William Regal has a warning for any wrestler who wants to be the best in the world

A lot of pro wrestlers call themselves the best in the world and are obsessed with achieving that status and reputation.

AEW performer William Regal has a warning for these folks. Here’s his message to them, courtesy of an interview with Metro.co.uk:

“It’s not a knock on anybody trying to be the best wrestler in the world, I just don’t want them to eat their lives up, fixate on it. I’ve seen it put some of my friends in the grave. That’s not an exaggeration.”

“Some of my friends have gone to the grave because they have been trying to live up to too much, because they put so much pressure on themselves to be somebody you can never be.”

“There’s always gonna be at least one person will disagree – even if they don’t disagree – just to disagree. If you listen to too much of it, it’s gonna send you off the deep end.”

“I’m gonna offend people if I say this because there’s no such thing – there never was, there never will be – as a best wrestler in the world, because it is subjective.”

“There’s always gonna be somebody that says there’s somebody better than you, or you don’t do something right. It’s something that’ll drive you up the wall.”

Regal’s words remind me of a recent Seth Rollins interview where Seth admitted that, even though he’s an extremely successful pro wrestler, it eats him up that he’s never been the top guy in the business. Rollins is far from the only pro wrestler who has expressed this kind of sentiment.

I think Regal’s warning extends well beyond pro wrestling. Any public figure should be aware that constant criticism comes with the territory, particularly with how quickly information spreads today on social media. Sometimes the best thing to do for yourself is to log off Twitter for a while.

His message can also apply to situations that don’t involve public feedback. Some people are so singularly focused on being the very best at what they do, to the detriment of many other aspects of their life. Regal has seen this approach end poorly enough times with pro wrestlers where he feels compelled to say something about it.

What do you think of Regal’s perspective, Cagesiders?