A Quote by Andrew Hawkins

I'm in a unique situation. I'm 5-foot-6, 175 pounds, so I wouldn't say people are super afraid of me. I live a normal life. I don't walk into a room and everybody looks at me and says, "He plays for the Cleveland Browns" or "He's an NFL superstar" - that doesn't happen. I go under the radar. Most people don't realize who I am until I tell them. So it's not like my life has changed since I've been in the NFL or people treat me any different.
As a young rookie NFL player, you go to the rookie symposium and the one thing they tell you is, "You guys know what the NFL stands for?" Everybody looks around like, "National Football League...?" The guy's like, "Nope - Not For Long." They tell you right there to get prepared for your second life. You take that in, and I've always been one to prepare early, to see ahead and anticipate and believe in great things happening, and they do. I'd already known that concept and appreciated that concept, but for me, I was always going to be here for a while. I just believed in that.
It takes time to come into yourself and realize your worth and realize your place and try to fit in, and for some people, it doesn't happen until way later in life, but, luckily for me, I realize I am around people, and I can't try to be like anyone else because I am me, and that's what's cool about me.
I've never been willing to lie about my age. Why on earth would I want to tell people I'm 35, which I'm not, and have them say, 'Oh that's nice,' when I could tell them I'm 47, which I am, and have them look at me and go, 'Whoa!'. I'm not afraid of aging. I stopped being afraid of life a long time ago.
The NFL is a brotherhood - if you think about all the millions of people that live in America and there's 1,900 people in the NFL. That's not that many, so everybody knows each other.
My life has been extreme. Most people will not have the experience I've had. But the things that changed me, really changed me, they happen to everyone.
I was in Korea. I've noticed all my life I see elderly people who have been close to death in an illness and they're absolutely cured and they say, now I know how to live my life. I've seen death. That happened to me when I was 19. It was a terrible, terrifying thing. And I live my life like those people decided to do when they were old. So, since I was 19, I've had the most fun possible every single day, even when I had a rough life. It was the army which taught me about life, and the theater which taught me how good it could be.
My wife says that if people reach conclusions as to what I am like based on what they see from me on the pitch they would say I am a guy who is always annoyed, always in a bad mood, they'd say what must it be like to live with me. There are two of me, two different people.
The people on the QVC shopping channel convince me that life is worth living. They see the good in everything. People who go to counselling should actually go to a room with a QVC seller for half an hour and let them find the qualities within them. For example, they'd look at me and say, 'To anybody else this looks like a stomach but, actually, his feet never get wet in the rain.
So to me, life is more than just money and making it to the NFL. Life's about memories, life is about experiences, and I feel like when players just plug in for three years and run to the NFL as quickly as they can, I feel like they're, without knowing it until they get older, taking themselves away from a really good memory.
I was mostly bullied by my classmates. People would come up to me and say, 'You're so dark.' I'd always fight back by calling out one of their insecurities, like, 'Well, you have a big nose.' Today, I'd tell them that I really love them. I'd thank them because they made me realize how unique I am.
There have been times when people who weren't my friends all of a sudden became my friend. I won't allow them to use me, but I have been pretty lucky to have friends who have supported me and who I have known since I was 12. They are still the same and they don't treat me any different.
I think my weight-training proved to me more than anything that I can do anything in life if I really put my mind to it. I saw me bring myself from 137 pounds to 175 pounds over a seven-year period. That alone said to me that all you have to do is really stick with something, and you can accomplish anything you want. It's brought me great self-esteem because I know I did it. I changed me.
I've argued this with a lot of people in my life. When people say God blessed me with a beautiful jump shot, it really pisses me off. I tell those people, 'Don't undermine the work I've put in every day.' Not some days. Every day. Ask anyone who has been on a team with me who shoots the most. Go back to Seattle and Milwaukee and ask them. The answer is me -- not because it's a competition, but because that's how I prepare.
The part of my writing I find the most rewarding is when people write to me or speak to me in public to tell me how his or her life has been changed by my books.
I've always wanted a normal life, and this is what I got. Being an actress wasn't a plan at all, so what's happened to me is very strange. Life isn't very normal, even though I'm still very much a normal girl. I ride the subway, I ride the bus, and all of that. It's the people around me that have changed. I love when I go to a restaurant and I walk past, and everyone waves. That's always really funny. It's strange. It just goes to show that whatever plan you have for your life, you are wrong, a lot of times.
People come up to me and tell me how I changed their life and I've inspired them. And they tell me their stories, and that keeps me going.
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