Young and Profiting with Hala Taha - YAPClassic: Matthew McConaughey on Greenlights

Episode Date: May 20, 2022

Matthew McConaughey wasn’t always the Hollywood mega-star he is today. His journey from Longview, Texas to the silver screen is one of perseverance, preparation, and self-realization. Throughout his life, Matthew has discovered the importance of reflection and has come to reframe his hardships and struggles as "green lights.” In this episode, Hala and Matthew discuss Matthew’s childhood and the origins of his confidence, his dedication to journaling, his best-selling book, Greenlights, why he took a break from acting to reinvent his image, how to turn red and yellow lights to green, and some life lessons he learned along the way.   Topics Include: - Why Matthew wrote a book instead of making a movie - Matthew’s process of writing and journaling - Defining “Greenlights”  - Why Matthew dislikes the word “Unbelievable”  - The story of “Little Mr. Texas” - Origin of Matthew’s confidence  - Turning a ‘Red Light’ into a ‘Green Light’ - Matthew’s decision to go to a less expensive college - Why Matthew went to film school  - On Dazed and Confused and the importance of preparation - Experience with romantic comedy movies - Matthew’s thoughts on celebrity status  - The Just Keep Livin Foundation - Matthew’s secret to profiting in life - And other topics…   Matthew McConaughey is an academy award-winning actor and the author of the New York Times best-selling book Greenlights.    Matthew is also a professor of practice at the University of Texas at Austin, as well as Minister of Culture/M.O.C. for the University of Texas and the City of Austin. He is also a brand ambassador for Lincoln Motor Company, an owner of the Major League Soccer club Austin FC, and co-creator of Wild Turkey Longbranch bourbon. Matthew and his wife, Camila, founded The Just Keep Livin' Foundation in 2009, which helps at-risk high school students make healthier mind, body, and spirit choices. Sponsored By: HelloFresh - Go to HelloFresh.com/yap16 and use code YAP16 for up to 16 free meals and 3 free gifts Current - Sign up in less than two minutes at current.com/yap for a chance to win $200 Jordan Harbinger - Check out jordanharbinger.com/start for some episode recommendations Wise - Join 13 million people and businesses who are already saving, and try Wise for free at Wise.com/yap Thrive Market - Go to thrivemarket.com/yap to get 40% off your first order and a FREE gift worth over $50!  Resources Mentioned: YAP Episode #101: Greenlights with Matthew McConaughey: https://www.youngandprofiting.com/101-greenlights-with-matthew-mcconaughey/  Greenlights by Matthew McConaughey: https://greenlights.com/ Matthew on IMDB: https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000190/ The Just Keep Livin’ Foundation: https://www.jklivinfoundation.org/ Matthew’s Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/officiallymcconaughey/ Matthew’s Twitter: https://twitter.com/McConaughey Matthew’s YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/user/McConaugheyOfficial Matthew’s Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MatthewMcConaughey/ Connect with Young and Profiting:  YAP’s Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/youngandprofiting/     Hala’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/htaha/     Hala’s Instagram:https://www.instagram.com/yapwithhala/     Hala’s Twitter: https://twitter.com/yapwithhala  Clubhouse: https://www.clubhouse.com/@halataha   Website: https://www.youngandprofiting.com/  Text Hala: https://youngandprofiting.co/TextHala or text “YAP” to 28046 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Source. Taxes and other fee still apply. You're listening to YAP, Young and Profiting Podcast. A place where you can listen, learn, and profit. Welcome to the show. I'm your host, Halla Taha, and on Young and Profiting Podcast, we investigate a new topic each week and interview some of the brightest minds in the world.

My goal is to turn their wisdom into actionable advice that you can use in your everyday life, no matter your age, profession or industry. There's no fluff on this podcast, and that's on purpose. I'm here to uncover value from my guests by doing the proper research and asking the right questions. If you're new to the show, we've chatted with the likes of XFBI agents, real estate moguls, self-made billionaires, CEOs, and bestselling authors.

Our subject matter ranges from enhancing productivity, had to gain influence, the art of entrepreneurship, and more. If you're smart and like to continually improve yourself, hit the subscribe button, because you'll love it here at Young & Profiting Podcast. Alright alright alright! This YAP Classic we're bringing you today is one of my all-time favorites, where I talked to, you guessed it, Matthew McConaughey. Matthew was one of Hollywood's

most sought-after leading men. His breakout role was in the cult's classic Dazed and Confused, and his first major success as a leading man came in the legal drama, a time to kill. Matthew received an Academy Award for his work in Dallas-Buyers Club in 2014, and beyond his work as an actor, creative director,

and producer, Matthew is also a professor at the University of Texas at Austin, Matthew is also a professor at the University of Texas at Austin, as well as the Minister of Culture for the University of Texas and the City of Austin. In 2009, Matthew and his wife Camilla founded the Just Keep a Live-In Foundation, which helps at-risk high school students make healthier mind, body, and spirit choices. On top of all, this Matthew is an author of the New York Times bestselling book, Green Lights. In this app classic, I'm only bringing you the best

moments from this throwback interview, so you can listen, learn, and profit faster. In this episode, we chat about the origin of Matthew's confidence and the role preparation played into his success. We also discuss writing green lights and his practice of journaling. And we dive deep into how we can turn red lights and yellow lights into green lights. This episode really captures how with the right mindset and dedication, absolutely anything is possible.

So if you're looking to turn your dreams into a reality and hit all the green lights on the way, keep on listening. All right, well, enjoy my episode with D1 and the only Matthew McConaughey. Hey, Matthew, welcome to Young and Profiting Podcast. Hello, hi, hello, are you young profiteers out there? Well, Matthew McConaughey, you are a guest

that really needs no introduction. You are one of the biggest actors of our generation. You've been in over 40 feature films and you're coming on our show today to talk about a new book called Green Lights. And so I was curious to try to get insight into with all your acting background, with your film production background,

what made you think about writing a book? Why didn't you just shoot a movie? Yeah, good question. Shooting a movie. All right, I'm doing, I'm acting in someone else's script directed by someone else, lensed in a camera by someone else and edited by someone else before it gets on screen for the viewer to watch it. That's four filters separate from my first original raw expression. I was like, look, we'll be only one filter. It's the written word. It's a much more direct line of my art

or means of communication to you because I'm directing it. I'm lensing it. I'm editing it. It's my script. And I wanted to... I've always loved words, you know? I mean, I have a career where I perform. It's not necessarily about the words. The words only 10% of what an actor actually does. I wanted to say, well, can I get across what I want to be just the word?

Can it be written in a way that you can hopefully see me perform it? Or you listen to the audible and that helps, but can it have my voice without actually having, audibly, my voice and my performance? And that was a challenge I wanted to tackle. And I was hoping that I had stories and some wisdom I've learned along the way that I could share that people could apply to their own lives as well. So let's talk about the process of actually writing this book, because from my understanding,

you actually went on a trek by yourself in the desert to kind of write this book. You also journaled a lot growing up all throughout your life. So tell us about the process and also journaling and your process in writing the book with that. Sure. So I've been keeping journal since I was 14, so 37 years now. And just, and always have.

