The Rock can't be a rock sometimes.
Dwayne Johnson, the pro wrestler turned big screen
actor whose bicep alone is probably bigger than your
entire upper body, reveals in a candid interview with
The Hollywood Reporter (June 27 issue) that he's had
his fair share of struggles in the past—from getting
into trouble with the law as a teenager to getting
kicked out of his home at 14 to being dumped as a
professional football player—and Johnson admits it
ultimately led to depression.
"I didn't want to do a thing," he recalled. "I didn't want
to go anywhere. I was crying constantly. Eventually
you reach a point where you are all cried out."
After attempting to overcome numerous obstacles as
a young boy, The Rock decided to turn things around,
and at 18, he won a full football scholarship to the
University of Miami and was ecstatic when he was the
only freshman chosen to play, something very rare in
college football.
However, he began to sustain multiple injuries and
ended up dropping out of school without even taking
his midterms. Johnson saw himself going into a
downward spiral again, until his coach called and set
him straight. "He says, 'Get your ass in a car and
come back right now.' He was so embarrassed and
pissed. It's one thing when you go through an injury
and depression. It's another when you walk away and
say, 'F— it.' "
The Rock went back to school and continued to dream
of playing for the NFL. Unfortunately, when the draft
came, he wasn't picked. He went on to get signed by
the Canadian Football League's Calgary Stampeders,
which was far less luxurious than what he pictured in
his mind, but it was something.
Until—yes, more unfortunate news—his coach told
him he was being cut. "You hear the words you never
want to hear as a player: 'Coach wants to see you.
Bring your playbook,' " said Johnson "There was no
injury. It's just, 'That's it. You're not good enough.'
That was very sobering."
That's when his second round of depression crept
back in. "The dreams I had, they're dashed," he
explained. "There is no more football. My relationship
was crushed. That was my absolute worst time...I
looked in my pocket, and I had seven bucks. Wow.
Seven bucks to my name."
However, all of Johnson's hardships is what helped
mold him into the man he is today—an action star with
a lucrative career that's far beyond anything he could
have imagined (his films made a whopping $1.3 billion
last year alone!).
Now if that doesn't inspire you, we don't know what
will.
Johnson also opened up about the moment he found
out his Fast & Furious co-star Paul Walker passed
away from a fiery car crash.
"I was driving with Lauren [Hashian] when she
immediately turned very quiet and was looking at me,
studying, wondering if I knew," he recalled of that
November day.
"I pulled over and looked at my messages and had a
moment where I just caught my breath. We said a
prayer right then to give his daughter strength—
because we had talked about our daughters. That's
what we would talk about. Both of us were divorced,
and we talked about the power of being a dad and the
strong connection of a dad and his girl. Then once we
got home, we started bawling."
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