I didn't want to escape my life and become a big actress and live my dreams. That was never the way it was; it was just these amazing opportunities that happened.
I've been able to not only fulfill my dreams and become a world champion, but there's been so many different opportunities that just blow my mind and opportunities that I never thought I'd have.
When you're a Black actress, the box that we often get put in is so small. And me being a dark-skinned Black actress, the opportunities become so limited in a way that is just wrong. It's not fair. I'm so capable of playing a wide variety of roles. It comes down to whether or not I'm given the opportunity to do it.
I believe that you can experience very profound moments of change in life...I never would have become an actress if I hadn't dropped out of high school. As a teenager, I was so driven to pursue my dreams that I made a decision to quit school at 17 so I could find my voice as an actress and eventually the profession embraced me.
It's never too late to think big. Widen your horizons. Look beyond your normal limits. See things in a larger picture. Consider the next step. The flow-on effect. Opportunities will become evident. Motivations will become clear. Perspective will emerge. One must live the way one thinks or end up thinking the way one has lived
I made a decision at some point to live a nontraditional life. I've become like, the opposite of a consumer. I just want freedom. I don't want stuff. I don't want clutter. I just want to be able to move freely. I want to be good to the people I love. But I don't want stuff. I just want, you know, love and big ideas.
Even in losing my mother, beautiful, amazing awakenings have happened within my family. Of course, losing her is not what you want. The things that happened after her death, she would be so just beside herself with joy that life turned out that way.
I absolutely don't relate to being beaten down my whole life - I had amazing opportunities at a young age - but there is still in many, many people's minds the notion that I'll never be able to escape Harry Potter.
I can't say that I wanted to be an actress, it just happened along the way. I did not even know that I would be doing modelling but that also just happened.
It is good that life never fulfils your dreams - it always goes on disposing, in a way. It gives you a thousand and one opportunities to be frustrated so that you can understand that expectations are not good and dreams are futile and desires are never fulfilled. Then you drop desiring, you drop dreaming, you drop proposing. Suddenly you are back home and the treasure is there.
You live a third of your life when you dream. So you may as well live in your dreams ? the way you want to be living. The way you want to be.
I do not know if I really am a big star. And in fact that is not the most important thing for me. What counts in life is to bring about more of your own dreams. In such a way that your life becomes like a fairy tale. This is what has happened to me, it is just like that.
One of the amazing things we have been given as humans is the unquenchable desire to have dreams of a better life, and the ability to establish goals to live out those dreams.
Since I learned the secret and started applying it to my life, my life has truly become magical. I think the kind of life that everybody dreams of is one I live on a day to day basis. I live in a four-and-a-half-million-dollar mansion. I have a wife to die for. I get to vacation in all the fabulous spots of the world. I've climbed mountains. I've explored. I've been on safaris. And all of this happened and continues to happen, because of knowing how to apply The Secret.
Rich dad said it this way, 'Big people have big dreams and small people have small dreams. If you want to change who you are, begin by changing the size of your dreams.'
I play to the best of my abilities and am thankful for the many opportunities and amazing success He has given me. Through it all, I want to do right, not make mistakes, and live a life that is pleasing to Him.
Sports have an amazing way of banding people together from all walks of life, building relationships that would have never happened.