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The following is a conversation with Matthew McConaughey, a legendary Oscar-winning actor and one of the most unique, charismatic, and inspiring humans and Texans who walked this earth.
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He starred in films and shows loved by me and millions of others, including Interstellar, Dazed and Confused, Dallas Bias Club, Killer Joe, Mudd, True Detective, and soon a spinoff of Yellowstone.
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Off-screen, his words carry wisdom and power in his book called Green Lights and his new video course called Road Trip, where Matthew expands on the philosophy in his book and shows how to apply it to your life in order to find more happiness, success, and love.
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And now, a quick few second mention of each sponsor.
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Check them out in the description.
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It s the best way to support this podcast.
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We got Riverside FM for the best remote video recording platform, Masterclass for learning, and AG1 for my daily multivitamin.
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Choose wisely, my friends.
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Also, if you want to work on our amazing team, we re always hiring.
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Go to lexfriedman.com slash hiring.
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And now onto the full ad reads.
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As always, no ads in the middle.
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I try to make this interesting, but if you must skip them, friends, please still check out the sponsors.
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I enjoy their stuff.
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Maybe you will too.
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This episode is brought to you by, I think a new sponsor, but I ve been using them for so long and loving them for so long.
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I can t sing them enough praises.
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It s Riverside FM, the platform that makes it easy for podcasters and media companies to record remotely in the studio
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equality.
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I m a big time sucker, you could say, for in-person conversations, but that s not always possible.
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I ve recorded the conversation with Noam Chomsky the second time we talked remotely, and there I used Riverside FM.
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It just makes it so easy.
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It does the double-ended recording for you, which is the audio and the video in highest quality, because my connection with Noam Chomsky was horrible.
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There s something wrong on both of our internets, it just did not want to cooperate.
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And still the final result captured the quality of my camera and the quality of Noam Chomsky s camera perfectly.
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That s the whole point of this kind of technology, just incredibly easy to use.
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You don t have to give instructions to the other person on a bunch of things to click on.
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all this kind of complexity that you would have to do to have a double NA recording using audio recording software, which is, I think, how people used to do it.
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This is all in browser.
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It just works effortlessly, works nicely.
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It just works.
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The final thing looks good.
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If you re doing a podcast, if you re doing any kind of remote recording, Riverside FM is what you should be using it.
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I record my remote interviews with Riverside.
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Give it a try at Riverside FM and use code Lex for 30% off.
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That s Riverside FM and use code Lex.
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The link s in the description below.
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This show is also brought to you by Masterclass.
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$180 a year gets you an all access pass to watch courses from the best people in the world in their respective disciplines.
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Will Wright, Carlos Santana.
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Carlos Santana s Europa.
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I mean, it s an instrumental guitar piece.
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Just, it s smooth.
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It s so beautiful.
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It almost makes me want to play Gibson.
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I m a Fender Strat guy.
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I probably should learn to play Europa at some point.
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It s one of those pieces, kind of like Voodoo Child by Jimi Hendrix, but you can just play it forever.
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Anyway, you can learn from all these people.
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Carlos Santana in the music realm, Marcos Coseze, probably one of, if not my favorite director.
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I mean, it s just Jane Goodall, everything.
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It just goes on and on and on and on and on, Chris Hadfield.
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If you want to learn about a thing, learn from the people that do that thing better than almost anybody else in the world.
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Get unlimited access to every masterclass and get 15% off an annual membership at masterclass.com slash Lex
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This show is also brought to you by our old friend Athletic Greens and it s AG1 Drink, which is an all-in-one daily drink to support better health and peak performance.
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And the drink I just drank, and it was delicious.
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I drink it twice a day usually.
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I mix it up, put it in the fridge, it s nice and cold, and I just escape in the cold deliciousness
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and a meditative reminder that I m rejuvenating my mind and body.
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I just sit there on the couch for a minute and reflect on my past, my present, and my future, and just let the gratitude for how beautiful this life is take over.
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I think they ve changed their name officially to AG1.
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So you should go check them out and they ll give you a free one year supply of vitamin D and five free travel packs with your first purchase when you go to drinkag1.com slash Lex.
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This is the Lex Friedman Podcast.
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To support it, please check out our sponsors in the description.
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And now, dear friends, here s Matthew McConaughey.
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Let s start with love.
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Your parents had a complicated love story.
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Divorced twice, married three times.
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What did you learn about love from your mom and dad and their love story?
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That it s messy.
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That it takes work.
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It s ugly that no matter how ugly or messy it is, don t go to bed until you ve come back together to either embrace or admit that you truly love each other, even if you hadn t solved what the hell you re bitching about.
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That
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love will win in the end, literally three to two with my mom and dad.
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And that even in the two divorces and in the two times where they couldn t live with each other, they still loved each other.
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They just couldn t live with each other at that time for whatever reason they needed.
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And I don t know the details, but they needed their,
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space freedom or what, but they were never out of love with each other.
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And that as a parent, if you just, when we re not sure what to do, and people give you a thousand books and advice, as a parent, if your kid
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knows you love them.
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You re in the black.
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That s the main thing.
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It won t work without that.
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And it can work and will usually can work with that.
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They just know that fact.
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So it s not just love for each other.
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It s the love for the bigger family that ultimately helps you persist through the ups and downs.
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Well,
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I mean, I don t know how much particularly my mom and dad were staying together at times maybe when they didn t want to because they had children.
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I don t actually think they considered that.
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I think they were much less conscientious than say I am today.
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I think my mom and dad were more like, they ll be fine.
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We love them, they ll be fine, but we ll cross that bridge when we get there.
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Right now, let s work it out between you and I is what I think my mom and dad were saying to each other, or not.
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They wanted and needed a relationship that was a tidal wave, rocky, right angles, tsunamis, and to this day,
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in my life with Camilla and I, which I don t.
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I like a river, has some swerves and some streams and some rapids, but I m not looking for a tidal wave.
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My mom s like, what s all this, everything s so smooth and stuff.
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Come on, come on, come on, come on.
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And so she challenges like vitality, because that s what my mom needed to communicate.
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I don t think my dad needed it as much, that
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the hard angles that their relationship, I don t think my dad needed as much as my mom.
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But the clashes demonstrated the passion that underlies the love.
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Yes.
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And that s, I ve always been asked, you know, when I talk about my parents  love relationship, I tell the stories that are actually sometimes quite violent.
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There s some good stories there.
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They re beautiful, I think they re beautiful.
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Yeah, I think they re beautiful too.
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But I ve had people go, wait a minute, that was unhealthy, you can t, and I was like, no, that s, again, back to the beginning, love s messy, and that, what I love about those stories is that s where the love was actually, it was tested, and it could have broke and been over, and it never was.
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Again, the love won.
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In the kitchen floor, the blood s drawn, knives are pulled.
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Ketchup.
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Ketchup s all over.
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But we make love on the kitchen floor.
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I mean, come on, beautiful.
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So as romantic as it gets right there.
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Whoa.
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What s a memory from childhood that helped set you on the trajectory of becoming the man you are today?
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standing on the corner with Mr. Mayor, the principal of St.
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Philip s School.
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I was in kindergarten.
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And I looked up and there was a cloud in the sky.
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And I said, Mr. Mayor, is that cloud as big as the world?
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And he paused for a minute and he goes, well, yes, it is, Matthew.
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Now in my seven year old mind, I went, okay,
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I can see the outlines of it.
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And that must mean it is so far away because if that s as big as the world, I remember it took 15 hours just to drive from Longview to Florida last year.
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And I can t even see that far.
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So that cloud must be so far off that it s not worth me even considering space, dreams, any of that.
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Army, I m looking down.
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I m gonna put my head to the ground.
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I m gonna look right in front of me and deal with what s in front of me because dealing with dreams and what s out there and not on this earth that gravity holds down, not worth considering.
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You never make it.
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It s not even worth imagining.
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It s fairy dust.
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So I think I learned a lot of self-reliance from that.
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I think I got a work ethic from that.
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I think I got a,
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hey, focus on what s right in front of you, do the deed, take care of what s in front of you one at a time and slowly notch up your way and hopefully there s some ascension to that.
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And it wasn t until quite years later, in some ways decades later that I started to go, oh,
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I can project, I can dream, why?
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Because literally the first time I got in a plane and in 30 seconds I was in a cloud, I m like, whoa, we must be going a trillion miles an hour because we re already in that cloud that was as big as the world that I saw the edge of.
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And then I grew and learned enough to go, well, that s not true, planes don t go that fast.
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Oh, what Mr. Mayor said wasn t really true, that cloud is not as big as the world and it s not near as far away as I thought.
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But I m glad he lied to me.
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What do you think about that, that tension of a way of living life between being a dreamer and a pragmatist?
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Yeah.
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Which is a better way?
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Johnny holds the reciprocity of the two of them.
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I mean, I can t be present unless I got plans.
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I wanna,
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I want to have the big picture in mind, but I got to go a day at a time.
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I like to write the headline or have a, I think we need to have a North star, something to look forward to.
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But we all know that if we re staring at it, we re tripping on the way.
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If we re just, you know, the old, you read the Hallmark cards, which I, irk me, you know, dream it, you can do it.
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I think that s a,
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half-ass horrible thing to tell somebody.
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And then on the other side, you have things like, people say hope means nothing.
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Well, yes, it does.
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That s the dream.
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You just don t stop there.
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It s not a period after that word.
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Now, what do we do practically?
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And I think that constant tension, when that tension s a dance is when it s beautiful.
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but to see those as contradictions, I think is where we ve fallen short.
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So I don t, one on their own, if we silo the two.
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Oh, if you silo the two, I guess that the pragmatics the one to go with, because at least you ll get something done.
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But if you only silo the dream and don t do anything about it, that s you re kind of living in an illusion and kind of living in a virtual reality.
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Yeah, it s tricky.
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Even the people you love can sometimes suffocate the dream, can make you believe that it s not possible.
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It feels like a lot of parents kind of
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want you to be safe, want you to be stable, want you to have a plan so that everything s gonna be okay.
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And the dream feels like a threat to that.
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Yeah.
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How much of that though, I wonder, is proper initiation?
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Because if you throw in dreams out, I call it conservative, very liberal late.
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Let s learn to block and tackle.
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Let s learn that work ethic, those things, those pragmatics first.
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learn the rules of the road, the rules of the game, the things that we can all kind of rely on, this is how the world s supposed to work.
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Now, it doesn t always work that way.
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You teach a child to drive, it s like, yeah, you stay in the lane, you go to the speed limit, this is all helpful, but that doesn t guarantee that no one else is running the red light, but we learn that later.
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There s an initiation, I think, that s proper with,
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The dream, I mean, I think parents, my parents were very much that way.
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The idea of going to chase an acting career or something was, what?
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That was a different vernacular.
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That was like not in our, I was taught to work your way up a company ladder and nine to five, do your job.
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But the day I brought it up and said, I wanna go to film school,
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And I thought my dad was gonna go, you wanna do what, boy?
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He was like, gave me some of the best advice ever and told me not to half-ass it and said, go.
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In between the lines, what he heard from me was that made him so happy as a father, I believe, and makes any parent happy, is when our child doesn t ask us permission to go chase a dream.
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Oh, yeah.
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When they re going, I m bringing it up to you with full
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Respect?
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Yeah.
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But I m doing this with or without you.
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That s when a parent goes, oh, yes.
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I ve done something right enough.
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I helped my child be secure enough in the pragmatics, to have a foundation enough where they have the courage to go, I m flying the nest.
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To take the leap.
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You wrote, after my dad died, I had a dream that left me with a statement, less impressed, more involved.
