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What are you doing now and how has wrestling helped you forge a new career?
When I got into the wrestling business I pursued it like anything else in my life, as a goal. I knew while I was paying my dues, and working the small independent territories, that I had something different.
I had a physique that was different to other people's and I knew if I wrapped that in a colourful, vivid and intense character it would work.
When I finally reached the ultimate goal, no pun intended, of fighting Hogan at WrestleMania VI, I was already starting to look beyond the ring.
As Ultimate Warrior was evolving as a character, I was also evolving and maturing as a man.
At that point, Vince McMahon had a really unique opportunity to be an incredible mentor for me, but instead he revealed himself to be unethical and unprofessional.
I didn't quite understand it at the time, that's why I came back twice and gave him the benefit of the doubt, but in 1996 it showed its full ugly face.
At that point I had already taken entrepreneurial steps and thought about how I could use the investment I'd made in Ultimate Warrior outside the ring.
I used some of the success I'd had from professional wrestling to invest in myself, and I went on a self-learning journey and became interested in the great books of the western world and all the great philosophers.
Part of that was building a speaking career, giving talks at schools and colleges about using your mind not muscle.
To have done something so intense and physical like wrestling, that left an impression on people that still stays today, and then to use my brain in the same way – I said "this is where my new career lies".
That's what I've been doing for the last five or six years, and it's been very successful.
The question every wrestling journalist gets asked without fail is "will Ultimate Warrior ever wrestle again?" So what it would take for you to make a comeback to the WWE?
I'd need to have a crystal ball and know exactly how things would play out. If I was to come back I'd need complete control over my character. And that's never going to happen.
Aside from what you watch on television, there's a whole part of the wrestling business in which you need to conduct your business.
In other words, when you get to a certain level you have to protect your character so it's not destroyed.
There are so many ways the political part of the business can do that, if you don't protect yourself.
It's not a far reach to say that every person who has ever left the WWE of their own accord but then went and cowered back to Vince, he has used them and totally eaten them up.
That's the way he operates, and there's just no way I can go back to the WWE.
Especially with the creative direction of cultural degeneration they've been on in the last five or six years.
It's not an easy thing for me to say that I'll never go back - because I do miss the money, success and thrill of the business – but that's the truth.
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What about returning to the ring for another federation, maybe WWE's American rival group NWA:TNA run by Jeff and Jerry Jarrett?
When NWA:TNA first got off the ground, Jeff Jarrett and his dad did contact me.
But they spoke to me like I was chomping at the bit to get back into the ring and all they had to do was set the match up and I'd show up for free!
Also they were talking in circles and didn't want to get to the point of what they wanted to do with me.
I represent myself and know what is going on business-wise and just how much The Ultimate Warrior is worth. There's only one other personality in the business who has the same price tag, and that's Hulk Hogan.
I get contacted about coming back all the time – mostly from couch potatoes who can operate a remote and think that makes them a promoter – but they're not even on the page when it comes meeting my terms.
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If the offer was right and you were given the control to develop your character, are you still in physical shape to wrestle?
It would take a huge investment on my part to get back into the ring.
Physical fitness and staying in shape is something I've been doing since I was 12-years-old, so based on an historical perspective I could probably wrestle for seven or eight more years.
But I couldn't just step back in the ring next week, I'd need to make a six-month commitment to going back.
I'd be an absolute idiot who should be put to death if I was still running around ready to go in the ring right now, at this very moment, like that was important to me.
We can only hope, for our sanity, that when people get to a certain age they grow up.
So I'm not like some of the idiots I used to work with who never grew up and ended up dying in cheap motel rooms doing dirty drugs.
These guys are dropping dead for the very simple reason that when you're in your 20s you can get away with doing certain things, but when you're 45-years-old you're taking a big risk that your body can't handle.
I don't have any sympathy for them. I'm not doing it and I think people are disappointed in that. The funny thing is if I had ended up a bum then I think I'd be better appreciated for what I achieved.
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Do you think the fact that you've not come out of retirement, like almost every other star from your era, makes Ultimate Warrior a more enduring character?
Yeah, I really do. And if I decided to come back, I would never do it like Roddy Piper did last year. He was out of shape, but could get away with it a little bit because physique was never his thing.
If I come back, I've got to be razor sharp or people will frown on it, and that's the last memory they'll ever have of me.
It's not easy for high-profile athletes to move on, but it's something that our society needs them to do, because they have large audiences they can help.
Nobody can doubt that Hulk Hogan is the white tiger of the wrestling business - it would never have got to where it is if it wasn't for him – but tell me one important thing he's said as a 50-year-old man.
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Do you still watch wrestling?
I haven't watched any wrestling since I left in 1998, I've not even caught it flicking through the channels.
But I hear a lot about it, through people writing to me and letting me know what is going on.
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Feme Sole: you can work at subway
Feme Sole: and give me free hoagies
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