Modern Wisdom - #863 - Matthew McConaughey - The Hidden Art Of Reinventing Yourself

Episode Date: November 11, 2024

Matthew McConaughey is an Academy Award winning actor, a producer and an author. Expect to learn what “Don’t half-ass it” means, the story of how Matthew got his iconic starting role in Dazed & Confused, how to see the upside during any crisis, why having a sense of humour should be your default emotion, McConaughey’s own version of his Lonely Chapter, when you should listen to your gut versus your head, why McConaughey turned down $14.5M to pursue something great, Matthew's reflections on the 10 year anniversary of Interstellar, lesson on finding the perfect partner, and much more… Sponsors: See discounts for all the products I use and recommend: https://chriswillx.com/deals Get a 20% discount on your first order from Maui Nui Venison by going to https://mauinuivenison.com/modernwisdom (use code MODERNWISDOM) Sign up for a one-dollar-per-month trial period from Shopify at https://shopify.com/modernwisdom (automatically applied at checkout) Get a 25% discount on the best supplements from Momentous at https://livemomentous.com/modernwisdom (automatically applied at checkout) Shop SKIMS Mens at https://SKIMS.com/modernwisdom (automatically applied at checkout) Extra Stuff: Get my free reading list of 100 books to read before you die: https://chriswillx.com/books Try my productivity energy drink Neutonic: https://neutonic.com/modernwisdom Episodes You Might Enjoy: #577 - David Goggins - This Is How To Master Your Life: https://tinyurl.com/43hv6y59 #712 - Dr Jordan Peterson - How To Destroy Your Negative Beliefs: https://tinyurl.com/2rtz7avf #700 - Dr Andrew Huberman - The Secret Tools To Hack Your Brain: https://tinyurl.com/3ccn5vkp - Get In Touch: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/chriswillx Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/chriswillx YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/modernwisdompodcast Email: https://chriswillx.com/contact - Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

What does don't half-ass it mean to you? Ah, if you're gonna do it, do it. Say what you can do, do what you say. If you can't do it, don't say you can do it. Don't over-leverage yourself. Don't over-leverage your decision and then jump in and kind of dip a toe. I think I'll try it out.

No, think if you're gonna try it out beforehand, but when it's time to go, dive. Finish it, find out. Come out the other side. Don't leave it and go, oh, if I just would've, uh-uh. That keeps me up at night. I think it keeps a lot of us up at night.

When you half-assed something, you just don't know whether you failed or succeeded, got what you want or didn't get what you want. Finding out and looking in the mirror and going, I didn't have acid, I went all the way, I found out, and that ain't for me. Or I found out and you damn right that is for me. That's a great place to get to.

But the limbo of not knowing, if you half-assed something, the limbo of going, I hedged my bet. What could have happened? You don't know. Were you surprised when your dad said that to you? Yeah. When you were going to take a pivot in life trajectory? I wouldn't have been in the top 100 things.

I thought he would have said, I was fully stabilizing in that moment. As I said, I called Tuesday night, seven o'clock. He'll have had a beer. He's already had dinner, not Monday, cause that's the first day of the work week. He'll be a little more stressed. Catch him at Tuesday. Seven o'clock, he'll have had a beer. He's already had dinner, not Monday, because that's the first day of the work week. He'll be a little more stressed. Catch him at Tuesday. When I unload this that I don't want to go to law school,

I want to go to film school. And I really thought he was going to go, you want to do what? Again, the family I grew up in, the idea of me thinking that the idea of going into film, it's like a very Saturday idea, a hobby idea, not a job. And when I shared it with him, the pause that he took,

another bead of sweat started on my back of my neck before he goes, well, don't half-ass it. Now we'll say this though, I do know now, and I didn't know it then, I've realized it in the last 10 years, the way that I asked him is part of the reason he gave me that answer. I really wasn't asking him.

I called him and said, dad, what do you got my command? He said, I don't wanna go to law school anymore. I want to go to film school. I didn't go, I don't, I'm not feeling, I'm not sure about law school. I think I want to, I mean, I think I may want to go to, if I'd have stuttered into that, I think he would have again heard me half-assing what I wanted and gone.

In the process of being told to not half-ass it, you didn't half-ass it. The way I asked, he asked and he heard my own conviction. And I think what he had in that moment was what I think every parent wants to hope to have with their kids is that, you know, we raise our kids to go in a structured form, follow this and you can get most of what you want in life.

But what, and that can work, but what do we really want our kids to do? We want them to follow that and then bust out of it one day and not even ask our permission. And that's when we're going, that's my boy, that's my girl, that's my child. We wanted to break out. And I think what he heard then was I was breaking out

without really asking his permission. And I was clear, I spoke up, didn't stutter. My voice was out of my throat a little bit. And I think that was part of why in that moment, he gave me the answer, don't have fast. Do you think that sentiment carried forward into how you got the role for days and confused that I'm going to continue to lean in, I'm on the front foot and 10 toes down?

Yes. Now how much that direct sentiment from that night when he told me don't have facet had to do with that? I mean, yeah, I did have something to do. Look, when he said don't have facet, he was, and I talk about this in the book, he wasn't only giving me permission, he was giving me a responsibility. He was going, I knew, I knew I was, I had his word with me in my future decisions. I was making them for more than myself. I wanted to fail less because I didn't wanna embarrass him.

And that was extra motivation, extra strength, extra courage, extra sobriety, extra like, well, let's find out, go for it, man, go for it. It carried on into other stories of other jobs. Time to kill with Joe Schumacher going, I want the lead. That's me going, I want to find out. And dad told me not to half-ass it back there a few years ago. You know, so if I don't go for it, if I embarrass myself,

I'm embarrassing him. So that was also some incentive and some weight behind those moves that I made, some of them. Are you a brave person in that way, do you think? Are you a brave person in that way, do you think? I don't know. People say that I don't think I take enough risk. I'm told that people whose opinion I admire think that that's my greatest asset, that I take the risk I'll take and the bravery I'll take with me.

And you still have a hunger for more? I think I'm a little chicken shitting. I mean, not overall, but I think there's many things that I'm not fully assing. I think there's many things that I'm still could take further, that there's still many things that more risk I could take and more bravery I could have. Yeah.

Could you tell that story, the Dates and Confused story of, of leaning in, of taking that risk? Yeah. So, I mean, the initial one started when I went to, on a Thursday night, went to my favorite bar at the top of the Hyatt. Cause I knew the bartender, he was at film school with me. He'd give me free vodka and tonic. So I went there. I get there that night. He brings'd give me free vodka and tonic. So I went there.

I get there that night. He brings me my girlfriend vodka and tonic, told me, Hey, there's a guy at the end of the bar producing a movie. Let me introduce you to him. I'll walk over, reintroduce me to him. Four hours later, that man, Don Phillips, legendary casting director, who was actually a producer on Days to Confuse. We get kicked out of that bar.

I've had as many vodka and tonics as he had since I sat down. So I'm not leaving easily either and I'm standing up for my new friend who we hadn't done anything get kicked out of bar We really hadn't we were just kind of standing on top of the tables imitating some golf shots We had played on similar courses in the past so we get not so Not so politely escorted out and he's in a cab or win a cab He's riding with me to my apartment, gonna drop me off before he heads back to his hotel.

He pulls out a joint, or I pulled out a joint, start smoking, he goes, hey, you ever done any acting? And I said, man, I was in a, you know, Trisha Yearwood video for a second, kind of more of a modeling job, I was in a middle light commercial for about that long. I go, I don't know if it's called it acting. He goes, well, you might come to this address

tomorrow morning, 9.30. You might be right for this part. It's this character called Wooderson. This movie, Day's Confused. I think you might be right for the part. This is three something in the morning. So 9.30 came really quickly and I was on time probably five minutes early. And we were already pretty tuned at this time. Now mind you, I get there, I walk in, they go,

Matthew? I go, yes. They go, Don left the script for you. I open it up, it's signed by him. Hey, here's the part, Wooderson, I got three scenes in there, three lines, they're all marked, check them out. I think he might be right for it. Good luck. Let me know. We'll call you in for an audition. I go away. I go look at these three lines. One of them was what I like to call these days, a launch pad line, which is a line that sometimes they'll have in a script where if that character means that line and that character's not playing that line

as an attitude or a wink or a joke, if that character means that line, you could write a book on it. You could write a book based on that reality. And that line in days confused from the character of Wooderson was a line when he's leaning against the wall outside the pool hall. High school girls walk by, he checks one of them's backsides, they go by and his buddy says, Wooderson, you got to cut that out, man. You're going to end up in jail. And Wooderson says, no, man, that's what I love about those high school girls, man. I get older, they say the same age.

That line, I went, who is that? There's a book on somebody, if that's not trying to be cute, if that guy's not trying to say something coy and clever, if he believes I've got life figured out, man, this is my North Star. So that line informed who the character was. I go, I read for it.

I remember the first time I got called back because they said the sound was bad. And now when I come back, I don't know if the sound was bad or the fact that I just needed to come back, I just used to come back and read for Richard Linklater, the director, who I did read for, and I got the part. Now the role was also based on, as I wrote about in the book, who I thought my brother was when I

was 11. My 17-year-old brother was already my hero. He was cooler than James Dean. And we had one day where his car was broke down and my mom, when I was supposed to pick him up from school, and he wasn't where he was supposed to be. We're looking for him. I'm looking at the back of our station wagon and there I see this silhouette of this guy leaning against a brick wall, left boot heel against the brick wall, leaning back, lazy, sick in the right hand, smoking. And it was my brother. And in that silhouette, he was 13 feet tall, coolest dude in the world. And just as I went to go, wait, there's Pat.

I remembered, oh, he's going to get big trouble for smoking. So I won't say it's him. My mom goes, who? to go, wait, there's Pat. I remembered always going to get big trouble for smoking. So I won't say it's him. My mom goes, who? I go, nothing. But that image in my 11-year-old eyes were, that was Wooderson. So we get to the set one night, and I just go in for what's supposed to be a makeup wardrobe test.

