Deepika Padukone on what success means to her now: 'Success is if I can wake up in the morning feeling alive, without anxiety or depression'

Deepika Padukone on what success means to her now: 'Success is if I can wake up in the morning feeling alive, without anxiety or depression'

At the CNBC-TV18 Global Leadership Summit, Deepika Padukone was asked to reflect on how her idea of success and ambition has evolved over the years. Her response was grounded, unglamorous, and personal. She traced her understanding of success back to childhood, when external symbols defined achievement. “As a young girl, when you’re growing up, success is… the fancy car that somebody’s driving or the home that someone lives in or the lifestyle that they have.
I think that as a young girl, what is your friend bringing to school in her tiffin box versus what are you bringing. If someone brought chocolates from abroad, it was like, oh wow, she’s really wealthy.”

But life, and particularly her own well-documented struggle with anxiety and depression, shifted her definition entirely. “As you get older, you start realizing that success and wealth are… for me today success truly is if I can wake up in the morning alive without feeling a bout of anxiety or depression. My mind and body working at 100%, that for me is success.”

Alongside good health, she places time at the center. “Time is our most valuable resource, but also scarce. So today for me, success is how do I manage my time, how do I spend my time, and who I spend my time with. That, for me, is success.”

The conversation naturally turned to her mental health advocacy. She acknowledged how difficult it was to come forward when stigma was rampant. “People questioned my intent. They thought I was being paid by pharmaceutical companies to promote an illness. They thought this was a publicity stunt for a movie. Even the foundation’s work was questioned because we didn’t ‘look poor enough’ to be an NGO.”

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Yet she and her team continued. “I remember thinking to myself and saying to the team, we know we’re honest in what we’re doing. All we have to do is put our head down and continue to do the work. And that’s what we’ve done over the last decade.”

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She recalled visiting Chhindwara for a government-linked mental health initiative. “They didn’t know that we were behind that work. And when I told them that I’m still on medication today and the gentleman sitting next to me was my psychiatrist, their eyes lit up. To know that even someone like me is experiencing what they are experiencing.”

Reflecting on her life choices, she added, “As a 16 or 18-year-old, to leave my family and move to Bombay… today, when I think back, that was brave. And if everyone is moving in one direction, you’ll always find me on the other side.”