Best 74 quotes of Ricky Williams on MyQuotes

After I won the Heisman Trophy, it just was OK, I’m supposed to go to the NFL and so that’s what I did. I didn’t really have any expectations and I didn’t really understand how things worked.

And any time you feed your ego, it's a one-way street. ... There were so many things I had to deal with that erased the positives I got from playing the game that it wasn't worth it. It's like eating a Big Mac and drinking a Diet Coke.

And I think if you look at any relationship, for the relationship to be productive and to move forward and to grow, sometimes things have to be said that one person or the other person is not going to like to hear.

Anytime you play a team sport, the success of the team really makes everything better. It's nice.

As an athlete, you figure you work your whole life to have what you have, and to be able to show the world what you have and how proud you are of it, that's always fun.

As human beings we have a tendency when we like something to tie it up and make sure it's there for a long time. I've been working on being able to let things go. I don't think I ever want to buy property again.

A team takes on the personality of the head coach.

At the core, we're all spiritual beings.

Coaches want so many things from a back. It's hard to find someone like Edgerrin James or Marshall Faulk, someone you can trust to block, catch and be physical. But I can do all those things.

Depending on their fondest memory of you, most people hold on so tightly to their fondest memory they don’t usually let you be anything greater than that. And that’s one of the things I think I allowed myself to be a victim of earlier in my career. What I learned as I got older is I decide. I decide what it’s like for me, not other people. You can be whatever you’d like to be. You just have to choose it.

Everywhere I go, I hear 'Welcome back.' But everywhere I have been, I have always been with myself. I'm with myself now more than ever. It's funny people say 'Welcome back' when I haven't gone anywhere.

Everywhere I go, people hear Ricky Williams and the next thing they think is marijuana or wasted talent.

Football is my job, not my life, but it's a job I'm going to give my all for as long as I'm in it.

Greatness is the willingness to choose in the midst of intensity.

Growing up with two sisters, you either play by yourself or play Barbie with them. I played by myself.

I allowed myself to think if I could be doing anything in the world, what would I be doing? And what came to mind is I'd be traveling a little bit, I'd be going to classes and I'd be going back to school.

I am an honest, God-fearing man who is intensely dedicated to being the best person I can be on and off the football field.

I am more mature. I'm a better football player. I just feel like this is my time.

I can look back at it now as definitely like an initiation into adulthood. Almost overnight in the NFL, I was put on a pedestal and I was supposed to be this icon or this image of what a professional athlete was supposed to be. I felt like I just got stuck trying to be someone else and I forgot who I actually was.

I do feel like a loner but I think it's because I look at things differently than other people.

I don't care what people think about me because I know I am more than all the pain and strife they hold inside.

I don't think people change. I think they definitely mature. But I think the essence of what I am today is the same as when I was five years old. It's just maturity. I've become a healthier, fuller expression of that essence.

If you identify yourself as a great football player, anytime anyone challenges that, you're going to have some kind of problem.

If you want to surf, move to Hawaii. If you like to shop, move to New York. If you like acting and Hollywood, move to California. But if you like college football, move to Texas.

I got high, and forgot I wasn't supposed to get high.

I had a lot of friends in high school and in college, and we had a good time.

I had this notion that everyone was staring at me and judging everything about me, from my appearance to the way I talk and everything.

I have no room in my life for any form of negativity or nonacceptance.

I led the NFL in attempts the past two years and they really didn’t go out and get a quarterback to help me so I knew it’s going to be all on me again. I could see my mortality as a football player, that I’m not going to be able to do this much longer. It just became obvious to me that playing football for me is not going to be fun, not something I’m going to enjoy and it’s time for me to do something different.

I'm closer to being happy. I'm doing things that make me happy. In football I loved to practice and I loved to play, but I hated to be in meetings, hated to talk to the media, hated to have cameras in my face, hated to sign autographs. I hated to do all those things.

I'm halfway intelligent. I'll figure something out.

I'm nice because, when I was growing up, so many people weren't nice to me, and I remember how that felt. And I don't want to make anyone else feel like that. I value nice.

I realized a while back that I have an innate ability to be compassionate, and I saw that the strength of compassion is something that healers have and healers use.'

I started practicing yoga. I started learning some hands-on healing stuff. And I found really good chiropractors, really good massage therapists, and what I found is I've been able to actually peel off layers of trauma on my body and actually move better now than I did.

I stepped away to find out more about myself, which I was having difficulty doing as a football player. I got a chance to travel the world. I studied Eastern philosophy, and I've grown as a person so much.

I think if I were a college professor, no one would say I was uncomfortable about being shy because that might be expected. But I think because of people's stereotypes, they think of a football player as someone who is very outgoing and I'm not.

I think I have a tendency to look at things subjectively rather than objectively when I reflect on my experience.

I think it's very easy for people to stereotype athletes, good and bad.

I think Ricky Williams had his time in the limelight. And I think it was good for what it was worth, and that was that.

It's funny, people say 'Welcome back' when I haven't gone anywhere.

It's something that I had been pushing down my whole life. The search for meaning, I guess, the whispering of the soul.

It used to be irritating just because someone can meet you and before they would get a chance to get to know you, they’ll go find someone else’s story about who I am. For me personally, I just always think it’s more interesting to get to know the person myself.

I've always been attracted to things that are taboo. I've never been afraid to go to that dark place.

I've always been shy, but in New Orleans there were times my shyness would cause me actual physical pain. I'd get so claustrophobic around people that I'd bend over from the sickness in my stomach. That's not a good way to be when you're famous, obviously.

I've followed freedom for a long time and I finally feel I've got more of it. People talk about the money that I've given up and the money that I've lost. But the knowledge and the wisdom that I've gotten from this experience is priceless.

I've had a lot of clouds in my life since I got into pro football -- too many -- but now I feel like I can see really clearly for the first time. And I can see the Super Bowl from here.

I've let a lot of things go, and obviously football is one of them. I think the hardest thing to let go is your self-image. That's what I'm working on now.

I want to really start focusing on what I want to accomplish and what it is I want to achieve, but not micromanaging this or that and focusing on the little things.

I want to thank all my fans, teammates, coaches and supporters for the strength they've given me to overcome so much.

I would drive home and see people wearing my No. 34 jersey and wonder why, because I didn't feel worthy of that. And all the time I just knew people were staring at me, talking about me everywhere I went.