Meaning put on makeup, put on wardrobe. When the director link letter can leave the set and gets a minute, he comes check shit, eyeballs, gives a few notes, and you say goodbye, I'll see you when I come back for work. Along this night, I come out of the trailer, Linklater shows up, has a look, cause he's walking up, his hands go out,

he's just going, yeah, yeah, Wooderson. He's like peach pants. Is that a nudes t-shirt? Ah, I like that. What's that over there? That tattoo, that's a Black Panther tattoo. Yeah, yeah, yeah, look at the hair, the comb over. I-shirt? I like that. What's that over there? That tattoo, that's a Black Panther tattoo. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Look at the hair, the comb over.

I like it, I like it. I said, cool. About to say goodbye. I think. And he goes, say man, he goes, you think, you know, Wooderson's been with the typical hot chicks in school, the cheerleaders and stuff.

I'm like, yeah. He goes, you think Wooderson would be interested in the redheaded intellectual? And I'm like, yeah, man, Wooderson loves all types of chicks. He goes, well, listen, the actress Marissa Robisi is over here in her car. She's got her nerd friends in the back. It's the last day of school. You think maybe we're gonna pull up and try and pick her up?

And I'm like, yeah. And he goes, okay, you can do it now. I said, give me 30 minutes. I took a walk. Now I'm about to be in my first scene. There's nothing written. I've not done this before, but I'm going over scenarios. Where are we?

Last day of school, I got some change in my pocket. I'm working for the city, sure. Red Hill, next one, we're gonna go out. I'd probably speak a little Spanish, blah, blah, blah. Next thing I know, I'm in the car, getting a lavalier mic put on me. I'm getting for the city, sure, Red Hill. Next one, we're gonna go out. I'd probably speak a little Spanish, pa-pa-pa. Next thing I know, I'm in the car, getting a lavalier mic put on me. I'm getting a little anxious, but I'm going, who is my man?

Who is Wooderson? What do I love? What do I love? What I love? As this mic's getting put on me, I'm like, I love my car. Said, bam, I'm in my 70s Chevelle right now. There's one thing I got going for me. I said, I love rock and roll, man.

I said, shit, man, I got Ted News at Stranglehold rocking in the A track. There's two. I said, I love rock and roll, man. I said, shit, man, I got Ted Nugent's Stranglehold rocking in the A track. There's two. I said, I love getting high. I said, well, man, Slater's riding shotgun. He's always got a doobie rolled up. There's three. And that's when I heard Action. And as I looked up and dropped it into drive, thought of the three things I had while I was going to get the fourth and I said to myself, and I love picking up chicks. In drive, pull out three affirmations of the three things I did have on the way to get the fourth. All right, all right, all right. Pull in, have the scene, try and pick her up, ditch the geeks in the back, gonna be a, you know, fiesta in the making,

whatever it was, kind of spoke a little Spanglish, blah, blah, blah, blah. And all of a sudden it was over, and a lot of people were laughing. And Rick comes up and goes, oh, that's great, that's great, great, we'll try one more time to do this, that. Did the scene too, maybe two times, three times,

I don't remember. And finish it, I get out, people are laughing, I just had fun. I think we're Cochran in the seats, in the Roy Cochran, the actor who played Slater. And the shotgun seat, he's giggling. I'm like, he's like, that was good, man. That was good. I'm like, cool. And all of a sudden I'm about to leave and Rick invites me back the next night. Got put in some other scene. Anyway, he invited me back every night for three weeks. And I worked three weeks.

Now what I found out two years ago was Rick also asked me that night on the sidewalk, hey, you'd think he'd be interested in Reddit and intellectual girl, is because Rick had just noticed that night that they had a story hole. They didn't know what car they were going to go, I think pick up the Aerosmith tickets in and who else had a car. Pickford had a car and I was the only one who had a car and had a little, a guy who had a job and he was trying to start to fill a story hole. He didn't tell me this till like a year ago and that's why he invited me into that first scene

at the Top Notch Barbecue where I said those three words, which were the first words I sell on screen, which were the three affirmations for the three things my guy did have. And I think they came from not intentionally, but leading up to that role, I was listening to a lot of doors and there's a live track of Morrison at some doors concert. I don't know where I think he's in Europe somewhere where he barks out. All right, all right, all right, all right. Very aggressively, not Wooderson style, but like four or five. All right, all right, all right, all right. Very aggressively, not Wooderson style, but like four or five, all right, all right, all right.

And somehow that pop, I had no plans, but it popped in my head in that moment as being, let me take that version, just give three of them for the three things I've got for myself, but in a more laid back, cool way. All right, all right, all right, pulled up. How did it feel to have that positive reinforcement so quickly out of nowhere, both privately and then publicly after?

Well, I mean, it felt fun in the moment. It felt good. And then it became public right there with the crew and the cast. Now publicly it became a year and a half later. I mean, look, privately on that, I remember going, that was so much fun. I think I was good at it. People were telling me I'm good at it. I'm getting invited back. And then the other thing was I'm getting scale.

I'm getting 330 bucks a day. And I'm working a job at Catfish Station Wait Tables and the most I've made there in one night is $73. And now I'm getting 340 or whatever it was for doing this. I was honestly, I remember going, is this shit legal? Is this really, what am I getting away with here, man? Yes, I'll come back for the pay

and because it's so much fun. And then you probably know the story, five days in my dad moved on. Rick and I were just talking about this the other day because his father just moved on a few days ago. We were talking about yesterday. I went home, came back to work. Still had going through morning with my dad, but had that sobriety that comes when you lose a loved one to death. You talk about sobering up in courage of the world even more than my dad

tell me don't have as it. Him passing gave me some real courage, man. I mean of looking at the world straight in the eye and not being intimidated by mortal shit anymore. And so it really helped me stay and focus on the role. Had a great time. Probably a little quieter than I was in the first five days. More to myself a little bit.

Rick and I, that's where Rick and I kind of became more friends than just director, actor at that time. Cause he was the person I was talking to about how it was feeling and how to deal with my dad's death. I finished that. became more friends than just director or actor at that time because he was the person I was talking to about how it was feeling and how to deal with my dad's death. I finished that. I go back to University of Texas, graduate film school. On the way out, already packed up at the U-Haul,

get the Texas Chainsaw Massacre job for like five weeks, which was super fun. Another under the table cash for play that part. Unloaded the U-Haul and drove out to Hollywood. And a year after that, I would say, when time to kill is when all of a sudden I noticed, oh, wow, I'm famous. Like I've cast a new check that I didn't know about

where I say the world become a mirror. There was no more anonymity. That was a whole new drug. I think one of the themes of your worldview that I've become familiar with is alchemizing bad times into good ones. Um, a reminder that things that seem bad can end up being good. And in retrospect, I think it's obvious and almost romantic to think about that alchemy in that way. But in the moment, it's basically impossible.

Yeah. How can people, or how do you have more of that perspective during a hard time? Yeah. Well, look, a couple of things. First off, Yeah. Well, look, a couple of things. First off, I probably start off intellectualizing something that I know I probably should believe in, but don't believe in it, and convince myself, even to an extent to trick myself, that, you know, sit here and go, well, you just tell yourself,

this too shall pass. Okay, great. Well, what the hell's that mean? Even if it's true in the moment, you're like, what are you fucking talking about, man? I'm in the debit section. I'm in a warning section. This sucks. I think that how much I'm conscious of it or not, my undeniable optimism and faith that this is all it is. And if it is, so what? If that's okay, well then really so what? You know what I mean? What's the big deal?

It minimizes, I seem to have a tendency not to make a bigger deal out of things that other people make a bigger deal. Dramas, I don't like to create false drama. When it comes in a chart, I am affected. I get the blues, I get sad, I get mad. I'm a shit to be around. I can't get to sleep.

I got demons in my own head trying to work, trying to work the riddle out. Why did this happen? That's the other thing that's tough for me is I think that any bad thing that happens to me, my initial reaction is, what'd you do wrong to lead to this? Like in a relationship, Camilla and I get in an argument.

My mind immediately goes, well, what'd you do in the last two weeks to let this get to a point where you just had to raise your voice or she had to raise her voice at you. Usually there's some P's and Q's that were not handled to get to that point. So I like it when things are running like this.

The challenge when things are running great is we all tend to think, aha, this is it. I've found it, bottle it. If I realize this, I can maintain this forever and the truth is bullshit, no, we can't. But we can minimize it. If I realize this, I can maintain this forever. And the truth is bullshit, no, we can't. But we can minimize it. There are habits that I notice of things I take care of in my life, health-wise, faith-wise, father-wise,

husband-wise, that I'm, no, if I'm doing that consistently, there's less valleys. There's less stress. There's less warning signs. There's less problematic, oh shit, how do we get in this? So there's consistently behaviors that I know I can act upon that have worked in the past. We'll get back to talking to Matthew in one minute, but first I need to tell you about

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it might not be your fault, but it is your responsibility. And one of the ways to unburden yourself is to assume that everything is, but there is a cohort of people. It's an arrogant notion. Yeah. Look at how I, if only I could have stepped in. Yeah, you make yourself a center.

But also the first side, I'm the reason that I stepped in shit, which is also an asset. Even if someone go, why are you giving yourself so much credit for screwing that up? Yeah. Beautiful. Yeah. I mean, look, I think part of this for me comes from we didn't get in trouble in my family for the bad deed we got in trouble for getting caught.

So times where I can screw up and get away with it, I feel better than times that maybe I didn't screw up as bad but got busted. Because I got caught, because I got busted, because I got myself in the pickle. Because things didn't go how I wanted it to go or how I believed it could go. Is there something that you try to remember about the upside of a crisis during a crisis or do we just need to ride that out? So I think that perspective zooming out would be so beautiful. And in retrospect, if only you could give yourself the gift of distance, of time. Yeah.

Yeah. And yet, you know, something hard is going to come again and you're going to be swept away by the wave. I mean, for me, I think it's an obvious dance to the both because you can't jump to the objective right away and go, inshallah, oh, fate will have it, this too shall pass. I'm fine, no, cause then you don't deal with the crisis. I do have a pretty quick threshold

for being able to laugh, like honestly start giggling when I'm in the shit because I've found that I'm able to handle the shit better if I just start, the quicker I start going, are you kidding me? And I will get objective and remind myself things like, you're going to die McConaughey, which gives me that, ah, so this is not as big of a deal as I thought. I also quickly somehow comes in my head, not right now, but one day this is going to be a great fucking story.

