I'll just get out of the way, and let the following excerpt from Brian Dawkins' Hall of Fame speech do the talking.
"Nothing just happens in my life. The majority of the success that I have had has come on the back end of pain. Pain has pushed me to levels unknown. For me at the time, all I knew was that was pain, but on the other side of it, all of a sudden, I became better in an area.
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When we go through those situations in our lives, pain helps you develop those things that are going to take you to the next level of whatever it is the Lord has for you. Believe that. I’m a living testimony of that.
See there’s a purpose for my pain. There’s a purpose for my pain. As you’ve been listening, you’ve probably read all this week, I suffered from depression. I went through it mightily my rookie year. I suffered through suicidal thoughts. And I wasn’t just suffering from suicidal thoughts. I was actually planning the way I would kill myself so my wife would get the money.
But what that pain did for me, it increased my praise exponentially. I have grown leaps and bounds because of the things that I’ve gone through, and that’s one of those things that I went through. And when I say went through, that means I came on the other side of it. So for those who are going through that right now, there’s hope. You do have hope. There’s something on the other side of this. Don’t get caught up where you are. Don’t stay where you are. Keep moving. Keep pushing through.
It wasn’t supposed to be me. This wasn’t supposed to happen to Brian Dawkins. It was not. I was not the biggest of guys growing up. I was not always ‘the dude.’ That why I was chasing Pat so doggone much. It was never me. I was always called little this, little that. I got tired of that crap. And so I grew a chip on my shoulder, but also what I began to grow was anger in me. And the anger in me became violent anger that I would lose control of every once in a while.
And the Lord spoke to me. He said when you have that type of energy, let’s think about a flood. When the flood comes, it comes and it washes everything out of its way. But when you put a dam up, and then you put vents in it to allow water to flow through the dam, it gives you an energy, endless. So when you see me crawl in like that, when you see me acting the fool, that’s some of that energy from that anger that I had bottled up. Yeah. That chip on my shoulder.
I’m not looking down on those who talked about me. I want to thank my haters. I want to thank those people that told me through other people that I wouldn’t be where I am today, that I couldn’t make it because I was too small, because I couldn’t do this, that, or the other. But what the Lord told me was, listen, you know the turbines that you have that the wind pushes, and you can generate energy from it. Guess what their words were to me. They just pushed my turbines. They gave me even more energy.
So my haters became my elevators. They helped me out, so thank you. Thank you for all those ho kept doubting me and told me what I couldn’t do."
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