And many did it for myself, trying to write like any one at 14 years old, probably mostly confused, trying to figure out what's going on Why do I have pimples on my face? Why did why did Gretchen break up with me blah blah blah things like that? And then I also continued to journal When maybe I felt very certain about things when I was on my frequency when I was succeeding when I had successful Relationships when all of a sudden I began to have successful working relationships personal relations when I was happy in my I continued to journal then and I bring that up because that's what most of us even if you do

journal that's when most of the stop journaling because when things are going well we go oh I don't need to write this down this is how it's supposed to be. I'll always remember this. No. Write down, dissect your success as much or more than you dissect your failures or when you're confused and lost because we will forget. And I know for me, my journals have been a great tool to go back and look at. At times, in my life, say, if I'm off, if I'm in a rut, again, I can go, I've gone back and look at my journalist and said, well, what were you doing, Matthew? What habits back when you were rolling, when your relationships were good, when you were, you felt like you were in line and on time. And I found habits that I followed that led to gave us sort of a science to what satisfaction I

had that then presently helped me recalibrate and go, well, I need to start doing that again so I can get back in line and they've helped me get back on track. The writing of the book was, I took all of those journals away to the desert for, it was a total of 52 days in solitary, spread out over five different trips, And I wanted to go away alone because I didn't want to have the luxury of going, oh, well, let me check my messages or the luxury of going, hey, let me also and so I wanted to go to a place where there's no internet connection where I had nobody to interrupt me or even if I got bored, I had nowhere to run. And all in place I could run to was to look back at my journals and who I've been over the last 50 years. And I wanted to be stuck with that person and look at that person in the eye.

And that was the process right in the book. Yeah, it's so cool that you journaled since such a young age. I think a lot of us have interesting stories growing up and we just forget them. And the fact that you had them saved and you were able to kind of like pull them out and then reflect on them later on and write this book. I just think it's so amazing and something that everyone can take away from this in terms of like the importance of journaling. Yeah, well, keep the stories alive. You can think when something awesome happens or you across the truth or something's really

entertaining or you're individually really laughed at something you think is really special. Again, we always think, oh, I'll always remember that. But what happens over time is it gets fuzzy. So one, I say yes, journal. But two, if you have something, the verbal telling of the story, keep telling the story over and over, keep sharing the story. That also keeps it alive. But also write it down because the first way you remember it will be different than you tell it 10 years later. Stories kind of take, they become different things. You come over time, you give them different facts. So it's good to be able to go back and go,

how did I originally feel about that? What originally turned me on about that circumstance in my life? And again, just, I say in the book, I write things down so I can forget them, not to remember. What I mean by that is if something turns me on in life, and if I write it down, I know that I can now don't have to keep thinking, oh, don't forget that, don't forget that, don't forget that.

Because I've written it down. That means I can forget it because I go keep thinking, oh, don't forget that, don't forget that, don't forget that. Because I've written it down. That means I can forget it because I go, no, I wrote that down. It's there when I wanna go back to it. So I don't have to continually go through life going, don't forget that thing, don't forget. Make sure you don't forget that.

I write it down so I can forget it because I know I have a written down. Yeah, that's something that David Allen taught me. He's the author of GTD Getting Things Done. And basically, you have open loops in your brain, and until you write them down, you don't actually close that loop. So, really a good point. So let's talk about the title of your book. It's called Green Lights. And I just want to get my listeners some context in terms of what does a green light mean? What's the difference between a green light or red light, is there something called a yellow light tell us all about that Yeah green lights Mean go they affirm our way They say carry on please more yes

Freedom out of boy out of girl. Keep on going. We like them because they keep us in our flow They don't want to talk to us yellow light We like them because they keep us in our flow. They don't interrupt us. Yellow light slows us down. We don't really like it. We don't want it to have you wait. Why am I getting interrupted right now? You know what I mean?

Get out of my way. Red light makes us stop. Those are crises or times of retrospection or introspection in our life. We need those. We may not want them, but we need them if we're going to evolve as individuals and as humans. The red and yellow lights, I've found

eventually turned green in the rearview mirror of life, meaning hardships we've had, or times where we've had to be introspective and look back over our shoulder and assess why we keep failing at something or why we keep running into the same problem or practicing the same bad habit. We find that later. Oh, I needed that. I needed that to turn the page. I needed my own life. I needed that to evolve. I needed that to grow. I needed that introspection because if it was all just green lights and life was one big summer Saturday, shoelace summer and like a saturday. Well then what's it all for? It's kind of like it's

all for entertainment. There's no evolution and then we eventually get bored. So you need the reds and the yellows and even hardships and tragedies in the red lights and life. There's gifts in there. And to realize that there's a green light asset in my life because my father died. You gotta wait a minute, how's that a green light? No, I'm not saying his dying is a green light. That's a red light. But boy, did I learn a bunch of courage sooner than I would have if he'd still been alive?

Because I was trusting that he'd still been alive because I was trusting that he had my back, that he was a crutch for me. And his passing way made me go, you better start becoming the young man you want to become and quit acting like one and start being one. So there was a green light asset in his passing. Again, I'm not, it doesn't deny the red light, but there's a green light asset in our red and yellow lights. I totally relate to that. My dad actually passed away this past May. And since then, I remember in your book,

you were saying, it was kind of serendipitous when my dad died because his closing of his life really led to the opening of my life. And I thought, and it was just like a nice, beautiful closing of that chapter the opening of my life. And I thought, and it was just like a nice beautiful closing of that chapter and opening of yours. And I can totally relate because right after my father died, it's like, my downloads 10x. I launched pretty much a million dollar business. I landed a TED talk like all these positive things started happening. And it's because like you said, I lost that

crutch of my father being there for me. I just found this new passion for life and thought, let me just work even harder than I was working before. And I really believed in myself. And I think believing in everything and believing that life is limitless is really how you end up just accomplishing your goals. I know that you had this speech at Houston,

you did like a commencement speech or something like that where you talked about unbelievable being a word that you dislike. So can you talk to us about that word unbelievable and why you don't like that word? I think that is stupid as well in the dictionary. Unbelievable. Unbelievable. Unbelievable. Play.

What an unbelievable movie. What an unbelievable sunset. What an unbelievable beautiful person. What? These things in life that are all some, why would we call them unbelievable? These are the things that make us believe more in the all of life.

So it's the Antenim and it's sort of discredits the limits of beauty. It discredits the evil mankind can possess. Let's go to the negative. Let's go to the ugly side. Somebody flew on 9-11, flew a plane into the Twin Towers in America. unbelievable. No, it just happened. Give more credit to the evil mankind can possess as well as give more credit to the awe and the beauty in life. These things are not unbelievable. And so I think the word unbelievable

can be used so often that we actually, it makes us numb and in denial of the extreme beauties and extreme tragedies that life just has. You know, on Earth plate times, it tidalically, because it was unbelievable. No, it wasn't. It just happened. Look that in the eye. And so that's why I don't like the word.