I quickly go to that. I'll get, I'll project forward into those places that ease me a little bit. And at least maybe look at it with a good eye. You're almost imagining being that future you laughing back at this present you. Yeah. And I think that goes back to the, the, the faith and belief that, uh, you know, again, I'm nervous for, I'm going to go speak or something. I got a little thing in my wallet.

You're going to die one day, McConaughey. And I'm like, oh, that relaxes me. If I'm going in, you know, complacent, I got another note, I'm telling myself, what you're about to say and do, will outlive you. So you better fucking do it well, you know, to get me more on edge. This balance is so fascinating. You know, being able to thread that needle, being able to find the golden mean

as Aristotle talked about. But yeah, I've heard you say that you should make a sense of humor your default emotion. Yeah. Linklater and I came up with that in a conversation about 12 years ago, Richard Lincoln. And we were just talking about how mad and angry and upset and offended people get

if they don't know how to react, if they don't have an opinion on something. And we were like, yeah, man, what if it wouldn't be, wouldn't the world be a better place? Easier to get along with everybody. If the default emotion, if you're not sure how to respond, was it? Okay. Now, most people think they go, well, that's insensitive. But that's, it's not insensitive. They usually think that means you're not given the crisis credit, if you can laugh at it. And I wholeheartedly disagree.

Oh, that there's some sort of a tribute in solemnity. Yeah, that you're not core enough about it, man, whatever that, you know what I mean? It's like, oh, you're not taking it seriously. You're actually putting me down. And just because you're saying, you're not, you don't feel victimized and you laugh at this situation. You're telling me, you're making fun of me being a victim.

No, no, no, no, no, I'm trying to deal. Because especially when we talk about the book, if it's inevitable too, that's it. I laugh a lot quicker when I know I'm in an inevitable pickle. I have no other resource to get out of it that I know of. So I'm gonna start giggling a little quicker. So I keep my eyes open and figure my way.

Maybe because sometimes the hard work and the endurance and the elbow grease, the work harder. We were talking about that hustle is not the way out. Sometimes it's, I need to back up, laugh, have a sip of my favorite, whatever, and dance my way through the raindrops out of this son of a bitch. Maybe it's not banging your head on the wall. Maybe it's backing up and seeing, oh, I got a key in my pocket that unlocks the door I'm trying. I've been

bloody in my skull along over banging. I ain't banging into it. I do wonder why. I like being serious and serious about the things I do. I'm serious about this podcast as you might be able to tell by the fact we've renovated in Taiwan. Uh, but there is something that you can take that too far. The seriousness can become a kind of rigidity, uh, as opposed to being dynamically persistent, you know, taking things too seriously, not swaying in the breeze. Right.

Presuming that you like the things you do and you want to keep doing them. But presuming that you like the things you do and you want to keep doing them, the less robust and flexible you are, the more likely you are to break in those ways. And I think that humor is a lovely bit of ballast that helps to balance that out. I would frame it this way. Be very serious about sense humor. Be very serious about comedy. I'm extremely serious about comedy. And I, you know, do I take myself seriously? Yes. But also take seriously the shit I don't. Do I want to know everything? Yeah. But I also take seriously the shit that I don't know. And go, be serious about that you don't know that. Be serious about that this is fricking funny

or at least it's gonna be. So I try to take the comedy seriously. I think we can take sense of humor seriously and we don't have to create a new category of going, oh, I need to be lighthearted or more careless and carefree. We can just care more maybe about the validity of a good sense of humor. Yeah.

You know, instead of it being a relief, oh, so let me let go of the pressure here. Now, let me, it's not, it's almost like it's not, it's not another bucket. It's in the same bucket of commitment and persistence and endurance and. Talking about that balance between good times and bad times, the lessons that we take from each.

I heard a quote recently that said, every man knows reflection and introspection when he's at his lowest. Bad times, you can't do anything other than wallow in retrospective assessment. Yeah. Ah, but one of my favorite things I've learned from you is when things are going well, given that that's presumably what you want to have more of, maybe worth deconstructing that. Yes. I wish I could more and I think more of us could all deconstruct our assets.

There's a, we happiness, you can't guarantee it, but there is a science to satisfaction. There, you can look at habits that engineered less pain in your life, maybe more pleasure, but at least less pain. And that's, that's a win. I, I try to deconstruct, look, I don't, do I write it, did I used to write as much? Look, anybody who's ever kept a diary,

what's the old sort of nostalgic idea of a diary? You go there when you're in pain and you share thoughts that you don't wanna share with anyone else of those reflection. I did used to, for some reason, I don't know why, but would force myself to write every day no matter how happy I was. And I didn't a lot of times wanna go write when I was happy, because I was like,

no, I don't need to write it. I don't need to become conscious of it. I'm having too much fun. It's getting in the way. Come on, I'm doing it. It's living, it's happening. But, and in writing Greenlights, when I went back, that's a lot of the consistencies that I found

that I wrote when things were going well, that I was taking some, for some reason, taking time to go, can I try and bottle some science here to why things are going well? And I did find consistencies. Who I was hanging out with at night, what I was drinking, what bar I was at, what food I was drinking, exercise, preparation for work, for school. And I found things I was like,

you're really happy in this segment of your life. Let's go back and look at what you were doing. Oh, man, I had Og Mandino scrolls. I was on them every day. I had some discipline where I was checking in with myself. Oh, you were going to church on Sundays. You were saying thank you, God, before you went to bed each night. You were appreciating more. You were pointing out beautiful things and not taking them for granted. Until I found a list of things.

I'm like, and when I get off track, I try to remind myself, you've been slacking on some of those. And I could pull it off. I've evolved. I got different ways. I get away with some now, but you know, I've definitely found consistencies.

And I think we all have them if we just notate them along the way that they're not by accident. Cause we sure as hell deconstruct the reasons when we're in the funk and we don't believe're not by accident. Cause we sure as hell deconstruct the reasons when we're in the funk and we don't believe they're by accident. We can take ourselves to behind the woodshed and show ourselves exactly why we're guilty

for every reason and condemn ourselves for every damn reason we got to that spot. Yeah, well, let's, if we're gonna do that, I just say, let's cheers, let's have a cheers on the way for all the things that will work for when we have shit going right. Also knowing that it's not forever, that we will have a mountain to climb here shortly.

Isn't it interesting, so much of content that people like to consume, books, podcasts, autobiographies, memoirs, is deconstructing the success of others. So we'll happily dissect success in other people, and yet only dissect failure in ourselves. This odd asymmetry where we bestow all of the glory on those people. Well done. And I must find out how to do it more, even if it doesn't fit me, even if they're a different constitution, different background, different time.

For me, I'll focus on the negatives. Right. There's a really interesting stat around the likelihood of you ensuring that your dog completes a course of antibiotics is about 95%. The likelihood that you ensure that you'll complete a course of antibiotics is about 50%. So we're prepared to look after an animal that's ensure that you'll keep complete a course of antibiotics.

It's about 50%. So we're prepared to look after an animal twice as well as ourselves. I was, I wrote a note the other day, man. What does that say on the back of your phone? Sticker. Oh. Choose to shine.

Very cool. My daughter gave me that. Yeah. I wrote the other day and then most of what I do is I use this notes app, right? And I wrote the other day, um, um, where is it? It was on that note. I was like, what, what's, what's my best advice I need to give myself right now is listen to my own damn advice.

Yeah. And it was, followed that up withed that up with, where is it? Yeah. Trying to live with less gravity and more backbone is a salty task. What's that mean to you? Kind of live lighter with less gravity, live lighter, not take certain things so seriously,

but still have the principle backbone because I'm getting older. We get older and the black and whites turn to gray. And then there's a great word, compromise, we all say, which is such a mature thing to do. And then all of a sudden we let things slide and then we start going, well, change will happen. Hey, change is inevitable.

Let change happen. And I'm not ready. That's part of getting old, I think, not just getting older. Same with cynicism. It's a disease of getting too old. And I'm not ready to, I don't wanna be ready to give up

certain things that I'm going, no, man. The beauty of ignorance, those things that we believed in. I've gotten away with so many things because of my ignorance. I would be dead 14 times in this life if I wouldn't have been ignorant of the situation I was in. And so, yeah,

not knowing what we know, not knowing or knowing what we know, it's... Anyway, yeah, it's more backbone to hold on and be principled to what I stand for, what I stand against when it becomes easier and easier to just go with the flow. And I'm not ready to go, let's just go with the flow. I just wanna, I wanna, I don't wanna pick the wrong battles. I'm trying to be discerning and not picking the wrong fights.

Cause I like picking fights and going after challenges. But I'm in a plank, I'm kinda like, man, it's tough duty to win the fair fights. And there's a lot of unfair fights out there. And why do I wanna spend my time if I got 24 hours a day picking unfair fights when I'm gonna be busting my ass to win the fair fight. And there's a lot of unfair fights out there. And why do I want to spend my time if I got 24 hours a day picking unfair fights when I'm going to be busting my ass to win the fair ones? Well, also picking fights with yourself. You know, you hinted just there at the difficulty of a negative inner voice.

You know, you take things seriously. You care about what you're doing. You want to achieve things in this world, which means that you need to have high standards, you need to posit an ideal. But as soon as you posit an ideal, you then begin to compare yourself to that ideal. And often you find yourself lacking because it's a fucking ideal. Yep. I think it's why a lot of relationships don't work. We make her Wonder Woman and she makes us Superman and neither one of us can live up to it. And that we've got that bulb, that honeymoon bulb turned up to a hundred

Watts and the honeymoon's over. We're trying to deal with some real, just some real base stuff. Let's leave it at 20 Watts. We're just lit, but we're not just feverishly, you know, superhuman. And I think a lot of us just purport that on someone else and they can't live up to him and it ends up not being fair to them. And then they do the same to us and we both walk away going, I under, I underwhelmed. Do you know the idea of the Michelangelo effect?

Have you heard of this? Awesome. So the Michelangelo effect describes a situation in a relationship, friendship or intimate partnership where each partner sees the best in the other and tries to help bring that out. So the best in the other and tries to help bring that out. So the sum of the parts is greater than it is individually.

