Shawn Mendes Addresses Sexuality, Says He’s ‘Figureing It Out’

Shawn Mendes is once again tackling the ongoing, years-long rumors about his sexuality head on.

During a recent concert performance Monday night at Colorado’s Red Rocks Park and Amphitheater, the 26-year-old singer-songwriter took a moment to explicitly address ongoing speculation about his sexuality — and whether he’s actually straight.

“I was really young when I started. I was 15 years old,” Mendes told the audience at one point during his show, according to video from the event captured and shared by TikTok user @lewisiana. “I went straight into working a lot and traveling and it was the most beautiful thing, but the truth is I didn’t get to do a lot of 15-year-old things and discover parts of myself that you do at 15.”

Mendes continued:

“Since I was really young, there’s been something about my sexuality and people have been talking about it for so long. I think it’s kind of silly because I think sexuality is such a beautifully complex thing and it’s just so hard to say that. into boxes. It always felt like an intrusion on something very personal to me, something that I was discovering within myself, something that I hadn’t yet discovered.

Although this is far from the first time Mendes has addressed rumors and gossip (he has spoken about them in 20162018 and in 2019), this time around feels markedly different, with his latest speech likely being the most intimate he’s ever been in talking about his sexuality, saying he’s “yet to discover” parts of his identity that he still haven’t discovered yet.

And just earlier this month, during another concert appearance (this time in Woodstock, New York), Mendes sang about people asking if he “likes girls or boys” in his new song “The Mountain,” which is set to be released as part of his upcoming fifth studio album Shawn.

“Some days/I have a change of heart/You can say what you need to say/You can say I’m too young/You can say I’m too old/You can say I can like girls or boys, whatever suits you mold,’ he shouts on the field.

“I guess I’m just speaking freely now because I just want to be closer to everybody and kind of be in my truth. The real truth about my life and my sexuality is that I’m just figuring it out like everybody else.” Mendes can be heard saying later during his speech. “I don’t really know sometimes and I know other times. It feels really scary because we live in a society that has a lot to say about it and I try to be really brave and just allow myself to be a human and feel thing and that’s all I really want to say about it for now.