Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
People often write to me, addressing the envelope, 'Stephen Hendry, Snooker Player' or 'Stephen Hendry, Scotland,' and it reaches me.
I think the word 'yips' trivialises it; it is completely debilitating, like a cancer spreading through your game and just destroying it.
When I was 13, my parents bought me a mini snooker set for my birthday. From the moment I first held a cue in my hands, I was transfixed.
When I'm practising on my own, my game feels great, but there's a big difference between practising on your own and playing against people.
If I'm going to play, I'm going to have to give it 100%, which means I'm going to have to play in all of the tournaments that I don't like.
There's no point, me turning up at the world championship as a publicity stunt and then lose 10-3 to someone who shouldn't tie my shoelaces.
I never dreamed, when I received a small table for a Christmas present from my parents, I would have the career that I did or achieve so much.
I liked Dalgety Bay, but my life did not revolve around the house. I was a teenager there, and these things aren't that important at that age.
The most I ever played was 12 or 13 tournaments. Now they're talking about almost 20, and it's all year round, playing through the summer as well.
The thing is, with century breaks, maximums, ranking tournaments, these sorts of things are automatically going to be broken: it's not if but when.
If the World Seniors led to a place directly into the Crucible, then I would take it very seriously because to play there again would be incredible.
Did I have a mis-spent youth? I suppose I did in that I left school early without any qualifications, having bunked off a few times for tournaments.
Steve Davis has found a way of competing to a level that is not as high as it once was, enjoying his wins, and not getting too angry about the defeats.
Financially speaking, I haven't ended my career in the best shape, and there are debts, as well as what is to come by way of a divorce settlement to Mandy.
There are players out there who want to dominate and keep their opponent sitting down. They want to make centuries and win frames at a single visit, and I like to see that.
My favourite store is All Saints. Having spent years dressed in a dinner suit and a bow tie as a professional player, it is wonderful being able to wear normal clothes again.
I got into poker in the early 2000s. In snooker tournaments, you are always looking for things to pass the time between matches, so we'd play together, or I would play online.
I would never be one to go striding over to any woman who caught my eye - after all, I'm the person who got to know my wife's parents before I plucked up the courage to talk to her.
I tried hard to create my own records when a lot of them belonged to Steve Davis, so to see someone else beat yours, you'd be lying if you said there wasn't a twinge of regret there.
There are times when there's been some discontent and muttered threats from audience members. I take no notice, and in any case, I always have John Carroll around to deflect unpleasantness.
Even when I used to play Jimmy White in Scotland, he would have the majority of the support. That's the only time it would irk me, coming back to Scotland and people still wanting me to lose.
I remember far more shots that cost me matches than the ones that won me matches. That is maybe the way you think if you are someone who has won a lot of tournaments and had a successful career.
When I started, there was never a great history of people doing well in snooker from Scotland. By chance, I got a table for my Christmas. If I hadn't got that, then none of this would have happened.
One of my biggest sponsors is based in China, and I probably spend as much time there as I do in the U.K. Over the years, I have really grown to love it, but the first time I went was a different story.
In China, they appreciate someone who has worked hard. They say it is incredible to win seven world championships. I know it is, but it's a shame I have to go 10,000 miles to get the whole crowd behind me.
In around 2000, I became aware of a recurring problem of the 'tightness' around my cueing action, which somehow stops me believing that I can play the shot - even shots I could previously play with my eyes shut.
Even though I say to myself that I was seven-times World Champion, the voice in my head says, 'You can't play this shot.' It's completely mental - quite literally. My confidence is sapped every time this happens.
The quarter finals is always an exciting round because you know you're one match away from that one table situation: where the magic really starts to happen at the Crucible and where it starts to come into its own.
I am not on tour any more, but I hear things, and there are stories that some players are not as dedicated as they should be and treating some of these PTC events in Europe as stag weekends rather than tournaments.
These days, you can watch many different sports; you are saturated with it 24 hours a day. And young boys all want to be footballers because you don't even need to be that good, and you can still earn £100,000 a week.
Even as a boy, my dad always told me, 'Don't show emotion.' If I banged my cue, he would give me a row and say, 'Stop that.' Don't show any petulance. It was developed, certainly, but I think you have got to have it in you.
I have always really loved clothes, although I am glad to say that my tastes have mellowed somewhat over the years. When I first played professionally and started to earn big money, almost everything I bought was by Versace.
When I didn't retain the world title after my first win, which no one's ever done, I was gutted and made my driver take me home straight away. We travelled through the night, and I didn't say a word all the way from Sheffield to South Queensferry.
In both snooker and poker, you have to play your best under pressure; I was always able to do that. I don't think it is something you can teach. Your mental strength, your confidence, your self-belief has got to be very strong. That is the common denominator.
It's the worst feeling in the world - to lose in the first round at Sheffield and then have to go home - because it's such a long tournament, and it's hard to avoid it. It's on the TV all day every day, and if I lost, I didn't want to be anywhere near snooker.
When you're young and you first come onto the scene, you're fearless. You just go for your shots and don't really think about the consequences. But as you play on through years and years, you get punished for those misses, and gradually, that leaves scars. It dents your confidence a bit.
Maybe I wish I could be out there on the big occasions playing like I did at my peak, but I certainly don't miss the six and seven hours a day practice that went hand in hand with being world champion in the nineties - or losing to guys knowing that it would never have happened when I was at my best.
By the age of 14, I had stopped doing homework and stopped studying - as soon as I had any spare time, I was up to the local snooker club. I was fortunate my parents never forced me to stop playing snooker and told me to carry on at school. Nowadays, that probably isn't the best advice. I basically had nothing else to fall back on.
In all the years I've been playing, I've never considered changing my cue. It was the first cue I ever bought, aged 13, picked from a cabinet in a Dunfermline snooker centre just because I liked the Rex Williams signature on it. I saved £40 to buy it. It's a cheap bit of wood, and it's been the butt of other players' jokes for ages.