Miley Cyrus Explains How Playing Hannah Montana Led to an 'Identity Crisis'

Miley Cyrus is opening up about her days as Hannah Montana.

On the latest episode of Spotify’s Rock This with Allison Hagendorf podcast, the 28-year-old singer explained how starring on the Disney Channel series made it hard for her to figure out who she really is.

“The concept of the show is that when you’re this character, when you have this alter ego, you’re valuable. You’ve got millions of fans, you’re the biggest star in the world,” Miley explained. “Then the concept was that when I looked like myself, when I didn’t have the wig on anymore, no one cared about me. I wasn’t a star anymore.”

“That was drilled into my head [that], without being Hannah Montana, no one cares about you,” she continued. “That was the concept. I really had to break that.”

Once Hannah Montana ended, Miley admitted that she went through “an identity crisis,” which she thinks happened because she “had gone from being a character almost as often as I was myself.”

“I think that’s maybe why I almost created a characterized version of myself at times… I never created a character where it wasn’t me, but I was aware of how people saw me and I kind of played into it a little bit,” Miley said in reference to her 2013 album Bangerz.

“Like, when I noticed that people gave a s**t that I would stick my tongue out, when they told me, ‘Stop sticking your f**king tongue out,’ I would do it more,” Miley said. “When people are pissed, that means they care, so that makes you want to do it, too.”

If you missed it, Miley Cyrus recently marked the 10-year anniversary of being caught on camera smoking from a bong.