It wouldn’t be a stretch to say Dr. Myron Rolle’s path to becoming a neurosurgeon went through the Brighton Reservation.

The former Florida State University football standout is a neurosurgeon at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston. His extraordinary story of being a standout on the football field to the medical field was profiled in a New York Times feature in October.

While at FSU in 2008, Rolle partnered with the Seminole Tribe to develop a curriculum at Pemayetv Emahakv Charter School in Brighton. The curriculum emphasized the importance of living a healthy lifestyle, including avoiding diabetes.

“I love coming back and I am always welcomed with warm arms,” he told the Tribune during a visit to the school in early 2009. “It’s is a wonderful experience to fellowship and have a relationship with the Seminole Tribe of Florida.”

At the time, Rolle had just received a Rhodes Scholarship, one of the world’s most prestigious scholarships. He would go on to study at Oxford University in England before embarking on a brief NFL career.

Rolle, who earned first team freshman All-American accolades at FSU, was selected by Tennessee in the 2010 NFL draft and spent time with the Titans and the Pittsburgh Steelers. He played in preseason games, but never a regular season or postseason game. He left football in 2013 and returned to Tallahassee to attend FSU’s College of Medicine.

He said in the Times’ article that he adheres to a philosophy he learned from Mickey Andrews, who was his defensive coordinator at FSU.

“Can you be two percent better than you were yesterday? You can if you take small steps every single day toward a larger goal. It helps me make more sense of the challenges, the tasks, responsibilities that I have,” Rolle told the Times.

Rolle turned that philosophy into a 240-page book that was published in May. “The 2% Way: How a Philosophy of Small Improvements Took Me to Oxford, the NFL, and Neurosurgery,” is available through Amazon, Barnes & Noble and other booksellers.

According to the Times, Rolle is in his sixth year of his neurosurgery residency at Harvard Medical School and Massachusetts General Hospital.

Rolle, 36, is married to pediatric dentist Dr. Latoya Legrand Rolle. They have two sets of twins. He is also the founder and chairman of the Myron L. Rolle Foundation, a nonprofit focused on supporting educational, health and wellness initiatives throughout the world that benefit children and families in need.