Disability is articulated as a struggle, an unnecessary burden that one must overcome to the soundtrack of a string crescendo. But disabled lives are multi-faceted - brimming with personality, pride, ambition, love, empathy, and wit.
I wasn't put on the Earth only to be an investor. That wasn't my only thing in life. The problem is that as you get good at something and you keep getting better at something, more and more people just know you as that, and they have you in that box.
As a person, I have a lot of different sides to me, and I genuinely just embrace them. I don't think, 'Oh, I gotta put on my cool face now!'
People who don't understand will try to label me as one or the other. I'm an athlete and a lot of people just have to come to terms with that. I do well in football, I do well in track. It is what it is.
I don't want to be labeled one thing. My main thing I care about is being able to create the things I want to do with my friends, whatever platform that is.
I think people sometimes have a hard time placing me because I don't fit into a box. When they ask what I do at a cocktail party, I either say I'm a Renaissance woman or I'm a high-level madam. Lately I've been more comfortable saying I'm an artist, because that can cover a lot of different things.
I'd like the audience to see different sides of me.
I don't want to be defined solely by what I do as a jazz musician at a club or a festival. That's not all of me. It's not even close.
The fifth member of my band is my non-profit work.
If you've built your identity only on your professional accolades and awards, what is going to be left of your legacy when those trophies tarnish and those records get broken? The Great Ones understand the importance of being well-rounded.
I don't want to be identified by any one role I do.
I've realized that it's important to stop trying to think I'm any one thing. People are confused as to their identity and try to cling to one aspect of that identity to describe what they are: American, Republican, Muslim. These are really incomplete.
I'd say I'm a pretty intense person. I'm definitely not my Denise character on 'Scrubs,' nor my Jane character on 'Happy Endings,' but I'm a mix of the two. I really feel that I'm kind of every character that I've ever played; it's just a part of me. And I am a bit of a control freak like Jane. I'm very, perhaps, obsessive like that.
