America may have been sad to see Jay Leno leave The Tonight Show, but at least one person is glad he did it.

That person is Jay Leno.

In an interview with the Associated Press, Leno explained that he feels “liberated” to spend the time working on his stand up routines while traveling around the world. This week, he was in Israel. Next week, who knows?

“Write joke. Tell joke. Get check. It’s pretty simple. It’s not a hard plan,” he said, explaining that doing stand up is easy compared to doing The Tonight Show every night, “You don’t have to watch ‘Noah’ and all these other films, these kinds of kid movies. You get to a certain age where ‘OK, I’m over the superhero thing. I don’t have to do that anymore so that’s fantastic!”

He also said he has no plans to get back in television anytime soon, but he wouldn’t mind appearing as a guest on his former show: “I have no problem doing that, but I think that once you leave you’ve got to let the ground lay fallow for a while.”

The last episode of The Tonight Show hosted by Leno had Billy Crystal as a guest who said this of the former host: “You work so hard because you love this job, and more than anybody I know, you love being a comedian. It’s been such a thrill to watch you be one of America’s friends, who they turn to before they go to sleep at night.”

What a night. http://t.co/Nzzjh6bsXN #TonightShow pic.twitter.com/hVIa5xQIJG

— Jay Leno (@jayleno) February 7, 2014

Jay Leno’s Twitter feed has been noticeably silent since he left The Tonight Show a few months ago. But you can still give a look and see the wonderful messages posted there wishing him well.

Thanks for all the memories, @JayLeno! pic.twitter.com/afOD9T4H91

— The White House (@WhiteHouse) February 7, 2014

It looks like their wishes came true.

Image via Wikimedia Commons.