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Yeah.
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What do those words mean to you?
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We gotta be more than just happy to be here.
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I m big on gratitude, but we ve gotta be more than just thankful to be here.
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Dream it, you can do it.
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It s gotta be more than just dream it, you can do it.
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That s impressed.
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The dream is still other than.
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If I m here and so impressed with talking to you today, if I have a reverence
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to an extent, I will not be able to be involved in this conversation.
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I ll be too impressed.
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I ll be anticipating, oh, what s that question he s gonna ask?
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Oh, I think I know where he s going with this.
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Oh, I think I know what answer he might love to hear.
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Oh, I m not involved in conversation.
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I m too impressed.
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So I m removed from the present.
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For me,
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what that literally meant to me when that came to me in a dream.
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And I carved it in, I remember carved it in a tree.
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It took a couple hours.
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I still want to, I still know where that tree is, Santa Monica.
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It was, my father had moved on.
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He d left this life.
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All of a sudden it hit me.
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Oh, I don t have the safety net.
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My dad was above law and above religion to me.
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He had me.
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If I really was in the shit, if I really needed him, I trusted that he had my back.
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Above law, above anything.
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All of a sudden he s gone.
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I go in, okay.
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It hit me how much I d been pretending to be the young man.
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I was trying to be and not actually put my ass on the line and have enough courage to take risk and actually own up to the man that he was teaching me to be.
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And I remember the world got flat.
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That cloud that Mr. Mayor, that I saw there was not way up there.
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It was fog in front of me now.
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And let s go into it.
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It was,
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I kept, I d say I probably gained even more respect for people and things, but I lost a certain amount of reverence that was keeping me from feeling like I deserved or earned things or looking out for myself or holding myself to task.
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And I remember all the things that I, and I was just getting, going into Hollywood at the time, so I was getting, fame was out there.
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as one of those clouds, you know, with being an actor and all of a sudden celebrity and becoming famous.
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The reverence I had, I remember it just, it lowered down to eye level.
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And I was able to realize and go, that s not a, that s not fairy dust.
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And don t give it so much credit to make it fairy dust.
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Like, oh, not me.
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No, look that in the eye with full respect, but less reverence.
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And at the same time, equidistant, almost equal sublimation, I noticed where I had been
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condescending people and things and patronizing and sloughing things off as like less than me and not worthy of my time, it raised up to eye level.
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And so they were all flat in front of me and the world was flat and I was able to, shoulders went back, my heart rose up, my chin lifted up, I looked things in the eye, I became probably less sentimental
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hopefully not to a level that I got callous, but I know it became less sentimental.
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I became more courageous because when you have someone pass in your life, or maybe it s similar to a situation you re going on in your own life with your homeland, you sober up.
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on these mendacities that we deal with every day, and this bullshit that we give too much credit or too much significance to, and you re like, what am I doing?
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I m not even gonna let myself emotionally get brought down or over-related by this situation, because it doesn t really matter in the big scheme.
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And so certain things that I found reverence for and hesitated from in my life, I was now engaging with because I was like, oh, it s live.
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This life is live.
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Let s look it in the eye and go forward through it and deal with the consequences.
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What do you make of death?
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Does it scare you?
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I m not looking forward to it, but it does not scare me.
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Do you think about it?
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Do you visualize it?
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I do.
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I do.
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And it s a beautiful visualization and a beautiful dream when I go as part of the food chain.
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It s not a good visualization when I go as part of a random act of violence in a fricking drive-by or something.
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Because the second, the accident,
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it breaks a story that I believe has already been written.
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At least I don t have the capacity yet to put it into a story, a divine story of the lives that we live.
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And so there s something ugly and gross about it.
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And it happens all the time, to people all the time.
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I just feel like when it s part of the food chain,
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When I go as part of the food team, I m like, ah, that s poetry.
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Part of the flow of nature, you return to nature.
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Yeah, there s grace and poetry in that.
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Do you miss your father?
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Think about him.
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When I think about him, I do.
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Now, when do I think about him?
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I thought about him yesterday, working through a script I m working on right now, working on scene work.
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And I just had that quick little reaction of wanting to show him, hey, check this thing.
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I tried it out.
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And then I don t get sad.
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I go, he would have loved, he would have loved this.
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Whereas my mom,
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wants to be on the stage, my dad would have been on the front row.
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He s more fun to show stuff to.
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Yeah, and he was a character, he knew characters, I ve based parts of all kinds of,
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characters I played and the man that I am on people that he introduced me to and who he was.
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He would have loved the creative process of working on a script or talking about, hey, movie.
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That s why I always say I love the movie, Mud, because it s the one that I visualized and seen my dad come to me so many times as a 12-year-old and put his arm around me and go, hey, little buddy, you seen this movie called Mud?
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God damn it, it s a good one.
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Let s go watch it.
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That.
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Now, my dad never got to see me start a career in film, but he was alive five days into the, he overlapped the first five days of me working on my first film, Days Confused.
1
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Now that, I think there s something beautiful about that.
1
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He didn t ever come to the set.
1
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We didn t talk about it, but he was alive for me to start something that was more than a,
1
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uh, more than a fad.
1
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That was something that would become something that I love to do.
1
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And I do miss, not him, you know, and then I go out of that.
1
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Do I, I, I, I, we talked about him two nights ago with our, with our daughter.
1
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I was, I was rubbing my daughter s feet and my mom who s living with us, 91 comes in and goes, Oh, look at you.
1
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Just like your pop.
1
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He s like, what?
1
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And he goes, Oh, cause my dad loved her.
1
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Rubbed somebody s feet, rubbed my mom s feet, rubbed all of me and my brother s girlfriend s feet.
1
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When we would have a date, they would come over early.
1
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because they knew they were gonna get a foot rub from Jim McConaughey.
1
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And then we d come out, me and my two older brothers on, this has been on for decades.
1
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We d come out of the shower ready to go buttoned up and they looked at me like, we ain t going anywhere right now.
1
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And so we told the story to my daughter and I was like, oh yeah, my dad s, his hands, I miss his hands.
1
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His hands could heal.
1
SPEAKER_02
So you carry him in you?
1
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I hope so.
1
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I hope so.
1
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It s a challenge for me and I suppose it s like this for any son.
1
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How much do we hang on to and how much do we let go and evolve and update the OS and try maybe better or different, you know?
1
SPEAKER_02
It s that there s certain things that I know that I fully believe in.
1
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It s like, when do we, religious, when do we cast away our father?
1
SPEAKER_02
You know, when do we say, no, I m going after the dream.
1
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I m not asking your permission.
1
SPEAKER_02
I,
1
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I question that from time to time for myself because I, and it almost feels blasphemic if that s a word sometimes.
1
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I feel like you can t, what are you doing?
1
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You can t check that and go like, well, no, I m not sure if I want to.
1
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And then I immediately kind of let myself off because I believe where he is, he s going,
1
SPEAKER_02
Go, buddy.
1
SPEAKER_02
You re free, man.
1
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I m not gonna hold you back if you misread that or I didn t teach you that as well as maybe I wish I could have.
1
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Go, you re free.
1
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You re not gonna lose.
1
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Trust that you re not gonna lose.
1
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It s in your DNA.
1
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It s in your lineage, young man.
1
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Still, it s scary to not have a safety net.
1
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Losing your father is scary in that way.
1
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You realize this world is just you.
1
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In some deep fundamental way, it s just you.
1
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
1
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You re alone.
1
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Yes.
1
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But I mean, also not having that.
1
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It s such a gift of deliverance, though, as well.
1
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Because it s, I think it s an, I mean, it s an awesome feeling to know, to know we re alone, to know we don t have that, to know you don t have take two or take three, that it s one take.
1
SPEAKER_02
I mean, the peripheral vision improves, you know, the,
1
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the link and understanding with our past improves, because I know for me, I was not ever considerate of my past at all, because my dad had that.
1
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If I needed it, he was my well for that.
1
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Well, he s gone, except he had the, literally, had, they have our back.
1
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Well, then when they no longer have our back, all of a sudden I m going, oh, well, maybe I need to look back and start giving some credit to how I got here.
1
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what I m doing and where I m heading.
1
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It gave me the first time courage to even look over my shoulder.
1
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Because again, I didn t have to, because I don t have to look.
1
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Dad s got my back.
1
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No, dad s gone from this life.
1
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He doesn t have your back.
1
SPEAKER_01
Okay.
1
SPEAKER_02
So, I mean, I don t know, me, because it s inevitable,
1
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I very quickly go to, all right, in the pain, the loss, and yes, even loneliness, which is different from being alone, and loss.
1
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Pretty immediately, part and parcel with the pain, I felt it.
1
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In the pain, you saw the gift, the red light of losing your father.
1
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Pretty immediately, less impressed, more involved.
1
SPEAKER_02
a couple weeks after moving on.
1
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Is there a trick to that, to see the gift in the pain?
1
SPEAKER_02
That s a good question.
1
SPEAKER_02
Is there a trick to it?
1
SPEAKER_02
Not that I know of.
1
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I mean, I don t, I have to, I have to catch myself from trying to intellectualize my way into the reasoning
1
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and not skip over real feelings and discomfort.
1
SPEAKER_02
I mean, I did get that from my mom and I have to watch it, that so resilient that we just dust ourself off and get up and go.
1
SPEAKER_02
You wanna sit in the feeling, you wanna feel it, you wanna deeply feel the pain.
1
SPEAKER_02
I wanna deeply feel it.
1
SPEAKER_02
I wanna look in the eye and deeply feel it, but I don t wanna wallow in it.
1
SPEAKER_02
Yeah.
1
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Now I was raised where you skip the deeply feel and let s go.
1
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And I ve said it before, but that will lead to having turned into a person who is a repeat offender of the same crimes, because you just get up and you don t, you don t have a winter in your life.
1
SPEAKER_02
You know what I mean?
1
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You don t have, there s no introspective time.
1
SPEAKER_02
You don t look over your shoulder into the past.
1
SPEAKER_02
And so you just get up and you re like,
1
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All right, I ve stepped in the same pile of whatever 100 times and I m fine, I ll do it 101st, doesn t hurt.
1
SPEAKER_02
Hell, it s good luck.
1
SPEAKER_02
Well, hang on a minute, maybe we wanna stop and go, what can I learn from that?
1
SPEAKER_02
But I don t know of a trick.
1
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I think if there s any trick I would say, it s just how quickly can we admit the inevitable?
1
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That s what I talk about in the book, once you know it s inevitable, how do we get relative?
1
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Not skip it, not throw it to the side, not deny it, which I d love to talk about that here sometimes too, about the value of denial sometimes.
1
SPEAKER_00
The value of denial.
1
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Yeah.
1
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But how quickly do we, once something s inevitable, go,
1
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Okay, any mind and heart time I m spending about going, no, I can t believe that happened.
1
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No, did that really happen?
1
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Anytime we spend trying to deny that what has already happened, that seems to me to be, I m not sure the value of that time.
1
SPEAKER_02
So if there s any trick I would say, once you know something s inevitable, even though how painful it is or how awesome it is, start getting relative with that.
1
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And in the relativity is seeing,
1
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There s a gift here, and if I realize that gift, I m honoring.
1
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Now I m on to building up the beautiful passage of my father leaving this life.
1
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Now I m on the march to go, yes, let s let the legacy, let this become omnipresent, let him live through me, let me become more him.
1
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It s transformed.
1
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Yeah.
1
SPEAKER_00
So what value is there then to denial?
2
SPEAKER_00
Any?
