Shawn Mendes Is Spending His Newly Single Life Focusing on His Spirituality
Shawn Mendes is trying his best to heal from his recent breakup with Camila Cabello. When facing troubling times, some people turn to fitness. Some go the other way and eat or drink in excess. For Mendes, the band-aid for his broken heart has been spirituality.
When did Shawn Mendes and Camila Cabello break up?
Although they met in 2015, Shawn Mendes and Camila Cabello didn’t start dating until 2019. The couple appeared head-over-heels in love, often appearing in photos on each other’s social media accounts. They even collaborated on the hit song “Senorita.”
The young couple attended the Met Gala together in September of 2021. Although Cabello was “giving Cher,” as Mendes famously commented, it wasn’t enough to keep them together. They announced their split on Instagram in November 2021.
It appears Mendes hasn’t been taking the breakup very well, writing on Instagram, “You don’t realize when you’re breaking up with someone, you think it’s the right thing to do, you don’t realize all this sh*t that comes after it.”
Mendes continued, “Like, who do I call when I’m like, in a panic attack? Who do I call when I’m like, f***ing, on edge? I think that’s the reality that kind of hit me – it’s like, ‘Oh, I’m on my own now.’ Now I feel like finally, like, I’m actually on my own, and I hate that.”
Meditation helps after Mendes admits he ‘hit a low point’
Spirituality helped Mendes even before his heartbreaking split. In an interview with Billboard, Mendes said, “I hit a low point a few years ago.” He started studying religious texts, which turned into a deep interest in the Bhakti movement in Hinduism.
Mendes now spends every Thursday meditating and discussing scriptures like the Bhagavad Gita with Jay Shetty, the author of Think Like a Monk.
“I think everybody has a moment where they just decide it’s time to kind of do something different,” Mendes said. “Now spirituality is a part of my life that is much bigger than I actually even let on.”
Recently, he was spotted at a beach in Hawaii performing a ritual meant to cleanse the soul of negative energy. He was photographed with YouTuber Hitomi Mochizuki performing an intimate practice that involves a two-pronged object, with one end inside his nostril and the other in Hitomi’s mouth. This process, called Rapé, is used to cleanse oneself from negative energy.
Heartbreak and healing are central themes in new songs, including ‘When You’re Gone’
The twenty-three-year-old singer told Billboard he’s changed his approach to songwriting, “There was a long while where I was convinced that you just had to write big songs,” he continued, “the type of music that I want to make, what I want to hear and what is important to me.”
It seems heartbreak and healing are what Mendes wants to hear at the moment. In December, he released the single “It’ll Be Okay,” a bittersweet message of letting go. “If you tell me you’re leaving, I’ll make it easy/ It’ll be okay/ And if we can’t stop the bleeding/ We don’t have to fix it, we don’t have to stay/ I will love you either way.”
On Apr. 1, Mendes released another breakup reflection, “When You’re Gone.” This time, he’s not as optimistic that it will be OK but is trying to hold on, “I know what we’re supposed to do/ It’s hard for me to let go of you/ So I’m just tryna hold on.”