It's a cop that word. Yeah, totally. Okay, let's take things back to your childhood. I want to get into some of these really amazing stories that are in your book, Green Lights. One of my favorite stories that I heard on there was your mother telling you since you were a child that you were little Mr. Texas, right? And so she told you that growing up and all throughout your life, your childhood, your teens, you believed that you were little Mr. Texas.

But then later on in life, you know, when you were much older, you looked at that trophy, you dusted it off and realized that you were just the runner up. So I thought this was a great lesson in terms of parenting and the fact that you can really instill confidence in your children and that's really important. And I wanna know, do you think you would be

who you are today? If you had never thought you were little Mr. Texas? It's a fun question and I throw it out there. I think I would be where I am today if I'd have grown. But it's a fun question to entertain. In 1977, I entered a little Mr. Texas contest. I get a trophy. I'm holding a trophy. I get a picture taken. My mom pushed that trophy, that picture up in the kitchen, and every morning tells me, look at you. You are little Mr. Texas.

And I wrote, I'm little Mr. Texas. I'm like, well, it was just a couple of years ago that I come across that picture. Cut to 2019, 2018, and I zoom in on the nameplate on the trophy, and it says runner up. Well, I'm like, what do you think? 1977, 1987, 1997, oh, 17, what, 41 years later, I find that

and you know, and I remember I went to my mom, I'm like, mom, I was runner up all these years. She goes, no, no, Mom, I was running her up all these years. She goes, no, no, no, you were a little Mr. Texas. I go, Mom, it says you're running up. She goes, no, the kid who won, his family was rich. And they had enough money to buy him a really expensive suit and we call that cheating. So you're a little Mr. Texas.

So she's still like you can get in there and says, no, you're still it. So that's, that's my mom is a great mala proper. And that's what I grew up believing. And you know, when we grow older, we all find that little, little white lives that were told us, hopefully, they're harmless. Some of them can't be harmful. But we find out, you know, I'm sure maybe you found out things about your father who just passed away. Things where the message was different than the messenger. You know, there's a gap between those. And I know I did when my father moved on, I've done that, felt that way when many loved ones moved on.

And the first feeling that sometimes we get is, well, how dare they? They didn't live by that, but they would tell me that we'll get over that part and go, no, you know what? They want to be a little bit better than they were. They maybe weren't able to act it out, but they want me to be able to. And there's grace in that. So that was an innocent little white lie that my mom told me for 41 years, but it all worked out. So how else did your parents instill confidence in you? Because as an actor and you are actually a very natural actor, you just walked on set basically to start your acting career and you didn't really go to school before you started first acting.

So, you had this natural confidence and I think little things like this add up. So, what else did your parents do to instill confidence in you, do you think? You know, we were always pushed to be ourselves, know ourselves. And it's true, it's true to this day, if the... Who else is more interesting? Or should be more interesting to get to know than ourselves. And if we can then be more of ourselves, we are inherently becoming more original daily,

because there's only all of us. So, you know, we see people, we look up to people, we see things, we want to be more like them, I wanted to be more like my older brother. Yeah, all that's fine. But boy, if you can sit there and go, who am I? And I know my parents are still right. Wait, get to know yourself. You'll be confident with who you are as much as you can be. And that's not easy. That's not easy to do. But it's

a task worth taking up. It's a challenge worth worth taking. And it's a challenge that's never over. I'm still doing it. I'm going to be doing it hopefully until the day I die. It's a challenge It's never over to constant in infinite quest That we never really arrive at being completely our true ourselves, but boy what a what a what a what a race to be chasing You know after our true ourselves, you know, and our our my mom would throw at quotes like You know, we'd be nervous to go to the dance and junior high with our first date. And she'd be like, don't you walk into that place like you want to bite. You walk in there like you own it. You'd be like, whoa, what? You know, so like,

you know, she threw that line back at me before my time to kill audition, which I was very nervous, which I ended up getting. I called her and she was like, don't you walk in there like you, you want that part. You walk in there like you are that part. And just great, mental perspective to go. Okay, and that has probably helped me. I think it's something that can help all of us, not let moments become bigger than we are.

And then, which is I think is a very good thing to, for us all to try and understand, something that can help all of us not let moments become bigger than we are in them, which is I think is a very good thing for us all to try and understand. Don't let the moment become bigger than you. You gain self respect from that. You gain self trust from that. You gain confidence from that. Let's hold that thought and take a quick break with our sponsors. Young and profitors, do you have a brilliant business idea but you don't know how to move forward with it? Going into debt for a four-year degree isn't the only path to success. Instead, learn everything you need to know about running a business for free by listening to the Millionaire University podcast.

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I think that's a really good insight. And it kind of goes back to like your journaling. You seem to be very introspective like you like to reflect on your life, write things down, think about it, and that probably also helps your confidence too, because you get to know yourself better. Well, yeah, I mean, I've also, you know, in the writing of this book,

to go back and look at my journals from 36 years of being the past was a daunting task. I'm not an intelligent guy. I don't really like to look back. I don't even watch all my movies. I don't watch any of my interviews. I'm like, well, I don't want to to look back. I don't even watch all my movies. I don't watch any of my interviews. I'm like, I don't want to, I'm comfortable. I'm like, no, I was there.

You know, I know what I did. I felt it. I don't need to go back and look at it and be a voyeur on it. I know, I felt what I did, but I don't like to look back and see replays of things I've done or look back in my life and see who I was. Well, to do that, I went back and I was like, man, I'm going to be embarrassed of who I was at time. I'm going to feel shameful. I'm going to feel guilty. I'm going to see

times where I was in an arrogant little prick and I'm not going to like who I was. And I was like, well, I dare you, McConaughey, I dare you to go look back. And I was all those things. But I found out that most of the things I thought I'd be embarrassed about, I lost that. Most of the things I thought I'd be shamed about and feel guilty about, I'd either already forgiven myself for or forgave myself for, and times where I was like, yeah, you weren't arrogant, a little no at all. Boy, what, that was ugly. Boy, you were such a no at all, it was ugly, but then I noticed, well,, actually your arrogance at that time in your life, Matthew,

gave you the confidence to put yourself in a position to get humiliated, which needed, which you wouldn't have had the confidence to put yourself in a position to get humbled if you wouldn't have been that arrogant. So everything sort of had its own

little green light, you know? Yeah, it's so interesting. And speaking of red light, green lights, let's talk about a red light that you had. And it's another one of my favorite stories from your book, it was your trip to Australia. So you went to Australia for one year, a rotary exchange program after you graduated high school.