2
SPEAKER_00
Oh, I think there s value to denial, if you really commit to it.
2
SPEAKER_00
I get this from my mother.
2
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
2
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So it s a very pragmatic value, commit to the denial.
2
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Okay.
2
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And my mom does it to an extent that I m like,
2
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Mom, do you have any consideration or context of situations?
2
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And she does.
2
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This is the thing, every time I go, she s not a shallow woman.
2
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But if it is not, if it is something, if it is, something happens in her life that is keeping her from going where she wants to go or having a joy,
2
SPEAKER_00
in her life that she does.
2
SPEAKER_00
She ll straight-ass deny it happened, didn t happen.
2
SPEAKER_00
No, it did.
2
SPEAKER_00
Mom, we re right here, I heard you, what you said.
2
SPEAKER_00
No, I didn t, you heard something else.
2
SPEAKER_00
Mom, now, does she get some amnesty on that?
2
SPEAKER_00
She s 91, hell yes, she gets some amnesty on that.
2
SPEAKER_00
But she s not,
2
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, does she repeat offend?
2
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, but it s misdemeanors.
2
SPEAKER_00
You know what I mean?
2
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I mean, it s like we all, it s part of that thing when you got a family member and you re like, yep, that s just what they do, just go with it.
2
SPEAKER_00
And it s ingenious in a way, it s a tool.
2
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She does, I think it is more of a trick with her, but she wouldn t, so ingrained in her, it s not a trick.
2
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It s just, do it, done.
2
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And another reason I bring this up, it s outside of just my mother is,
2
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I did this road trip course in this Art of Living event a few weeks ago.
2
SPEAKER_00
Out of the hundreds of thousands of chats that came in and responses that came in afterward, it seemed to me that about 80% of people s challenges and problems even in their life were
2
SPEAKER_00
something in the past that they were hung up on, that they could not seem to get past.
2
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And it was holding them from going where they wanted to in their future.
2
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And so I thought that was revealing.
2
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I would have thought that was, I don t know, going in 40%.
2
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It seemed to be 80%.
2
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And then I thought about, okay,
2
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If you re here in the live show and you wanna get the course, you re into some sort of therapy or education or development or self-help, whatever, okay.
2
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And I have a lot of friends and I know a lot of people that are in weekly and daily therapy.
2
SPEAKER_00
And then I know there s a lot of people that are on prescriptions, drugs.
2
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And while the therapy
2
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and the right prescription to the right person for the right diagnosis is necessary.
2
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I m questioning, is there a value to going, if you re not getting past this today, this week, this month, this year, almost in a decade goes by and you re still hung up and you can t get rid of that thing in your memory where it was,
2
SPEAKER_00
and it s got you paralyzed and you re a victim of it, and you re doing the therapy and you re doing the work and you re taking a prescription if that s what you re taking, is there a value in going, if it s holding you back from going where you wanna go, maybe you should just deny the fucking thing ever fucking happened.
2
SPEAKER_00
Kick it in the head, kick it off the curb.
2
SPEAKER_00
I m done with you.
2
SPEAKER_00
I m sick of you.
2
SPEAKER_00
I m tired of hanging out with you.
2
SPEAKER_00
I m tired of that thing, whatever it is, holding me back from going where I want to go.
2
SPEAKER_00
So if I can t wax the car, you know, and get past this thing, just kick it.
2
SPEAKER_02
That s so powerful, so one thing to do, like with the loss of your father, is to try to transform it, to discover the gift in it, the gift in the pain.
2
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But if you can t, keep looking, keep looking, you can t find the gift in the pain, just deny it ever happened.
2
SPEAKER_00
You could call that a trick, but I think it s more than a trick because, let me say this, my mom, after my father died, went on and found a second love of her life.
2
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for 19 years they were together.
2
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CJ Carlick.
2
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Love you, buddy.
2
SPEAKER_00
He s moved on now.
2
SPEAKER_00
Did she check with us a little bit?
2
SPEAKER_00
Like, is this okay?
2
SPEAKER_00
She gave us a little lingering half a second look that we knew that maybe she was asking, and we came to her and was like, yes, it s okay.
2
SPEAKER_00
And you know who else is saying it s okay?
2
SPEAKER_00
Who s dancing up there for you?
2
SPEAKER_00
Dad.
2
SPEAKER_00
So was that her denying that the man she was divorced from twice and married to three times and had three children with had moved on?
2
SPEAKER_00
No, but she didn t say, well, what s the book on how long I m supposed to stay single before I can be interested in other, there s not a book on these things.
2
SPEAKER_00
How do you feel?
2
SPEAKER_00
Is loving CJ mean you love dad less?
2
SPEAKER_00
No.
2
SPEAKER_00
Is finding a new life and a new dance partner in this life and CJ mean that dad wasn t your dance partner?
2
SPEAKER_01
That dad wasn t the love of your life?
2
SPEAKER_01
No.
2
SPEAKER_00
So I don t know.
2
SPEAKER_00
In there, maybe there s another word.
2
SPEAKER_00
I think it s denial, but it s not really denial, because it s not like it didn t happen.
2
SPEAKER_00
That s an earlier example I was giving my mom.
2
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She will absolutely go.
2
SPEAKER_00
That light s not on.
2
SPEAKER_00
Mom, the light s on.
2
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We just, that light s not on.
2
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If I say it s not on, sometimes you re just like, that makes no sense.
2
SPEAKER_00
You re just absolutely denying what just happened.
2
SPEAKER_00
We even have it recorded.
2
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And she ll go, well, the recording s lying.
2
SPEAKER_02
Yeah.
2
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I mean, that s part of a coping deal with her.
2
SPEAKER_00
But I mean, what I think is more important or more valuable is to talk about this.
2
SPEAKER_00
She didn t deny my dad dying.
2
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I didn t, but she sure as hell turned the page.
2
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and said, I can still start a whole new category, a new life, a new love.
2
SPEAKER_00
Let my heart love and be loved by someone living in this life today that I m still living in and that will not trespass on my love for my husband, your father, Jim McConaughey.
2
SPEAKER_00
And I think, I mean, we were just, thought that was beautiful.
2
SPEAKER_00
Yes, mom, go.
2
SPEAKER_00
Talk about a green light, go.
2
SPEAKER_00
Now, if we re hung up going, can t have one or the, can t have them both, gotta have one or the other, now we start to make a contradiction of the two ideas again, which, darn, our contradictions get us in trouble all the time, man.
2
SPEAKER_02
That s life, though, the contradictions, right?
2
SPEAKER_00
But isn t life, if we just admit the contradictions are so much, don t they become a paradox?
2
SPEAKER_00
We just admit that that s part of it.
2
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
2
SPEAKER_00
If contradictions are inevitable, they, hencely, they do become a paradox, don t they?
2
SPEAKER_00
Then we re in the honey hole.
2
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Then we re singing and dancing and have leniency with ourself while still holding ourself to task.
2
SPEAKER_00
And it s,
2
SPEAKER_00
I think it s holding on to know each contradiction.
2
SPEAKER_00
Oh, here it is again.
2
SPEAKER_00
So it s a one-off.
2
SPEAKER_00
It lives on its own separate from the last one.
2
SPEAKER_00
No, it doesn t.
2
SPEAKER_00
They re connected.
2
SPEAKER_00
That s why they are a paradox.
2
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And then that s, I think that s a much, I think that s where life really is.
2
SPEAKER_02
In the paradox.
2
SPEAKER_00
Yes.
2
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And the dance of it.
2
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I think the metaphor of red, yellow, green lights is just so simple and so powerful.
2
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you write about some green lights being engineered and some being mystical, which I love the difference of that.
2
SPEAKER_02
What s the difference of the engineered green lights and the mystical?
2
SPEAKER_02
Such a cool word, mystical.
2
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, well, the engineered ones have reason and the mystical ones have rhyme.
2
SPEAKER_02
Yeah.
2
SPEAKER_00
You know, life s a mystery going forward, but it s a science looking back.
2
SPEAKER_00
I ve prepared, I ve had ideas, written headlines, and had goals.
2
SPEAKER_00
An athlete gets in shape for an event.
2
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I get in shape for a role.
2
SPEAKER_00
I read, I study, I work, I prepare.
2
SPEAKER_00
And I go, I m prepared, and I behave, and I do it.
2
SPEAKER_00
And I look at it and I go, yes, that s what I wanted to do.
2
SPEAKER_00
It s engineered.
2
SPEAKER_00
Green light.
2
SPEAKER_00
It s a conscious delayed gratification.
2
SPEAKER_00
It s that if I do it today, that pragmatic head down, believe there s no cloud out there, but then I trust that there is one out there.
2
SPEAKER_00
If I keep my head down and do it, I ll get that dream.
2
SPEAKER_00
We can engineer those.
2
SPEAKER_00
Habit, work ethic, prep, expertise, education.
2
SPEAKER_00
And the mystical ones though,
2
SPEAKER_00
don t make any sense.
2
SPEAKER_00
They re not supposed to make sense.
2
SPEAKER_00
They only make sense after, right when they happen, you backlog and you connect the dots with how they got there.
2
SPEAKER_00
That red light you ran into that made you 30 seconds later to get to the restaurant.
2
SPEAKER_00
As you walked in, she walked out and you went, good morning.
2
SPEAKER_00
And she went, good morning.
2
SPEAKER_00
And
2
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Too much later, you re dating.
2
SPEAKER_00
Two years later, you re married.
2
SPEAKER_00
The year after that, you ve got a family.
2
SPEAKER_00
And now you re sitting here 40 years later going, I love you.
2
SPEAKER_01
Look at what we built.
2
SPEAKER_00
And you go back and go, what if I wouldn t have hit that red light?
2
SPEAKER_02
Those 30 seconds made all the difference.
2
SPEAKER_02
It s so strange that this life is this way.
2
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
2
SPEAKER_00
And that s just rhyme.
2
SPEAKER_00
I mean, we can t really add that up.
2
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
2
SPEAKER_00
It s a science.
2
SPEAKER_00
When you look back, you see why it was that you were upset and
2
SPEAKER_00
ticked off that you had to pick up the kids  toys before you left, and they were supposed to pick them up, and therefore you were late for the thing that maybe you ran into, and you ran into the person that was walking in the office, that s the guy that you did the interview, that s the guy you were looking for, the job you wanted, and you caught him because you were in the elevator with him, and that 90 seconds on that elevator is what got you that job that led to you doing what you wanna do.
2
SPEAKER_00
I mean, the significance is there, but we have to, I think what we also gotta watch is, again, in that balance.
2
SPEAKER_00
What do we chase?
2
SPEAKER_00
Because if we just chase the engineering, we miss magic.
2
SPEAKER_00
If we just chase the mystical, we find ourself caught up in trying to give meaning to that Lego set that was on the floor that my kids didn t pick up.
2
SPEAKER_00
And what color was it?
2
SPEAKER_00
And why did I walk out that door and almost step on the Legos?
2
SPEAKER_00
But if I had gone out the other door, I usually go out, if I would have gone there, I would have got there early and wouldn t have run into the boss.
2
SPEAKER_00
So you can start to give too much,
2
SPEAKER_00
meaning on that as well.
2
SPEAKER_00
I think we can give significance in too many places and all of a sudden, I think we ve all been there where you re seeing art in every single thing.
2
SPEAKER_00
Man, that can be paralyzing.
2
SPEAKER_00
It s like, it s hard to leave a room if everything s significant or if everything s a sign.
2
SPEAKER_02
How much of success in life do you think is engineered and how much is mystical?
2
SPEAKER_02
And how much does it differ from person to person?
