place.

That framing is deliberate. The goal, per the episode’s own setup, is to challenge the assumption that status and achievement act as a shield — the same myth that keeps a lot of people from seeking help because they assume their success should have solved it already.

The Resources Attached to the Episode

Every clip is bracketed by a direct disclaimer: this is not medical advice, and if you’re in crisis, the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-TALK (8255) or 911 are the actual next steps, not a video. It’s a small addition, but it matters — compilations like this tend to circulate widely during Mental Health Awareness Month, and putting the hotline number directly in front of viewers rather than burying it in a description box is the kind of detail that separates an awareness piece from a listicle. Outlets covering the causes behind depression and anxiety have made the same point for years: destigmatizing the conversation only works if the resources are just as visible as the story.

Bilyeu has said the goal isn’t to wrap these struggles up with a bow — it’s to show that Lady Gaga managing fibromyalgia and depression on tour, or Phelps sitting alone in his room after Rio, look a lot more familiar than most people expect. The compilation doesn’t try to resolve any of it in nine minutes. It just puts seven people who “made it” on record saying they still had to fight for it, and lets that sit.