David Letterman is a "better person" since walking away from his TV job and moving back to his home state of Indiana

He told GQ: "In show business, I find that I have pretended to be someone I'm truly not. In my life here in Indiana and at my home with my family, I am probably the person I actually am. And I regret that they don't kind of cross at any point."

When asked if he thought being in the entertainment industry made him a "worse person", he replied: "Yes. You're exactly right. And I don't know, maybe it's only because I went through show business. I got that out of my system eventually that I can concentrate on being a better person and probably couldn't have reached this point if I had not gone through the exercise of trying to succeed at show business."

He added: "I just feel like personally, I have greater humanity than I did when I was in show business.

"It was all single-minded and great pressure, real unimagined, and I felt like it's all on me, and it's all on me, and that it was all nonsense.

"All I cared about was television, one hour of television that I was responsible for, for 30 years. That's all I cared about.

"Everything fell apart, went away. I didn't even know if it was falling apart or not. And now I have the energy and the broader focus to recognize humanity has other fulfilling pursuits."

Since walking away from late night TV, Letterman has been hosting a series called 'My Next Guest Needs No Introduction' for Netflix and he added of his career: "I'm surprised that I'm still doing it at my age. On the other hand, I still get a kick out of what we're doing. So what does that mean? I don't know."