Madonna has opened up about her time in a coma in 2023 during her first-ever podcast appearance – find out more below.
Yesterday (September 29), Madonna made her first-ever podcast appearance, joining Jay Shetty on his On Purpose show. During the wide-spanning chat, the Queen of Pop spoke about her severe bacterial infection in 2023 that resulted in the musician slipping into a coma for four days. At the time, her relatives revealed that they were “preparing for the worst”, but she has since made a full recovery.
During her chat with Shetty, Madge revealed that she had seen her late mother – who died from cancer when Madonna was just five years old – “on the other side”, but refused to join her as she wasn’t ready yet.
“I was almost there on the other side, and I had a conscious moment,” Madonna recalled. “My mother appeared to me, and she said, ‘Do you want to come with me?’ And I said, ‘No.’”
“My assistant was in the room with me, but I was still unconscious, but she heard me say, ‘No.’ And then when I did eventually wake up, I realized that the ‘No’ was about me needing to forgive and make good with people that I still held grudges against.”
One of the grudges she let go of was her strained relationship with her brother Christopher Ciccone, who died in October. The siblings’ relationship fell apart after Madonna gained fame, and she reflected on social media after his death: “We did not speak for sometime but when my brother got sick we found our way back to each other.”
Elsewhere during her chat with Jay Shetty, Madonna spoke extensively of her decades-long spiritual journey, which kicked off in 1996 when she discovered Kabbalah – a Jewish tradition of mystical interpretation of the Bible.
Madge told Shetty: “You need to be spiritual to be successful. Success is having a spiritual life, period. I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t have one… My soul’s purpose is to reveal light in the world through whatever I do. I want it all, but I want it for the sake of sharing, not to keep it for myself.”
“Spiritual wisdom is not helpful when everything’s going your way. It’s helpful when you’re challenged and when you’re happy,” she continued. “It’s helpful to remember that at any given time, in any moment, it could be gone. So don’t take it for granted. Have humility. Radical acceptance is just accepting that what is happening to you is meant to happen to you — and that you’re going to be okay.”
This isn’t the first time Madonna has spoken of her spirituality – earlier this February, she shared a personal note on social media explaining why she wasn’t afraid of death, telling fans that it was largely due to her faith and spirituality.
In other news, Madge earlier this month announced her return to Warner Records with a new dance album, ‘Confessions On A Dance Floor Part 2’, scheduled for 2026. The new album will see her reunite with the producer of the original ‘Confessions on a Dancefloor’, Stuart Price, whom she already revealed she had been working with back in December.
It will mark her first LP since 2019’s ‘Madame X‘, which was her 14th studio record.
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