“Writing Has Been My Anxiety Therapy”- Zayn Malik

The former One Direction singer went public with his personal struggles in June (16) after pulling out of a big London gig – his first solo show in the U.K. – at the last minute, revealing he was dealing with “the worst anxiety of my career”.Now Zayn has opened up about how he is dealing with the issue, revealing putting pen to paper, whether in the form of a song or diary, seems to work wonders for him.

“I feel like writing anything down is a little bit of a therapy process,” he explained to New York DJ Elvis Duran. “It’s a way of alleviating your mind and getting it out there.

For me, it was a little bit of that (therapy),” he shared. “I kind of enjoyed it. It was fun to reminisce on things and think about what was good and what was bad and make sense of it all. I didn’t have time to do that in the band.

I’m enjoying what I’m doing at the minute,” he said. “When I was in the band, there were times where I needed time away to go see my family and recollect my thoughts. But right now, I feel like I have the time to process things, and I’m doing things in my own space, so it’s a good place to be in.

Where I’m from, people are very easily ready to pull you down to the earth when you get a bit big headed,” he remarked. “I’m thankful for that because one of the things that I like to hold onto in my personality is the fact that I’m quite grounded.