Dan Reynolds of Imagine Dragons on Depression, Faith, Fame, Ayahuasca and Songwriting

High-Level Overview

Lex Fridman talks with Dan Reynolds, lead singer of Imagine Dragons, a band with more than 75 million records sold and four songs streamed over a billion times on Spotify. Fridman describes him as one of the most down-to-earth people he has met, shaped in part by a lifelong struggle with mental health. The conversation starts, unexpectedly, with Reynolds learning to code in C# for a video game he has been developing with a team from Kyiv, and then ranges widely: authenticity in art, the Johnny Depp and Amber Heard trial, growing up Mormon in Las Vegas, a crisis of faith, an ayahuasca experience, depression, the loneliness of fame, therapy, working with Rick Rubin, the making of "Believer", his father's early encouragement, LGBTQ advocacy, religion, and the meaning of life.

The tone is warm, candid and reflective, with moments of humor and several pauses to listen to songs by Harry Nilsson and Cat Stevens. Reynolds is unusually open about dark periods, including a moment when he felt nothing during a near plane crash, while repeatedly returning to a theme he says is central to his life right now: that people and situations are more complex than they seem, and that none of us really knows the final answers.

The Discussion Explores:

• The joy of completion in both coding and songwriting, and the self-imposed rules of pop music
• Why audiences have a strong "bullshit indicator" and why truth matters more than technique
• Growing up in a conservative Mormon family in Las Vegas, and the crisis of faith that followed
• A profound, frightening and healing ayahuasca experience
• Depression, the highs and crashes of performing, and why fame can be lonely
• Therapy as a mental gym, and practical habits that help him cope
• Rick Rubin's feedback, the story behind "Believer", and his father's pivotal encouragement
• Advocacy for LGBTQ people, making peace with religion, and saying "I don't know"

Deep Dive into Main Ideas

Completion, coding, and the prison of pop

Reynolds says what he loves about both coding and songwriting is completion: starting with nothing, building something with the tools you have, and standing back to look at it. He's a beginner programmer, thrilled simply to make a cube move in an object-oriented environment, and learned C# so he wouldn't be "an idiot" talking to the Kyiv-based team building his game, all of whom he says are now in safe places. He believes engineers are artists too.

Songs, though, are never really done; he has to make himself let go. He admits he writes within confines of his own making, such as keeping songs around three and a half minutes and repeating a chorus enough times to stick, because he grew up loving pop music. When Fridman calls it a prison he built himself, Reynolds agrees: he's a happy prisoner of a prison he thought was a mansion. He recalls Rick Rubin telling him that Imagine Dragons weren't confined to one sound, which Reynolds sees as both a benefit and a detriment, since audiences often want bands to be one thing. His own taste came from genre-hopping in the 1990s, from Cat Stevens and Biggie to Nirvana, Billy Joel and Enya, and especially the angsty women of 90s rock like Alanis Morissette.

Truth is what people feel

Listening to Harry Nilsson's "Without You, Reynolds says the most important lesson for any young artist is that people have a really good bullshit indicator." For art, leadership or performance to succeed, people need to believe that you believe what you're doing. The same song, sung with the same technical qualities, can land or fall flat depending on something he can't quite name. He says performers like Elton John, who didn't write their lyrics, can be just as authentic because they find their own meaning in them.

He hears "Without You" as a song about someone who can't love himself enough to feel deserving of the person he loves, which he identifies with deeply. He mentions that he and his wife went through a difficult separation, and that love is more nuanced than attraction or laughter. That leads to the Depp and Heard trial, which his wife watches at night. Reynolds says it makes him sad: the internet always needs a hero and a villain, but he sees two people with deep hurt and anger, possibly still some love, and he believes life is always more complex than it looks from the outside.

A Mormon kid in Las Vegas and a crisis of faith

Reynolds grew up in a very conservative Mormon family in Las Vegas, a city he says was built by the Mormons and the mob. His mother would tell the kids to close their eyes when they passed billboards on the way to church, and he wasn't allowed to watch PG-13 movies. He's grateful to have seen both sides of that juxtaposition, which he now applies to everything: there are always two sides. He has also seen Vegas's darker side, losing friends to overdoses and gambling addiction.

