Punishment for doing your job well is an unparalleled professional pressure.

My breadth of football experience, my injury history, and my all-or-nothing goal to become one of the best linebackers in the NFL, combined with all I'd been learning about the game's neurological effects on the brain, convinced me I'd be wise in choosing another career.

I couldn't really justify playing for money, and I think what I wanted to achieve put me at too great a risk, so I just decided on another profession.

Folks who blithely disregard the benefits of football likely haven't played or are being intellectually dishonest. The game, perhaps more than any other, requires absolute dedication and teamwork. Yes, I ultimately quit, and if I ever have a son, he won't play, but I'll always cherish the lessons I learned from football.

I was doing well in TV as a freelance cameraman, but it wasn't the direction I wanted to go in. I directed videos and tried to put something cinematic in every one. Dialogue, action sequences, helicopter, Steadicam.

There's not really a choice about, am I going to pursue a typical career? Because I'm not the typical standard, so that's not even an option.

Jhalak Dikhhla Jaa 6' was the turning point in my career.

I think writing is a part-time career, because otherwise you get a little stale, maybe even self-indulgent, when you have to fill the hours with sentences. I don't think, if I wrote 12 hours a day, my work would be much better.