My life as a professional athlete has allowed me the opportunity to visit and live in many different places and meet many interesting and diverse people.

If you're a professional athlete, and after the game, you're eating at the same place that somebody in the audience is eating at? You're making a mistake.

As a professional athlete, I believe that I need to explore my opportunities to the maximum, in order to excel and continue to play the best football I can.

Every professional athlete owes a debt of gratitude to the fans and management, and pays an installment every time he plays. He should never miss a payment.

Just having what's important, to have people around you to support and take care of you. That's the most important thing when you are a professional athlete.

Being paid as a professional athlete didn't change how hard I was working because I'm always going to do that, whether it's the weight room or the film room.

Any professional athlete will tell you that the mind is everything. For me, there is no shame in saying that I visualize and I meditate, because it really works.

Obviously, you're known for what you do. But you still want to be known as a good person. You're a person a lot longer before and after you're a professional athlete.

I know I have a big future in front of me, so that's my main focus. So when I'm outside of the ring, I try to carry myself as a professional athlete, not just anybody.

I'm a professional athlete - one who's supposed to set examples - so whatever it is I put in my body, it's up to me to take responsibility for it, and I have done that.

In my 20s, it was easy. In your 40s, it's a lot more challenging. You have to look at it like you're an actor, but you're also a professional athlete. You have to train.

As a football player, as a kid and as a professional athlete the moment of playing in the Super Bowl and winning a Super Bowl, that's what you play your whole career for.

As a professional athlete, the small print says there could be a trade at some point in your career. Sometimes expected, sometimes not. You have to be able to handle that.

With every passing week, I get an opportunity to improve my acting because I get to do it day in, day out. So a lot of times, I compare it to being a professional athlete.

I want to be a professional athlete who plays for the love of the game, never quits trying to give my best and is a good role model for all of the kids who look up to baseball players.

No professional athlete likes to admit that he has played too long. There is too much money involved, rarely enough saved, and there is the eternal hope that age has not withered skills.

No athlete ever ends his or her career the way you want to. We all want to play forever. But it doesn't work that way. Accepting the end gracefully is part of being a professional athlete.

Not everyone wants to go to school. Some guys might be blessed with being 6'10 and running and jumping better than anybody, so they want to be a professional athlete. There's nothing wrong with that.

As a tennis player, or any professional athlete, our career has a shelf life. I don't want to waste any opportunities, I don't want to look back on it when I'm 45 and think I could have done a lot more.

When I was younger if I was in someone else's shoes, if you saw a professional athlete you'd want to go up and introduce yourself and ask a couple questions, so I definitely know where they're coming from.

If I could do this until I was 60, I would. This is a great life. All I do is train, all I do is work out, and prolong my life by the training that I'm doing, the things I have to do as professional athlete.

Since my sophomore year in high school, I knew I didn't want to do anything but be a professional athlete. I knew when I got to college there was no way anybody was going to stop me from being an NFL player.

A female professional athlete has to have the whole package, as opposed to a guy who can just be good at sport. You have to have a job or go to uni or do three sports instead of one, you have to be a standout.

There are perks to being the partner of a professional athlete - we were invited into beautiful homes, enjoyed stunning sponsor cars, got special treatment at restaurants, and attended many exquisite functions.

Ever since I was a little boy, I had my eyes set on being able to say I was a professional athlete. I worked hard every day to make sure that it became a possibility and sacrificed a lot for the game of football.

When I stepped away two springs ago, I just really wanted to shift my priorities to be able to be more available and present to show up for things that I felt were mattering more than being a professional athlete.

The irony of that is, what makes it kind of ironic, is when you do become successful as a professional athlete in particular, a lot of the young children who are emulating these stars do have a different perspective.

I try and tell all the kids that I meet that hope to be amazing one day and be a professional athlete or a doctor or a lawyer or whatever they want to be. I tell them they can do all that because Tourette's won't stop them.

I wanted to be an endurance athlete from a young age. I remember being in a careers class at school and saying I wanted to be a professional athlete and the teacher replying, 'You're not going to make it; it's not possible.'

