Zach Anner Quotes and Sayings - Page 1

“You want the world to be set up for you, but sometimes it just isn't.”
-- Zach Anner

#World #Want #Sometimes

“CP is a struggle, but it's also been quite the tool for me to find success and deliver a message. It's something about me that's unique, so it'll open a few doors as well as keep a few closed. If you have the other tools that you develop as an individual, talents, things like that, you can harness this to do positive things in the world.”
-- Zach Anner

#Struggle #Unique #Doors

“You can never walk a mile in someone elses shoes, but you can walk a mile in your own and be proud of it.”
-- Zach Anner

#Shoes #Proud #Miles

“There's a tendency to treat anyone with a physical disability as inspiring. I call it a pedestal of prejudice, in that you're lifting people up to dismiss them. My whole thing is bringing us down to everyone else's level and saying we're all the same. The struggle is the same.”
-- Zach Anner

#Struggle #People #Prejudice

“I think that's where it comes into play, when you are just looking at a document or whatever and you see the word "disability." Does that automatically trigger something in you that denies someone their personhood?”
-- Zach Anner

#Thinking #Play #Doe

“When I read the script [of Glee], the whole premise was that all the high school kids were being cruel to this kid in the wheelchair, and then the quarterback comes along and has a heart of gold and takes him out of a Porta Potty. That's too often what I see in media, that the characters with disabilities are there to make other people seem like heroes for treating the character with a disability with respect. Those are the kinds of roles that are out there.”
-- Zach Anner

#Hero #Heart #School

“I didn't have a girlfriend until I was 29, and I thought it was because I'm in a wheelchair. And I realized that it's not that, it's because I listened to what the dismissive part of society was telling me and accepted it as truth. There was nothing that was keeping me from dating or falling in love other than the fact that I was scared of being rejected. And everybody has that fear. That's a universal thing.”
-- Zach Anner

#Falling In Love #Girlfriend #Dating

“If everything was perfect, it would always be a person-first conversation, but whenever I have the opportunity, I lead with my personality. If they're looking and seeing the disability first or the chair first, I know that I have the ability to change that.”
-- Zach Anner

#Opportunity #Perfect #Personality

“You really just have to have a good attitude, challenge yourself, and you can accomplish great things.”
-- Zach Anner

#Attitude #Challenges #Challenge Yourself

“The most important thing is to have the conversation, and let people who do make mistakes feel comfortable enough to continue the conversation.”
-- Zach Anner

#Mistake #People #Important

“The biggest disabilities are when you sabotage yourself mentally, those personal demons that get on your shoulder and you can't shake 'em.”
-- Zach Anner

#Ems #Disability #Demon

“I feel a lot of personal responsibility to undo the negative stereotypes. I know that it's not coming from a bad place. It's coming from an ignorant place. I can sort of be an ambassador in a subtle way to say, "This is what I am: a comedian, a show host, a writer." It will still always be part of the conversation and people will want to focus on it because there is a culture that is so embedded that if you have a disability, you're someone to be either admired just for living, or be pitied for having to struggle.”
-- Zach Anner

#Struggle #Responsibility #People

“I didn't feel like I was putting anything good into the world, even though it was funny. I wanted to do something more positive that would have an impact. So even when I'm doing naked push-ups or whatever, it's astounding to see how people respond to it.”
-- Zach Anner

#Impact #People #Naked

“Technically I can get out of my wheelchair and crawl around and do things, but when I've traveled and they've lost my wheelchair in transit, I feel like I need to be bound to it. My functionality and autonomy are often bound to this.”
-- Zach Anner

#Needs #Lost #Wheelchairs

“We did a book signing and people came up to me. There was an expectant mother who was like, "I think we might name our child Zach because of your work."”
-- Zach Anner

#Mother #Children #Book

“My experiences of traveling abroad and going to Italy with my father, having to break down a gigantic electric chair to get on trains. You've got three minutes. You go to Pompeii and there are shockingly few accessible hotels in a city that was covered in volcanic ash.”
-- Zach Anner

#Father #Cities #Three

“You may not have a physical impairment, but you have things, whether it's finances, self-esteem, it doesn't matter. It's cut from the same cloth.”
-- Zach Anner

#Self Esteem #Cutting #May

“Call yourself and define your relationship to your chair the way you want to, or your disability the way you want to.”
-- Zach Anner

#Want #Way #Disability

“We'd done a couple of road trips with my big chair, and it was such a hassle if we didn't have the van with the foldout ramp. I figured: There's got to be some option that I can use on the go. Now I can go anywhere with my friends, which is a big, life-changing thing. I can sit on it for as long as I need to.”
-- Zach Anner

#Couple #Life Changing #Long

“I just love all the music. My grandma was a church organist for 40 years, and she got me into jazz music and great songwriters, Harold Arlen, George Gershwin, all those folks. I can't do it, but I have a profound respect for it.”
-- Zach Anner

#Grandma #Years #Profound

“Writing was not my medium. I preferred to do video.”
-- Zach Anner

#Writing #Video #Mediums

“I feel that religion can be used as a tool to guide your life and help you connect with other people.”
-- Zach Anner

#People #Tools #Helping

“No Atlantis is too underwater or fictional.”
-- Zach Anner

#Underwater #Atlantis

“What I don't like about the way the media portrays religion is that they seem to weaponize it and use it as a tool to divide people.”
-- Zach Anner

#Media #People #Tools

“Even if you have an ADA room, every disability is so different that people need different things. A lot of times they'll put something on the toilet to make it higher, and for someone transferring from their chair that's fine, but I transfer from the floor so it causes more problems.”
-- Zach Anner

#People #Different #Needs

“I used to be an insult comic, and I didn't end up liking the way that I felt about myself.”
-- Zach Anner

#Way #Insult #Comic

“I thought this should be a travel show, because a lot of people with physical disabilities get discouraged.”
-- Zach Anner

#People #Disability #Discouraged

“I realized that I was a really, really terrible actor. I was like, "I'd better be myself."”
-- Zach Anner

#Actors #Terrible #I Realized

“I always say, once I get in a room, I can sell myself just fine. I know that not everyone who has a disability has the social skills or cognitive skills that I do, and it may be harder for them to navigate through.”
-- Zach Anner

#Skills #May #Rooms

“There's a whole chapter about my unfortunate manscaping accident. I was so focused on, "I've got to look this certain way and do this to be ready for this." So I missed out on a lot.”
-- Zach Anner

#Looks #Way #Chapters