And the reason I love it is why it's called the Michelangelo effect. So the block of marble that David was carved from had been attempted by a number of other, uh, sculptors previously, huge, monstrous thing. If you've ever seen David in person, ginormous. People can't, and when you're looking up as well with that angle on the plinth, it's even bigger. Previous sculptures had attempted and failed, but Michelangelo saw inside of the marble what was David. He just needed to get away all of the things that weren't. I love that idea. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

I think in life you want to be finding people that believe in you more than you believe in you, that hold you to higher standards. I think that's the definition of a good friend. I think that's the definition of a good partner. The definition of a good husband, wife. You know, they remind us of the best of ourselves. They shine that light and remind us,

cause we do, I know I do. It gets, I put the blinds on it and I don't see it a lot of times and I'll be reminded. I, this is, this has always been a thing for me. And I don't know how this correlates, but I've never been as good in my dreams as I am in real life. I never win the day, get the girl, ace the test, and I can perform in my dreams.

Never have, never have. As well as I will in real life. Think I'm the same. And I'll get, and I'll be, I guess what I'm saying is I'll be, I'll pull something off. I'm like, everyone see that? And my friends are like, no shit. That's you, bro.

What's the biggie? You know what I mean? It's kind of what I like about living in Austin, Texas. They're not really impressed with shit that I pull off. They thought it was cool, I won an Oscar, but they were like, well, no shit. And I was kind of like, oh, all right, yeah, yeah, thank you, man.

That's, you know, and that's what friends will do in a way, loved ones will do that and be like, yeah, there you are. Ken comes back to that. It's so much easier to be supportive and gentle of other people than of ourselves. You know, you will happily bestow this sort of gentle, reassuring pat on the shoulder when somebody succeeds or falls short when they tried their best.

Right. Yet, given the fact that you tried your best, you give yourself a kick in the dick on the way out of the door and a harsh word to follow you. Right. Yet, given the fact that you tried your best, you give yourself a kick in the dick on the way out of the door and a harsh word to follow you. Yep. What do you think about when you do succeed and a lot of people go, oh, that's nothing.

I prescribed it. I think we should take some time to be able to look in the mirror and own that thing that we pulled off and go, good job, that's what you wanted, that's what you got. At the same time, be able to, as we do more often, look in the mirror when we fail and go, eh, bogey,

you did not pull that off. You know what I mean? But I mean, it's kind of, beginning to own the ownership idea of the fail or the gain ownership being really important. And I don't, I'm a fan of the ego. I wish people, someone said this to me before, look, oh, this, this, this,

a queen said this, it came off the cuff, I didn't even think about it. She was like, ah, tell me, Matthew, you're so full of yourself. And I, without thinking, I was like, well, who else am I supposed to be full of? That's a good line. And I stopped there and I was like,

that's exactly what I meant. I wrote that down. I wish more people were more full of themselves. Not in the arrogant way, but I'm talking about a healthy ego to understand. And I understand ego's difference between I and me. Me is the objective, but to know the I, I wish more people,

I wish we were more full of ourselves. I wish more people know we're more full of themselves. I think part of the challenges in life is, a lot of us are running around half-assing ourselves, half-fooling ourselves, not full of ourselves, not studying ourselves enough, not holding ourselves to task enough, not patting our own self on the back when we do get what we want enough, not cracking our own whip on our backside when we do get out of line even though we knew better. I wish we were more full of ourselves that way. The guy that was sat there yesterday, Dwayne, I asked him something not too dissimilar about

self-esteem. He took a little while. He said, I like me. I'd buy me a beer. I just thought that's so fucking great. Yeah, man. I'd buy me a beer. I'd buy me a beer. I just thought that's so fucking great. Yeah, man. I'd buy me a beer. I'd buy me a beer. Hey, he's shaking hands with himself, you know?

And, sweet man, I got plenty of times where I was sure as hell, I'm the last guy I want to have a beer with. I'm happy to say I've got some times where I'm like, I appreciate drinking alone. You know what I mean? I'm happy to say I've got some time, I'm like, I appreciate drinking alone. You know what I mean? I mean, it'd be nice. Would that be, not more than nice, is a better word than nice,

but if go try to be today, someone you wanna have a beer with, it's pretty good, easy way, pretty good bumper sticker. You know what I mean? Could have been in the book. Yeah. Talk to me about the non-deserving complex. Yeah. This feels similar.

Yeah. So, it definitely, and I think it's called, isn't there a term, imposter syndrome or something like that? When I got famous off of Time to Kill, I had more people saying, I love you. And I'd only said that like four times in my life to 40 people. And I was like, wow, this is, they mean it.

You know, the red carpets in Caviar, This is, they mean it, you know? The red carpets in caviar, I started to get that, why me, why me? There's other people that deserve this more than me. And that's back when I had a, I was using the word deserve, which I'm not the biggest fan of now. I prefer earn, but I didn't feel like I deserved it

in the big scheme of things. It was a, I think it's a, we have to, what's dangerous about it, I think at its core, it's a coping mechanism, but it's a false humility. Yep. Yep. I understand. It's like, it's almost arrogant to think that you did all that even. It's almost like guilt is an arrogant thing. Who makes you the judge and jury of you on that? It's like saying, being very arrogant, and you go, oh no, no, no, not me.

I shouldn't have that. It does help you deal with the stimulus that the world's brand new and coming on you. It helps you back up because you don't want to take any more arrows because you're feeling it all as arrows. I sure felt that when I first got famous. Talk about all the options and yeses, brand new yeses for me in the world. I pushed against it and I even had clumsy times where I got ugly just to counter it. Like I said, I'm tripping myself running downhill.

I tripped myself because I felt like, man, things are going too well. I need a bloody nose. Bam! I give myself one. Now I feel more. Okay, now I'm where I'm supposed to be. Does part of that come with the fact that I grew up in a middle-class blue collar family in Uvalde, Texas, 12,000

people from a dad who was like, you get out there and you earn, you break a sweat. Probably. I don't know. Um, I, I wouldn't fit so much stuff was coming at me and I didn't feel like I would, I'd broken a sweat to get it. I was having fun what I did.

And I was, couldn't give myself enough credit for maybe he's going, you're good at what you're doing and I was like, and, and, and, and I was looking for the proverbial sweat. I was looking for the, where's the exhaustion of a full working day where I actually, I drew blood, man, how did it? I made it through. Dude, the Puritan work ethic runs strong.

I used to struggle, I ran nightclubs for a long time and there was a period where I didn't miss a single Saturday, which was our big event, for 204 Saturdays in a row. And I would go on holiday, the holidays I was having, you know, I'm 22 to 26, something like that, so prime young guy territory. And I would go on holiday from a Sunday morning until a Thursday evening, and then make sure that I was back

in the Northeast of the UK. Why'd you make sure you got back on the Saturday night? Because I couldn't bear to have success without having bled for it. Okay. Because if it, there were so many hoops I had to jump through in order for things, for me to get a pat on the back. Had to go well, because if it went badly, I was less. But not only did it have to go well, I had to suffer in service of it going well. Yeah.

Because if it went well, but came easily, that was also somehow lesser. For me, I felt like it was a sin almost. Yes. Not a disease, but more of a sin. I was like, I didn't pay a penance there, man. I didn't, I hadn't given enough tithe. I didn't, like I said, break the proverbial sweat, draw the blood to earn that thing.

And yet I'm getting all this. Didn't, wasn't able to look at the eye. Didn't feel it. Needed things to feel. I also needed at that time anonymity, which I lost. And I think everyone needs an anonymous soul. And I had lost mine and I didn't know what was up, down, left or right.

I got through stuff. If I look back at my interviews, the first two years I got famous, I bet you they're so damn boring. Cause I was, my two rules were be a gentleman and don't lie. Two pretty boring rules if that's only what you're going in for and you're creative and you got a colorful life.

But I was just, repeat it, stay down the line. It wasn't until later on that I was like, oh man, I trust myself enough. I believe myself enough to share how I feel about things. Yeah, privacy is one of the privileges that people are born with that they don't realize until they've lost it. Right.

And this has been a little bit of a trajectory that I'm starting to dip my toe into over the last few years as well. Of loss of privacy, loss of privacy, increased scrutiny, right. Sense of eyeballs and even, you know, it's a micro niche degenerate version of, of proper fame, but still this sort of sense of vigilance being watched in some way or another. And yeah, it's one of those odd inverted privileges. Most people think about privilege as

something that is bestowed upon you after you have done X, Y and Z. But this is one of those things that as you tend to go on the trajectory, most people want to go on, it's something that gets derogated, something that go on. Yeah. It's something that gets derogated. It's something that you lose. Sure. And you, people have, you skip the salutations of, hi, how are you doing? What's your name?

People have a bio on you. They have an idea, an opinion for you before you ask for it. Sometimes it's hyperbole to the awesome, to overly exaggerated awesome. Sometimes it's well below. And you walk outside, you don't even have to talk to the world. You know, you feel eyes.

You see how people move towards you or move away from you or you catch it all in your periphery and you start going, they, I know what they think. And maybe that's false. It feels a lot better when it's maybe false, but to the, oh, they even think I'm better than them. They think I did better than I did. But still just concerning either way. Either way. It's all fountains because it's not on parts. Why? I headed out to Peru after I got famous, took the 22 day backpack trip. I, and I remember writing that, I said, I need to go test my, who I am, my character

on people who know me as a stranger. And when I left the hugs, after 22 days, the hugs and the tears of the strangers, no longer strangers after 22 days, but the hugs and the tears of the strain, no longer strangers after 22 days, but the hugs and the tears were coming from people that only knew me as a guy named Matthew, and that's it, who showed up and met me from there, no biography on me, had no idea I was famous,

no ideas in the movies, and 22 days later, they're weeping tears of gladness and sadness saying goodbye to me. That gave me, trust me, I was like, I got it. I did this. I'm still that. I got it. I can still fix a tire.

This whole thing isn't just AAA coming to fix the car. Okay. I needed that. It gave me a lot of confidence to come back to Hollywood and look a lot of what I was deeming excess, look it in the eye and go, I get it. I get it. I know I earned getting here. I'm still, I got the goods.

All of this, I may not have earned that. I didn't even ask for a lot of this, but I know I got myself here. Okay. In other news, this episode is brought to you by Shopify. Shopify powers 10% of all e-commerce in the United States and they are the global force behind Gymshark, Skims, Allo and Nutanik.

