When I was in top shape I'd go to the ring and show my conditioning.

It's a lot about the individual and it's really up to you, how much you dedicate to the fight and how hard you are working and that's where the outcome will come.

Boxing gave me the opportunities to grow into the person that I am today.

It was a natural process, because when we go to the ring we are human beings, but once you feel the punches and the competition that's when the beast comes out and takes hold of us.

I think I went on a nice winning streak of about 20 fights until I fought Jorge Reyes and he stopped me in 6 rounds after I punched myself out.

See, I respect boxing because it has given me so much and that's why I will never allow anyone to mistreat the sport of boxing if I can help it.

If you can believe this, I didn't fight for my first world title fight till I had 58 fights, so I really appreciated what I was fighting for and for whom as well.

Of course after the fight you want to make sure that you're okay and so is the other guy, it's a brotherhood in there, so you want to make sure everyone is okay after the war is over.

Not many people do at the age of 21 or younger even, know how to act nor could be concerned with anything other than fighting, women and money.

I do think the heart can balance out the mind, if your heart is in a good place it can give you the strength to do the right thing and behave the right way and overcome the mind.

I'd say the most memorable thing for me was my dedication and motivation in how I got so involved in boxing.

Then he got more books. He saved all the books.

History – An account mostly false, of events unimportant, which are brought about by rulers mostly knaves, and soldiers mostly fools.

Cynicism is intellectual dandyism without the coxcomb's feathers.

... man is eating the earth up like a candy bar.

... in Northern Ireland, if you don't have basic Christianity, rather than merely religion, all you get out of the experience of living is bitterness.

There are three stages in scientific discovery. First, people deny that it is true, then they deny that it is important; finally they credit the wrong person.

The trouble is that neutrality is confused with hostility. We're not disrupting churches, or interrupting people's prayers. We're not fighting religion.

Awareness is the greatest agent for change.

Clarity is the most important thing to me - in thinking - and so I try in the books to be as clear as possible.

I shall play Scarlett O'Hara.