“I don’t necessarily agree with you, but I appreciate it very much,” Louis C. K. says to an applauding crowd at the start of his new stand-up special, “Oh My God.” It’s a quintessential act of belittling himself — a refusal to believe that he deserves the gratitude of the hundreds of fans surrounding him at the Celebrity Theater in Phoenix and the thousands more who will see this comedy special when it makes its HBO debut next Saturday. It’s emblematic of the defeatist charm of Louis C. K., who at 45 finds himself a performer of the moment whose moment keeps getting bigger and bigger.

But something funny seems to have happened to Louis C. K. lately, and not in a ha-ha way. Could it be that he has also found his confidence?

In a little over a year he has released a hit stand-up special, “Live at the Beacon Theater,” which he self-produced and sold on the Internet, and organized a nationwide tour (on which “Oh My God” was recorded) without relying on a major ticketing company. While his alter ego on his FX series, “Louie,” was having awkward dates with Melissa Leo and Parker Posey and vying unsuccessfully to replace David Letterman (with help from a talk-show whisperer played by David Lynch), Louis C. K. won Emmy Awards for “Louie” and “Live at the Beacon Theater.” Currently on a yearlong hiatus from “Louie,” he has filmed a small part in Woody Allen’s “Blue Jasmine” and is shooting a role in a movie by David O. Russell (the director of “Silver Linings Playbook”) about the Abscam sting operation.

“I’ve got maybe 10 years to ladle the butter into a jar for my kids and then die,” he said over a recent breakfast in the West Village. But beyond this reflexive modesty he does not carry himself with the same stooped self-deprecation that comes across in his stand-up routines. Some part of him is highly cognizant of his value and the influence he wields, and knows how to get what he believes he deserves in his work, if not always in his life. And he is supremely aware that there are consequences to having a spotlight shone on him for as long as he has.