I spoke to my parents and my agent a year before Rio. I was like: 'I don't want to do this. I want to get away.' They said: 'Just grit your teeth for a year. Then you can have your break. And if you want to retire, you can retire then.' I was in tears. I just hated it.
People say, 'Oh, so you should retire.' Yeah, you want me to retire so you won't get knocked out. I won't retire.
I just want to retire before I go senile because if I don't retire before I go senile, then I'll do more damage than good at that point.
I'm still a horse that can run. I may not be able to win the Derby, but what do you do when you retire? People retire and they vegetate. They go away and they dry up.
My coach keeps telling me to say I'm not going to retire. I should just go through the motions and see what I feel every year and see if I really want to do it, but personally, I want to do it, but my coach says just take your time, don't rush.
I don't go to shows because I just want to listen to the music performed live. I want to get to know the person who's performing it. Or I want to, like, take away a sense that I had an experience that nobody else is going to have again, or a unique experience for that moment.
Most people don't hold a job for 45 years. They pass on or want to retire. I don't want to retire. My real goal is to do 50 years on 'Sesame Street,' and I only got 4-and-a-half years to go.
I wanted to play characters that were going to make me better and really challenge me to raise my skill level up or that were just interesting to me personally. I want to be the best actor I can be, and I want to be the most creative actor I can be. I want to take on roles that will move the chain to where I finally want to go.
I want to retire here, man. The Suns gave me an opportunity to revive myself and why would I want to go anywhere?
I suppose you retire from trying. If you retire from trying, you think, "Maybe love will just come my way if I don't want it anymore."
In my situation, unlike some players who retire because they have no choice - either teams don't want them or injuries have caused them to retire, and they just can't do it - for me, I really had never thought I would give out mentally before I gave out physically, but I think that was the case.
When I retire, if people see me on the street and remember me, just give me a smile. That's all I want.
One of my favorite things is when I get letters and video messages from fans or people who have attended one of my workshops that say things like "because of your workshop, I finally have the confidence to go after my dream/love myself/have the strength not to listen to anyone telling me I can't do the things I really want to do!"
For me, to say I want to go to sleep and retire and prepare for my afterlife, I think that is very selfish.
What's great about things like Kickstarter is that it enables me, finally, and without any bad feeling at all, when people come up to me now saying, "I want to do this." I can just go, "There are no excuses anymore."
I enjoy the competition and the process of learning as we compete. The whole thing is just fascinating. I don't know what I'll do when I retire. When I go sailing, I look around ... anyone want to race? I just love competing as opposed to just going out and watching the sunset.