Nikki Bella found great success in WWE, but that didn’t come without a few bumps in the road.
The Hall of Famer recently appeared on Renee Paquette’s The Sessions podcast to discuss her run with the company, which included a dominant reign as Divas Champion. Nikki opens up about the obstacles she was facing, and how it eventually led to her developing a “Fearless” mindset, one that truly allowed her to be herself in WWE. Highlights from the interview can be found below.
How she developed the Fearless Nikki personality:
In the beginning, it was hard. Then, I was like, ‘you can woman up and you can make this something.’ I remember one day looking at my ex and going, ‘I’m going to war. I’m gonna pack up, I’m gonna suit up, and I’m gonna go in there and win this thing.’ I just got this fire and I think that’s what helped create Fearless Nikki. Whether it was filming a scene or just walking in to go to catering, I was like, ‘I’m going to own the place, not be affected, and if I give myself this energy and this feeling, I’ll be unbothered. I’ll live rent free in everyone’s head and I’m going to do my thing.’ It helped me and it helped me conquer a lot. I took that fire and rose up like a phoenix.
How frustrating it was for her coming up because she was being limited in what she could do in the ring:
When I came up on the road, it was, ‘can’t do this, can’t do that, go out there, let them throw you around, make sure to pull hair and slap.’ I listened. I listened all the time, and I should have fought for myself. I should have fought on everything that I learned as an athlete and professional wrestler, and I should have showcased, and I didn’t. When that fire came about, I was like, ‘no one is telling me no anymore. They don’t want to do my move that I just learned or this sequence that I think looks badass, they don’t want to treat me like I’m a powerful woman? Well then, get in line, I’ll fight someone else tonight. We’re going to go out there and do it.’ I feel like with that fire and just going out there, it created a whole different person that I wish I was, but I had to learn, and now I take that into what I do now. The whole ‘apologize later’ is such a good thing to go into because it lets you be you and what you have in here. It took me to get all that fire to finally go out there and be that person.
In this same interview Nikki recalled the criticism she received for winning the Diva of the year award. You can read about that here.
(H/T and transcribed by Fightful)