And you stayed with a very unusual family. You were a very nice kid. You were trying to be respectful to them and you didn't really know if it was just cultural differences or if something really was going on. And tell us about that story, how it was a red light and how you turned it on its head and turned it into a green light. Well, so I just come out of high school where I was catching all green lights. Meaning, I made straight A's, so mom and dad were happy in high school. I just turned 18, which meant for the first time I no longer had a curfew. I had a car, it's paid for. I had a job, I had 45 bucks in my back pocket

at all times. I was dating the best of a girl at my school, dating the best of a girl at my school. The day the best of a girl crossed town, I had a poor handicapped in golf. I was rolling. Like, it was great and it's like a screeching halt. I'm in this little town in the middle of nowhere. I got no car, I got no friends, I got no girlfriends, I do have a curfew. I have no job and I don't even have my golf clubs. And I've got nothing around me.

And I was with it in a strange circumstance with an unusual family. And I went a little bit insane while I was going insane over there. And the reason I was going insane is because I only had me to rely on. I was writing 14 page letters to me and returning them, writing a 14 letter page letter back to me. I mean, this was, I was in a sacratic sort of implosion, but I felt at the time, because everyone was like,

why didn't you come home? Why didn't you come home? Well, one, I told the rotary people, I said, I'll go up, give you a handshake, that I'm not coming home before the year's over. So I felt part of a challenge I wanted to live up to. Secondly, I felt like even while I was losing my mind, I was like, I had a hunch. This is a penance for a reason. There's light at the, there's something,

if you can survive this and get out of this, because I was forced to get to know myself. I didn't have anybody else to go, hey, is this cool with their saying or what they wanted to do? I had no sounding board. I didn't have mom and dad, I didn't have friends. I had to ask myself, so I had to form my own identity and form my own judgment and form my own discernment of things that I would stand up for or wouldn't stand up for.

Things that would slide or wouldn't. And it was hard because of an 18-year-old kid just becoming an adult, but it was wonderful because I was forced to. I was forced to, but hook her by crook, make up my own mind and figure out how I was going to navigate through this hairy situation without anybody else's help. And it was a great ride of passage for me. And a year, you brought up little Mr. Texas or would I be here with that little, if I thought I was runner up, I think so. Would I be here with that year in Australia?

I doubt it. What makes you think that, like what happened in Australia? Like tell us some of the stories in terms of some of the weird things. Well, yeah, it's just a really good book for the story because the story is really well written I think and it's got great details in there. So I'm not going to go into those to do better to read those. But again, it was a year in my life where I was lost lonely, alone, losing my mind,

taking up odd disciplines that when I look back are hilarious and horrific at the same time. I did not think I was losing my mind, but I look back at the letters I was writing, and I look back at letters I even wrote my mom, my mom kept ones I wrote her, I look at them like, did you know I was losing my mom?

And mom's like, well, I had a hunch. I mean, it's a 17 line run on sentence here you wrote. You know, when you're going and saying, you're like, I have too many adverbs and adverbs, just overly, just mentally, not midgetizing almost, just imploding. And it was just a, it was a year where I was forced to get to know myself.

It was a year of forced introspection. And until then, I guess I'd been an introspective person, but I was much more of forced introspection. And until then, I had, I guess I'd been an introspective person, but I was much more of an extrovert. I was not a writer, not a reader. I was not a contemplator. That year, I was forced to because my only form of entertainment or freedom or insanity was me and me. And I did not always enjoy the company, but I was forced with me. So I had to get through it. I went through it. So coming out of that, I ran into hardships in life and still do today, but I'm like, oh, that's nothing. What I endured that year, this is nothing. And so I have gone through things that may, if I wouldn't have had that year, I may have thought

some crises and hardships I've had in my life. I'd be like, if I didn't have that year, be like, oh my gosh, this is daunting. But because of that year, I look at things that maybe that otherwise would have been daunting and then I'm like, oh no, I got this. I'll handle this. This is nothing. And I totally agree with you. The story in the book is so entertaining.

So everybody listening right now, go check out Green Lights. make sure you buy the book, listen to the audible. I was cracking up during the story. He basically was like almost kidnapped by this family that basically wanted him to be their son and it's just a crazy story. You definitely got to listen to it. I loved it. So let's talk about when you, so you came back to the US and then you were going to go to college, right? And you wanted to be a lawyer for a while, I think since you were in high school, you wanted to be a lawyer. So you were going on that path.

And there was one school that you wanted to go to that was quite expensive. And one that was more local, that was more affordable. And your brother actually told you like, hey, you should probably go to the cheaper school because your dad's having some financial struggles, right? And you quickly made the decision to respect your father. You never told him why he made that decision, but you went to the cheaper school and you

listened to your brother. And to me, as like somebody that young, that really showed me that you were mature, you had really good decision-making skills at that age. So talk to us about that decision. Talk to us about your decision-making process in general age. So talk to us about that decision. Talk to us about your decision-making process in general and how you were able to have that good judgment so young. Well, we're a close family. And I knew, the school I wanted to go to was,

was that seem to you, it was in Dallas, Texas. My idea was that as a lawyer in the big city of Dallas, I'll be able to get an internship early on. So when I get out of school and I'm in law school, I'll jump right into the job because I'll already have a planted my feet and I planted seeds within a law firm that I want to work in because it's a big metropolis.

This other school, you know, Texas was in a smaller town in Austin, but it was a state school. So it was about a third of the price. Well, my dad said, well, when you wanna go to the University of Texas at Austin, I'm like, no, sir, I wanna go to the Dazs. He's like, you sure? And I'm like, yes, sir.

And he's like, okay, okay. And I remember you question, but I was wondering why is he questioning? But he didn't ever say you'd be doing me a big favor because it costs a lot less. But my brother calls me And we're close family my brother says hey, man Dad's not gonna tell you this

But he's in Businesses tough right now and it's gonna cost 18 grand to go to SMU. It'll cost five grand to go to Texas You'd be doing him a real solid if you chose you versus Texas. And then my brother didn't call those things. I wouldn't have got that call on a whimsy. You know what I mean? My brother to tell me that and then then to also know that my dad had too much pride to let me know that. I'm like, oh, okay.

Yep. Got it. It was sort of it was very, very quickly. And then decisions like got it. Yeah. Well, go on. I'll go to your study and never never told my dad that's why. So I called my dad and go,

dad, I'm sorry, I don't want to go to your university text, and he's like, oh, great idea, buddy. We're super idea, way to go. And I was like, yeah, it's changed my mind, you know? So another decision that, hey, would I be here now if I didn't go to university of Texas at Austin, a city in the university that had been very good to me and I love a lot? I don't know if I'd be here now.

Would I be going to law school and become a lawyer? I'd gone to SMU. No. So that decision probably based on how tight we are as a family. My dad never asked anything of me. My dad had too much honor and pride to tell me, to tell anybody in our family. But dad never asked anything of me. My dad had too much honor and pride to tell me, to tell anybody in our family. I found that since he's passed away, there were many times that he was almost bankrupt. We couldn't tell. We had no idea. We never went out.

We were middle class and lived more like upper middle class probably. We never knew he was financially strapped. Now, does that lead up to part of the stress he had that led up to him having a heart attack at 62? Probably, but he never showed us. We never felt like we were going, he never once said we can't afford that. And so, even at that age of 18, I'm like, what an honorable, cool thing Even at that age of 18, I'm like, what an honorable cool thing of a father to do. He's not even letting us know that he can't afford the school. And he would have found a way. If I would have gone to that other school, he would have paid for it.

