It's not hard for me to stay humble. I think there is always somebody better than me, so that's what keeps me humble. A lot of people could learn how to stay humble.
You can do one of two things: You can humble yourself or life will humble you. I think it's a lot easier to find a way to humble yourself.
Daniel Boulud told me at a young age, 'Whatever happens to you in your career, you're going to be great - be humble. Just be humble.' And I think about that daily. Like, whatever happens to me, whatever awards we win as a team or whatever else, just be humble.
The Pulitzer has nothing to do with me; it's more about people's perceptions of me, whatever they may be. I'm not being humble - I honestly do not and cannot think about that. It's a lovely piece of crystal on my bookcase, but that's all it is to me.
I've been through a lot off the field. I think that kind of translates onto the field. Football serves for a lot of life lessons, and so it allows me to stay humble and continue to work.
Let me tell you - when I was standing there on top of the world, you become so humble. You don't think about breaking records anymore, you don't think about gaining scientific data - the only thing that you want is to come back alive.
It hurts me when I see a priest or a nun with the latest model car, you can't do this. A car is necessary to do a lot of work, but please, choose a more humble one. If you like the fancy one, just think about how many children are dying of hunger in the world.
I've met a lot of big stars who have humility. Sly Stallone is a very humble guy. Robert DeNiro is a really humble guy. Some of the women aren't so humble for some reason. I don't know why.
I think failing is the best way to keep you grounded, curious, and humble. Success is dangerous because often you don't understand why you succeeded. You almost always know why you've failed. You have a lot of time to think about it.
I think the '80s created me, in a way, when I look back on that time, but I don't necessarily think that a lot of my choices, and a lot of things that I did, and a lot of things that happened to me - or I let happen to me - were about that decade.
I think I was raised by a very humble mother, who, if anything, is probably over skeptical. She has that sense of everything being a bonus: like, you have your lot, and anything else is on top. She's quietly proud, and quietly humble.
I'm not boasting or nothing but a lot of people have a lot of love for me. I'm a legend, but I stay H and H, hungry and humble.
My fellow actors inspire me a lot and really good writing inspires me. And then trying to stick to the decision to only do something that I think will challenge me and that I, personally and very subjectively, I think is good not do something because I think it will bring me a lot of money or bring me a lot of awards. I've tried to very, very rigorously be highly subjective about what I do. And that's something that I think I have basically lived by.
The Funkasaurus character was great and it taught me about being humble, about the character, about not being concerned with what people think you should be.
I would say a lot of it came from a lot of different drills that Coach Fleck put me through. That's my man. He taught me a lot, a lot, a lot about receiver play. And he taught me a lot about catching the ball and just hand placement.
As an athlete you have to think about yourself a lot. Think about your body, think about your mind, staying healthy, staying strong, your goals. So it's always about me, me, me, me.