Goldie Hawn has been famous for almost her entire adult life, but the Oscar winner reveals that melancholy made it difficult for her to enjoy it in her twenties.

The 75-year-old spoke to Good Morning Britain about the importance of mental health care and the work that her MindUP program has done since 2003 to offer youngsters the tools they need to manage stress. She also spoke candidly about her personal struggles with mental illness.

“When I was young, I became depressed. I was 21, and I was rising to success ,” Hawn said. She found early fame to be “a very difficult thing [and] I didn’t necessarily want that,” she remarked.

Her burgeoning stardom only made her wish to return to anonymity.

“I was very depressed and I had a lot of these issues where I couldn’t even go outside in public,” she explained. “I didn’t want to be a big deal. I wanted to go home. I wanted to [get married], I wanted to be a dancing school teacher. I did have a plan [and] I didn’t have delusions of grandeur on any level; I was extremely realistic.”

To say Hawn was famous in her early twenties throughout the 1960s would be an understatement. When her go-go dancer performance secured her a regular-cast spot on the iconic sketch comedy show “Rowan & Martin’s Laugh In,” she gained international notoriety. Her upbeat demeanor earned her the title of “it girl” in the 1960s. And when she won an Oscar for “Cactus Flower” in 1969, her celebrity and legitimacy in Hollywood skyrocketed.

Hawn, on the other hand, stated that she was able to deal. “This is something that, for me, I worked through. I went to a doctor, I went to a psychologist, I learned about quieting my mind and what happens to the brain,” she stated.

Since then, Hawn has devoted her time attempting to educate others about the significance of mental health, particularly among youngsters. That is the purpose of her children’s mental health nonprofit, MindUp, which equips teachers and families with curriculums to help youngsters comprehend their emotions. It was especially crucial during the COVID-19 epidemic, according to Hawn.

“When this pandemic happened, it gobsmacked everyone,” she said. “We didn’t know how to handle our children, we were dealing with ourselves…. It’s just a plethora of problems.”

The actor advised others to seek mental health therapy when they are in need, emphasizing the need of removing stigma from the subject.

“For every one of us, we may have a different reason why we may feel low, or anxious, or depressed,” she said. “All I want to say is that if you really aren’t happy, we do need to be able to tend to ourselves, to go to a doctor.”

“Don’t be embarrassed, mental health is real,” she continued. “If I broke my arm, I would go to a doctor. If I fell and hurt my hip, I would go to a doctor. Our brains are an organ. There are things that we can [do to] help ourselves and doctors can help us. We should never be ashamed to say ‘I’m feeling sad.'”

Over the years, the industry veteran has given a lot of consideration to the concept of happiness, and she was ready to share her thoughts.

“Happiness is an interesting thing because it’s a state of mind,” she explained. “Happiness is something that we actually look at, we churn it like you churn butter and create butter and cream out of milk. You literally have to understand that happiness is a choice.”