Justin Bieber has made quite the reputation for himself over the past few years of being, well, not the most well behaved young man out there. The pop star has been in trouble multiple times for causing noise disturbances in his neighborhood, has been caught drinking underage while drag racing, was arrested for an ATV accident in Canada, charged with vandalism in Brazil, has been charged for egging a home and causing thousands of dollars worth of damage, was allegedly involved in the attack of a limo driver, and has been accused of urinating in the mop bucket at a restaurant, for starters.

Now Bieber has spoken out in claims that he is not really that person at all, and is making efforts to apologize for his poor behavior. He recently made an appearance on the Ellen DeGeneres Show, which was one of the first television appearances he has made in quite some time. His claims were bold, but heartfelt and hinted at a lot of change.

“I didn’t want to come off arrogant or conceited, or basically how I’ve been acting the past year, year and a half. I’m not who I was pretending to be,” he said.

“[O]ften we pretend to be something we’re not as a cover up of what we’re truly feeling inside. And there was a lot of feelings going on in there. Just being young and growing up in this business is hard. Just growing up in general is hard.”

Bieber joined Ellen for the show on her birthday and brought along some flowers and a package of Calvin Klein underwear as an echo of his recent ad campaign. Bieber stripped down and posed in his skivvies for the company. The photographs have been suspected of a bit of creative photoshopping, but for once that scandal does not belong to Bieber himself.

Bieber has an upcoming Comedy Central roast on March 7, so perhaps he has become a bit self reflective in preparation for it. Whoever is roasting him will certainly have plenty of material to go with.

Bieber also posted a video on Facebook after the talk on Ellen’s show further discussing his desire to move on and be able to make light of some the incidents in his past.

“I just felt awkward up there. I felt like people were judging me, and I really want people to know how much I care, how much I care about people, and how I’m not that person to say, ‘I don’t give a f*ck,’ you know? I’m not that kid. I’m a person who genuinely cares. And although what’s happened in the past has happened, I just want to make the best impression on people and be kind and loving and gentle and soft. And although people can call me a ‘softy,’ that’s how my mom raised me,” he said.

If the pop star really wants to change, he certainly has time on his side. Bieber is still barely an adult at only 20 years old.