Top 80 Ricky Williams Quotes (2025 Update)

1. “Tomorrow doesn’t really exist.”

— Ricky Williams

2. “My helmet is off; I’m not afraid anymore.”

— Ricky Williams

3. “I got high, and forgot I wasn’t supposed to get high.”

— Ricky Williams

4. “It’s funny, people say ‘Welcome back’ when I haven’t gone anywhere.”

— Ricky Williams

5. “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.”

— Ricky Williams

6. “A team takes on the personality of the head coach.”

— Ricky Williams

7. “I do feel like a loner but I think it’s because I look at things differently than other people.”

— Ricky Williams

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

— Ricky Williams

9. “I’ve always been attracted to things that are taboo. I’ve never been afraid to go to that dark place.”

— Ricky Williams

10. “One thing I’ve learned about life is that if you really let go, it’s just a joy ride.”

— Ricky Williams

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

— Ricky Williams

12. “In therapy, I see myself in the mirror differently.”

— Ricky Williams

13. “I definitely have come out of my shell a lot more. When you question who you are, you can’t be proud of who you are. Now that I’m trying to peel off those layers and really understand who I am, I don’t have anything to be shy about.”

— Ricky Williams

14. “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.”

— Ricky Williams

15. “The moment I started treating my social anxiety disorder, I started feeling better.”

— Ricky Williams

16. “There is no need to smear my name or to defame my character for the sake of news.”

— Ricky Williams

17. “Sometimes success will get in the way of maturity – at least temporarily.”

— Ricky Williams

18. “If you replace the word God in the Bible with the word Truth, it reads exactly right.”

— Ricky Williams

19. “Greatness is the willingness to choose in the midst of intensity.”

— Ricky Williams

20. “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.”

— Ricky Williams

21. “Now that I have conquered social anxiety disorder, I find pleasure in fans approaching me.”

— Ricky Williams

22. “Maybe I’m stupid or whatever, but to me if I got a concussion, if I could see straight and I could carry a football then I’m not telling anybody.”

— Ricky Williams

23. “I’m halfway intelligent. I’ll figure something out.”

— Ricky Williams

24. “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.”

— Ricky Williams

25. “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.”

— Ricky Williams

26. “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.”

— Ricky Williams

27. “Anytime you play a team sport, the success of the team really makes everything better. It’s nice.”

— Ricky Williams

28. “There’s more to life than success, and if you can try to be more well-rounded, you’ll be able to enjoy your success more. It won’t own you or control you.”

— Ricky Williams

29. “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.”

— Ricky Williams

30. “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.”

— Ricky Williams

31. “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.”

— Ricky Williams

32. “One of my biggest problems is that I’m always so influenced by what other people are thinking about me.”

— Ricky Williams

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

— Ricky Williams

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

— Ricky Williams

35. “I feel no need and have no desire to give any attention to other people’s opinion of me.”

— Ricky Williams

36. “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.”

— Ricky Williams

37. “There’s nothing I miss about anything in the whole wide world. The idea of missing something means you’re not living in the moment. Every moment is good for something.”

— Ricky Williams

38. “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.”

— Ricky Williams

39. “I am more mature. I’m a better football player. I just feel like this is my time.”

— Ricky Williams

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

— Ricky Williams

41. “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.”

— Ricky Williams

42. “It’s good to do things slow in the bush. It makes you appreciate everything a lot more.”

— Ricky Williams

43. “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.”

— Ricky Williams

44. “I’ve gotten to a point, where I realize that happiness doesn’t come from the outside.”

— Ricky Williams

45. “The people that I see on the street, they treat me more as a human being and not just an icon or a football player.”

— Ricky Williams

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

— Ricky Williams

47. “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.”

— Ricky Williams

48. “I think sometimes when it comes to sports, and especially relationships between players and coaches, that people lose track, lose a sense of reality.”

— Ricky Williams

49. “When you make that crossover from life to real life, when you’re not treated as a child anymore but as a man, and you are no longer given the benefit of the doubt, it takes some courage to face that.”

— Ricky Williams

50. “At the core, we’re all spiritual beings.”

— Ricky Williams