- [Announcer] Sam Acho is an NFL player,

author, speaker and humanitarian.

Sam believes that it's time to stop hiding

behind an emotional mask

and instead allow theworld to see the real you.

- How do you handle emotionand what are you hiding

and what are you keepingfrom everyone else?

- [Announcer] In his book,

"Let the World See You,"

Sam shares lessons from his life,

helping you overcome your fears

and allowing God to use your gifts

to help those around you.

- All right, well joiningme now is Sam Acho.

Thanks so much for beingwith us today, Sam.

- Yeah, I'm so glad to be here.

Thanks for having me.

- Of course.

All right, well let's go back a little bit

to your childhood.

More specifically, your teenage years.

You mention in your book thatyou were actually picked on

and that's kind of hardto believe right now

because of just how popular you are,

but tell us about that.

- Yeah, well anybody who has ever known me

knows I'm a big guy, right.

I was a bigger kid.

I remember I went to anall boys school, right,

all boys, predominantlywhite school in Dallas.

The church I went to was apredominantly black church

in South Oak Cliff

and my parents are from Nigeria

so in our household it's almostlike this Nigerian household

so it's almost like I was living

in all these different worlds.

I remember going to a church service,

youth service one Wednesday night

and I remember getting made fun of

for the clothes I was wearing

and how I was dressed, the shoes,

and I remember just feeling uncomfortable

and not knowing what to do

and so after they stopped, you know,

kids were making fun of me,

they said oh, you don't know who that is,

that's Dr. Acho's son.

My dad was a pastor at this church.

They said, oh, you can't talk about him,

his dad is a pastor here

and I would, I thought thatthat saying would give me

a kind of confidence

and say yeah, I'm Dr. Acho's son,

but in essence, I felt alittle bit of dejection

and sadness of saying oh no,

like am I somewhat of likean embarrassment, right,

embarrassing people around me.

So as soon as they turned around,

I actually got up andtook about a 25 yard walk

to the restroom stalland I just sat there.

Sat there, I didn't wanna be made fun of,

didn't wanna be talked about,

and I waited, usually about 30 minutes in

we'd break up from our, like our big group

with the middle school and high school

to just your own age groups, about,

sat there, 15, 20 minutes

and I went back and kindamet up with my classmates

and that became a theme.

It became a theme notonly in my teenage years

but fast forward to the NFL,

right, I've played nine years in the NFL,

highly competitive and no,

I wasn't going to restroom stalls to hide,

but often times I wouldhide who I really was,

a fiery competitor, somebodywho loves God wholeheartedly,

but also was trying todominate you on the field,

you know, make it nine years in the NFL

if you're not, you don'thave that kind of mentality.

But I was trying to always figure out

who I was going to be.

- Wow, well another thingthat you mention in your book

which I love is that allof us come to a point

where we are faced with our insecurities

and you say that there are three ways

we can deal with coming face to face

with those insecurities.

What are those three things

and what did you choose for a while?

- Absolutely, well, you know,

the first option is you can run, right.

You see something, you see an insecurity,

something you're dealing with

or maybe an area thatyou're not comfortable with,

you can run from it and just avoid it

and just run the other way, right,

just act like it doesn't exist.

Another option is to hide.

So what I chose, oftentimes I'll hide, right.

Okay, they're gonna make fun of me,

I don't wanna be made fun ofso I'll just go and I'll hide.

Right, but the last option,the best option, right,

think about what Jesus did with the woman

who was caught in adultery, right,

he looked at her and he saw her

and he said I see you, right, I see you.

He was without sin cast the first stone

and oldest to youngest,they dropped their stones,

they walked away andJesus went to this woman

and says woman, where haveall your accusers gone?

Right and then he looked and he said,

he said they don't accuseyou and neither do I,

go and sin no more.

You can face, right, these insecurities

and then all the sudden you realize

that people don't hate you

or they're not ashamed of you.

In all reality, thethings that you thought

were your insecurities

are also what in fact God isgoing to give you to grow you.

I was ashamed of my size,

I was a bigger kid.

I was like man, I gotmade fun of all the time

for being so big, you'reso big, you're so big.

Well fast forward, right.

I'm going on my tenthyear in the NFL, right.

A lot of big people play in the NFL.

God used an area that was, theenemy tried to use for shame

and he used it for my benefit

and for his glory

and so you can run, you can hide

or you can address your insecurities.

It could be in a marriage, right.

It could be in this idea that I wanna

look like I'm perfect.

As a mom, there are alot of moms out there

that are saying okay, I'mtrying to have it all together

and look like I'm the perfect mom

or perfect wife and all these things.

It's like no, we'reall, we're all beautiful

and we're all broken at the end of the day

and so, but Jesus looks at us

and he says I see you,

where have all your accusers gone.

Right, I don't accuse you,

so don't accuse yourself.

- Wow, that's powerful.

Well you mention that,

well, first of all,

you are a man of manyaccolades and many things

and there's many successes.

You got your MBA whileyou were playing the NFL

and you mention in the book that

you actually didn't sharethat with many people

and I'm sure a lot of peopleassume that to be humility,

you know, that's something humble,

you know, you don't bragabout your accomplishments.

But what is the differencebetween being humble

and hiding who you really are?

- Absolutely, well all humility is

is thinking of someone else more

than you think of yourself.

So think about pride this way,

if I think about myself more often

than I think about others.

Humility is thinking about others

more than you think about yourself

and so true humility,

yes, I went and I got my MBA from

the number one internationalbusiness school in the world.

It was a school called the

Thunderbird School of Global Management,

it was Glendale, Arizona,

students from all around the world

would come to this school

and I didn't tell anybody

and people might think that is wow,

so proud of you, Sam, you're so humble.

No, no, no, no, no.

Right, that was pride of me thinking

I don't want people to see

or to think that I'm not abig, bad football player.

I want them to see me as this guy.

Humility says no, hey guys,

I love learning, I love education, right,

my parents founded us on faith in God,

right, and educatingyourself and working hard

and so I love that.

So real humility says hey,

I'm going to do this, this is what I love,

what do you love, right.

Hopefully I can inspire and encourage you.

And so yes, I was named one of the

top 20 smartest athletes in all of sports,

I can recite Shakespeare and Chaucer

and I can tell you pi to the 14th decimal,

that's how God made me, I love learning,

I love being on TV and talking

and doing the things, Ilove competing, right.

That's how God created me

and he also created me to love Him

and to get to know Him, right.

But me hiding that, no benefit.

- Yeah, definitely.

Well Sam, I wish we had more time.

Thank you so much for being with us.

Everyone who is watching, get his book,

"Let the World See You."

It's available wherever books are sold.