Quote Of The Day By Ted Danson: 'I Was Not Really Fully Emotionally Baked Until Shortly Before I Met...'

Ted Danson has been a TV mainstay for over 50 years, and has starred in some of the best sitcoms ever made, including NBC's "Cheers" and HBO's "Curb Your Enthusiasm." His star power also carried over to the big screen, landing roles in movies like "Three Men and a Baby" and "Saving Private Ryan."

Some of the best Ted Danson shows have been later on in his career, and his role as the hellish architect Michael in "The Good Place" shows just how much fun he can have with bizarre characters. In recent years, however, he's led Netflix's "A Man on the Inside" as retiree Charles Nieuwendyk, who helps out a private detective.

Like many great comedies, it's hilarious but also has a heartfelt streak baked into its story, as Nieuwendyk is still grieving the loss of his wife and lives a mundane life until he starts working for investigator Julie Kovalenko (Lilah Richcreek Estrada). Sadly, Netflix confirmed in September that ""A Man on the Inside" will end with Season 3. To celebrate Danson's work on the series, here's his quote of the day.

"I was not really fully emotionally baked until shortly before I met Mary ... Thank God we didn't meet earlier."

Ted Danson spoke about his 30-plus-year marriage to Mary Steenburgen in an interview with People back in 2024. The "Cheers" star explained that during his 40s, he recognized that he needed to grow into more of an "emotionally mature, honest human being." Danson said that he doubts Steenburgen would've got into a relationship with him if he hadn't spent that time working on himself.

The pair had previously met during auditions for 1983's "Cross Creek," but Danson didn't land the role. They reconnected when they both worked on the 1994 adventure movie "Pontiac Moon." Clearly, Danson's personal development efforts paid off — they've been happily married since 1995. 

Ted Danson's reflection on where he was at before getting into a relationship with Mary Steenburgen is a reminder that we can always take time to work on ourselves. If we're not "fully emotionally baked," as the "Cheers" star puts it, then we risk not being able to connect with other people properly. That also applies to platonic friendships as well as romantic relationships. If we've not spent time trying to mature and grow, then it can be hard to maintain a connection with others.

Of course, personal development is quite a broad concept, and it can be different for everybody depending on their personality, life circumstances, or even their job. But at it's heart, it's about ensuring you can deal with everyday life alongside the difficulties of the modern world with a level head. There's no time limit on this kind of personal development, as Danson himself implied when he said that he was in his 40s before he had that realization.

• "We are truly all in this together, which is a spiritual thought. It isn't us against them. It has nothing to do with politics or philosophy or religion, it is these laws of nature, these laws of life, of which we are a part. We are so arrogant, we forget that we are not the reason for evolution, we are not the point of evolution. We are part of evolution. Unfortunately, we believe that we've been created to dominate the planet, to dominate nature. Ain't true." — from a 1995 interview with Feminist.com
• "One of the hardest things for me to do is watch myself. The first time I see it, I am obsessed with my left ear or my right ear or some other physical attribute, or the fact that I'm 60 or whatever shallow ego thought is running through my head. I'm just destroyed that I'm not Cary Grant or whatever." — from a 2010 interview with The New York Times
• When you have brothers, you learn to be fiercely competitive with someone you love so they won't kill you and you won't kill them. — from a 2013 interview with Metro
• "Don't slow down, just keep going, keep living your life. I think that's one of the things our elders can pass on to us. This is how you live life right up until the end." — from a 2024 interview with CBS News