My dad's half-Lebanese, my mom is full Lebanese. I'm three-quarters Lebanese. Irish-Lebanese.
Tom ShadyacAs I "won," I didn't feel the fruits of that. I felt the fruits when I served others, when I gave myself away. . . . I've always seen my life as an experiment. I just want to go to what works. As I felt the charity aspect in my life, the giving aspect, I felt a power and I've walked more into that.
Tom ShadyacTRUTH: When a child believes he must win to be worthy, when young adults define themselves by what they do and not who they are, it is a kind of slavery a slave master would envy.
Tom ShadyacIf you bounce a tennis ball against a wall it will come back to you the same way every time. But if you shift the wall a few degrees it will come back another way.
Tom ShadyacI wasn't big in the party scene but I did have an excessive lifestyle. I had much more than I needed. I think that was a manifestation of a certain kind of mental illness.
Tom ShadyacNature is very clear on this. In fact, there's one fundamental law that all of nature obeys that mankind breaks everyday. Now this is a law that's evolved over billions of years and the law is this: nothing in nature takes more than it needs. A redwood tree doesn't take all of the soil's nutrients, just what it needs to grow. A lion doesn't kill every gazelle, just one. We have a term for something in the body when it takes more than its share. We call it cancer.
Tom Shadyac