Kemo
06-23-2016, 08:26 PM
Former WWE Superstar Daniel Bryan spoke with The Daily World to promote his role as co-host of WWE’s new Cruiserweight Classic series, which premieres on the WWE Network Wednesday, July 13th.
Even though it’s been several months since his official retirement from the ring, it’s still difficult for him to embrace the fact that his in-ring career is over. He’s been at the WWE Performance Center this week meeting the Cruiserweight Classic competitors and will be calling the action at tonight’s CWC tapings from Full Sail, but says it’s “borderline painful” to be around wrestling.
“It has been good, but it is weird, because my life had been so busy before retirement.” he said. “Now, you have all of this extra space and time. Because I was forced into retirement and not wanting to retire, I have to keep my mind away from wrestling. It is borderline painful. OK, so how do you fill your mind when you have filled it with this one thing for so long?”
During his time away from active competition, Bryan has been keeping busy with new hobbies, including gardening, taking classes at Arizona State University and Olympic weightlifting.
Despite his efforts to move on, the reality of his situation has still not fully sunk in.
“I’ve experimented with gardening. I love it, but you don’t love it like that,” he said. “A part of my mind hasn’t accepted it. I wake up sometimes with dreams of wrestling. This literally happened to me (the night before the speech). I was in Las Vegas and I flew in. I woke up this morning from a dream where I was going to wrestle and I’m not. I have to remind myself at times.”
He’s moving on, but said he would “drop everything” and return to the ring if WWE ever called up him. “Realistically, no one should feel bad for me,” he said. “I am getting paid to figure out what I want to do. Who gets to do that?”
Even though it’s been several months since his official retirement from the ring, it’s still difficult for him to embrace the fact that his in-ring career is over. He’s been at the WWE Performance Center this week meeting the Cruiserweight Classic competitors and will be calling the action at tonight’s CWC tapings from Full Sail, but says it’s “borderline painful” to be around wrestling.
“It has been good, but it is weird, because my life had been so busy before retirement.” he said. “Now, you have all of this extra space and time. Because I was forced into retirement and not wanting to retire, I have to keep my mind away from wrestling. It is borderline painful. OK, so how do you fill your mind when you have filled it with this one thing for so long?”
During his time away from active competition, Bryan has been keeping busy with new hobbies, including gardening, taking classes at Arizona State University and Olympic weightlifting.
Despite his efforts to move on, the reality of his situation has still not fully sunk in.
“I’ve experimented with gardening. I love it, but you don’t love it like that,” he said. “A part of my mind hasn’t accepted it. I wake up sometimes with dreams of wrestling. This literally happened to me (the night before the speech). I was in Las Vegas and I flew in. I woke up this morning from a dream where I was going to wrestle and I’m not. I have to remind myself at times.”
He’s moving on, but said he would “drop everything” and return to the ring if WWE ever called up him. “Realistically, no one should feel bad for me,” he said. “I am getting paid to figure out what I want to do. Who gets to do that?”