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A lot of my personality was informed by feeling very different in the world I grew up in, feeling that I didn't fully belong, that my parents didn't belong.

When I was growing up, I wasn't taught how to feel or communicate feelings.

Since being quite young, I've had a very strong sense of independence and survival. As a child, I was on my own two feet emotionally.

When I was younger - up until I was 19 years old and in college - I was surrounded with people in high school who felt like they knew what they wanted to do with their lives, and that was intimidating to me because I didn't.

My parents were intelligent and encouraging, but at the same time, they were displeased at me becoming a wandering troubadour and wire walker.

At school, I felt out of place. I was bullied. I would think, 'These kids don't like me, they don't accept me,' but I felt like in the entertainment industry, I would fit in.

In my late 20s, I realized that I had a very clear social conscience and strong opinions about things like diversity, equality, and education, and while I tried to become more politically literate, I just couldn't catch on. It felt like I had walked into a movie that had already started, and no one would explain what had happened.

My childhood was bittersweet in many ways. We moved around a lot. By the time I was 10, I had travelled thousands of miles, often on my own. My parents were like my friends, so it felt like I didn't really have parents at all. But in a crazy way that was very liberating. It forced me to be independent, maybe a leader, and certainly a survivor.

The remoteness of my parents from the schools, so unfashionable today, was often painful for me, but I learned early to deal with an outside and sometimes hard world.