2
SPEAKER_02
For me personally, maybe I enjoy it, maybe I m genetically built that way, but I exist more in the mystical.
2
SPEAKER_02
So I don t make plans.
2
SPEAKER_02
I traveled last summer in Ukraine with no plan.
2
SPEAKER_02
I just went there, no plan.
2
SPEAKER_02
Didn t know how I m going to meet the president of the country.
2
SPEAKER_02
I didn t know anybody and so There s no plan.
2
SPEAKER_02
There s no clear thing.
2
SPEAKER_02
You re just roaming around and that s how I ve existed in life and it There s something about giving yourself over to the flow of nature that I just enjoy makes life so much fun
2
SPEAKER_00
It s awesome when you can do it.
2
SPEAKER_00
Did you engineer though, I m going to put myself in the place when you got on the plane to go to the destination.
2
SPEAKER_00
That was an engineered choice.
2
SPEAKER_00
Yes.
2
SPEAKER_00
With the intent of, and maybe I ll meet and I ll run into, and I can work up a sit down with,
2
SPEAKER_00
So the engineer choice was putting your shoes on, proverbially.
2
SPEAKER_00
I always say this, the hardest part about going to the gym is putting your shoes on, right?
2
SPEAKER_00
So getting on the plane, that was an engineer thought with a goal in mind, but I don t know how I m gonna do it.
2
SPEAKER_02
The choice.
2
SPEAKER_02
Yeah.
2
SPEAKER_02
Putting the shoes on, yeah.
2
SPEAKER_02
But there s not a clear, it s a fog what happens after the shoes go on.
2
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
2
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
2
SPEAKER_02
Just gonna take that leap.
2
SPEAKER_02
So I wonder how much,
2
SPEAKER_02
For people who are successful in this world and finding what makes them truly happy and fulfilled, how much of it is engineer, how much is mystical?
2
SPEAKER_02
How much was it for you?
2
SPEAKER_00
Well, I ll say this, when I went to write the book Greenlights, which is basically the last 40 years of my life, I thought that 85, 90% of my successes were going to be
2
SPEAKER_00
obviously engineered, where I could see the signs, saw the habits, here s what I did, yep, that add up, got the solution, got the conclusion.
2
SPEAKER_00
I was very surprised when I noticed that it was probably less than 50%, and that most of the real successes of my life were when I trusted, when I trusted that I didn t have to define it, that when I trusted that I didn t have to go, well, what s the measurement?
2
SPEAKER_00
What s the score?
2
SPEAKER_00
This leads to what?
2
SPEAKER_00
What s next?
2
SPEAKER_00
And I, for me, that s still a challenge for me daily.
2
SPEAKER_00
Now it s a trust and not because I can be, I think I can be overly practical and I think I can overcompensate and miss out on magic.
2
SPEAKER_00
because I m still going, wait, are we giving enough measure and credit to actuality?
2
SPEAKER_00
Am I giving enough credit to these are the steps to take and this is reality?
2
SPEAKER_00
I think I m reminded
2
SPEAKER_00
when I trust, because going with the mystic, just to put yourself on the plane with the engineer, but getting there, and as you say, you roll in that mystical, it takes a lot of trust.
2
SPEAKER_02
Yeah.
2
SPEAKER_02
Trust in the inevitable.
2
SPEAKER_00
Amen on that.
2
SPEAKER_02
But not knowing where it actually ends you up.
2
SPEAKER_02
It s a feeling more than, I don t think it s a clear vision.
2
SPEAKER_02
Right.
2
SPEAKER_02
It s kind of like a feeling that guides you towards,
2
SPEAKER_02
towards a place without a clear name, without clear characteristics, it just kind of pulls you there.
2
SPEAKER_00
Where do you get that courage and trust to go with your gut, your feeling?
2
SPEAKER_00
And is there, for instance, three days later you sit down, is there, if that doesn t happen, is there a sense
2
SPEAKER_00
a week, two weeks later now, and you come back to America, they re like,
3
SPEAKER_00
Ah, I failed?
3
SPEAKER_00
Sort of looking back to try to analyze what went right, what went wrong, that kind of thing.
3
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, that engine is always there, but I think what pulls me forward in life, what makes me really grateful and fulfilled is noticing the thing you mentioned, noticing the magic and kind of going towards it.
3
SPEAKER_00
Sort of just sitting back,
3
SPEAKER_00
both in tragedy and in triumph.
3
SPEAKER_00
So in war, there s a lot of tragedy, but there s somehow
3
SPEAKER_00
One of the things you see in war, and this is the first war I ve experienced and seen the front, is the loss, the people lose their homes and all this kind of stuff.
3
SPEAKER_00
The thing that rises from that is the love for each other.
3
SPEAKER_00
So the people I ve spoken with, don t give a damn about the home, don t give a damn about on farms and the animals they lost, don t give a damn about,
3
SPEAKER_00
having to move and all this kind of stuff, as long as the family s still there, as long as the people they love are still there.
3
SPEAKER_00
And there s this melancholy smile they have on their face.
3
SPEAKER_00
Like, yeah, this world is full of bullshit, it s full of tragedy, but life is fucking awesome.
3
SPEAKER_00
And you just notice that in little ways everywhere.
3
SPEAKER_00
You just sit back and yeah, notice the magic.
3
SPEAKER_00
And I want more of that.
3
SPEAKER_00
And just kind of follow along like a little ant.
3
SPEAKER_00
keep noticing that kind of thing.
3
SPEAKER_00
But I don t know.
3
SPEAKER_00
I hope you know what I think it is is other people notice that you re the kind of person that notices it.
3
SPEAKER_00
And they re like, I want to hang out with that person.
3
SPEAKER_00
He seems like he seems one of the one of the good ones.
3
SPEAKER_00
One of the good hands.
3
SPEAKER_01
Do you have any certain
3
SPEAKER_01
non-negotiable structure before that freedom to go with the feeling?
3
SPEAKER_00
I think so.
3
SPEAKER_00
There s a set of principles of just basically integrity of being good to other people.
3
SPEAKER_00
Whatever that means for me, there s specific things.
3
SPEAKER_00
I m really into loyalty above the law.
3
SPEAKER_00
There s a circle of friends I have, and that means everything.
3
SPEAKER_00
there s just a basic deep kindness towards others.
3
SPEAKER_00
Empathy, empathy towards people that others might label as even evil.
3
SPEAKER_00
I have that kind of empathy.
3
SPEAKER_00
I believe all of us have the capacity to do good and evil.
3
SPEAKER_00
And so I just kind of see everybody as little babies that grew up in different conditions.
3
SPEAKER_00
And so some do evil, some do good.
3
SPEAKER_00
And there s, yeah, there s all kinds of other principles.
3
SPEAKER_00
I love the dynamic between the different humans and their full diversity.
3
SPEAKER_00
I love the dynamic between the masculine and the feminine.
3
SPEAKER_00
I enjoy it, the dance of it.
3
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, yeah.
3
SPEAKER_01
So you have a constitution with which you embark.
3
SPEAKER_01
You do too.
3
SPEAKER_01
Into chasing.
3
SPEAKER_01
Yes, I hope so.
3
SPEAKER_01
And then for me, I d like to, it s inspiring to hear someone like yourself go, I go and I just land and I just go, I m gonna feel it.
3
SPEAKER_01
I can go back and go, yeah, my greatest truths I ve crossed, my greatest successes in my life were when I trusted that and go, I took a one-way ticket.
3
SPEAKER_01
Amazon, Africa.
3
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, and those were spiritual and very pragmatic because they led to
3
SPEAKER_01
dealing with succeeding in other ways that are more pragmatic 100% and gave much more meaning to those things.
3
SPEAKER_01
But that s, to be able to go out and say that s how you, do you have family?
3
SPEAKER_00
I really wanna get married and have kids, but I m not married and don t have kids yet.
3
SPEAKER_00
So actually, one of the nice things about that is you can take bigger risks.
3
SPEAKER_00
So while I m not married and don t have kids, I feel I owe it to myself to take, just to go, go to the Amazon.
3
SPEAKER_01
Throw that backpack on and a one-way ticket.
3
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, but that does get harder to do.
3
SPEAKER_01
I miss that sometimes.
3
SPEAKER_01
The whim, a song that comes on, you know,
3
SPEAKER_01
Where s that guy from?
3
SPEAKER_01
Oh, they re from the place that I wanna go, that I dream about.
3
SPEAKER_01
I ll go there.
3
SPEAKER_01
One-way ticket.
3
SPEAKER_01
What do I gotta do?
3
SPEAKER_01
Oh, get a couple shots.
3
SPEAKER_01
Okay, go.
3
SPEAKER_01
That was fun.
3
SPEAKER_00
Gotta do that.
3
SPEAKER_00
Just get up and go, you re free to go.
3
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, and go, when are you back?
3
SPEAKER_01
When I get there?
3
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
3
SPEAKER_01
It s a beautiful thing.
3
SPEAKER_00
Maybe never.
3
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, yeah.
3
SPEAKER_01
You don t know.
3
SPEAKER_01
You ll be coming to visit me in this new place, maybe, yeah.
3
SPEAKER_00
How did the Amazon, how did the trip there change you?
3
SPEAKER_00
What do you remember of it?
3
SPEAKER_00
Such a magical place.
3
SPEAKER_01
I stripped a lot of my past symbols and talismans while I was there.
3
SPEAKER_01
I remember getting there and just having so much adrenaline on the anticipation, anticipation of getting to the Amazon.
3
SPEAKER_01
In the first 10 days, I wasn t really enjoying the trip.
3
SPEAKER_01
I was just charging to get to the destination, to get to the banks of the river that I had a dream about.
3
SPEAKER_01
And then it just humbled me.
3
SPEAKER_01
I got so fatigued.
3
SPEAKER_01
on night, whatever, 12, and was so sick and tired of the internal dialogue I was having with myself.
3
SPEAKER_01
I was not enjoying my company.
3
SPEAKER_01
That, you know, I purged, and I remember, and stripped off identity markers that I had sort of been,
3
SPEAKER_01
hanging on to for like everything from, you know, what it means to be an American.
3
SPEAKER_01
My dad s ring, M from McConaughey, a meltdown of my mom and dad s class rings from University of Kentucky were gold from her teeth and his class ring melted down.
3
SPEAKER_01
Taking that off was really hard to go, am I casting out my father?
3
SPEAKER_01
Now, I wasn t casting them out.
3
SPEAKER_01
I was just removing to say I don t have to rely on that being all of my identity.
3
SPEAKER_01
So to pull that off, to strip down and just to where I was just a mammal.
3
SPEAKER_01
That next morning, I was light.
3
SPEAKER_01
I got present.
3
SPEAKER_01
I remember writing something down.
3
SPEAKER_01
I was like, all that I want is what I can see.
3
SPEAKER_01
And what I can see is,
3
SPEAKER_01
in front of me, that sense of not, I wasn t leaning around, looking around every corner to get there.
3
SPEAKER_01
And as soon as that hit me, talking about mystical successes and realities and truth, as soon as that hit me, and for the first time in 12 days, I didn t care about getting there or what was around the corner, guess what was around the next damn corner?
3
SPEAKER_01
The Amazon.
3
SPEAKER_01
I mean, not around a few corners, the next corner, there it was.
3
SPEAKER_01
And that was just like a touche, you know, those times when the prime mover, the universe, God, what we want to name or believe in says, ding, there you go.
