A Quote by Eve Ensler
When I was younger I felt very disempowered, very disappeared. I felt worthless, like I had no right to exist. I think a good part of my life was spent recovering from that. Pulling myself out of that.
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Actually when I was wounded and recovering in Japan. I went to church there and I remember on the air base where their hospital was, I remember coming out of that church and feeling like I had been - at that point I just felt very, very close to God and that I'd done the right thing with my life. And I knew I wasn't going back to Vietnam. I just knew I wasn't going back.
Then I realized what separated us: what I thought about him could not reach him; it was psychology, the kind they write about in books. But his judgment went through me like a sword and questioned my very right to exist. And it was true, I had always realized it; I hadn't the right to exist. I had appeared by chance, I existed like a stone, a plant or a microbe. My life put out feelers towards small pleasures in every direction. Sometimes it sent out vague signals; at other times I felt nothing more than a harmless buzzing.
I tried to be really tough when I was younger. I felt I had to stand up for myself. I never felt like I fit in.
One of the first roles I had on stage was with a brilliant director in a brilliant play with a brilliant cast, but I just couldn't find my way into the heart of the character. I found myself straining a lot. When it started. I felt lost. That was the Eugène Ionesco play Rhinoceros. I don't think I was prepared for that. I don't think I had the full tool kit to do it justice. It's a very difficult play, it's an extraordinarily difficult part, and I never felt I really got it right. Far from it. To a degree, Hamlet was the same.
The kind of person I find myself interested in is a cross between being very emotionally complex and very immature. That's what I felt I was like when I was younger.
So I felt like I had to become a better person, a better man when it comes to my life and everything I have done and will do. I had to figure that part out myself. When it came to the way I was thinking, it was all about, 'Oh, make this play, get these stats, get these accolades.' I felt like that's what was important, and that's never true.
I never felt like a boy or a girl, never felt I should wear this or dress like that. I think that's where that confidence comes from because I never felt I had to play a part in my life. I just always come as Shamir.
What it felt to me was like the dissolution of my idea of myself. I felt like separateness evaporated. I felt this tremendous sense of oneness. I'm quite an erratic thinker, quite an adrenalized person, but through meditation, I found this beautiful serenity and selfless connection. My tendency towards selfishness, I felt that kind of exposed as a superficial and pointless perspective to have. I felt very relaxed, a sense of oneness. I felt love.
I felt very maternal around eight months. And I thought I couldn't become any more until I saw the baby... But it happened during my labor because I had a very strong connection with my child. I felt like when I was having contractions, I envisioned my child pushing through a very heavy door. And I imagined this tiny infant doing all the work, so I couldn't think about my own pain... We were talking. I know it sounds crazy, but I felt a communication.
I felt totally myself, nothing like the emptiness and horrible feeling I had then [pulling out the Olympics] - no dizziness.
I felt very honored, and I knew that people would be watching very closely, and I felt it was very, very important that I do a good job.
I felt a certain modicum of success because I had been paid well to be an actor for the first time in my life, but I felt like I had done adolescent work on the show, and stepping into the New York theater arena was the first time I felt like I'd come into my own. I felt like I was proving myself in a gladiatorial arena.
My middle name really is perseverance. I've always believed that I had talent, even when I felt like a very inferior sort of person, which I spent a lot of time living my life feeling that I wasn't worthy. But even then I knew that I had something special, and maybe that's what it takes. Maybe people need to have that kind of particular core driving them. But I felt I had talent.
For younger athletes - women, especially, if it's a male-dominated sport - I'd say be very careful to just be true to yourself. I spent a lot of time trying to emulate how a male wrestler was. They're tough, they're very confident, they don't show a lot of emotion, and they push through everything. That's not me at all. I'm a wrestler but I have emotions, I'm sensitive. When I stopped trying to be something that I wasn't, I felt like I was freeing myself up to find ways to make it work for myself.
Why had I wasted all my time pretending to be someone I wasn't? I was tired, so very, very tired of standing on my own brakes. I felt...right. I felt free.
I've never felt limited by my circumstances, no matter what they were. Even when I was living in Iowa, it wasn't like I had big dreams, but it wasn't that I felt I couldn't have any. I always felt very capable.
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