AceShowbiz - Katy Perry fell into a deep depression after her Witness album flopped last year (17).

The pop star tells Vogue Australia the public's reaction to her fifth record, which featured the tracks Swish Swish and Bon Appetit, left her heartbroken - and led to some serious soul searching.

"I have had bouts of situational depression and my heart was broken last year because, unknowingly, I put so much validity in the reaction of the public, and the public didn't react in the way I had expected to," Perry tells the publication.

First look: @katyperry covers Vogue Australia's August 2018 issue. Read the cover story here where Perry talks her career, meeting the Pope and protecting her relationship with Orlando Bloom: https://t.co/GggPFWl7RMpic.twitter.com/X0Ini3QWNA

— Vogue Australia (@vogueaustralia) 17 July 2018

The low prompted Katy to seek help and counselling at the Hoffman Institute in San Rafael, California, where she felt recharged and re-energised.

"Essentially and metaphorically, we are all computers, and sometimes we adopt these viruses via our parents or via the nurture that we are given or not given growing up," she explains. "These toxic tendencies can start to play out in our behaviour, in our adult patterns, in our relationships."

Katy was so impressed with the treatment she received at the Hoffman Institute, she has started handing out gift certificates to friends, urging them to seek help there when they need a breakthrough in life or a mind makeover.

And she admits the biggest breakthrough she had was realising she didn't have to be an emotional wreck to be a successful singer and songwriter.

"The biggest lie that we've ever been sold is that we, as artists, have to stay in pain to create," the I Kissed a Girl singer shares.