He would have found a way. And I would have never known that it was taxing on his finances. So that was obvious to me when my brother said that. So that was a quick decision to go, oh yeah, let's do data solid here. And I'll make this other school work, which it turned out to be a gift. That I went to the school, even if it was, even if it was a cost three times more

than the other one. I'm going to, I'm that I went to this one, but it did, it was three times less. Well, how about another tough decision when you decided to go to film school? What was, why did you decide to just switch gears like go of the dream of being a lawyer and how did your father take that information?

Well, I was not it was I was not sleeping well for the first time with the idea of becoming a lawyer. And I had I had the all I ever wanted to be. And now here I am. What of the 19 2020 21 years old? And I'm starting to think, I don't know if I want to go to law school. I got to graduate here, then I go four more years to law school, then I get out. Basically, I will be working, putting my stamp or my fingerprint in society until I'm in my 30s.

I don't know, but one's been my entire 20s learning. At the same time, I've been writing a lot, been writing short stories, and sharing short stories with a writer friend of mine who's telling me, hey, those are pretty damn good. Probably secretly enjoying performing in front of the camera, but not even able to admit it yet. So I said, I want to go to film school, to get in behind the camera, to learn the art of storytelling from behind the camera,

and get into the storytelling business. Well, I'm very nervous to call my father, who's paying for my school to tell him, I don't want to go to law school anymore, I want to go to film school. Remember, I come from a blue collar family, which is you get a job and you work your way up a company ladder, you get something that's dependable. The arts film production storytelling, that's a hobby on Saturday, yeah, you can do it, but that's not the way you do it. I'm not gonna pay for you to go get educated in that. It felt too avant-garde, too European, too whimsical

of an idea to even do. Well, I decided to call them one night and tell them that that's what I'd like to do. Ask, tell. And I called and this is a data I don't want. I decided I don't really want to get a law school anymore. I want to go to film school. And he goes, you sure that's what you and I did. I'm said, yes, sir. And the

next three words he said to me were incredible. He said, well, don't have acid. And I remember getting tingles at the time and almost crying because my dad in saying, don't have acid. He didn't just approve my choice. He gave me responsibility, accountability, more than privilege. He gave me freedom, courage, and a challenge to go do it. And in looking back at that moment,

because I really did not think that's how the phone call's gonna go. I thought he was gonna be like, you wanna what boy? What are you talking about? But in a matter of a 22nd conversation, he said, where I told him that I wanted to make a complete career choice change in school, 22nd slater, he said, don't have to ask. I think what it was is that like any parent out there, we build structure for our children.

Here's what you should do. Follow these rules, stay within the line. And that's good because a lot of us will succeed to assert it. If we do that, and that's that is a very worthy thing to do. But when a parent's really, I think happy is when a child maybe supports enough to come to them and go, I'm breaking out, I'm going on my own, I'm doing it. And I think he heard in my voice, when I said, I don't wanna go to law school, more I wanna go to film school,

even though I was calling to ask permission, I really wasn't. And he heard the certainty in his son's voice. Because if I would have gone, I mean, I think I do, I don't know, he'd probably said, hell no, because I would have gone, I mean, I think I do, I don't know he to probably said Hail no Because I would have been bluffing he to heard me bluffing, right? So he heard my voice that I was not bluffing that I really wasn't asking permission and that's what gave him

I think the pride the honor and the pleasure to go yes That my son is letting me know I've raised him well enough to frame to have the confidence to come to me and go, Dad, this is what I'm doing. And that may be very happy. And I think that's something makes any parent happy. Yeah. And it probably really helped you, you know, because I think he passed not too long after that.

It probably really helped you that he supported your acting decision. And that probably gave me the confidence to keep on going town that path. Confidence, encourage and, you know, I had my own bit of honor and pride to say, look, dad gave you more than approval to go chase down this as a career path. And now that he's gone, it gave me more courage to go, well, now you really better not half as it. You really better not quit it this you better make this happen. You're really better succeed. You really better

do everything you can to be as good of an actor as you can. So inherently I'm sure that was part of it too of me going, I'm doing this for more than just me. So let's talk about the beginnings of your acting career. Like I mentioned before, you are very natural. You ended up kind of forcing your way to get your breakout role on days and confused. So tell us about that. Tell us how you convinced the director to give you that part. Well, I go out to this bar in Austin one night

with my girlfriend that I'm telling you. And I knew the bartender who was in film school with me and he says, hey, there's a guy down at the end of the bar named down Phillips. He's in town producing a film. He's been coming here every night. He's staying in the hotel. Go down and introduce.

I introduce myself. Well, three hours later, he and I are talking golf and telling stories and movies we like, et cetera. We keep kicked out of the bar. On the cab right home to drop me off that night, he's riding with me and to drop me off of my apartment and he says, hey, you ever done any acting before? And I said, I mean, I was in this Miller light commercial

for about that long and I was in this music video and he was like, well, you might be right to this part. This is a guy called Wooderson. Here, I'm gonna leave a script for you at this address. Come down tomorrow morning, pick it up. It's three lines, but it's cool, Karek, you might be right for it. Well, I go pick up that script.

There are three lines. I study those three lines for two weeks. I come back, I audition for the director, Richard Linklater, I get the part. Now, all of a sudden, I'm on set one night. I'm not supposed to work. I'm doing a hair makeup and wardrobe test, which is where you just put on your makeup and your wardrobe

and when the director has a free time, he walks off the set and comes and looks you up and down and gives you note to what happened. Not supposed to work this night. Supposed to, my first day to work is a week later. Well, the director comes up and looks me and goes, yeah, this is worseerson, I like it. And all of a sudden, as I'm about to say goodbye,

he goes, hey, you know, you think Wooderson would be interested in the red-headed intellectual girl in school? And I'm like, yeah, what does he like? So I'll kind of go, he goes, well, there's a girl, Marissa Rebece, who's playing the role of Cynthia, the red-headed intellectual. And she's over here in the car, and she's got her three nerdy friends.

And I don't know, maybe Wooderson pulls up, tries to pick her up, tells her there's a party later on. I'm like, give me 30 minutes. And I took a walk with myself. And I was like, who's my man? Who's Wooderson? Who's this guy? There's this scene I'm being invited into

that there's no lines written for. Next thing I know, I'm in the car about shoot my first scene ever. There's not a line written for it. All I know is the scenario. And I'm telling myself who's my man? Who's who's who's who's the character I'm playing? And I'm getting kind of nervous and I tell myself to myself I say I'm about my car. I said well I'm in my 70s chevelle. There's one I said I'm about getting high. I said, well, Slater's riding shotgun. He's always got a dooby-willed up.

There's two. I said, I'm about rock and roll. I said, I got 10 news, you'd strangle hold in the eight track playing right now. There's three, and all of a sudden, they hear action. And I look up, cross the park and line at the red-headed intellectuals, Cynthia, and I go, and me, what are some, I'm about picking up chicks.

