I had a job when I was 10. I started living on my own when I was 17 or 18. I've earned my own money; I've traveled the world. What would I rebel against?
I was in a band till I was about 17; then I went to television, and I spent seven years doing that. When I came to Seattle, I started to audition for things. The passion's always there, and that's what's been the hard thing: to fit that passion into a normal life. You can't do it. You can't have a normal life and pursue this dream.
I started being a photographer because I liked fashion. I liked the idea of dressing up and changing my look. I got earrings, dyed my hair. I would dress like a fashion photo.
When I started windsurfing, it was a hobby, and I enjoyed the lifestyle. Then it became an Olympic dream. Now I've achieved that with a medal. I just feel so lucky.
I started angel investing because I like hanging out with entrepreneurs.
I used to fly around quite a bit, you know? I took a lot of unnecessary chances on the highways. And I started racing, and now I drive on the highways, I'm extra cautious because no one knows what they're doing half the time. You don't know what this guy is going to do or that one.
When I started acting, one of the first things I learned was - especially in Hollywood - was branding. I'm a tall guy. I'm like, 'Yeah, that's probably going to be my foot in the door,' because that's my impression on everybody. I'm an athletic guy, and I think, because I grew up disliking jocks so much, that became, like, the character for me.
I did Alan Ball's 'Five Women Wearing the Same Dress,' and then he put me in 'American Beauty.' Everything started to happen from all the years I put into the theater in New York City, and working, and having great parents who supported me through that.
When I started out, it was rare to see elected representatives with foreign roots. Often, I was relegated to my origins, put in the diversity box: 'You're the new face of diversity.' That annoyed me because I always felt French, and suddenly I was being made to feel I wan't as French as others.
I started my blog in 2002. That was pre-MySpace, pre-Facebook. That was back before newspapers realized they were going out of business. That was back when no one gave any credence to Internet writers.
The day after my high school graduation in 1952, I headed to Alaska. I was 17. I started out greasing equipment, then became a heavy-crane operator. I made and saved good money there for two years.
I started dancing because of Janet Jackson.
I used to skip out of high school and go flying. It was just one of those things, I thought it was kind of a cool thing to do. I never thought about doing that as a profession, but I started checking things out and I found out there was a flight school down in Daytona Beach, called Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University.
I have four older siblings and one younger, and all three of my brothers are in the music industry. My dad was really involved in music, too, with the disco, and he also started Radio Caroline and was the one who invented pirate radio, if you like, off on a coast in England on a boat.
When I first started talking about gay marriage, most people in the gay community looked at me as if I was insane or possibly a fascist reactionary.
I started a trial period a couple of weeks ago as a correspondent for 'Extra,' and now it's become full time.
Once everyone is connected to everyone and everything else, nothing matters anymore. If everyone in the world is your Facebook friend, then why have any Facebook friends at all? We're back where we started. The ultimate complexity is just another entropy.
I started out as an actor but now I act to fund my own productions. I've managed to separate my mindset.
When I started writing music on the guitar, it started off very folky because of my limited ability to play. It was slow, soft melodies. But then, as I got better on the guitar, I started exploring different sounds.
When I started Samhain, I remember a producer telling me that I had a real band now.
Not many people know this, but when Yes first started doing club dates back in 1968, '69, we did a few tracks from 'The Magic Garden' album in our set. We just loved the harmonies that the 5th Dimension had as well.
When I started, there weren't any arenas. There was football fields, but they would only hold three or four or five hundred people at the most... We played a lot of high school auditoriums and things like that - a lot of churches... but boy, it has changed.
Adventure travel existed before I started, I just didn't know it.
My dad was a theater actor, so he had an agent, and he brought me into his agency when I was maybe four years old. That was how I started. I started modeling, and it progressed from there.
In my little imperfect way, what I'm trying to do is understand the world. As a filmmaker, you realize as you get older that each film is part of a dialogue you're having with yourself. That started when I was working in documentaries. And in a way, I've never deviated from it.
I had heard that Robert Duvall was interested in doing 'Lonesome Dove,' and he's one of those actors with whom I'd work on any project. So I tracked down the script and started to bug the producer, Dyson Lovell, to get in there.
I started making my own short films as a way of being able to give myself something to do and to study my craft.
At art college, I started to do music and then painting and drawing - and that would have been my ideal life, to be an artist and be paid for it, to be able to create stuff. I realized it was difficult, but I don't know if I had the application for it.
When I first started submitting my work professionally - and we're talking years and years ago - I had no patience for editorial response times. I hated waiting to hear back from people, hated waiting to see my work in print.
I started this fight career with one objective. When I step inside a ring or an octagon, it is to beat the guy in front of me.
When I started painting 17 years ago, I never imagined that anyone would look at my work or buy my pieces. But now I do about 14 exhibitions each year.
I started writing because there's an absence of things I was familiar with or that I dreamed about. One of my senses of anger is related to this vacancy - a yearning I had as a teenager... and when I get ready to write, I think I'm trying to fill that.
Graphic design is a hobby that I started with back in 2010-2011, which I am still doing today. And because of that, I was able to design my own stuff and designed my own logo.
I started to use music almost like a therapist, where it's like, everything that I don't really dare to say or speak about, I can sing about.
I went back to the States and started at a small newspaper in Riverside County, California, covering the police; I was making $280 a week covering the police.
My parents started a business out of the living room of our home and, 30-plus years later, it was a multimillion dollar company. So, President Obama, with all due respect, don't tell me that my parents didn't build their business.
