Quotes from Montel Vontavious Porter

Professional wrestling is the first non-criminal activity that I truly, truly applied myself to and believed in and devoted myself to. Otherwise, everything else I did was a whatever. I had no real interest in it, it came and went.

From age 16 to 26, I literally became a man in prison so it was influential in shaping me.

I never really saw myself as a producer but there were times when I thought after my in-ring career perhaps I could go into being a commentator or coming back as a general manager.

I don't have any disparaging words about WWE.

At 16, I was facing 11 life felonies.

I do remember watching the cartoon, 'Rambo,' and I had some of the action figures.

For me Japan was my dream and the WWE was my goal, so making it to the WWE and actually standing in that ring for the first time in front of millions of people nationally and tens of millions of people internationally, I was there, I was at the show! it was so real, that's the best way I can describe it.

When you are the WWE Champion, you have an X right on your forehead.

I sprint to keep my wind up.

The truth of the matter is that I'm naturally gifted.

I even said it in a promo before, that a 'smart man learns from his mistakes, but a wise man learns from the mistakes of others.' I've seen a lot of mistakes made.

Sometimes people say that a picture is worth a thousand words, so if you look at my tattoos and you know what you're reading, you can draw a lot from them.

I've known Miz for a long time. We were both at the now-defunct Deep South developmental territory, and dude works hard. He works really, really hard at his craft. I remember him vaguely as that kid from 'The Real World,' and I had no respect for him, but he earned my respect by working hard and practicing and improving his craft.

After having been at WWE and being somebody who was being groomed to be a world champion, I ran afoul of some politics and spent three months on a losing streak. I had a confrontation with one of the executives.

AJ Styles has proven time and time again that he is phenomenal, and sleeping on AJ Styles is a bad move.

If you don't like somebody because of the God that they worship, or because of the color of their skin... there's something wrong with you, not them.

The WWE is the NFL or the Premier League - it is the top of the tops.

In our society, if an individual commits a crime, he or she is sent to prison and they're supposed to repay their debt to society by serving their time. But, more and more, our institutions are taking away educational programs; they're taking away the Pell Grants so that people can take college courses.

In terms of adjustments, I'm just adjusting to life after wrestling while I can still wrestle. I will still wrestle periodically for the most part, I enjoy stepping into a Paul Heyman type role.

New Japan is my personal favorite wrestling company, working there was my dream; it was my dream to wrestle in the Tokyo Dome.

I had every intention of retiring. While I've had the honor and the pleasure of being in a few WrestleManias, I never thought I'd be in a WrestleMania again.

To go from being at the Performance Centre, essentially working in an empty warehouse, to go from that to the ThunderDome to actually being in front of a crowd at WrestleMania, is almost indescribable.

Matt Hardy is a tag team wrestler. He's one of the greatest tag team wresters in the history of tag team wrestling.

I always tell young, up and coming professional wrestlers, when you're trying to play a character that's not really you, it's going to be difficult and fans can register that. Sometimes it's not even consciously, it's subconsciously they pick up on it.