My Life in WordsEverything interesting I do, I write about here.
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I have had many acting experiences over the past ten years, but perhaps my favourite to date is a music video which was shot back in early 2012.
It was produced by Tall Man Short Man Films, and was an entry for a music video competition by leading band Mona run through Genero TV, my role was the lead male actor, and to say the least it was a bit of a whirlwind experience, Tall Man Short Man Films Jamie Korn messaged me out of the blue looking for a male lead, stating that the shoot was in two days. I presently have no use of my left hand, and have only extremely limited use of my right hand. To cut a long story short on how this happened, in 2008 I suffered a partial tear in the scapholunate ligament of my right wrist.
I was supposed to have a full repair job done on the ligament, however, at the last minute it was decided to first remove some ganglion cysts which had formed as a result of the tear. The reason being the ligament repair surgery did not have a good success rate. Over the years I have acted in a number of things, from short films, to theatre productions, to music videos to TV series and even to feature films.
That sounds much better than it is of course, the short films were just local amateur projects, most of my own making, the theatre productions were local and small scale, the music videos were also local and small-scale, the TV series was extra work as was the feature film. I’m a big fan of bodybuilding, I suspect it was Arnold Schwarzenegger films that got me into it, perhaps Jean-Claude Van Damme as well and Sylvester Stallone. Needless to say I’m a big fan of 80s and 90s action films. But also I’m a big wrestling fan, and grew up watching Shawn Michaels, Stone Cold Steve Austin, The Rock, The Undertaker and all the others from the attitude era battling it out with their monster physiques.
But it was not just seeing these Goliaths on film and TV battling it out that got me into the gym, it was also my experiences at school. I was a tall and superslim teen, and was bullied frequently as a result. Therefore seeing these Goliaths on TV gave me the idea that if I looked like that no one would ever be able to bully me again. If all humans died tomorrow, would the world stop spinning, the sun stop shining, the stars stop lighting the night? No, in the grand scheme of nature and the universe, not even an eyelid would be battered. Life only matters because we choose to make it matter. Remember that, and remember that you, and you alone get to choose what is important in life.
And you don't make this choice through your words or thoughts, you make it through your actions. For me I believe family is the most important thing, which is why I spend more time with family than anyone else, and I love writing, which is why I spend more time writing than anything else. I always find when you say the words male model, people for some reason think a man getting naked and sitting in the middle of a room being painted by women in an art class. Either that or they think of Zoolander – if you haven’t seen the film, I can’t recommend it enough, Ben Stiller at his very best.
That is not the type modelling I’ve done though I did most often seem to have my top off. This blog was my first foray into the writing world, and I set it up by chance a 2008 while studying a degree in finance and investment management. I needed some inspiration to keep me researching the stock market, and this became that inspiration. I would post all my research and analysis on the companies listed on the stock markets.
The most successful and followed part of my blog was 'Gray's Stocks to Watch', where I posted the names of the stocks and shares that were of most interest to me, when the prices were of most interest to me, along with blog posts in which I explained my reasoning. I started my journey as a writer back in 2008. I was studying Finance & Investment Management at Northumbria University, and as part of that I set up an investment blog where I would write up company reports and offer my thoughts and opinions on the investment world.
The blog ended up gaining quite a big following, with thousands of views per article. Because of this, I was invited to become a contributor on Stockopedia -- a renowned investment website – which further increased my readership numbers. |