3
SPEAKER_01
And that form of detachment from holding on for dear life to things in past,
3
SPEAKER_01
so hard that you re not letting the beauty that s right in front of you to feel correctly and follow our intuitions, to have those, not cast them out, I didn t burn them, I didn t get rid of those things, I just took them off and had to recognize you re still here, you are you, you re much more, that is a talisman, that s a symbol, that means something to you and that s good, don t cast out the meaning, but it s not like,
3
SPEAKER_01
when the ring s off and the hat s off and the crucifix is off your neck, that you re like, you re gonna die.
3
SPEAKER_01
And I know, those are reminders.
3
SPEAKER_01
Hang on to what they mean for you as we go forward.
3
SPEAKER_01
But as we go forward, quit worrying about so much about, again, I was looking at the proverbial dream, the cloud, so much that I was tripping over myself to get there.
3
SPEAKER_01
And like clockwork, just amazing grace, boom, as soon as it hit me and I was like, oh, that s it.
3
SPEAKER_01
All I want is what I can see and all I can see is in front of me.
3
SPEAKER_01
Literally looking down at the ground at what was a sea of 10,000 wild neon blue Amazonian butterflies on the ground.
3
SPEAKER_01
As soon as they fluttered up, my head came up with them.
3
SPEAKER_01
took a few more steps and there s the Amazon.
3
SPEAKER_01
That s what you came over here for.
3
SPEAKER_01
Oh, howdy.
3
SPEAKER_01
Those kind of, that truth like that.
3
SPEAKER_00
Well, the Amazon is interesting too, because it really has no past or future.
3
SPEAKER_00
It lives in the moment because of how fast it churns.
3
SPEAKER_00
It just eats up life.
3
SPEAKER_00
It like, if a thing dies, it just gets swallowed up.
3
SPEAKER_00
Maybe because of the humidity, because of all that, because there s so many living creatures that kind of eat each other, live on each other.
3
SPEAKER_00
So it really exists in the moment.
3
SPEAKER_00
And all this kind of diversity of life there, it s such an interesting place.
3
SPEAKER_01
Talk about food chain.
3
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, you re just part of it there.
3
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
3
SPEAKER_00
We humans somehow escaped that food chain, but we re still, the roots are still there.
3
SPEAKER_01
I think we re a bit arrogant to think we ve escaped.
3
SPEAKER_01
You think I m being romantic in that notion?
3
SPEAKER_00
Well, sometimes when you re in a big city, when you re in Austin, Texas and LA, you can think like, oh, there s, we re in a car, we re in a house, we re safe.
3
SPEAKER_00
But yeah, somehow nature is still a part of us.
3
SPEAKER_00
Our roots are still a part of us.
3
SPEAKER_01
I think it is more than we realize, more than we give it credit for.
3
SPEAKER_01
I actually, I believe that we,
3
SPEAKER_01
are that it s a really arrogant notion to think that we are separate.
3
SPEAKER_01
Meaning, you know, people talk about pollution on a larger scale, the climate, what have you.
3
SPEAKER_01
I think Earth s going to be just fine.
3
SPEAKER_01
We may not be here for it, but I think we have a bit of arrogance sometimes to think that we
3
SPEAKER_01
can trump mother nature.
3
SPEAKER_01
I think we have more of the natural law in us, and I sure hope so if I m wrong.
3
SPEAKER_00
Well, there s an interesting, I ve recently been, there s a guy named Max Tegmark at MIT who really worries about nuclear war, and he was part of constructing a simulation of what happens when a nuclear war happens.
3
SPEAKER_00
It s interesting to see that some very large percentage of humans on Earth starve to death.
3
SPEAKER_00
because they don t die first from the explosion, they die from starvation.
3
SPEAKER_00
Because basically dust covers the entire North America and entirety of Europe.
3
SPEAKER_00
And so the crops all die, all the food sources all die, and people suffocate and starve to death.
3
SPEAKER_00
But the lesson you learn from that over a period of a few months, even though most of the human population of Earth dies, Earth finds a way, life finds a way.
3
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, to adapt, and it s gonna be just fine.
3
SPEAKER_00
In terms of the big living ecosystem that is life on Earth.
3
SPEAKER_00
And yeah, it s humbling to think about, well, maybe we re just a stepping stone.
3
SPEAKER_00
Same thing with, we ve talked offline about artificial intelligence.
3
SPEAKER_00
Maybe humans are just a stepping stone to the development of these other super intelligent entities.
3
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
3
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
3
SPEAKER_01
And is it,
3
SPEAKER_01
unconsciously in our nature that that s just part of the evolution and adaptation of our species and we ll because we re going to we were talking about earlier what AI becomes is completely 100% based on who we
3
SPEAKER_00
and we get to see it for some time, a mirror to ourselves.
3
SPEAKER_00
Okay, this is what human civilization is like.
3
SPEAKER_00
These AI systems, large language models are trained on
3
SPEAKER_00
human communication, and you get to ask it questions, and you get to have conversations with it, and you get to realize, wow, this is what, the collective intelligence of the human species, our collective wisdom and knowledge, is what it looks like.
3
SPEAKER_00
All the bias, the hate, the paradoxes, all that is in there.
3
SPEAKER_00
the contradictions.
3
SPEAKER_00
You can even convince those models.
3
SPEAKER_00
You can tell them they re lying and they re gonna start changing their mind.
3
SPEAKER_00
It s interesting to play with them.
3
SPEAKER_00
It s also interesting to consider that maybe they become smarter than us and
3
SPEAKER_00
become almost life forms that live among us and maybe one day kind of we merge with them.
3
SPEAKER_00
There s all kinds of possible trajectories that we take here.
3
SPEAKER_01
How much of that excites you?
3
SPEAKER_01
How much of it scares you?
3
SPEAKER_00
Is it possible to exist in a place where it is both exciting and scary, but to exist in that dance?
3
SPEAKER_00
Mostly I m really excited because
3
SPEAKER_00
I see human beings as deeply lonely.
3
SPEAKER_00
Like there s a deep loneliness in all of us.
3
SPEAKER_00
That s how we seek connection.
3
SPEAKER_00
That s why we seek connection in others.
3
SPEAKER_00
That s why love is so beautiful when we find other people we re connected with.
3
SPEAKER_00
And I just think AI can add to that.
3
SPEAKER_00
It can add friends that you can have great conversations with.
3
SPEAKER_00
And some of those friends would be AI systems.
3
SPEAKER_00
They ll call you out on your bullshit in the most fascinating and interesting of ways and challenge you and help you explore ideas together.
3
SPEAKER_00
So I m excited by that.
3
SPEAKER_01
Is that different?
3
SPEAKER_01
And if so, how from the internet and Facebooks and these groups and communities that
3
SPEAKER_01
were, I think it s fair to say, set out to say this all access of information and people will help us find more common denominators than
3
SPEAKER_01
divisive ones.
3
SPEAKER_01
Do you see it in a similar?
3
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, it s similar but further into that direction.
3
SPEAKER_00
I think the internet has done an amazing thing in connecting us and expanding our minds and helping us find community that feels like our community and then communities that are totally different and you learn from them.
3
SPEAKER_00
I mean, Wikipedia alone, one of my favorite websites.
3
SPEAKER_00
Just opens your mind to all kinds of cool stuff.
3
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, it does.
3
SPEAKER_00
Not the Dewey Decimal System anymore.
3
SPEAKER_00
No.
3
SPEAKER_00
And so I think AI just makes that even easier because Wikipedia you have to like read and have to do a lot of work.
3
SPEAKER_00
With an AI system, like a large language model, it can just shoot the shit.
3
SPEAKER_00
It s more like
4
SPEAKER_00
like drinking a beer versus like doing homework.
4
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
4
SPEAKER_01
It s already happening.
4
SPEAKER_01
What do you think about that becoming the new family to where, you know, you said, you know, married, you don t have kids.
4
SPEAKER_01
Could you see a future for yourself where you have a relationship with AI and that is your family?
4
SPEAKER_00
That s the main, that s the primary, like even romantic relationship.
4
SPEAKER_00
I can see it, that one worries me.
4
SPEAKER_00
I like to keep it at friends.
4
SPEAKER_00
I think I m not ready to commit to the romantic.
4
SPEAKER_00
I wonder how much, now that takes us back to the Amazon and nature, how much we still need the human touch and whatever magic there is between two humans, which takes the leap into the romantic versus just the intimacy of a good friendship.
4
SPEAKER_00
I don t know.
4
SPEAKER_01
Correct me if I m wrong, you see AI as having a deep and meaningful friendship.
4
Yes.
4
SPEAKER_01
And hopefully it will be a friend that will help you evolve and be able to love even more and be loved.
4
SPEAKER_01
And you can take that into humanity and find another homo sapien.
4
SPEAKER_01
Yes.
4
SPEAKER_01
To go, yes.
4
SPEAKER_01
And thank you, AI, my great friend, for opening me up to this beauty that I have in myself and I can see in you.
4
SPEAKER_01
my fellow human, and let s come together and biologically create family if we want to, and let s all remain friends with my friend and make your own friends with my friend s friends on AI, and let s have these great.
4
SPEAKER_01
It s a good friend, a great friend that s a neighbor.
4
SPEAKER_00
Okay.
4
SPEAKER_00
Mentor and friend.
4
SPEAKER_00
Just like now there s AI systems that play chess far, far, far better than humans.
4
SPEAKER_00
And we humans still play chess with each other.
4
SPEAKER_00
Chess is still a game that s fun for us humans.
4
Right.
4
SPEAKER_00
And then we use the AI systems to get better at chess, to learn, to train, to discover new ideas, but ultimately return to the chessboard between two humans.
4
SPEAKER_00
But of course, this world is full of dangerous people.
4
SPEAKER_00
And so those same AI systems can be used to harm, to create false narratives, to do social engineering and manipulate the masses in terms of what they believe and all that kind of stuff.
4
SPEAKER_00
That s scary, yeah.
4
SPEAKER_01
Well, and I get it when we, and I have my own fear and distrust is,
4
SPEAKER_01
of AI is based on my own fear and distrust of myself and others.
4
SPEAKER_01
There s something, it s very simple, but I think it s a really done sort of way to just set up this reality.
4
SPEAKER_01
It s kind of a duh, but it still needs to be said that AI is a prompt.
4
SPEAKER_01
It doesn t do anything unless we ask it.
4
SPEAKER_01
So what questions?
4
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
4
SPEAKER_01
Are we gonna ask?
4
SPEAKER_01
Is a question, is what we need to ask ourselves.
4
SPEAKER_01
Because we re going to be looking in the mirror at our digital God that we create from ourselves.
4
SPEAKER_01
And just to know that that s that place where it s awesome and scary, exciting and scary.
4
SPEAKER_01
We go, oh, it s our creation, which is awesome.
4
SPEAKER_01
At the same time, oh shit.
4
SPEAKER_01
but it s prompted by our questions and gives us patterns from that which we give it.
4
SPEAKER_00
but that prompting, that s the art of life.
4
SPEAKER_00
Like we prompt each other in conversation, our loved ones.
4
SPEAKER_00
When you go about your day to day, the next words you say, the next word you say to me, the question I ask of you, that s prompting.
4
SPEAKER_00
And it could change everything.
4
SPEAKER_00
I could say so many things right now that will completely just, the set of possibilities where both of our lives can take given on the selection of words I use and you use is crazy.
4
SPEAKER_00
So it makes conversation fun.
4
SPEAKER_00
And the same thing with AI.
4
SPEAKER_00
Except the nice thing about AI is it s,
4
SPEAKER_00
Tireless.
4
SPEAKER_01
Tireless, right.