He describes seeking God as an obsession since childhood, intensified by an OCD nature that won't let questions go. Losing his faith in his twenties felt like the bedrock of everything he believed being ripped out, and for a long time he had given up hope that there was anything beyond evolving, living, dying and nothingness.

Ayahuasca: the curtain pulled open

Reynolds says the closest he has come to experiencing God was through ayahuasca, even though he can't enjoy cannabis because he hates losing control. He was terrified, having been raised with no exposure to drugs, but his wife had a profound healing experience first and he followed. The first time had no effect. The second time, about 20 or 30 minutes in, he felt the curtain of reality pulled open, which was frightening, and then felt as though he were communicating with something incredibly wise, whether one calls it God, a higher self, or Mother Earth.

It showed him scenes from his younger life, as if through a video camera, and explained why he struggles to accept success without feeling undeserving. Most importantly, it dissolved his anger at his parents and community for raising him in what he had seen as falsehoods. Mormonism, it seemed to tell him, was one grain of sand, with some truth and some falsity like all the others, and he should forgive, focus on truth, and let go of control. He stresses that none of it came in words, that it felt like it didn't come from him, and that he isn't telling anyone to do it: it was the scariest experience of his life, feeling like both heaven and the darkest hell.

Depression, performing, and the loneliness of fame

Asked what keeps him going in dark times, Reynolds says his kids now give him an obvious reason, but he admits that for years it was a real struggle. Early in his career, on a small jet overseas, an engine failed and the plane began to dive. His brother and manager was crying and texting his wife goodbye, and Reynolds felt nothing, even thinking it might be nice. He was deeply depressed, had tried medications since childhood without success, and was in a faith crisis. Imagine Dragons began as a side project, with band names scribbled during a biology class he hated.

He is an introvert who loves a late-night conversation with a couple of friends, a good book, a podcast or a walk, yet on stage he feels free and exuberant. Singing his songs with crowds in different cultures makes the world feel like one team, and then he comes off stage to news of everyone hating each other. His uncle, a leading heart surgeon in Nashville, warns him that musicians die because their hearts and cortisol levels spike on stage and crash afterward, and Reynolds says he understands why artists turn to drugs, having struggled with drug abuse himself.

Fame, he says, is something you can't take back, and its biggest pitfall is being reduced to people's perception of you. For years he felt he had to play Dan Reynolds of Imagine Dragons, even with family, and empathic, people-pleasing artists are especially vulnerable to losing themselves. Early on, Charlie Sheen told the band, "boys just mark my words your life is about to get really weird," and it did. When everyone praises everything you say, it becomes incredibly lonely, and some people are rude just to prove they don't care. He adds that chasing fame, like chasing any when I get there I'll be happy goal, is the opposite of self-love and never arrives. Having his brothers as his manager and lawyer has helped keep him grounded.

Therapy as a mental gym

For people struggling with depression, Reynolds goes back to basics: exercise every day, eat healthy, make time for something you love (even when nothing brings joy), and look for what you can clean up. For him, cutting back on alcohol helped a lot, since he felt it hurt his mood and drive. He has been diagnosed with major depressive disorder, which gets worse in winter, and he says sometimes you just keep breathing and it will get better with time.

His biggest message is to destigmatize therapy. Surrounded by high-achieving older brothers, including a plastic surgeon, an anesthesiologist, a dentist and two attorneys, none of whom went to therapy, he avoided it for years because it felt like admitting he was broken or weak, and he says that almost cost him his life. He describes it as "like going to the gym but it's a mental gym." His path to a good therapist was bumpy: first a Mormon therapist focused on scripture and prayer, then Scientology-based marriage counseling (his wife was a Scientologist when they met; she no longer is), before finding secular therapy that worked. He explains that real therapy isn't just relief from sharing secrets but work: identifying triggers, connecting them to past events, and having hard conversations. If therapy isn't a little difficult, he suggests, it may not be good therapy.