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that's Shopify.com slash modern wisdom to upgrade your selling today. Did you ever have a lonely chapter during your trajectory? Looking back, I would say I did. I mean, look, I had some wonderfully fun and healthy and honest single years that became sort of revolutions, that became sort of structurally tangent. And it was fun. Stayed on the surface purposefully. I kept it there. They kept it there. But I would still, you know, have many lonely nights when a man lays his head on the pillow, no matter who was in the bed, I was sleeping with me.

And felt like many times I was in neutral, didn't have something that I was building towards and chasing relationship-wise, even career-wise at that time. relationship-wise, even career-wise at that time. I got through it fine. I didn't I didn't go overboard and overindulge and didn't get dangers with my health or anyone else's. Mainly because if I did get to, if I get the blues, I'd be like, open your eyes, bro. Look around, man. You kidding me? Take your time. And so, you know, I would say ultimately I was lonely in that time. Cause I knew, I knew it was a stop, not a stay.

And I knew I wanted more career relationships, et cetera. But I wasn't really fully committed. I wouldn't, didn't have to maybe think the wherewithal, the identity to go actually chase it and go, I know what I want. I wanna live a way to attract that. I did try and go, did have time where I tried to go find it.

But as I talked about in the book, I mean, I had time where I was every red light, who's over there? Produce section, who's over there? Every party, who's over there? Produce section, who's over there? Every party, who's over there? Looking for the one. And once I was like, uh-uh, I had that great dream of the 88-year-old bachelor that I was with all the kids showing up. That dream gave me grace, man, because I quit looking for that one. I did start acting like someone though, my target drew the arrow. I started acting like someone who had a wherewithal and a peace of mind with myself,

not needing someone to fulfill that drew her to me, that I didn't have before that dream. You've had a front row seat to some, a variety of rhythms of marriages, your parents, yours. What have you learned about choosing a good partner? Oh. Well, I'm, and I'm friends first? No, we became lovers pretty quickly but the things I respected about her and saw that she had were things that I valued

in a close friend. Someone who respected their past, someone who had a great sense of humor, but was never gonna lie to put themselves to get what they wanted in front of me or take advantage of me. Someone who was impressed with who I was much more than they were impressed with what I did. Someone who very quickly saw the best in me and was like, I like that. Let's see some more of that. And watered that side of me. As we talked about

earlier, let's see some more of that. Let me put some more fuel on that fire so you can even be more of that. Why not be all of that? Then if you're going to get together, I think this was a Susan Sarandon line when she was married to, what's his name, Tim? Who was Susan Sarandon married to years ago? An entire room of people shaking their heads. Great actor of Shawshank Redemption, Tim Robbins. There we are.

They had a line that said that we have similar moral bottom line. It's always stuck with me. You're going to partner with someone, especially if you're going to have family, I think. Make sure you got a similar moral bottom line because, and look, Camilla and I are going through new challenges now because we have teenagers. Our moral bottom line and do's and don'ts and what's accepted and what we wouldn't accept had been pretty part and parcel up until now. Teens are getting like, well, I'm a little loose over here.

Yeah, let them go get that scar. Let them go get their heart broke, whatever that is. Let them go try it out and fail or succeed. Let them go negotiate, free play. She's a little more, and so we're, her and I are working on that balance right now. And it's a new balance having teenagers as they're getting their independence.

But having a similar moral bottom line, you know, connected to bringing out the best in the partners is having somebody you're a fan of and that they're a fan of you. You call each other on your shit or you don't have to call it because the look says enough and you're like, yeah, and I know. Yeah, that was me, bogey, you know, or yeah, I got away with that one again, no more, cut that out. And then what I'm learning now, trying to learn, is that seems we're essentially all the person that, for me now, I think I'm essentially the same person I was as I was 19 years ago.

You know, it seems essentially the same person I was when I was 8, 51. But our value systems reorder as we grow independently and as a couple. Your value system changes for every parent when they become a parent for what's important in their life. So you read, you're moving things different places on the chart in the number one spot, the two spot and three spot. But to understand that it also happens with us as individuals and going that we do change

and how do we, even by being essentially the same person that we fell in love with, we still need room to change along the way and go through things that may seem inconsistent with who the DNA of why we fell in love with that person or what we love, who someone was. But no, there's still essentially that, but give them room to change, give them room to change. Also the, I think it's the Springsteen line, you know, you don't, about sometimes you're running

and the other one's walking. And it's okay to be ahead, but don't lose sight. Don't get so far ahead that you leave your mate lost back there going, you know, sometimes, you know, somebody's real healthy, the other one's on IR. Oh, we're still on the same team. That takes patience by the one who's healthy and takes persistence by the one who's on IR,

but you gotta wait up to hold that hand to go, we're still doing this together, even though maybe in this zone right now in my life, I'm flying and you're walking. So certain things that I find, well, she's flying and I'm walking, you know. And so navigating that and how we change as we grow up and measuring that against who we initially fell for in the first place and seeing, well, they are

still that. Of course they change. Hell, I've changed. I want to say, you know, and a lot of times I know I, we say it, I know I said, well, you've changed. I was like, well, heaven yeah, I've changed. I'd hope so. And doing that with a partner is part of the work, I think, of a relationship. Sort of talking about transformations, trajectories, pivots, changes.

Let's escape Hollywood and go to South America and see what's going on over there. Let's escape singlehood, pivot into a marriage, pivot into family from dyads to triad to so on. I'm fascinated by the aggressive pivot that you made between different movie categories. And that requires, I think, a lot of courage and hope and self-belief and faith in order to do, to let go of something good for the chance at something that you think could be great. Yeah. I think that's something that a lot of people

wish that they had a little bit more fuel for. It was a big risk. It was a big chance. And it was no guaranteed return ticket. It was a one-way ticket possibly to, I'm a head coach of high school football to this day. One-way ticket to a dead end. Or to something new, but a one-way ticket to a dead end in Hollywood.

It's an actor for sure. Look, it's no coincidence that at that time to have the courage to make that decision, I did have really cool things going on in my life. I'd fall in love with Camilla, she just become pregnant with our first child. That gave me some significance of like, ah, that's what I've always wanted to be. So father, here we go. If I stick with it, this will give me a home base to feel secure in even though I'm stepping away from what has made me, given me significance

for so many years and decades in my life. Having her to sit there as much as I knew it was the right decision and it was a 3 a.m. decision in my own soul, She's always been very good with me about going, now say it out loud and we're gonna do, here's what we're gonna do. If we're doing this, she's the one that said, this could be dry for who knows how long. You may not get work ever again, but if we're gonna do this,

I'll be here by your side and we're doing it together. And there's no going back. There's no, we're not gonna get, we're not gonna get nerves at the goal line. If we don't know where the goal line is, we're not gonna get down the line and go, oh, a pulled parachute. Even if it's a $14 million parachute.

Even if it's $14 million parachute. Even if it doesn't work out and you become a teacher or you go become a lawyer again, whatever. So making that a choice that was inevitable that there was no pulling the parachute on, sure as hell helped with the endurance of me being away for what was 20 months. I learned a lot of endurance in that year in Australia,

though, same way that gave me a lot, very thick skin for enduring something. So that 20 months was really hard. And I've said it before, that proverbial bottle on the shelf was looking better and better earlier in the day as time went on. I mean, how many more times could I work in the damn garden, man? I'm like, I'm not a gardener for life. I like this, but I gotta come on, man. But she

helped me stay steady. I stayed steady. My faith helped me stay steady. I did have a real belief, whether I was tricking myself or not that there's a bigger pot of gold for me on the other side of this if I just out endure it. If I just, I'll out endure this so much. And it became a little like the year in Australia. I started, I got a little, I started to gain pride and honor with the longer the penance went on and being without what I wanted. And I started to be like, well, I'm definitely backing out now, man. I'm six months in.

Turns into momentum. All in a year later, I'm like, I'm a backing out now, man. I'm six months in. Turns into momentum. All in a year later, I'm like, I'm a year in, man. This is getting good. Okay. Come on. And out of the blue, 20 months later, I'd been gone long enough to become a new good idea. Where's McConaughey?

Plus he said no to that $14.5 million offer three months ago. And I guarantee you that tells some people in Hollywood, what's this so much up to? You don't say no to a $14.5 million offer. It was way too big to get out. And he said, no, no. Someone does that. You get a little more attracted to him. He's on to something. He's got his own program. He's playing offense on something. He's got his own program. He's playing offense on something. He's not just regressing. And I think that also sent a bit of a signal.

This is my hunch through Hollywood. And then the fact that it was just honestly 20 months, almost two years later, where's McConaughey? We haven't seen him in a rom-com. We haven't seen him on the beach shirtless. Where is he? He hadn't shown up in front of our faces anyway. I don't even know what he's doing.

Does anyone know what he's doing? Do you fear or did you fear not being sufficiently prolific, not being sufficiently sort of front of stage, keeping your name out there? What if somebody else takes that place of me? What if I become irrelevant? What if somebody else takes that place of me? What if I become irrelevant? What if people forget?

I didn't have any fear of anyone taking the place. Cause my place at that time was romcom king. And I was sure, I was like, I've done enough of those right now. I don't need another one of those right now. I don't want another one of those right now. If someone steps in and take the place, bravo. I always like to say, I took the baton from Hugh Grant.

And then I had my time and I was like, who do you think you threw it to? I don't know. The rom-coms are definitely not as healthy of a genre now as they were then. We were rolling in the rom-coms. They were like, can't miss this, man. They're medium budget, 30, 35 mil, so the studio's not blowing their wad on the budget. They come out, they make good money. Studios make good money. All of them kind of worked. Even the ones that didn't work as well kind of worked.

Yep, huge potential audience. Everybody can go see it. Repeats on Valentine's Day, come on. You know? So I don't know that did really hand it to you. I don't know if anyone's really jumped in that lane or if that lane's even got a help wanted sign anymore. Did I feel the irrelevance?

Sure, I felt the unease of irrelevance. I mean, but then I became irrelevant. I mean, it got to the point where I knew I was irrelevant. It got to the point where I remember my agent saying, I said, you heard anything? Because Matthew, I haven't heard your name in over two months. I was like, and you're my agent, you only have five clients. He goes, yeah, I haven't even heard your name. I'm like, that sounds pretty

much like irrelevance to me, bro. Okay. All right. But never, like I was shaky, but never was I gonna go, okay, I'll go back. Rip cold. I'll do it. Never was I gonna pull the parachute. And you know, what if I didn't? What if those calls never came? Would I regret that sitting here now? Maybe I wouldn't be sitting here now,

but I bet everything I got, there's no way I'd regret it. Whatever I'd be doing in my life right now, I would have said, this opened up. We start off the conversation with this, the things you don't get. I've put us more in places where we are, where we find our own satisfaction than the things that we do get in many ways.

