Pittsburgh Steelers head coach, Mike Tomlin sat down on The Pivot Podcast with Ryan Clark, Channing Crowder, and Fred Taylor and spoke about several topics. One of those topics was about one of his favorite "Tomlinisms," "Don't Seek Comfort." The Steelers head coach has been notorious for his "Tomlinisms" over the course of his long tenured career.
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Tomlin finishes answering a question about coaching:
" I just think that I came into this thing fighting every day to prove I belong, to help them dudes eat. And so that's just a mentality that endured for me."
Crowder asks Tomlin, "Do you still feel that way?" Tomlin answered, "Absolutely."
Crowder then asks another follow up question about Tomlin feeling like he still needs to prove himself after 15 straight seasons without a losing record and a Super Bowl championship:
"You still feel you got to prove yourself, bro? You got championships!" Crowder continued. "Every day you walk into that, you leave this big ass house because we're in your basement, and I ain't even been to the fourth floor yet." Crowder joked. "You walk in still to this day, you walk in and you think you have to prove yourself?"
Tomlin responds matter-of-factly:
"I don't care about that," referring to the championships comment mentioned by Crowder."I create comforts for my wife and kids, man. I just lay my head down here until it's time to go to work the next damn day. You know what I mean? I resist comfort. I ask my guys to resist comfort, right? Guys that played for me, they can tell you, one of my sayings, I got a lot of sayings, is... 'Don't seek comfort.' Seeking comfort is a natural human condition, right? We all want to be comfortable.
I realized if you're going to have special outcomes that you got to be comfortable being uncomfortable. And so, I've just trained myself over the years to resist comfort and so [to] appreciate my resume is seeking comfort. You know what I mean? I get my ass whipped and I say, 'uh, but my resume is such and such.'"
Former Steelers Super Bowl XLIII Champ, Clark interjects in a jokingly way further reiterating Tomlin's point:
"But I'm still a Super Bowl champ."Tomlin quickly points out, "Yeah, that's seeking comfort!"
Former Pittsburgh Steelers safety, Ryan Clark (#25) celebrates in the confetti after Super Bowl XLIII. | Chris McGrath / Getty Images
Tomlin continues:
"Those that love us most in our business, they do the best job of helping us seek comfort, right? I come into this house, man, and I lose a home game, and my mom is sitting in the kitchen, and she's talking about the refs did us wrong, blah, blah, blah. I'm like, ma get out of here with that. I don't need that. It stings my ears. I've trained myself to hate it, because hating it keeps me upright, keeps our program upright.That's just a mode of operation that I'm comfortable with. I can't allow myself to do that. I think if I did, I think those that I leave will see it. And that's not what I'm about. That's not what I stand before the men and talk about on a daily basis. And if I talk about it, damn it, I got to live it. And so I'm prepared to do that every day."
Keith Srakocic / The Associated Press
Words to live by from the best head coach in football! "Tomlinisms" aren't just words or phrases, they're bigger than that! They're nuances to live life by, especially for Tomlin.
Check out the entire episode below!
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