Rick Rubin, "Believer", and his father's two cents

Reynolds writes over 100 songs a year, finishes every idea, and releases about 20 every three years. He writes like keeping a journal, with no theme in mind, and lyrics, melody and music arrive together as one soundscape. His only gauge for releasing a song is whether it makes him feel something and whether he wants to listen to it repeatedly; the band's worst-performing single, "I Bet My Life, was the one he wanted to hear least, a lesson he took to heart. Rick Rubin's main feedback was I don't really believe you on that song, and they went through lyrics line by line. Reynolds held firm on one line about self-love in the song Number One" that Rubin found cringeworthy, and accepted many other suggestions.

Of "Believer, he says the greatest things in his life have come from the deepest hurt, and that after losing faith in everything he was rebuilding a belief in goodness and light. The opening line first things first simply came to him, and the line about being the master of his sea echoes a saying his father kept in his office. A former drummer and beatboxer, he writes percussively, and he deliberately delayed the word pain" in the chorus so it would land as a striking moment. He likes divisive songs: he'd rather people love or hate them than feel indifferent. He says he doesn't fear his own death, but fears not seeing his kids again.

The most pivotal moment of his musical life came at 12, when he wrote a bluesy song about a lonely boy and worked up the courage to play it for his father, a humble man who starts sentences with "this is just my two cents." With nine kids and long work days, his father had little time, but he listened carefully and told Dan the song was really good and what it made him feel. Reynolds says he probably would have given up music otherwise, and he still sends every song to his dad. He contrasts hurtful criticism with well-intentioned criticism that sees the value in what someone is trying to do. Listening to Cat Stevens's "Father and Son" and discussing Harry Chapin's "Cat's in the Cradle", he and Fridman reflect on how both father and son can be right at once.

Self-love, advocacy, religion, and not knowing

His advice to young people, and his kids, is to learn to love themselves: focus on the things you love about yourself, serve others (which he believes increases self-love), take time daily for what makes you happy, and forgive yourself, because everyone fails. He sees self-doubt as useful in moderation (if he thought he had written a perfect song like "Imagine", he might stop), but warns how easy it is to kill an artist, citing a MusiCares statistic that about 75% of musicians say they struggle with severe depression.

His LGBTQ advocacy grew from close friends in the arts who struggled to reconcile faith and sexuality, severe bullying he witnessed in the 1990s, a Mormon LGBTQ teen from his community who took his own life in front of the Las Vegas temple, and family members. When he married, his wife's two LGBTQ best friends didn't attend because of the Mormon church's support for Prop 8. He felt that by not saying anything, he was saying everything.

On religion, he acknowledges it has caused great harm, but has stopped just complaining about his upbringing and recognizes the good it gave his family, like closeness and the comforting belief that families are together forever. When his child asked if they would see him again after death, he chose to say he didn't know but hoped so. His brothers and sister are highly intelligent practicing Mormons, so he won't call them wrong; a zealous atheist is as laughable to him as a zealous Mormon. His purpose, he says, is to bring light and love to the world and himself and to live with integrity, and he wants to surround himself with seekers. He closes by reciting the chorus of the final song on the band's upcoming record, which asks listeners to take it easy on him, and summarizing: be easier on each other, look for truth wherever it lies, and remember that none of us really knows.

Conclusion

Dan Reynolds comes across as a seeker who has turned depression, a painful loss of faith, and the disorienting weirdness of fame into songs and a hard-won philosophy of humility. His lessons are practical and humane: audiences can tell when art is true, fame won't fill the hole that self-love must, therapy is strength rather than weakness, criticism should come from care, and a parent's thoughtful attention can change a child's life. Across coding, songwriting, psychedelics, parenting and religion, his recurring message is that life is more complicated than heroes and villains, and that saying "I don't know" while staying open to more is the most honest place to stand.

This is a summary of "#290 – Dan Reynolds: Imagine Dragons" from Lex Fridman Podcast, giving you the GIST so you can decide if you want the REST. Listen to the full episode.