Years ago, I was always serious, and now I chuckle and make jokes to create a calm environment because 'WrestleMania' can be a high-pressure atmosphere.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
'WrestleMania' was the best day of my life, the greatest opportunity I've ever been afforded, but at the same time, no one wants to lose the main event for the WWE world heavyweight championship.
Just being involved in WrestleMania is a dream.
There's plenty of people who've never gotten the opportunity to wrestle at WrestleMania. To perform there and do that, I never thought it would ever happen. I had learned to live with it. So to say I did, that is a big notch in my belt.
'Wrestlemania' is the time of the year where careers are made or broken.
As great a spectacle as WrestleMania is, there's something to be said for seeing a guy you like telling stories from the heart from 20 feet away.
Ultimately, jokes are this really special thing that we can all share. It's exciting to have basically a thousand people in a room together that can laugh at the same time, but I think of it almost as, like, a religious experience.
Honestly, I try to think about when I first got into wrestling, and I remember Wrestle Mania VI being the first time that I watched Wrestle Mania as it happened.
I realized that comedians of the day were operating on jokes and punch lines. The moment you say the punch line, the audience either laughs sincerely or they laugh automatically or they don't laugh. The thing that bothered me was that automatic laugh. I said, that's not real laughter.
That whole 'Giant Killer' era was actually kind of fun for me. That is what elevated my name in WCW.
WrestleMania is a week of activities and family-oriented fun, and then there is the special night at the end of it where you can see history being made.