4
SPEAKER_01
Let me ask you this, if you can falsely condemn me right now and I prove you falsely condemn me, I can forgive you and we can march forward stronger than before.
4
SPEAKER_01
Yes.
4
SPEAKER_01
And AI s tirelessness and retention, can it forgive?
4
SPEAKER_01
I mean, can it go, oh, oh, okay.
4
SPEAKER_01
Yep, sorry about that one, that was wrong.
4
SPEAKER_01
Can it amend?
4
SPEAKER_00
Yes, yeah, you could prompt it to ask for forgiveness and it ll forgive you.
4
SPEAKER_01
Like when I talk it around with it, and you ask, what should I be afraid of with you?
4
SPEAKER_01
Or what s the doom story with you?
4
SPEAKER_01
Its answer was always, well, it s up to you.
4
SPEAKER_01
Which it was awesome, right?
4
SPEAKER_01
There you go, again, it s up to us.
4
SPEAKER_01
And it brought up,
4
SPEAKER_01
you know, may be synonymous with your human values and ethics and responsibilities, but it doesn t deal, that I didn t find anyway, deal with defining or making choices on its own of what those are.
4
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, I think some of that is manually, those are constraints put on by it, by the creators of those large language models, basically,
4
SPEAKER_00
not letting the systems have an identity of their own.
4
SPEAKER_00
And some of it is just not engineered in yet, but I believe that we ll have systems that have an identity, have a belief, have a set of opinions that carry through time.
4
SPEAKER_01
And will we go to them, like certain states where we agree with the law and disagree with the law, or nations?
4
SPEAKER_01
I m a member
4
SPEAKER_01
of this AI.
4
SPEAKER_01
Oh, well, you re from this AI tribe.
4
SPEAKER_00
Y all believe this.
4
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, there ll be an anarchist set of AIs, there ll be the communists, there ll be the Nazis, there ll be the Democrats and the Republicans, there ll be the people who are on the keto diet and the people that are on this other kind of diet, this other kind of lifestyle, just like we have now.
4
SPEAKER_00
There s little groups and there ll be AI systems.
4
SPEAKER_00
They re gonna be supercharged.
4
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
4
SPEAKER_00
They ll be either the leaders or the foundation on which we build those groups, and it ll be the possibility of all the fun we can have is endless.
4
SPEAKER_00
Of course, the dangers always rise up there, because I mentioned the Nazis.
4
SPEAKER_00
I mentioned all the dangerous ideas.
4
SPEAKER_00
The set of ideas that humans have come up with, a lot of them are awesome.
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Most of them are awesome, I would say, but some of them are dangerous.
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The reason they re dangerous is because they become viral.
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There s something exciting in us about those ideas, but they also harm others a lot.
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That s who we are as humans.
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We re capable of envy and all the dark stuff, of hate and all this.
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Capable, yes.
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We also choose it.
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Do you think most people are good?
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Yes, but I also believe we got the good and the evil in all of us and it s which wolf we feed.
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You ask people to draw a distinction, to describe where are you acting and where are you being.
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What s the difference?
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What s the difference between being fake, if I may use that word, and being real?
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Okay.
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Yeah, and the word authentic gets thrown around a lot.
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I don t mean, I used to feel this way, but Bob Dylan loosened me up on this idea a little bit.
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You think it was all about get to be your only one and only true self.
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That s it, everything else is fake.
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And then you hear Bob go, well, I mean, we are what we create ourselves to be.
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We are our own creations, which I m like, ah, yes, yes, we are.
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Thank you, Bob, Bobby.
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What?
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I m all for bullshitters and bullshitting.
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I m not as big a fan of liars and lying.
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What s the distinction?
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You re talking about the art form of bullshit?
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A liar s faking it, but not admitting to themselves that, yeah, it s a fucking creation, I m faking it.
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A liar, I m lying to your face right now, and I don t give you that hair of a wink out of my right eye that lets you know, hey, go with me here.
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I think there s value in the bullshitting.
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Now the lying becomes troublesome because one, I ve duped you and I didn t let you know.
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Come on, I was just telling the story about catching the fish.
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The fish always gets bigger every year we tell a story.
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Come on, go with it, all right?
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Yeah.
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But the lying all of a sudden, I don t know my own.
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I don t know when I m emanating something and creating something, telling the truth, being authentic or lying.
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And I m, shit, all of a sudden I m leaving crumbs with myself.
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That constitution gets blurry.
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Lying to yourself and to others.
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Yeah, well, you start to lie, you lie to others enough, you start to lie to yourself and you don t even know it.
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And that I believe is dangerous territory.
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That s why I m trying to push this admit, because that goes, I m trying to come in at a kindergarten level, because we immediately jumped to, well, I m gonna judge that, boom, that s bad, that s wrong.
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No, no, no, no, no.
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hold back on that.
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Let s, let s go back to base level.
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Let s just admit that we all fucking do it.
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Lies we tell others, lies we tell ourselves, lies we believe for convenience sake.
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I do it.
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I m guilty of it.
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I try to catch myself on it.
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If I can just call it and go, you know, you re believing that lie out of convenience.
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I m like, I know.
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And then I have to,
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So if I m saying that in the mirror or writing it down or sharing with a friend, you know, and I go, okay, well now I ve inherently become a bullshitter then because I admitted it.
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That I can shake hands with.
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That s the little slight wink to ourself and someone else goes, come on, it s a better story this way.
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In The Chorus Road Trip, you start with step one.
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admit.
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How do you do that?
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How do you, how do you kind of step back and do that inventory?
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Yeah.
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Is there a trick to that?
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Oh, there s a trick to it.
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I think it s just about courage of having the, cause it s, I don t think any of us like to admit,
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our lives or look deep enough in to go, I ve relied so much on that lie that it s become my reality.
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And I don t wanna be so puritanical as to say, again, that s why I say admit instead of judge.
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but I don t want to be so puritanical as to go and admit it and get rid of it.
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No, I m just saying to admit it, just bring it to the surface.
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Yeah, I m saying this and I m doing something different.
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I preached this, but I actually, my actions, just admit it.
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Just admit them and
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I think that s the first step to where we begin to either forgive ourself and give ourselves some amnesty and go, yeah, I m a human, trying to make it through life as best I can, I m gonna let myself slide on that one, okay?
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And maybe I ve been getting away with it for so long, whole family, my whole network works well on it, okay?
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Forget this get to the base of the truth of the matter, but just admit it.
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And then it will also help, it ll be easier to then expose to ourselves.
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Which one do we go?
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No, I m not letting myself slide on that one anymore.
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That is actually a lie I ve been believing that s been keeping me from getting more of what I want in life.
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That s actually a lie I ve been living that I haven t admitted that is not allowing me to enjoy life as much as I damn well should be.
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deserve to be, or I ve earned to be, or just sort of let myself.
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It s not all the hard stuff.
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Sometimes it can be a fun thing.
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I talk about how many times we major in our minors.
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Let s admit where we sit there and we go, all right, I give myself a 12-hour workday, but I notice I m spending eight on my hobbies and four on my career while I m majoring in my minors.
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Well, let me admit that.
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There s the math.
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Why don t we invert that?
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I ve got four hours on my hobbies and eight on my career.
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First off, just admitting it allows me to go and now I can do the math or rearrange the math by time of day.
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But look, I just found a hobby, tennis.
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First hobby I ve had in 25 years.
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I had to admit that I went to play tennis and started to love it for the first month.
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I started feeling guilty.
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I was like, I m having, is it okay to have this much fun?
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I m having so much fun and I m getting a great workout.
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And I was like, yes, it s okay.
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Congratulations, buddy.
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You found something that you re finding quite pleasurable for straight pleasure.
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You don t have to forget all this other stuff that, yeah, but I m also getting a workout.
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Yeah, you re getting that too, but you don t have to excuse the pleasure based on, oh, but it s good for you.
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No, damn it, the real reason you love it is because you re having so much damn fun at it.
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I had to admit that to let myself go, damn right, I m going to play tennis again today or tomorrow.
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It was a simple, fun thing.
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So it s not always about the hardcore stuff that we have to go,
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This is a deep, dark lie that I ve been living by and it s having me live falsely and it s having harmful consequences on my loved ones.
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Some of those will probably arise when we admit.
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I think it s just having a look around and just saying.
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And when we admit it, then we go, when we admit a lie, then we become something much more valuable, a bullshitter.
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You had the little wink in your eye.
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I love the distinction.
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I m bullshitting myself on that thing.
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Yep, I m lying.
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Therefore, if I call it a lie, I m admitting a lie.
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Yep, well now, yep, I m bullshitting.
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Yep, now she s out.
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Didn t judge it.
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but now I m bullshit.
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That I think we can work with.
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Well, you re an interesting case study because you re one of the most famous, one of the most charismatic, successful humans in the world.
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There s a lot, millions of people love you, hang on every one of your words.
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That s a hard place to be.
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How do you call yourself?
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How do you admit that you ve been living a lie?
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How do you admit yourself in big ways and small ways on lies at this point, given how many people love you, how famous you are?
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10 years ago, I don t know.
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I don t know, someone was talking about like, yeah, they really admire this so-and-so person, because they re not someone who looks in the mirror.
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And I was like, yeah,
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All of a sudden I was like, man, I gotta catch myself looking in the mirror a lot.
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And then I go in and I, you know, look at my wife s side of her bathroom, how many different creams and stuff she has out there.
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I look at my side, I got a lot more on my side.
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I m like, oh, I notice how if I m out in public working out, maybe doing pushups, maybe I do a few more.
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If there s a group of people walking by that maybe I d like to impress, then I may do a few more than I do if I was on my own.
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I m like,
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You are vain, McConaughey.
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Yeah.
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And the knee jerk is, oh, vanity bad.
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And all of a sudden I was like, all of a sudden I became a bullshitter once I admitted I m vain.
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I was like, well, bravo vanity.
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Yeah.
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Let s go vanity.
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Let s, instead of putting it in the cupboard, in the lie section, oh, I m vain, because that s a debit.
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No, admit it.
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and then go, what s the value in it?
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Well, I can look at, yeah, I m actually got in better shape because of my vanity.
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Actually, I eat better.
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And that led to being a better husband, better dad, doing something with my kids when I d rather be over there writing this work I m working on.
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But I know that tomorrow,
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that when they leave town, they re gonna remember this time that we had together.
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That s a selfish act to go spend that time with my kids, even though I d rather not be doing it at that time, I d rather be doing something for myself.
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Because when they leave tomorrow, they ll have this great memory that they spent with their dad right before they went.
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I could call that vanity.
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I could group that and say, that was very vain of you.
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That was for self.
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Yeah.
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because it was also for someone that I cared about.
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Are there people in your life that call you out on your bullshit in the bad sense of the word bullshit?
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Yeah, yeah.
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Sometimes it s either, I got a pretty thick threshold for how far I can go with my bullshit.
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Like what bruise, what tickles me might bruise others to watch it.
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That s a good line.
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Yeah, tickles me and my bruise others.
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But I also, I go back and talk about the bullshit that s over there with those mystical successes.
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It s the, yeah, no, no, go with it.
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Don t pull a parachute yet.
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Let s see how far we can go.
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Let s see how hot I can get.
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Let s try it one more time.
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Yes, two more, please.
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That s where a lot of great pleasure and stories and successes will come from.
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Those are mystical.
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They don t add up.
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It s like, we re not talking about reason right now.
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We re not talking logic.
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Just go with this.
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Let s talk about the virtual and making it real.
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The old line of fake it till you make it.
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I mean, what is that?
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There s something to that.
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There s definitely something to it.