And as I said that, it went through my mind as I put it in drive. Well, I've got three out of four and I'm going to get the fourth. All right, all right, all right, and pulled out. It's the first three words I ever said on camera in a film, 1992. And then we did the scene. And then I kept getting invited back every night, the director kept inviting me back. And that whole cast would involve me in the scenes. They'd ask me questions in the middle and ask my character questions in the middle of the scene.

And so they wrote me into the picture. And all of a sudden I worked three weeks, three lines turned to three weeks work. And it was awesome. And I had a great time doing it. People were telling me I was good at it. I'm getting paid $300 a day. I'm going, is this legal? Is so much fun.

And people were telling me, I'm not at it. Please, I go back, I graduate college. And I drive out to Hollywood with you hauling 3000 bucks the next year. And here I am 28, 29 years later turned into a career. Hey, Young & Profiters. As you guys know, we have some awesome sponsors of the show. If you want to support Young & Profiting podcasts and get awesome discounts, text deals to 28046 and get all the deals of the month. Again, if you guys want to get all the deals of the month on Young & Profiting Podcasts, send directly

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go. That way, I can multitask while I learn. Get unlimited access to every class and right now, as the app listener, you can get 15% off when you go to masterclass.com-profiting. That's masterclass.com-profiting for 15% off an annual membership masterclass.com slash profiting. It just goes to show that you need to really like take your opportunities because that opportunity, you could have just chickened out. You could have just been like, you know what, I'm not ready, I didn't get my lines, I've never done this before, you could have just chickened out. And you had that one moment, whatever, how many minutes that was, 30 minutes you said, to figure it out and get the balls to kind of just do it.

And I just think that people need to realize that sometimes you need to take the opportunities that are in your face, because they could just go away forever. They can, and you know, that window of opportunity, so many times, it opens up and we see it. And if we start to go, hmm, should I take it? That can sometimes already be too much time.

It closes. So I remember he goes, you know, I was just answering the question, yeah, I like to, you know what I mean, think about my Mandy, you want to do this? I'm already seeing this as like, well, it's going to be an opportunity. I don't know what the hell I'm going to do,

but this is, let me go try and figure it out and then try and relax and just be my, be my man, be my character. But yeah, they do open up. And you know, I could have said no and still been invited back and done the three scenes, the three lines and the three scenes and could have done well. But I don't, I don't think I would be sitting here right now with the life I have or the career I have And but I've tried to take that into my acting career throughout is Even if it's one line character Think about what that whole character is in every scenario

Write a look on that character. So if you're in any position and someone throws you an improv line and ask you a question You got an idea of what you got, what's your personal say, your character would say. And I guess as I'm saying, it goes along with who we are in life as well. Know ourselves well enough. Play ourselves out and project ourselves in the different scenarios. To where, if we're in them, we can improvise and be ourselves. Yeah. And BSO, it also goes back to like B so prepared that like nobody has a choice

but to give you that opportunity because they just know, Oh, well, he's got it. He's he's so good. You know, like give them no choice but to give you that opportunity if it comes up. If it comes up and it's a fine line because look, you can, you know, say, Oh, I've got to look for opportunity. So I've got to create, yes, we do create opportunities. But you've got to know your zone. You've got to read the room.

You've got to know what you're dealing with. Meaning, say if I wanted to be in that scene to that night, but wasn't invited, which I risen one. And say I went up and they were like, okay, your car, you can go home now. And I'm like, no, I'm gonna stay on sex. I'm looking for my opportunity, right? And then maybe they're not getting the scene down and they're having trouble getting the scene.

And I'm saying, I'm over there on the sideline nervous thinking, when am I gonna find my opening and say, hey, can I get in here? And maybe I say it and they're like, look at me, I'm going, who the hell is this guy trying to get get in here and we're trying to, hell, no, you can't. Then I go home and then they're going, do we even want to invite this guy back

to do the three lines we hired him to do? He's a really ass. He's trying to, he didn't gracefully. So it's a bit of go after what you want, but also sit back and be prepared enough for the opportunity comes, you and be prepared enough for it. The opportunity comes. You're like, I got it. Put me in coach. Give me the ball. But you can't be overbearing because sometimes you'll be overbearing and you're anusus. But it's a balance. I love that. I think this is

such good advice for my listeners. I hope everyone is paying attention. Okay, so let's take it a little further down in your acting career. Mid-90s, you're like the biggest rom-com actor ever. You're in every single movie. That's when I was a teenager. I was watching you all day, you know? And so, talk to us about that. Like, did you like doing rom-coms?

You also say that rom-coms were green lights for you or like the green light of movie. So, tell us about that and your experience there. Yeah, I did enjoy romcoms. You know, they were light. They were fun. When I prepare for them enough, the actual making of the movies,

the acting of them, were easy. They were supposed to be easy. It's a flow. The rom-com is not, the characters aren't, you know, you say, you know, how long is it going? I'm an advertising agent. But the character's not about my character as an advertising agent. It's just a job I've gotten.

So it's not, what I talk about. It's not have to be job specific. It's all about the lingo between the boy and the girl or the couple, whoever they are. They have the sauce. Are you looking at him going, oh, this is good. And you gotta have a jost. There's always a jost. You know, in a romcom, boy means girl usually,

they go on, they break up for some reason, at the end in the third act, boy, Chase's girl, get your roller credits. You know that's gonna happen. You know that couple's gonna get together. You just want to have a good time seeing them do it. We want to think that it's gonna fail, but the NB happy way does succeed. You want to be in on the joke when Kate Hudson's gonna try to trick me. You want to be in on the, and I don't know it, but you the audience know it and she does. You want to be in on the joke when I'm about to trick her, but she doesn't know it, but you the audience knows it. You want to have fun seeing each other,

let's do each other in an innocent way. So there's, it's about lingo. You can improvise in those things. And I had always been a very comfortable improviser and you play out the scenario and try to wiggle your way out of the trouble and try to come out of the scene winning. And that's part of the fun of watching rom-com. Seeing each character try and win and not always winning, watching someone fail, get duped, and then maybe recover or not. So they were great fun. And I did, you know, they're also medium budget in Hollywood terms at that time. They were great fun. And I did, you know, they're also medium budget in Hollywood terms at that time. They were like $35 million budget. It's not $80 million budget.