I mean, like say it's, you know, life's mystery going forward, the science looking back. When you look back, we can all connect every single dot. It's mathematical, scientific how we got to this table right here. We've got plans for this afternoon, but we're not sure what's going to happen. But everything looking back, it's all connected if we go back and look at it. And there's a whole lot of, I thought that was the end. Well, it was the end, but it was the beginning of this thing. Or I caught that red light and therefore made me 60 seconds later to get to that cafe where I met that movie producer or that woman who became my wife or whatever that is.

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Right. Yeah. Ironic tragedy. Who said that? I mean, what do you think about all the life's the ironic tragedy, life is pain, and it just is nothing but pain, but so we, if just if we can endure it. Like I, my mom, I, I, I can't help. She's worn me down with her endurance of her prescription on life. How old does she know?

92. And she is the absolute proof of the value of denial if you really commit to it. Committed denialist. absolute proof of the value of denial if you really commit to it. Absolutely committed denialist committed denialist. And it's not an intellectual trick. There's no, oh, I'll, I'll intellectually deny it. So then I'll tuck myself in. So now I can fake it until I make it. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Faited complete. No, it didn't happen. No, mom, it didn't. No, it didn't. I've said it. It didn't. And she's not, you don't catch her in between the lines or off by herself realizing like, oh, well it did. No, it's done. Non-negotiably done. Her favorite word is yes.

Mom, how you think you're living so long? Well, I can't imagine not being here. Geez. Oh man, that's pretty good. No, I really can't. I honestly cannot imagine not being here. So she's beaten two types of cancers on aspirin. And we're like, that doesn't make any sense. And we have to tie her up and haul her to the doctor, the dermatologist, if you get something on her leg. Because going to a doctor in her mind- Recognition.

Is recognition of possible sickness. So you go there, remove a cancer, take some cancer medicine. Do you have cancer? No, I don't. And you wink and she does not wink. I don't, I don't, what? Anyway, if you're not following suit,

you don't believe it, next question. That's how she is, and she's banned, because she's not playing a trick. She just does it. It's a full on commitment to denial. And it's awesome. She would not prescribe to life is painful and you have to get through it.

She thinks it's, now mind you, she's very anti because she's someone who, like I said, I think I touched on in the book, she had a horrible motherhood, mother and parental growth. She did not know how to be a mother. How did she become a great mother? By saying, I'm doing the opposite of what that bitch did. There's value to that of going, oh, this sucked.

I don't know how to do this, but if I just do the opposite. Dude, I love this idea. So I grew up in a very working class town, Northeast of the UK, famous only for having the highest teen pregnancy rating in England. And then it lost that. So it didn't even have that anymore. And I think there's that idea of food deserts in America

where it's areas in which it's difficult to get good food. And I think that Stockton on Teas in the nineties was a role model desert, at least for me. So I wasn't around many people like the person that I wanted to be like. And at the time, I think I was desperately looking like a thirsty man parched for water for somebody that would be that. But in retrospect, again, ironic, there were a lot of people around me that were people I didn't want to be. And I was able to plant flagpoles in the ground that helped me to avoid the catastrophes and

the tragedies that would have awaited me had I have done that. So I don't want his relationship with his family. I don't want the way that he drinks in order to be able to deal with his emotions. I don't want the way that he speaks negatively about all situations. I don't like the way that. I think much of life is avoiding pitfalls, not necessarily expediting successes. The pitfalls can take you out of the game completely in one form or another. And yeah, I don't like dwelling on the negatives in that way,

but also that's another version of alchemy that we were saying before, hey, here's something that you think is useless or toxic or not, yeah, not valuable. And you've managed to turn it into something that benefited you. It's the same reason why teaching people lessons that you've gone through from tragedies, traumas, whatever in your life. It's kind of like pointing at the thing that was bad and say, you didn't get me.

I'm going to make sure that you're not going to get them either. Yeah. And even looking at the things that are bad and going, oh, thank you. Appreciate that. I mean, the push-off, you have established leverage rather than the create. You're going to lean into something. Do you also need something to push up? The push off is what you're leaning into is that mystery going forward, right? That ironic charge that you have something to push off the, well, I don't know what I do want, but I do know I don't want that you have leverage.

Yes. You know, it's there. So, I don't know. I mean, we can get into a big discussion on victimhood here as well, but I, you know, I wrote about in Greenlights about how, you know, we always say, well, who are you? You know, once you figure out who you are, and we ask, I try to, I try to ask my kids that now, why won't you know who you are? And a part of that who's helped me is Bob Dylan's lines, like, I don't know what all this talk talks about who we are, man.

We are all just what we create ourselves to be. And that gives me a little, oh, that's relaxing. But it's so much easier to figure out who you're not. And if you start eliminating who I'm not, by sheer mathematics, you end up moving towards who or of what feeds you and who you are. And it's a hell of a lot easier thing to go, how can I get rid of some bullshit in my life

than it is to go, well, how do I go to my true self? Do I want to press the accelerator more quickly or do I want to take my foot off the fucking brake? Right, yeah. Yeah. And sit there and, cause I'm banging my head here and I'm going to eliminate some of that stuff. I want to get some of those things out of the way that didn't had

another hangover. I drank the same amount. When I didn't, you don't usually have a hangover. Oh, maybe it was the conversations I was having. Maybe it was, you know, maybe it was the people I was hanging out with those just clocking some of those things and eliminating them. Is it much easier place to start? You know, and maybe, maybe more, is it maybe more valuable? I mean, I don't know. I always like to think that the UFC champ or the boxing heavyweight champ

that believes they are the greatest is more empowering than the one who's out for revenge. But man, the one out for revenge wins a lot of the times. The one who's pushing against, now I'm gonna get back at you, rage. Nothing gets more shit done than that emotion of rage. We like to say, no, freedom and light is the one that carries, man, I don't know,

that's maybe too evolved for us to really grab ahold of. Rage and anger and revenge are mighty powerful emotions, man. Yeah. They get a lot of shit done. Yeah, especially in the beginning, especially for a short period of time. I think when you, it's a potent fuel that's toxic in the longterm.

And I think that it's the sort of thing that you use to overcome the activation energy, especially the beginning of a thing. I need something to kick me out. The chip on my shoulder from the kids that didn't believe me in school. The fact that I felt like I was mistreated or victimized or, or, or in some form, there was something, some limitation placed on me. It's a pretty good fuel that'll get you a long way.

some limitation placed on me. It's a pretty good fuel. That'll get you a long way. But you do not want to be using that two, three, four decades down the line. Well, and you'll, what do you call it? It'll self implode because you can't recognize your allies from your enemies. And you start taking that on your allies.

We see it in relationships. You start taking that on your mate, start taking it out on your wife, your husband, your lover, and like, I'm an ally, man, we're on the same team. But you're back to that non-deserving, no, I've got to bleed. No, I got to win, I got to get angry. Now you'd, hey. Well, also the lesson that you've taken is

enemies are more functional motivating sources than allies. Right. Therefore, if I can make enemies out of allies, I will just find lily pad, lily pad, lily pad. I'll just keep jump, jump, jump, jump, jumping. Yeah. But that, like, I think what you're saying is that, that, that, that trajectory starts to go.

It's not good. Well, what have you got left? You've got an entire world filled with enemies or at least no allies. Right. And yeah, you know, as someone who used a chip on his shoulder for a good while to get some activation energy, I much prefer the version that I am now. Me and a friend have three versions of ourselves

that we think about. So we have a dopamine Chris, we have serotonin Chris, we have cortisol Chris. Okay. And, uh, dopamine Chris is lean in. He's thinking about plays on the show and, and how magnificent big it's going to be in awards and cool money and stuff like that. And cortisol Chris is seeing threats and anxiety.

He's looking out for that, that ambient vigilance that I was saying before. He's on edge. Then serotonin Chris has taken a micro dose of magic mushrooms. He's playing pickleball with his friends or he's lying under a tree looking up at the sky. I want to spend as much time in serotonin Chris as possible. Yes. I want to spend as much time in serotonin Chris as possible.

And I find myself, Where's serotonin Chris, magic mushrooms in a hammock hanging with his buddies. Exactly. Okay. Yeah. I want to spend as much time in that as possible. Uh, but that wouldn't have got me out. That wouldn't have been the escape velocity that I needed to be able to leave whatever atmosphere I was in.

I needed to use these other, I needed to, to run away from a life that I didn't want. And run toward one that I did needed to escape something that I feared. And I also needed to escape something that I feared. And I also needed to go towards something. But the, the real bliss is when you go orthogonal to both of those, which is. Or let me ask you this. So when you're serotonin Chris, magic mushrooms with your buddies in the hammock, how long can you lay in that hammock

before you get to the imposters, the thing, hey, I gotta go accomplish. For me, it's going to accomplish something, to have some sort of purpose. I've got to, I'm still working on getting better on vacations. I'm much, my wife knows that I'm much easier to get along with on vacation

if I get a couple hours to write in the morning and get a workout in. Dude. I wish I could go two weeks with going, hey man, whatever. But I get, I get antsy, I get edgy. I'm not present because I need a little, need a little time to go break a sweat, mentally, physically, and then I can be,

then man, the rest of the day I'm great. I love this topic. I've been thinking about it so much recently. Type A people with type B problems, type B people with type A problems. Okay. So the insecure overachiever needs to learn how to lie in a hammock. Yeah. And the lazy person who's on the verge of bankruptcy needs David Goggins shouting in their face.

Right. Yeah. Now the interesting thing is because of culture and because of the way that people are perceived, a person who is overworked, but outwardly very successful will always seem to be in a more preferable position than someone who's on the verge of bankruptcy and needs to get off Xbox. All right?

So we gift more sympathy, because it seems charitable, right? Seems supportive to the person who, you just need to work harder. Think about what you have contributed to the world, which are movies in every movie. The training montage of the down underdog is them working hard and, and, and learning to get up on time and be disciplined and so on and so forth. I don't know of any movies where a guy learns to log out of Slack at 6

PM and lie on a beach holiday. Right. How, how like opulent and transactional and dopaminergic are you that you need to be taught how to chill out? You're not know there's people out there that would kill to be in the position that you are. That's, that's, that's the dialogue right there. That's interesting.