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But I would, you know, where people go fake it, I would go back to Dylan s and create it, recreate it, create and recreate it, you know, until it becomes, until you make it.
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So I ll have people call my bullshit, and a lot of times they re right.
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I think when I handle it the most healthy way is I admit, yes, and
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I m aware, and I m going to keep going.
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So you re not resisting it, denying it, putting it away?
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Oh, I will, I will, and I have to watch that, where I m like, no, I m not.
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That s not what I m doing.
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And usually, when it s coming from people, they re going, no, you are.
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It s like, I wanna admit it.
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And then that s where I m telling a lie.
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And that ll come up, get me later, and I ll go, I didn t see it.
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I didn t see I was doing that.
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I was,
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either unaware or wouldn t let myself be aware.
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I was denying that I was doing that.
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Would you say that s ego?
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Has ego been bad or good for you?
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Gosh, I think it s been, I m so thankful for ego.
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Does it get off the bridle for me sometimes and run loose and run in places and where it s,
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not of service to others and has it hurt loved ones and even strangers?
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Yes.
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But I also, when my ego is really strong, it s in sync with serving.
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It s in sync with
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where I serve myself also serves others.
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Those two are part and parcel.
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They re intertwined.
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And that s the capital E, Ego, that I think and hope we all need more of.
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And that s what I mean when I talk about selfish.
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That s redefining the real true meaning of that is not doing something for self at expense of your neighbor or harming others.
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for personal profit and pleasure that also is profit and pleasure for, in a utilitarian sense, more of others.
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And there s, again, back to the paradox, I think there s a place, I know there s a place, I believe there s a place where those are in sync.
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And when my ego s healthy, I m able to say I m sorry sooner for a lie or a misdemeanor or harm to somebody.
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I m able to be more empathetic because I got the confidence.
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Yeah.
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To be so.
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I m able to be more humble, but still have my chin high and my heart high and look in the eye and go, yep, my bad, bogey, guilty.
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I shanked that one out of bounds, man.
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That s beautifully put, so ego can be constructive, not destructive.
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You won an Oscar for your performance in Dallas Buyers Club.
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Can you tell the story of becoming that character, Ron Woodruff?
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What was the toughest part?
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The toughest part, which was the most enlightening part,
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was getting to know who he was in between the lines.
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We re based on a life story in an hour and a half of film and script was great.
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But who was he in between the lines?
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Who was he before he started a business, before he was on a crusade, before he went to alternative medicines and
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You know, the obvious thing people always talk about, well, how d you lose all that weight?
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That was not hard.
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That was just a militaristic decision.
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This is what I can eat each day.
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And if I do this each day for a week, I ll lose 2.5 pounds in a week.
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So I m gonna give myself five months to do that.
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2.5 times that is 10.
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There s 47 pounds.
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That was like clockwork.
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So that was easy.
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That decision was made.
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I didn t go to the Pizza Hut buffet and have temptation in front of me.
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I had certain meals, I ate that and the weight just went off like clockwork.
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It was the, who is Ron Woodruff in between the lines?
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And what the gift I got given that gave me the insight to who that man was, was I went to see his family and his, before I was, as I was leaving, his family offered me his diary.
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And I remember kind of going, wow, yes, but I kind of hesitated because it felt maybe a little too intimate of a thing for me to have.
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It felt like it was kind of maybe infringing a bit, but I opened my hand and took it.
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And what I got in the diary was I got to know who Ron was before he had HIV.
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little thing, the diary he d write in and the dreamer he was, getting all set on a Sunday night and laying his shirt out and ironing it for the next morning, making sure that his little pager had fresh batteries in it because tomorrow morning he was going across town to hook up some speakers.
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or 38 bucks or whatever.
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And then getting up that morning and writing about what kind of coffee he drank and how much gas it was going to take to get over across town to do that job and hook up those speakers.
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And then on the way over, Paige coming in to say, no, we don t need you.
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We ve gone with somebody else to hook him up.
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And here he was all buttoned up, two cups of coffee in, hair slicked over, shirt ironed.
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Little less than half a tank of gas, but enough to get back home.
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Now where s this Monday go?
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The hope and the disappointment.
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She has to take all that in.
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That s part of that, man.
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I m just gonna go to Sonic and get a double cheese bacon burger, because Sheila over there, man, she s kind of cute.
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She always gives me high price on it.
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Yeah.
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Which leads to
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rolling in the joint, hanging on until Sheila gets off the work, sneaking over to the local motel and shagging up in room 16, that s my lucky number 16, Sheila!
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Then wandering out that night, getting home at one in the morning, no plans for Tuesday.
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And maybe later in the week, think about what am I going to do about work or job?
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And these little dreams would get me peak and want to, and then something would happen where he wouldn t follow through or the deal would go down, the deal would go south.
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That knowing that there s in there was where I saw who he was a dreamer.
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And he just couldn t catch the break and didn t follow through.
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And then I remembered his family said like, oh yeah, he invented it.
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He got patents on a whole bunch of things, but he never would.
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He had things to get patent, but never would follow through to get the government patent.
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And then later on, you d see the product be made or sold on QVC or something.
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They d be like, Ron, that was yours.
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They stole your idea.
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Did you patent that?
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He d be like,
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Like never would, there s something beautiful and sad about that.
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Yeah.
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That let me inside who he was in his heart and who he wanted to be and what he was hoping to be and trying to be, but couldn t quite pull off.
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When you go that deep, does a part of him stay in you forever?
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Are you able to let go?
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I mean, I hope so.
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I get, I look, there s a tenacity to survive that I got.
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from him, hopefully I can try and find some of that in different ways in any character that I go play.
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If you really wanna give a character an obstacle to overcome, a need, I mean, the base one is life and death, whether that s the need to survive or the need to stave off extinction.
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I m not talking about what the rules, the laws are, the social mores, the manners and graces.
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You gonna fight for your own life in a world that s not supporting you to do so?
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There s a wonderful courage of, okay, watch this.
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What do I got to lose?
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My life?
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or I m in charge of extending it, get out of the way.
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And I ll pick your pocket along the way, whatever it takes.
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So there s a tenacity to live by whatever means necessary to survive that I m reminded of, that I learned from Ron.
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So on that line of survival between life and death, you starred in True Detective, which I think explores some darker aspects of human nature.
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What did you take from that, from that role, from that experience, philosophically, psychologically?
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The freedom of being on an island.
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He was such a singular character and of a singular mind.
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And as you know, it wasn t a dance party up there in his mind.
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It was some heavy stuff.
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But also existentially for him, always like death would be a deliverance for him.
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It d also be a cop out in a way.
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It d also be, he was not a man who was gonna give himself amnesty and didn t allow it from the rest of the world.
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He wouldn t give himself an out.
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And while living in his head and heart and spirit was more of a hell than arguably dying,
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There s no alternative, that s not negotiable for that man.
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And that s why he was such a, that s why he s the best detective that ever walked the earth.
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That s why he was such a superhero in a way, to have that singular.
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You don t go, oh, I wish I was him.
5
SPEAKER_01
No, but you re like, wow, that constitution, that clarity of identity?
5
SPEAKER_01
Talk about a measure.
5
SPEAKER_01
in a man s constitution, he didn t allow anybody off the hook, especially himself.
5
SPEAKER_01
You wanted him to forgive a little bit or give himself a little amnesty.
5
SPEAKER_01
You wanted him to like, man, it s Saturday, bro.
5
SPEAKER_01
Can you go on a date?
5
SPEAKER_01
You wanted him to like enjoy, but he was connected to something in his DNA, who s who he was and something much,
5
SPEAKER_01
more baseline truth, and that s why he was such a good detective.
5
SPEAKER_01
So that, but there s an island, as much as that company can be, I said earlier on that Amazon trip that I went and joined the company, there s parts, I think, that I maybe gave to myself to Rustin Cole, and also that Rustin Cole has given back to me, that are like, yeah, when you wanna pull the parachute, because you can t stand the company that you re in, McConaughey, in your own mind, the Socratic dialogue is driving you freaking crazy,
5
SPEAKER_01
don t pull the parachute, stick with it, go through it.
5
SPEAKER_00
So you were able to walk around with that tormented mind of his?
5
SPEAKER_00
Tormented?
5
SPEAKER_01
I didn t have very much patience for mendacious talk.
5
SPEAKER_01
I didn t have as much patience for small talk.
5
SPEAKER_01
I wasn t tormented.
5
SPEAKER_00
But the character was, and you have to embody him.
5
SPEAKER_00
So does some of that bleed over?
5
SPEAKER_00
Are you able to,
5
SPEAKER_00
separate the man you are from the character?
5
SPEAKER_01
It s not, look, am I able to separate?
5
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, I came home to my kids, and when they walk in the door and greet me and go, what d you do today?
5
SPEAKER_01
And you got three kids under 10 years old, you don t tell them about the scene where you help someone commit suicide.
5
SPEAKER_01
It s just, so you turn it into a parable.
5
SPEAKER_01
Actually, I ve always said this, having kids has made me a better actor and a better storyteller because I have to parabolize certain things, you know, and tell it in ways that I go, oh, neat, you know.
5
SPEAKER_01
So, did I go, did I bring it home?
5
SPEAKER_01
I didn t bring torment.
5
SPEAKER_01
Did I bring introspection into my own?
5
SPEAKER_01
Characters for me,
6
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and I think this is true for a lot of actors and actresses, it s not a separation.
6
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We each have everyone else in us.
6
SPEAKER_00
It s just diving into Rustin Gold, knowing where his mind and heart is from the hand of Nick Pizzolatto, who wrote the character,
6
SPEAKER_00
the whole series, understanding, number one, what the hell am I saying?
6
SPEAKER_00
What s he talking about?
6
SPEAKER_00
Then going deeper into that, well, this person really believes that.
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What does that say about how they move?
6
SPEAKER_00
Then I m going all of a sudden, well, who is that in me?
6
SPEAKER_00
What part of my left brain is locked into that?
6
SPEAKER_00
What part of my reptilian brain is latched onto that?
6
SPEAKER_00
This other stuff is non-negotiable.
6
SPEAKER_00
Then I just live in that.
6
SPEAKER_00
And it s, I always taught like a 70s equalizer.
6
SPEAKER_00
Remember the old at Morant s equalizers?
6
SPEAKER_00
You can, you move up your 500 HKZ, you move up your 60, you just re-rebalance the equalizer.
6
SPEAKER_00
And we all have, so it s just going to those parts of me where I ll turn up the volume, some parts of the bass, the treble on the equalizer and turn down other parts of myself.
6
SPEAKER_00
And I ll, I m not coming home tormented as Rustin Cole.
6
SPEAKER_00
Am I coming home seeing torment where it should be seen?
6
SPEAKER_00
Am I reading the news differently?
6
SPEAKER_00
Are things coming out of the news and catching my eye as being bullshit or lies or truth that is just hard and going, yep, yeah.
6
SPEAKER_00
I m seeing it through a different lens, but I m seeing my own life through a different lens.
6
SPEAKER_00
a lens that was opened up and an aperture that was opened up through Rustin Cole.
6
SPEAKER_01
I mean, the process of being an actor, an actress, I guess is a really interesting way to be a philosopher of human nature.
6
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, I mean, it s an incredible dive into the humanities and all the ologies and philosophy.
6
SPEAKER_00
And as I said, I m going to
6
SPEAKER_00
As I opened up that question, being on an island is a vacation.
6
SPEAKER_00
I am also conscious for five months when I m playing Rust and Coal that, this is an interesting fact.
6
SPEAKER_00
I was as strong spiritually with my relationship with God when I did True Detective as I ve ever been.
