Athletics was just a way of changing the view people in the township had of disability, and especially my deformity. I realised that everyone who does any form of sport respects somebody who runs fast and jumps high. So I decided that I'm going to be the person who runs fast or jumps high, regardless of my ability or natural inclination or talent.

In the beginning, I felt defeated by the looks I was getting, but I had a massive amount of support from my mother, my gran and my uncles who basically told me that everyone looks weird. Mine was just a weirdness of a different kind.

There was a steep hill at my gran’s house, probably with a 30-degree incline, and the story goes that I stood up and bolted up the hill to meet my mom because I knew she was coming home that Saturday. Everyone was in tears and I didn’t understand why, until they said, “Hey, firstly you actually ran and, secondly, you ran very quickly”. 

I ran a 100-metre race in which I had come second, when a guy by the name of Fikile Scotty, an arm amputee, said to me, “You are so talented, you could represent South Africa”. Within one year I went from being classified to being in the South African team and then representing South Africa in Rio, Brazil.

What it really takes is self-belief, with a support structure that allows you to be a version of yourself that you have never seen. If you listen, and trust those who know more than you do, the results will speak for themselves.

Appearing on the global stage when we broke our records filled me with immense gratitude. Every single time there was gratitude for the people that have put in the time and effort and have invested in who I am, allowing me to stand on their shoulders.

Failure is inevitable in whatever sphere, therefore the aim is not to beat failure, you should be aiming for, is understanding what you can learn from those failures and how to move forward from those failures.

I really think there's a season and a time for everything in life. One of my mentors very early on told me, “You can have everything. There's nothing that you can't not have. It's just that you can't have it all at the same time.” When you come to that realisation, you have to put away a certain amount of time that you dedicate to whatever you're passionate about.

The basic premise of anything and everything that drives me is how much value can I add to those who are around me.

As a life principle, as long as you are finding people that will have the hard conversations with you, that will question why you do certain things, that will allow you to come up with the answers you need that will drive you to where you ultimately want to go.