How about, how about a movie about the, a low handicap movie for the type A that needs to learn how to get off Slack and go hang in a hammock and pulls that off. And don't ask permission to tell it. Don't ask for boo-hoo's for the character. Just, no one's showing that. I mean, look, what do we do today? What are the things going on? You probably know better than I do.

There's a lot of, it's like, people have gotten much more into meditation. Successful people got much more into meditation. You brought one up earlier, psychosilicebin is now sort of an avant-garde sort of here. Hey man, this is a way to deal. Breath work, cold plunge, sauna, sound healing. Yeah. Now how many of those are we going to look at in 10 years and go, that was a fad? How many of those are we going to go, that was a really cool discovery. Well, here's the vicious thing about those modalities that a lot of people,

I call it productivity purgatory, which is the things that you do for fun, you only do in order to be able to service more productivity when you get back to it. So why do you do your breath work? Not because it makes me feel good and I like to do breath work, but because I watched an Andrew Huberman podcast episode that said that it allows me to work 15% harder the next day.

You go, no, no, no. Like your recovery modalities should be in service of themselves. Do go, no, no, no, like your recovery modalities should be in service of themselves. Do you think this is a, if we're going to call it a sin or disease, I'm going to do that for stereotype and typical word, you think this is a sin or disease of the West? Because for instance, I'm in Italy, and we're with this wonderful couple, older couple, and they're both like 80, and they were just having shit together, man. And the lady was a great shape. I get a great shape. She was, oh, I, I swam around the island each day and, and then I swim there. And my question was, how far do you swim?

And she was like, what? I swim until I don't want to swim anymore. I was like, it's a very Western idea. How far? How much time? She was like, I swim until I don't want to swim anymore. I was like, it's a very Western idea. How far? How much time? She was like, I swim until I don't want to swim anymore. You wanted to quantify it. I was quantifying like. You tracked it on Strava, right? You've got a spreadsheet for this.

Do you have your, do you have your oar ring on? She was like, what? She was confused at my question. And I was like, ah, a beautiful stereotypical difference in a European thought and a Western thought, but it's similar to that. It is very much. I mean, we were playing a friend's birthday earlier this year in Miami and there was a pickleball court, but we were playing, I like good British blokes.

We were playing, um, sort of foot tennis instead. And I realized that we were playing to win and I didn't want to play to win. That wasn't the energy I want. I was in dopamine Chris, and I want it to be in serotonin Chris. So I said, why don't we change the rules of the game and work both teams separately, but together to try and make the most beautiful game that we can. I want us to, everyone to be doing trick shots. You want to set up the other side to do trick shots. Some of the guys were good football freestylers, stuff like that.

And the first response from my friend that came up with the serotonin dopamine cortisol thing, George, his first response was, yeah, and we can count them. And no, no. Let's keep the mathematics out of this. And that's your lady swimming around. How long, how far, how many times? Yeah.

Yeah. What? Yeah. I'm taking this thought to my, I'm going to play tennis for two hours and we're going to leave here here and the girl I'm going to hit with as much as I can, I'll see if I could do it. I doubt I could do it for two hours, but I'll see how long I could do it. Let me try and set her up for great shots and see how the rallies go. Yeah. But even then within that, well,

was that shot better than the last one? Was that more beautiful? You know, it's this infinite fucking regress of performance metrics and all the rest of it. Speaking of which, in other news, this episode is brought to you by Skims. If you've ever wondered how McConaughey makes everything look so effortless, here's a tip. Start with being comfortable. With Skims new box of briefs, that's exactly what you get. No awkward adjustments, no bunching, just a perfect fit that

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That's S-K-I-M-S. Dot com. Fastball. In six weeks time, it's the 10th anniversary of Interstellar. And I think it's being re-released in theaters in 70 mil IMAX. In IMAX?

Yeah. Okay. How did that movie change you? It's my favorite movie of all time. So thank you for- I have a lot of people tell me that that's their favorite movie of all time. And that's another that a lot of people go, had to go watch four times.

There's a lot to take in. There's a lot to take in. There's a lot to take in. Classic Nolan. Yeah. How did it change me? And you're not talking about like the success of the movie, you mean like the subject material and everything else. I was working with Christopher learning about,

I mean, you know, Kip Thorne, fucking the consultant physicist on that show. So much stuff. Well, also, you know, in that sense, it was similar to when I did a movie called Contact, and I got to sit with Carl Sagan for three and a half hours. And he went through, and I remember walking away from that going,

oh my gosh, as a believer, God's backyard's a whole lot bigger than I thought it was, which is a very humbling and empowering thought. it was, which is a very humbling and empowering thought. I mean, look, the main thing was, I think, on the human side of the real... Me personally, I was like, oh, you don't leave your kids to go do what your dream is. And then when I changed dream, what your dream is too, to go do what you were meant to do, what you were born to do, that you have an ability to do like nobody else.

I'm just like, ooh, well maybe you do leave your kid. That argument and that leaving, which is that countdown, that's where I remember, that's where I was. That's the scene I'm remembering, is the price you pay, the cost, the consequence of chasing down something. And I had, my initial thought was, oh, Cooper's being selfish in the wrong way.

You know, don't, and then it's a good argument though. I don't think you can easily say that. There's a major consequence with that, but look at what. And I look, I deal with it now. I got three kids doing my favorite job, but I think I was, I feel fine, extreme and endless purpose in parenting. But I'm dabbling in different versions of leadership that have to do with the betterment maybe. I feel fine extreme and endless purpose in parenting.

But I'm dabbling in different versions of leadership that have to do with the betterment maybe I hope of more people, but it would become a consequence of being there and being present like I wanna be from my three children and my wife is our family. I haven't found anything that I believe is worth that at the sacrifice of this yet. And my argument with myself there is the best exports we can have if we do it well as our children, no better export

you can put out, a better extension of yourself, no better way to affect the world. Create legacy. Then hopefully having some healthy children that can go be independent enough and of, you know, and you taught them when they see the world in the right way and can chase down things that they love and they hopefully love the right things. So contributing to anything in place of that is a net negative. Well, that'd be my argument at the sacrifice of fewer

that I feel like, oh, that's, that's millennia. I've really got to, I've got to, that's, I'm helping give them the palette to paint on. And I'm handing the right colors to them and letting them fall from the right height to the wrong, the right trees, you know, to where they get bruised, but hopefully don't break an egg, you know what I mean? So, but I don't, but it's a, but it's a good argument, one that I understand on the other side. And I have friends that go, have sacrificed that.

I have friends that have been very successful, even in the career of being an actor in Hollywood and a successful actor in Hollywood. You know, this brings me back to when we first had kids before Camilla pulled the goalie to get pregnant, she goes one condition, you go, we go. And my first reaction was, hey, hey, hey, hey, I'm lone wolf artist here, man. I go off my airstream with my dog.

I'm a solo coyote here, man. And while I'm saying that, I heard my mother's voice go, you better nod your head and say, she's giving you a gift, say yes, ma'am. And I did, yes, ma'am. And that, we've done that. I have a 16-year-old, a 14-year-old, and an 11-year-old. No doubt that has a major contribution to how, to whatever strength our family is. And I think our family is very strong and the security that my kids have

and the courage that they have. That, because we've never been away from each other that long. They picked up, came with. There's another side, I understand, you go, got opportunities that can do great things, like you share art or leadership in the world, that, hey, I'm gonna be away. And maybe there's an argument that that could be better for your children later on, or maybe better for their children. Mm-hmm.

Well, this is the, you know, we were talking about that infinite regress of being mean to yourself, or it's emotions about emotions and stuff. Thinking about the decision that Cooper needs to make and also the decision that you need to make, it's, you can always continue to kid yourself a little bit more.

Is it more virtuous to stay at home with your children, to raise your children, despite the fact that the likelihood of them surviving into the future and their kids surviving into the future is lessened by that, okay. But then if you go and do the thing, you leave them, you're making that sacrifice. But are you doing it because you want to save the world or are you doing it because it's your dream or the fact that you can get something virtuous out of something that's also your dream is that fucking Puritan work ethic we were talking about before, which is I, the only way that this can be a virtuous decision is if I suffer more, it's only suffering,

not just that it's good for the future, but also that I don't want to do it because if I don't want to do it, then I know that it's really, really true. It's a high price that I pay. Cause go pull it off. And this is, as far as I can see, the curse of the deep thinker. Amen, amen, amen. A curse and gift. Because it does do one thing that we hadn't brought up at a very base level.

And I think this goes along with stress, anxiety, at the very base, it means in something that we can't take for granted, because not everyone has it, it means you give a damn. Yes. And let's not throw that out like, oh, of course you, no, because not everybody does. It means you give a damn about more than just yourself.

And that is a high, that's a high end value and not an old fashioned nostalgic thing to go, oh, that's so 1950s bullshit. That's a real thing. Some people can't care. Or some people struggle to care about things. Or entire people that go through their lives. It's odd, especially in the UK,

loving things, being too keen, right? Americans kind of have permanent first line, cocaine energy. Yeah. Very exciting. Yeah. And I like it. I like excitable people. I like enthusiasm.

However, the UK doesn't necessarily have that quite so much. And I always think how much more I would, how much I wish I could gift that back to the UK, but how much that positive reinforcement, we were saying it before that first scene that you do and the guy next to you goes, Hey, that was pretty good. The right encouraging word, the right time, where would that push people to? And okay, if that's what you want for you in the world, you have the opportunity to be that for other people and maybe it's gonna start to come back around

and maybe we can begin to change culture a little bit by doing this. When would that English, or does it, does it have someone though, that is constantly like, ah, ah, bullocks, that goes and succeeds that the English culture goes, fucking bravo.

Really. Does it ever? Really. So interesting stat around the UK. Globally, so far in 2024, the UK has the second highest number of millionaire exits on earth. What's a millionaire exit? A millionaire that has left the country and is now living in a different, a different nation, China first 15,000 UK second nine and a half thousand.

