Fighting can put you in a dark place, giving back helps put you back into the light

I have spent my whole fighting career harming people; it is what I do for a living. Now I want to balance things out and help people. I am finding that balance. 

Yes, I still compete, and I still love the competition, but I don’t wish harm on the other person. I need to find that balance in my life. Otherwise you get left with dark feelings after a fight, especially if you see you have done damage to someone. 

I am a personal adviser for children who are leaving care, helping them figure out independent living. A lot of them are coming from war-torn countries like Afghanistan and Syria and they have a lot of trauma, post-traumatic stress, and they need encouragement.

I have always done mentoring work with autistic children, and that’s something I am passionate about. One of my qualities is being able to listen to, and understand people, and how their minds work. We are all on a different frequency; no one is ever the same, so if you expect everyone to behave the same then you are never going to be able to understand somebody. 

Some of the children I work with have come into the country illegally, but you can’t just reject people. 

I work with ten to twenty cases at a time, providing pathway plans, assessing mental health, their social life, and education – I try to make all the things easily available to us, available to them. 

No one seeks immigration by fleeing their native country unless life is really bad. They are fleeing because they are fearful, and that often comes from experiences they have had. 

Relating, observing, and listening….

I never grew up like that.

I’ve never feared for my life. I’ve not had to be on the run. 

But, I can relate in the sense I was a loner growing up. I was the only brown kid in my area. I went to a predominantly white school. That made me a target. The difference was, I was big. But, that meant I would attract the bullies from older years. 

Looking back I appreciate it, because it toughened me. It also taught me to take a stand, because not everyone is the same. 

You need to take a step back from all situations and observe. Observe people and try to understand why they are the way they are. 

A lot of these kids are angry, they are so angry. But they don’t understand why. It’s best to ask the questions and let them unfold. I don’t want to tell people why they are struggling – I want them to tell me why. That way they are fixing themselves. I can be a nice gentle influence, through what I have done in sport.

There was a time I was just living in my car. But I had a dream. I had nowhere to live, I had fallen out with my family. A friend of mine had a gym where he let me shower every day, but I had nowhere to live. I had no money and I had to build myself. 

Today you see my accomplishments, and you see the young people I work with getting inspired. They think they can achieve things too. It gives them hope to do something instead of sitting there and being a victim – because that’s too easy.

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Bullied from a young age, I had to fight

I could have been that victim myself, but I have always had that little spark in there. When I was in school, maybe year seven before I started playing basketball I was a little chubby kid with long curly hair, and I genuinely had to get tough. Coming in every day kids would be picking on me, wanting to fight me. 

They would come outside my house and spray graffiti outside my front door. 

I had to start hitting people. 

My mum would tell me if anyone gave me shit I should just hit them. I thought I’d get in trouble but she told me I wouldn’t be in trouble with her – she gave me the green light. 

I was always the one who would fight for my friends, defending them from bullies, and getting into scraps helping out other people. But I was never a bully myself. 

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Leaving my basketball dream behind, but taking the lessons I learned from Kobe

There was a time when basketball was the only thing I ever wanted. I was obsessed. 

I was a good player and had won a competition in the UK and the winner got to visit the facility where the LA Lakers trained. The development coach there at the time came over and seemed to just like me and we stayed in contact. I emailed him saying I wanted a shot at my dream. He told me if I was ever in LA to give him a shout. So that’s what I did. 

I went to LA, and emailed him again. No reply. This went on for days so I just ended up going down and waiting outside the Lakers’ training facility. Two or three days I waited. The team wasn’t training because it was the off-season, but eventually I saw a guy I recognised, told him my story and he took me inside. I told them I was good enough and that I wanted a chance. I ended up staying there the whole summer. 

Every day was so good. I learned I was more than good enough to be in the NBA – but no one knew who I was, I was just this kid from England. No one cared. 

I was offered a place on the development team with the chance to be called up, but the money didn’t make it possible. 

When that didn’t happen, I made the decision I was done with basketball and had to find something else. I didn’t waste time, and moved on. It was an instantaneous decision. I knew it was right to leave that part of my life behind. That was my dream, and I got myself as far as I could, and I was proud of that because I knew there was nothing else I could have done. I was 26 then, there was no point in me pursuing something I knew deep down wasn’t going to happen. 

I knew I had to put my passion and skill into something else and that’s when I picked up fighting. 

One thing I will take away from that summer, is the opportunity to meet and play with Kobe Bryant. I was absolutely gutted when I heard of his death earlier this year. 

I watched him as a young player. I wanted the Kobe boots. I idolised him. 

I only played a couple of games with him, but it was enough to see that he took everything really seriously, even practice games. You have to be serious about your practice and training. It gives you that aggression and mindset you need at the top level.