In some ways the ACL tear was a blessing. I had hesitated to return to elite gymnastics after the 2008 Olympics. I told myself I had already accomplished so much, and the road was just going to get harder if I continued.
I'm a chamaleon, ever-changing, always evolving, and eager for the next phase of metamorphosis. This is me, imperfections, inconsistencies, passion, and desires. I make myself happen, because if I didn't you can be damned sure nobody else would.
If I reveal myself without worrying about how others will respond, then some will care, though others may not. But who can love me, if no one knows me? I must risk it, or live alone.
All my life, in nameless, indeterminate ways, I'd tried to complete my life with someone else--first my father, then Hugh, even Whit, and I didn't want that anymore. I wanted to belong to myself.
Raising myself and caring for my brothers and sisters allowed me the benefit of a lot of information that I wouldn't have otherwise gotten. I had to be frugal, thoughtful, resourceful. I didn't have anyone to tell me, 'You can't.'
I've always had this nightmare of going back to the Kingdome and seeing myself waddle in bald, overweight, with a big belly hanging over my belt, and I just imagine people going, 'That's Steve Largent?'
I made an instant connection with boxing right away. Boxing became such a part of me. I ate boxing, I slept boxing, I lived boxing. Boxing was a way of expressing myself because I was not that outspoken.
Yeah, you know, if I'm having an emotional scene I do like to go off and be by myself; not to say that I'm a method actor or anything like that, but for scenes like that that are more emotional, I do like to take that night off and not be so social.
The real joy is in constructing a sentence. But I see myself as an actor first because writing is what you do when you are ready and acting is what you do when someone else is ready.
When I buy a Nikon camera, I have no tolerance for the instructions. I'm ready to make some mistakes using it and get some bad pictures back until I've figured it out for myself.
You have to wonder at times what you're doing out there. Over the years, I've given myself a thousand reasons to keep running, but it always comes back to where it started. It comes down to self-satisfaction and a sense of achievement.
I have done, this year, what I said I would: overcome my fear of facing a blank page day after day, acknowledging myself, in my deepest emotions, a writer, come what may.
My parents taught me the way to deal with being picked on was to be compassionate. I had to defend myself physically, but I had to be compassionate and understand the position of those abusing me. I had to figure it out and then rise above it.
I dream that one day I would be a published writer and people would read my books - if not, I would be living in the mountains in a small hut, near a pond where swans swim, writing a diary for myself.
I was a hacker of sorts. Not a mind 'reader,' exactly; more a mind 'radar,' in tune with the workings of the aether. I could sense the nuances of dreamscapes and rogue spirits. Things outside myself. Things the average voyant wouldn't feel.
There are lots of things, including changing the kind of inner dialog, that can mitigate anxiety. And yes, there are people who have the glass half full and glass half empty, and I'm afraid the glass is going to break and I'll cut myself on the shard...
To be very honest, I cannot drape a saree myself. I have never draped one on my own, ever. But it has been done on me so many times, that now I have memorised all the steps, and if someone challenges me, I will surely be able to do it.
I've been offered 'Celebrity Fit Club', where you have to take off your shirt and get on a scale. I got kids, man. I'm not going to humiliate myself. I'd rather drive a cab.
She wisely reasoned that my chosen husband was no ordinary man, that his whole life was absolutely dedicated to God and His service, ad that I must never, never hinder him by trying to put myself first in his heart.
Sometimes, I get afraid it has defined me, that sense of grief, loss and illness. But actually, it is about allowing myself to take hold and say: 'This is part of who I am, but not only who I am.'
Even as a college professor at Carnegie Mellon and Stanford, I saw myself as an entrepreneur, and I went out, took risks, and tried to invent new things, such as participating in the DARPA Grand Challenge and working on self-driving cars.
