For me, personally, when I'm afraid of something - when you're afraid of something, normally you try to go away, you try to avoid it. Instead of avoiding it, to overcome your fear, I believe you need to embrace it.

Because Conor McGregor is so confident - he goes there 'I'll beat this, I will do that' - If I would be his coach I will tell him all the time, behind closed doors, how dangerous [Nate] Diaz is and how much of a war this fight will be and how painful, and long, and uncomfortable it would be, and to get prepared for the worst day of his life.

My mentality is that when I go to sleep at night, I'm a better martial artist than when I woke up in the morning.

The danger is not to set your goal too high and fail to reach it. It’s to set your goal too low and reach it

That's the way to go. People say: 'Oh, he doesn't want to come back, he's scared,' and it's to play with your brain, to play with your mind. I'm not scared of nobody. I'm not scared of no human being. I'm scared to fight, every time I fight I'm scared, but I'll bite into my mouthpiece and I'll walk the walk.

People have mistaken my break, I took a break from competition, it was because of mental problems, and because I was not agreeing with Performance Enhancing Drugs. I put the things on pause for a while, but I didn't retire.

My fear delivered one of the great lessons of my life: That someone without fear can’t push himself. He can’t get better. He can’t transform negatives into positives. He can’t open his world to creativity and invention, or even progress.