RugbyRebels

Blatantly lifted from shedweb as I don’t subscribe to the ‘graph, important thing for me is the inference he is still into Gloucester, not looking elsewhere as has been suggested.

If you put all of your emphasis on an outcome, or invest all of your happiness on the decision of someone else, you are going to go through some turmoil.
I would have loved to be involved in England’s Rugby World Cup squad. It has been a seven-year goal with different challenges along the way.
But I can’t be disappointed because there was honestly no expectation from my side. It was never my right. I never thought: 'Last season went pretty well, I should be picked'.
All in all, I had two weeks in camp, then a week on my own with my sprint coach Margot Wells after being told I needed the extra conditioning. Then there was one final training session with game-based drills on the Friday, led by Eddie Jones.
Afterwards, later that afternoon on my way back down to Cheltenham, he rang to say I would not be going out to Italy. Three days later, on the following Monday, I flew to Los Angeles and I have been here since.
I have been working very hard out here, spending plenty of time on the track. Laird Hamilton is an innovative trainer and mentor who pushes boundaries and there are elite athletes in our group like Joakim Noah, who has played in the NBA for 12 years.
I am extremely grateful to Gloucester and Johan Ackermann for the extra time away, because I needed it. For the past seven years, I have found it hard to switch off. I will be back at the end of August, though, and will be excited to hit the ground running.
I received phone calls from England to inform me that I was not involved in the first warm-up against Wales and to say I was not in the 31-man squad. On the day that final group was announced, I woke up to a bunch of messages offering commiserations.
I didn’t feel like I need them. Out here, I am with people I love and I am fine. My goal of continual improvement does not change. If anything, it makes me want to prove my resilience again and again and again.
England have everything planned down to a tee. On the field, the players know how to execute plays. Off it, they are getting closer as a squad.
I was there for the trip to Devon. Five or six years ago, man, I would have hated it! These days, I know that your response is all you can control about something like that.
We all bought in and had an awesome time. My team for the challenges included Tom Curry, Sam Underhill, Piers Francis, Dan Robson and Willi Heinz.
Rugby is a sport that is open to interpretation and people form opinions about people they do not know a great deal about.

"For me, right now, all I can focus on is how I can become better for my experience with England, and not just as a rugby player – as a leader and as a person, too.
Eddie has said that everyone needs to be ready and the best way to do that is for me to be the best version of myself at Gloucester. I have not been told where I am in the England pecking order, but if the stars align and the call does come at any point, I’ll be ready. I felt ready seven years ago.
As a professional sportsman, and if you are very lucky, you will have a career that lasts 10 or 15 years. You probably cram 30 years’ worth of life lessons into that period, because the environments are so intense and you meet so many people.
That is the beautiful thing about sport. But you have to make sure you keep developing as a person so that you can move into the next stage of your life and be ready.
It can be painful not to achieve what you desire, but everyone in the world is fighting for something. Not everyone achieves what they want all of the time. I am fortunate that I have a platform and get asked questions about falling short, so I feel a duty to fight for people that do not necessarily have a similar platform.
It is OK not do get what you desire, but you must keep fighting. I am driven by an aspiration to achieve and the lessons along the way are what shape me.
So, how can I be better in the next stage of my career? I realise how lucky I am to be able to return to a great club like Gloucester and to compete. It starts with playing there in September and continues into whatever I do when I finish in three or four years’ time.
I feel like I have had seven seasons of consistent rugby but I can still do better than what I’m doing. That is my challenge for the coming season."

Good man, he seems to have finally grown up

Quite, it's all about sincerity, and once you can fake that...