So you could put them out. They didn't know that studio didn't have to put up so much bank. And the ones that I was doing were doing very well. And then they were getting played on the time cable TV and DVDs and now they're still playing. So that's also money back to this studio. And they were succeeding. I was the romcom guy to go to guy. And I had done like three or four now that had all succeeded. And I was starting to feel like, ah, I feel like, okay, I'd read the next romcom script,

and I feel like, oh, that's a good one, but I feel like I could do this tomorrow morning. I was like, I want something that I'm looking at, and going like, I don't know what I'm gonna do with this character, but I can't wait to find out. And that was not romcoms. So, I decided to take a sabbatical from rom-coms. I just said, I just say, look, the dramatic fare I wanna do,

they're not offering me that. No one wants to finance the math and maconahana drama. So I said, if I can't do what I wanna do, I'm gonna quit doing what I've been doing. So I said, no more rom-coms. Well, that man I was gonna go without work for a while that man I was going to go with that work for a while. And I did have to go with that work for a while. I didn't get offered anything but romcoms for the first six months. I said no to them all. And then for the next year and a half, I got offered

nothing. So I go basically two years without working, wanting to work, but not working. wanting to work but not working. And then after two years, I think I gained some anonymity. I think in the audiences, eyes, and the studios, eyes that make the movies, it was like, where's my come at? Has it been in a romcom in front of us on the screen? We don't know where he is. We haven't seen him shirtless on the beach in Malibu. Where is he?

Well, I was a down in Texas. Hi, now, say a note, a rom-com is waiting, hopefully, for something else to come. Well, after two years, with that anonymity that I gained, I unbranded and I became a new, good idea for those dramatic roles that I wanted to do. So it took two years of being gone to be able to be seen for the first time as, hey, you

know, be interesting casting, original cool casting for Lincoln lawyer, killer Joe, pay for boy, magic mind, mud, burning, tree-tector, Dallas, barsco. Come on, hey, but it wouldn't have happened unless I took the two years off and unbranded. Yeah, it's so interesting because, you know, you're celebrity, right? And so you needed to do that because everybody knew who you were. They recognized you as a certain character and you needed to unbrand yourself.

And that's something that I think like the average person doesn't really have experience with. We can just reinvent ourselves continually. And it doesn't really, people aren't paying attention that closely where that would ever be an issue. Right. Well, and look, and I understand, and some of the listeners of me,

maybe I'd be out there going, yeah, well, lucky you, you were able to take off work for two years to unbrand. Not everyone can do that. I get that. I had invested well and been very conservative with my money enough to be where I could maintain a certain lifestyle without working. And I was trying to do some voice work during that time,

but no acting. So yeah, I was in a privileged position to take time off. But the concept is still useful for anyone is to go, boy, if I can't do what I want to do, maybe I need to quit doing what I'm doing. It's again, it's about when I talk about the book, about finding our own identity. It's not always about knowing what we want to do. That's hard.

What's easier is to eliminate the things in our life of who we are not, whether that's work, whether that's who we're hanging out with, where we're going, how we're greeting the day, what we're drinking, how much we're sleeping, whatever that is. So let's continue on this topic in terms of celebrity and some differences in terms of what you guys have to deal with. And my boyfriend's actually a very famous hip hop producer and I've dealt with it with him over the years.

Now I'm starting to gain a fraction of celebrity, not anything compared to you or him. But I know that your mother, actually, you had a falling out with your mother for quite some time because she was really interested in your celebrity and even invited tabloid news people into your house and you felt like you couldn't be yourself around your mother for that reason.

And I know a lot of celebrities are very private about their life and really just try to keep that separate because I'm sure it can be really hard. So talk to us about that and maybe some of the things that you've struggled with with your celebrity and how you deal with it. Sure. Well, so, I became this celebrity sort of over one weekend. And it was when a time to kill came out. I mean, I was a bit of a celebrity before maybe,

so it's a third extent, but I became famous when a time to kill came out. That weekend, I was the lead and a major studio Warner Brothers picture that did well. And that film opened on that Friday, my life changed from that Friday to the following Monday. Over the weekend when that movie came out, the world was a mirror. All the sudden, everyone was looking at me and had an idea and a biography of who I was,

what they thought about me. People come up and go, oh my God, I'm so sorry about Miss Hud. And I'm like, going, I've never met you. How do you know I have a dog? How do you know her name's Miss Hud? How do you know she has cancer? What's your name? You just skip like four things

and you jump right into my life. I'm like going, whoa, you know three days ago, you were a stranger. Now you're not, or you're at least acting like you're not. You lose anonymity. So I had to go, chose to go off on my own to take some walk about to the backpack to gain my anonymity and sit with myself and go,

okay, all of a sudden you have all these new options in your life, you have all the, what was 99 knows and one yes last Friday is now 99 yeses and one no. Wow, that's great, but at the same time it's it's like oh shit what do you want me to do? Three days ago I would have done any of this but I couldn't and now you're telling me I can do almost all of it and you want me to decide. So you know with all the options and then when the roof was taken off I was like well there's only 24 hours in the day. What do I want to I need some discernment

here to decide what does I want to do I need some discernment here to decide what is I want to do. I needed to go off, spend time with myself, figure out what the hell mattered to me and what did. Another lesson that I learned with fame seven years in after that becoming famous is that with fame you start to get a lot of things. You obviously get the backstage passes. You get to the front of the line.

You get things carte blanched handed to you. And it's awesome. At the same time, I went through a bit of an imposter syndrome, sort of non-deserving complex, like, why, why me? Why can't I always do? I deserve this. And I was a little awkward with the champagne and caviar that were now being handed to me for free. And I was like, okay, okay, again, a few days ago, I couldn't even have this. But I learned to, and all of a sudden people say, throw the word, I love you around more. And I'm like, that's a word. I've only said to four people, but everyone's telling me they love me. And I don't even know what's this mean. And I took it personally to some extent. But I learned seven years after my fame that,

oh, it's not none of it's personal. It's business. I had, when the height of my fame, I could get anyone on the, any studio head on the phone, anybody on the phone. Well, then I go do a few movies that don't do as well. They don't return my calls. Then all of a sudden, my career picks back up,

and I'm doing, well, now they're calling me. Well, I could either choose to go F you, man. I remember when you wouldn't call or go, it's cool. It's all business. I got it. So when I made it less personal, I said, oh, it's all business. Just roll with it. Just just just how the flow goes of my career. And if someone who becomes famous or less famous at the time and then more famous again, it ain't personal. It's business. If you get that joke, that's the joke to get with fame. It ain't personal. It's business.

If you get that joke, it'll be a lot less stressed. You'll be able to accept all of the adulation better. You'll be able to accept the champagne and caviar easier with grace, but you'll also, for me, not necessarily need that for your sense of identity as much because it's fleeting. You got to watch it with fame. When you go to that and you need the attention, look at, look at musicians. Now get it. You're on a stage with thousands of people looking up, adoring you in a show. And what happens when you don't, when you're not touring live anymore,

or no one's buying your albums? Huh, real life, regular life? It's not enough to get off to. I need more of a buzz. I can't get off to this because I was so high. Then you got to watch I can't get off to this because I was so high. Then you got to watch how much we get our identity and our sense of satisfaction and pleasure from things that you get at the height of fame. You got to appreciate it, I think, but make sure they're not just completely making up your sense of who you are.

Because in fame, it's infinite, yeses. Now I. Now actually the devil be living. The devil be living in the infinite yeses, not the nose. I mean too many options can make a tyrant of any of us. So that's what you've got to watch with fame. You have all access. Well if you got all access, you can you you can peter out and burn out because you don't have the energy or you got to watch your health and your mental health and your spiritual health and your physical health. So take some time, if you're fortunate enough to get famous, take some time to go check in with yourself and go, what matters to me?