My mum and dad are both sportspeople and know what's it all about. They know it's hard work, but they also know what it takes to become a professional athlete. I don't think - without their help, I wouldn't have got this far.

To try to be a professional athlete and work out when you're not sleeping right, you're traveling day to day, not to mention the bumps and bruises in the ring, and you're trying to eat right - it's a very, very challenging job.

I have been a Cowboys fan since I was a little bitty boy. And my dream has finally become a reality, of not only just playing a professional, becoming a professional athlete, but playing for the team that I always wanted to play for.

If I'm only defined by my sport, I really have failed. Yes, I've opened myself up for more criticism, but I'm a professional athlete. I get criticised every week. I'm used to it. It doesn't mean it doesn't hurt, but you get used to it.

Madonna is an athlete; she has to be treated like a professional athlete. She doesn't work out for six hours a day, though, like some of the press says. She never works out for more than two hours a day, and then only when she has the time.

You're a person a lot longer before and after you're a professional athlete. People always say to me, 'Your image is this, your image is that.' Your image isn't your character. Character is what you are as a person. That's what I worry about.

I am a National Football League player of American Samoan heritage. Because of my status as a professional athlete, I have been blessed to play a role in educating players and fans about the culture and history of America's southernmost territory.

I've said numerous times the hardest job in America isn't being a professional athlete. It's not being a matador or having some job that puts your life at risk. The hardest job in America is being black, because it's the one thing you can't outrun.

For the longest time people were like, 'Oh you play soccer, what else do you do?' Cause they couldn't believe that you could just be women's professional athlete. That's really frustrating because it's almost devaluing your actual skill and ability.

I wanted to be a professional athlete. Young men and women from Montana don't make it to the professional level that often. And I always believed that because I was a great football player that made me better than you. And that's not the case at all.

When all you've done is work toward being a professional athlete, and then you injure yourself, and you know that you're going to be out for a while, it's gut-wrenching. It almost feels like your life is over because that's all you've ever worked for.

There's far more that goes into being a professional athlete than being a college athlete. So many differences that people don't realize. It's not just about playing football and getting paid to do it. There's a lot of things that you have to deal with.

There aren't too many principles of proper business conduct with which just about everybody will agree. Two come to mind: 1. Unless you're a professional athlete, don't offer co-workers encouragement by patting them on the butt, and 2. Don't burn bridges.

I'm a professional athlete. I've been paid since I was in my early 20s to go out there and fight with guys who were 40 or 50 pounds heavier than I am and fight for my life. I got into a business where people make decisions based on some of the most stupid things.

Even if you don't become a professional athlete, the experience of working with a team, knowing how to set goals, and working every day to figure out how to accomplish those goals definitely gives you confidence to apply those same characteristics to other life challenges.

Do you need to train two hours a day? Probably not. The reason why my celebrity clients have to train two hours a day is because their endurance level is so strong. For Madonna to get results and keep results, it's like a professional athlete training - she has to push harder.

I think it's huge to set a good example. Whether you like it or not, as a professional athlete you are always going to be projected out into that spotlight of judgement. People are always going to judge every single thing we do and I think it's cool to just be real with yourself.

I'm from Minnesota and have always lived there. And my competitive career actually started in the late '90s racing motocross, which then turned into racing snowmobiles professionally. I turned pro in 2003, racing with the best in the world and living my dream as a professional athlete.

I know America is very nice and very good people. I'm a professional athlete. I come here. I never have a problem with somebody about my religion, about my name. I am happy. I'm always comfortable because I never do anything wrong. All the time I do something right. I follow all the rules.

I came out of my professional athlete career with a 450 credit score, no money in the bank to show for it, but I had an Ivy League degree. So I put that Dartmouth degree to good use and got a job on Wall Street. I hated it but used the time to make connections and become financially literate.

Once upon a time, it was hard to decipher what was more difficult to stomach: the foolish, detrimental behavior of a professional athlete or the apologists disguised as their inner circle, eager to excuse the inexcusable. And then there came Allen Iverson, who didn't make it difficult at all.

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