But the UK is 3% of the population of China. So pro rata, we have got by far the most millionaires leaving by far. We do not have a good culture around supporting success around people doing different things. Another great example of this, the UK has got three universities in the two or three universities in the top 10 in the world, as does America. So it'll be Oxford, Cambridge, maybe Kings or Durham in the UK. And there'll be Yale, Princeton, Harvard, something else in the U S and a couple of others.

And we have 20% the number of startup founders, despite the fact that we have the same number of university graduates going from top flight universities. Why culture? Well, speaking of that, what did you learn? You did the gentlemen with guy. Yeah. You spent a good bit of that, what did you learn? You did the gentleman with Guy.

Yeah. You spent a good bit of time presumably and meshing yourself into British culture. What did you learn while you were there? Well, so there is still a royal dance to play the part and do, and I found that interesting and quite entertaining. I remember, you know, that everything has, there's a costume and a, and a timing and who goes here, when, and here's how you sit there.

And this is how we do this. And I found it very interesting and- Pump and circumstance. Yeah. It was all there. And, and, and I, and I, and I indulged in, and, and, and, and, and played that part and enjoyed. Bit of whimsy. Now, when I went out to the gym, I was all there and I indulged and played that part and enjoyed. Bit of whimsy.

Now, when I went out and they saw that I was actually a very good shot at pheasants, I got a few, hey, I got a few attaboys. Bring the American over here. I like you now, right? He's good with guns. And then I remember this one though, where the, I think the term is where the posh went overboard, but nobody seemed to notice it but me. And we were at this dinner,

and it was one of those dinners where 24 people on this side, 24 people on this side, Mrs. is down there and Mr. is down here. Mrs. has a 24 foot by 18 foot oil painting of herself over her chair and Mr. has an eight 24 foot by 18 foot over his chair. And it was just absolutely, it was all this fucking great. Everyone had their own waiter, they saw ding on time. And this is just absolutely great.

Well, after the dinner, the youngsters, the sons and the daughters had come over with their friends and they were all, they just all so posh to smoke a cigarette. Yes. And I remember this one get flicking the ash. There's an ash tree right down the table. Boom, on the carpet. I was like, dude.

And without even saying it, it's like, no, man. It's more posh. I'm posturing. It's cooler to go, I can drop my ash on your $550,000 Persian rug than it is to put it in the ashtray. And I was like, why that one, I think y'all went over, I think you went out of bounds on that one.

But the fact that that was, it was a bit, it was games, but they, but they were doing it and consistently. Isn't it fascinating the Americans are basically blind to class. You've had to use the word posh almost in speech marks there. Right. It's like a word that there is not a single school child that doesn't use the word posh in primary school once a day in England. Everybody understands.

And it means class? It means this person is well-to-do from a well-to-do background. Okay. It means class? It means this person is well-to-do from a well-to-do background. Okay. And there's, you know, I remember there was a guy that I played cricket with.

Cricket's still a working class sport in the UK. It's not necessarily upper class. There's very working class town. There was a kid who got a class Mercedes used for his 17th birthday, which is when you can drive in the UK. I was like, wow, Danny's from a posh family. I never can drive in the UK. I was like, wow. Danny's from a posh family. I never really knew that much, but I knew he had money.

He always had nice kid. He always had new, new boots at the start of each season. But I was like, wow, he got a Mercedes. In retrospect, it's maybe a seven grand car, 10 grand cars, something like that. For me, I'm like, Oh, posh. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Is there something though, going on with the with the, as the royal family and the king and the queen are losing power and that's becoming, is these millionaire exits, is this still a bit of a, how dare you become that wealthy in the private sector? You're not a royal? No, I certainly don't think with regards to that, but there is definitely skepticism around the monarchy at the moment. And I'm really not sure where I stand on that.

One of my friends is a very compelling argument that we should do away with it. Doesn't like the word your highness higher than what. But also, what was it that you were just saying? Like, what have we got if we don't hold onto the culture and the things that people know us for? And I like the pomp and circumstance. When I graduated, uh, from Newcastle university, there's this 10 minute procession of different mace bearers, literally wielding medieval weapons,

of different mace bearers, literally wielding medieval weapons, dothing their caps to different people in different sequences in order to show who and where and why. And it's like, this is fucking cool. Whatever it is, it's still... Because America, we're, whether we know it or not, we're hungry for ritual. Yes. And we don't have near as much ritual.

It's not established, right? There's trees that are older than your country. Yeah. We're just, just puppies. I hope that you don't get watered down to where, yeah, cause y'all have amazing ritual, laugh, giggle at it or not, do it and appreciate it and go, this is a different place and it's been around, it's been around a while. Um, yeah.

Posh. It's class. Okay. Yeah. A little bit well to do. Okay. You mentioned there about, um, some of the prices that people need to pay in order to be who they are.

Yeah. I'm fascinated by this question. I'm fascinated by the cost of entry, price of doing business to be a person that other people admire because I think that it helps to humanize others' success and it helps to mitigate jealousy and envy because you, you see what someone has had to go through in order to be in a position that you think you want to be. And they go, Oh, you, you get to see this much.

By the way, there's this monster hiding behind. What do you wish more people knew about the price of success in life? Well, success has taken on different definitions over time. It used to have to do, and some people listen to this will be like, oh, come on, McKinney. It used to have to do with some integrity. Actually, I think it was a word that was in the definition in 1901 or 11. And now, you know, money, fame, that's your definition of success. So it seems to be that and always has been to some extent, whoever has more, so much successful, more access, more money, you're the winner. The last for a lot. That is, I'm not saying it's a race to the red light, but I am saying the fourth quarter

of that being your goal, it has the residuals decline on quality of life. I've met many more very rich men who've chased that dollar to be successful and to be relevant for having the most money that the last 15, 20, even younger years or bewildered, lost, had no relationships, didn't have purpose. Chasing the dollar, they just did it. They were good at it and made it happen, but they didn't feel what they were doing. They couldn't even necessarily say what they were really good at. Just good deal makers who made the right calls in certain mathematics. But that's the definition.

It's also why I wasn't surprised when Trump first got elected. Hit fame, hit money. We sell that every day in the West as this is how you make it. It's America. This is what you do. It's America. That's America. Yeah. So I was not surprised because that's what we're getting fed. What a success. Let me prephrase it with this. We all want to be relevant, but I think we all forget to ask ourselves relevant for what before we chase our relevance or chase success.

I think there's a difference between success and profit. I mean, profit does pay you back. Can you do things? And I love money, I'm all for it, but there I see a lot of one way tickets that are you can get successful when have more money, but not be making a profit in your life. How many times we sacrifice quality for quantity? The two don't have to be separate. Now you may have to make some sacrifices of quantity

to have more quality, but I think we should give quality more credit than we do. Well, are we not ultimately having more quantity in the hopes of more quality? You're sacrificing- But that's not a quid pro quo. It doesn't equal out to that. We believe it will, and hey, it can access.

I mean, I got a lot of things now for money I've made that I'm like, damn right, man. I'm glad I have that. That makes my life not even more convenient. I actually like that more. I like what I can do with my family more with that. I like what Camilla and I can do as a husband and wife. I like what I can do solo even more with that. Enjoy it. And again, it feeds me. it. And again, it feeds me. But would I be any less, would I be any less happy if I had a 30, a 40, a 50th of what I have right now? No, I know that there's no, no way I'd be less happy. No way I'd be less happy. No way I'd be less happy. Don't want to give all that away and say,

well, would it make me poor? Sometimes I'm like, hey, you need to be more poor. Other times like, no, no, no, no, no. Don't be getting the imposter syndrome on this one. You're using it for, you're using it pretty good. You could use it even better, but don't be, don't get mad at it. You know what I mean?

I think we just need to ask ourselves that question, relevant for what? And also in the pursuit of quantity, which is what the world rewards, ask ourselves, read, watch out, just drink of the Kool-Aid and go, what is the quality? What do I want? And again, that's a hard question of what I value the most, what I really value the most. And it's a hard question to answer, but if we can answer that, make sure you're, it'll make you, it makes us answer the quality question of what we want more of. And not just the quantity question. Cause a lot of us, I've done it too.

Been blind as can be chasing the quantity to see, let me see if I can get the biggest number. That's dope of me, Matthew. Dope of me, Matthew. And I'm pretty damn good at it. If I want to put on my business hat and go, that's all I'm going toamine, Matthew. And I'm pretty damn good at it. If I wanna put on my business hat and go, that's all I'm gonna be right here, found out I'm pretty good at it.

But I don't wanna stay in that dopamine, Matthew, on that, on that. Cause I don't get the reward. I get the reward of the acquisition, but the acquisition does not equally pay back the dopamine of the getting. It's the conquering. That's the hit, you know?

Redefine, everyone can have their own definition of success and ask yourself, can I have quality with the Kauanite and can I have profit with my success? And profit goes into, leans into relationships. I think profit ends up to be a spiritual question too. And how we treat ourselves and others. I think it's a longer game. This chase for just success, if that's money and quantity, is a short-sighted game. If that's all you're after. Now I understand some people out there who can't pay their rent or are sick and trying to make it to the next day would listen

to this and go, easy for you to say. And I say, you are correct. I'm speaking from where, from my position, because you asked me, because you've got some people that are going, I'm not, this is a high, this hyperbolic conversation you're having, I'm trying to make it to the next day. Type B person with a type A problem thinks what a champagne issue that is. Yeah. It's, but it's, it's, it's, it's a real one and, and, uh, I'm apologizing for it, but I understand the difference. But I would just, I would say that if more people that are type A and are maybe things are working out,

just check your quality as you're chasing your quantity and make sure that whatever you're succeeding at is giving you actual profit and actually paying you back. Matthew McConaughey, ladies and gentlemen. Dude, I really appreciate you. I love the way that you think. I love your insights about life. Congratulations on the new book. Congratulations on the tequila. Thank you. Thank you for coming today. I really, really enjoyed this. I did too, Chris. Very much. Glad to be here, man. Met up top in a barn somewhere in Austin where I was looking down. Didn't even know where I was going. Showed up at a barn, I was like, oh, this is where we are. Yes, it is. Seems on brand for you.

I like it. Heck yeah. Dude, until next time. Until. Thank you very much for tuning in. Look, we went to a lot of effort to get Mr. McConaughey here and convert an old barn that's from the 1800s in Texas. So I really hope you enjoyed it.

I'll see you next time.