Because I write about this in the book, For the first time, you can do things that you never could do before. So your first instinct is go, well, yes. Why, yes? Because I never had the option before. So of course, well, as yourself, if you want to, before you do, when you can. I think that's excellent advice.

And I just have to say that you've been so humble. You know, I didn't know you're going to be like, you're obviously very famous. You've got a lot of privilege, but you do give back to the community. So I did want to give you a chance to talk about your foundation. Tell us a little bit about your foundation and its mission. Sure, just keep living foundation.

We're in after school, Title I schools, which is schools with lower income families and students, a lot of single parent homes, 50% dropout rate. So we have a curriculum in those schools after school days where kids and young men and women come to set a exercise goal. Maybe that is, I'm gonna get in shape so I can make the football team and I'm not in shape. We'll help you get in shape.

Or maybe it's, I need to lose four pounds so I can fit my prom dress. We're going to help you do that. We teach nutrition goals. Okay. Instead of five cheeseburgers again for dinner, let's take that $38 and we're going to take it to a supermarket and you can buy vegetables, rice, beans and maybe even some meat, a healthier meal, and you also get to cook it with your family. Third thing, community service. All the students have to do community service within their own community. And fourth thing is we have what we call a gratitude circle, which at the end of each curriculum all the students sit around and openly share something they're thankful for in life.

sit around and openly share something they're thankful for in life. And the coolest thing about that is the students come and they're saying, I love the gratitude circle because I'm hearing my friends say thank you for things in their life that I have in my life that I've always taken for granted and never said thank you for. So we believe that the more you're thankful for the more you're going to create your life to be thankful for, I think gratitude're going to create your life to be thankful for. I think gratitude creates responsibility because if you get more value to things, you want to take care of them. And if you want to take care of the things that matter to you, that's actually how you get more freedom.

So that's what we're providing in our curriculum, giving all the way down to giving these kids some of them, it's just a safe place to go after school that they didn't have before. And where can people go to contribute to that foundation? Just keep living, no G on the end, foundation.org or jk-divine-foundation.org. Thank you. Cool, I'll put that in the show notes.

Okay, so the last question I ask, oh my guess, is what is your secret to profiting in life? Well, sometimes it's a greater risk to go for something you want. And sometimes it's a greater risk to sacrifice and say, no, I'm going to go without that. That's really another place where the art, I think think of living is, and we've been talking about that generally in the, for the last 30 minutes. Try through can to say, okay, look, we all want to make money. Money's good. It's a great tool.

It does help the world go around and the capitalist side, we need money. I'm all for that. We want to fill our bank account. But let's ask ourselves, when all for that. We wanna fill our bank account. But let's ask ourselves, when we're filling our bank account, can I also fill my soul's account at the same time? But if we find a way where we can fill our bank account and soul's account, where we don't fill our bank account at the expense of who we are or what we believe in,

we don't lie cheating, stealing, screw people over in burn bridges and to get what we want. That's long money. That's real profit. That's so beautiful. Thank you so much for sharing that. Thank you so much for joining us today, Matthew. Where can our listeners go to learn more about you

and everything that you're doing? I mean, I share some pretty cool, what I think is a pretty cool stuff on my Instagram and officially Mcconnaught. If you wanna find out about the foundation, just keep living.org. And if you wanna find out more about the book, hopefully go check that and read it

and get some of the promo, but that's at greenlightsthabook.com or greenlights.com. And, hey, I'm still here, living live. Hopefully I'm only halfway through this big thing called life. We'll see. Awesome. Thank you so much, Matthew. I appreciate it.

Oh, that Matthew. What a guy. You know, what a guy for coming on my show like that. I feel so honored that he came on my show and he's so humble and down to earth. And I loved hearing his story about Dazed and Confused and the origin of all right, all right, all right.

I mean, that just gave me chills hearing that back. But whenever I think back to this conversation, something else that really sticks out to me is the idea that yellow and red lights eventually always turn green if you have a growth mindset at least. You can look back at all your hard times, the times that you've made mistakes, your red lights, your failures, all those things that are red lights in your life, and you can choose to actually look back and recalibrate them into green lights. I mean, talk

about a growth mindset. This is all, whenever we're talking about positive thinking and things like that, that things are going to happen in your life. But it's all about how you kind of twist them and see the positive in them. And so Matthew and I both shared stories about the passing of our fathers. I had a really, really traumatic experience with my father dying from COVID. And it was really, really negative. And Matthew also had a negative story about his father passing, but we both choose to reflect on these tragedies and see them as green lights rather than red lights. Lessons of loss and love that positively impacted the decisions we make and the way that we live moving forward.

So, even death can become a green light if you have the right mindset. And I'm not saying this happens overnight because everybody comes from a different place, everybody has been through different things, but all I'm asking is for you guys to start to see the silver lining even in the most difficult situations. You're going to grow and come out stronger than before every single time. And what it takes to do this is the willingness to be introspective and respective and to sit down with yourself and quiet and reflect on your past and really learn about who you really are. And Matthew uses journaling as a way for him to revisit and reclaim his past and

acknowledge the present. The practice of daily journaling is a great actionable tip from Matthew. He also says that it's important to journal even when you're hitting those green lights. And this is super interesting because everybody talks about learning from your failures and things like that, but nobody ever talks about learning from your successes as much as your failures. So that was a really unique thought that Matthew had. And I think it really makes a lot of sense.

You have to learn from your successes as well as your failures. So don't forget that. Well, young and profitors, let's keep on hustling, growing, and hitting those green lights. And if you love listening to Young and Profiting podcasts, please do take a moment to drop us a five-star review on Apple Podcast, or wherever you listen to the show. Reviews help us find new listeners,

reviews help us get sponsors. It's super important, so make sure you take the time to thank us. It is the number one way to thank us here at Younger Profiting. And you guys can also text me now. If you have a question for me, if you have a question for Matthew or any of the guests that have been on our show,

all you have to do is text YAPYAPE to 28046. Just pull up your phone right now. Text YAP to 28046. You guys are gonna get updates about the show. You'll get discounts. You'll also get to text me. Anything, that's the main purpose of it guys is to text me8046. You guys are gonna get updates about the show, you'll get discounts, you'll also get two text meet. Anything, that's the main purpose of it, guys, is to text meet your questions.

So I can respond and we're actually gonna put out a series later on that's gonna have a compilation of all the best questions and I'll answer them live on the show and shout you out if you submitted a question. So again, that's YAP to 2.8046. You also can connect with me on Instagram or Twitter at Yapathala. I'm on LinkedIn. If you search my name, it's Hala Taha.

And with that, I want to shout out to my YAP team. Thank you guys so much for helping me produce this incredible show. I appreciate you all. And this is your host, Hala Taha, signing off. Are you looking for ways to be happier, healthier, more productive and more creative? I'm Gretchen Rubin, the number one best-selling author of the Happiness Project. And every week, we share ideas and practical solutions

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