"All me, all the time" - Cody Rhodes on how his mindset changed after leaving AEW for WWE

Despite being one of the founding fathers of AEW as well as its promotional poster boy, Cody Rhodes was never able to win the company's world championship. Looking back, that was by design.

In the early days of AEW Dynamite, The Elite – including Rhodes – seemed to be more focused on kickstarting the pushes of lesser-known talent than grabbing the glory for themselves. This was exemplified by The American Nightmare locking himself into a stipulation that precluded him from ever challenging for the AEW World Championship again if he couldn't defeat Chris Jericho at Full Gear 2019.

In stark contrast, Cody Rhodes seems hellbent on chasing WWE's top prize since returning to the sports entertainment juggernaut. In a recent conversation with Daniel Cormier, Rhodes detailed his mindset in putting himself first now that he's back in WWE:

"I'm thinking all me, all the time. I joke with some of my other peers that there are guys that will hit you with the, 'Oh, I'm trying to help you. This will be good for you.' When you hear it, you're like, 'Ah, I feel like this is about you.' If I'm the one on the receiving end of that conversation, I kind of just want the truth. That's how I've become."

Cody continued, explaining that after he had his daughter, he lost a certain sense of frivolity about his own career and wanted to grab the spotlight:

"One of the things about having my daughter was, I lost my sense of BS. It just became, I think I'm pretty good, I'm better, I want to be better, and how much longer do we have on the clock? You feel like it's never going to end, but it will end at some point. At this moment, I'm not doing any of the things...that is what I was meant to do then, now I feel no problem in saying, 'Nope, I'm about myself at this moment. I'm about getting it done for me,'" he said. [H/T Fightful]

Cody Rhodes reacts to The Elite re-signing with AEW

Over the last several months, speculation has been circulating about the future of The Elite – Kenny Omega, "Hangman" Adam Page, and The Young Bucks. As their deals with the Jacksonville-based promotion were reportedly up soon, some fans hoped the group would follow in Cody Rhodes' footsteps and sign with WWE.

However, the four have decided to stick together and recently extended their contracts with All Elite Wrestling. Speaking on the Haus of Wrestling podcast, Cody Rhodes had this to say about it:

"I’m very happy when any wrestler or superstar gets paid. I don’t want to sound carny or hacky, but to know that your peers and people who take the bumps and go through all this and have that type of physical struggle that comes with this gig, to know they’re getting paid is really exciting. I am over the moon that that group did what they did because, as Nick Jackson said, I believe they’ve made some NBA money off of it."

Do you think Cody Rhodes made the right decision to return to WWE? Let us know your thoughts in the comments section below!