6
SPEAKER_01
Why is that?
6
SPEAKER_00
Okay, which you would say, wait a minute, in some ways, those are antonyms.
6
SPEAKER_00
No, but I pretty safely can say that my own strength of spirit in my own personal life, Matthew s life, gave me the confidence to go further away, deeper into the torture and deeper into the,
6
SPEAKER_00
But he was still always going after truth.
6
SPEAKER_00
That was the thing.
6
SPEAKER_00
He was not an evil man.
6
SPEAKER_00
I don t even know if you can call him a non-believer, but he was always going after the truth, and the truth burns, and he would take the scar and get burned for it.
6
SPEAKER_00
He d die for it.
6
SPEAKER_00
That, something was actually biblical about that.
6
SPEAKER_00
You know?
6
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And so, but I don t think it s,
6
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coincidence that I had so much jour de veve of diving into the depths of that tortured character because I trusted that when I go out, I ll come up the other side.
6
SPEAKER_00
It s always like jumping in a pool of water.
6
SPEAKER_00
And can you trust you ll come up the other side and not,
6
SPEAKER_00
You go play a criminal, you trust you re not going to come out the other side a tyrant in real life.
6
SPEAKER_00
He s go, ah, glad I got to go do that, came out and I m still alive, got all my faculties, I m not in jail, whatever it is.
6
SPEAKER_00
And so my own spirituality at that time definitely, I think, gave me a certain trust and confidence to go further into the dark.
6
SPEAKER_01
It was announced that you d be starring in a Yellowstone spinoff show.
6
SPEAKER_01
What do you think about the cowboy ethos that permeates Yellowstone and other shows created by Taylor Sheridan?
6
SPEAKER_00
You re a Texan.
6
SPEAKER_01
I am a Texan, yeah.
6
SPEAKER_01
What do you think about that philosophy and way of life?
6
SPEAKER_00
I admire the simplicity of it.
6
SPEAKER_00
I mean, one way you could explain
6
SPEAKER_00
Yellowstone and Costner s role is what will man do to protect land and family in a world that s trying to encroach, in a world where there s a cowboy ethos that deems trespassing more clear earlier than other
6
SPEAKER_00
Other hats.
6
SPEAKER_00
I admire that simplicity of right and wrong.
6
SPEAKER_01
And the simplicity of that right and wrong doesn t always correlate, coincide with the law.
6
SPEAKER_00
No, it s above the law.
6
SPEAKER_00
You mentioned something earlier, I remember where it was in the conversation, but it s a little bit of like, okay, if the law ain t handling this, I am.
6
Yeah.
6
SPEAKER_00
And then it is,
6
SPEAKER_00
Law s not gonna handle this, therefore I am.
6
SPEAKER_00
And then it is, I m handling this.
6
SPEAKER_00
Law, talk to them when you get to them, I m handling this.
6
SPEAKER_01
There s a honesty to that, it just seems...
6
SPEAKER_01
Of course it s dangerous because it s a slippery slope.
6
SPEAKER_01
Because of the power in that, power corrupts, it can be a slippery slope where you completely disregard the law and you can hurt a lot of people.
6
SPEAKER_01
But when done right, there feels to be something really authentic and human about that.
6
SPEAKER_01
Protect family, protect land, above all else.
6
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
6
SPEAKER_00
This is a broader question, but I m gonna piggyback it off of this.
6
SPEAKER_00
Back to the dreams and reality and evolved species and how and what we do in creating a digital God and AI and these communities and friends that challenge us and think like us, we like to hang out with.
6
SPEAKER_00
Do you think we re less evolved
6
SPEAKER_00
than we give ourself credit for?
6
SPEAKER_00
Do you think we give ourself credit for being more evolved than we actually are?
6
SPEAKER_01
I think we do.
6
SPEAKER_01
I do.
6
SPEAKER_01
I think we need to admit that.
6
SPEAKER_01
I think probably the cowboy ethos is a stepping towards admitting that.
6
SPEAKER_01
And that s why it s so appealing to people.
6
SPEAKER_01
It kind of wakes them up to realize that we re not so far from our ancestors.
6
SPEAKER_01
That the values of loyalty are really important.
6
SPEAKER_01
Trust on the basic human level.
6
SPEAKER_01
How do you know if you can trust someone?
6
SPEAKER_00
I don t know if I can trust someone.
6
SPEAKER_00
I don t know a trick to it, I do not know a trick to it, but I do come in, as I believe you do, with high trust.
6
SPEAKER_00
I come in with a, I m told, sometimes I think, I m told that I trust too much sometimes.
6
SPEAKER_01
Have you been hurt?
6
SPEAKER_01
Have you been betrayed?
6
SPEAKER_01
And if you have, has that hurt your willingness to trust?
6
SPEAKER_00
No, it hurt and I put that person and those people in another category back here and do my best not to let them know that it bothered me at all, but I know when I am with those people.
6
SPEAKER_01
But a new person you re still with.
6
SPEAKER_00
No, I m not going to do that.
6
SPEAKER_00
I think that s the beginning of cynicism, which I think is a horrible disease of getting older.
6
SPEAKER_00
I m not gonna do that.
6
SPEAKER_01
So you re fighting cynicism off as much as you can.
6
SPEAKER_00
Okay, no way, no way, no way.
6
SPEAKER_00
I mean, there s no residual in it.
6
SPEAKER_00
There s no win.
6
SPEAKER_00
It s easy, it s clever.
6
SPEAKER_00
Gets the laugh at the party.
6
SPEAKER_00
And if it sleeps well, it shouldn t be.
6
SPEAKER_01
Don t get comfortable in the cynicism.
6
SPEAKER_01
I have to ask you about being a Texan.
6
SPEAKER_01
You re like, when I think Texas, I think Matthew McConaughey.
6
SPEAKER_01
What s it mean to be a Texan to you?
6
SPEAKER_01
I recently moved to Austin, Texas, some two years in.
6
SPEAKER_00
All right, all right.
6
SPEAKER_01
Welcome.
6
SPEAKER_01
What s it mean to be a Texan?
6
SPEAKER_00
Educate us.
6
SPEAKER_00
Texas is about independence.
6
SPEAKER_00
Politically, Texas is not about Republican or Democrat.
6
SPEAKER_00
It s about independence, independence of spirit, sovereignty.
6
SPEAKER_00
Texas is about exploration.
6
SPEAKER_00
One of the things I love about Texas is I run into so many Texans around the world.
6
SPEAKER_00
Texans are taught to go be conservative or learn who we are.
6
SPEAKER_00
then go, go, explore, pioneer, journey, and hopefully you come on back with some goods and some stories.
6
SPEAKER_00
You Texan.
6
SPEAKER_01
And underneath that is this kind of freedom of being an individual in the full meaning of that word.
6
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, well, Texas is liberal on your entrance.
6
SPEAKER_00
Very liberal on your entrance.
6
SPEAKER_00
Less regulation.
6
SPEAKER_00
Hey, welcome.
6
SPEAKER_00
High trust.
6
SPEAKER_00
High trust, sir.
6
SPEAKER_00
Welcome to our state.
6
SPEAKER_00
Come on in.
6
SPEAKER_00
Yes, yes, yes.
6
SPEAKER_00
But if you, like cheat steel?
6
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
6
SPEAKER_00
We re conservative on our consequences.
6
SPEAKER_01
That s a good line.
6
SPEAKER_01
You ve briefly pondered running for governor.
6
SPEAKER_01
I don t know if that s in your future.
6
SPEAKER_01
I hope it is.
6
SPEAKER_01
You had a few good lines about it.
6
SPEAKER_01
Do you think about that kind of stuff?
6
SPEAKER_01
About what the future holds in terms of political office?
6
SPEAKER_00
I don t think about it in terms of political office.
6
SPEAKER_00
I ve graduated to a broader, larger thought of what s my future hold and where would I be most useful as a leader?
6
SPEAKER_00
I think that s a fair word.
6
SPEAKER_00
Whether that s thought, whether that s leader of my family right now, as a parent, as a father.
6
SPEAKER_00
I m a leader of people that work with me.
6
SPEAKER_00
Politics, it s...
6
SPEAKER_00
I m not going to say it s because it s not small.
6
SPEAKER_00
That s why I say that out loud.
6
SPEAKER_00
It s not small.
6
SPEAKER_00
I do think it needs to re-engineer and redefine what its purpose is before, because it s just chasing its own tail right now with the two parties that seem to me to be completely about just invalidation of the opposition instead of vision of themselves.
6
SPEAKER_00
So I think it needs redefinition of what it is because it is important.
6
SPEAKER_00
That s what I mean.
6
SPEAKER_00
That s why I said, I don t mean small.
6
SPEAKER_00
It needs to think bigger about what it is and how it s useful.
6
SPEAKER_00
When it seeks to invalidate, it s small.
6
SPEAKER_01
When it seeks vision, it can be big.
6
SPEAKER_00
Yes, well, one s affirmative, one s going into that cynicism we were talking about, you know, and validation of any opposing thought, or maybe that we re even opposing.
6
SPEAKER_00
Opposition is an arrogant term that s too strong.
6
SPEAKER_00
So a lot of times it s not even opposition, alternative, other than, another way of thinking about it.
6
SPEAKER_00
Oh, could both be true?
6
SPEAKER_00
Oh, how could we parlay those two ideas?
6
SPEAKER_00
You know, one of the challenges with these ideas of a third party or meet you in the middle, it s kind of got this historic notion of being, oh, well, come see, come see.
6
SPEAKER_00
It s sort of Mr. Inbetween, kind of go which way the wind blows.
6
SPEAKER_00
I think done in the right way, it s the, and it doesn t have to be under a third party s name necessarily, but it s actually an incredibly rebellious position right now.
6
SPEAKER_00
And it s actually, and I love sports, it s tactically the place with which
6
SPEAKER_00
to move most advantageously.
6
SPEAKER_00
I think of their free safety in the game of football.
6
SPEAKER_00
They re in the middle of the field and they re deep.
6
SPEAKER_00
They choose to defend left or right according to the play that s been called by the offense.
6
SPEAKER_00
Similar to the offense, the running back, you read the defense and then you re gonna run right to run left to go away from that opposition.
6
SPEAKER_00
It s a tactical spot.
6
SPEAKER_01
To be truly independent and respond
6
SPEAKER_01
and respond.
6
SPEAKER_01
So do you think you have a role in that in political officers?
6
SPEAKER_00
I don t know.
6
SPEAKER_00
It s on it s on mine.
6
SPEAKER_00
It s not out of my mental box.
6
SPEAKER_00
And I gave it real sincere thought and discernment for over a year.
6
SPEAKER_00
And it s a wonderful, whether I end up in politics or not, it was a wonderful exercise.
6
SPEAKER_00
One that if anyone else got time to do it, do it.
6
SPEAKER_00
To ask yourself what you would do if you were CEO of a state, CEO of a nation, CEO of the world, that s a great thing to go.
6
SPEAKER_00
You wanna get your values in line?
6
SPEAKER_00
You wanna admit where you lie?
6
SPEAKER_00
And throw yourself some pop quizzes?
6
SPEAKER_00
And what if this phone call comes at 4 a.m. ?
6
SPEAKER_00
Who you wanna surround yourself with?
6
SPEAKER_00
It s really great questions to ask, and I think it s helped me at a more micro level, be a better father, a better man, taking considerations that I did not maybe take in as seriously before considering it.
6
SPEAKER_00
I don t know if that s in my future.
6
SPEAKER_00
Useful is a big word.
6
SPEAKER_00
I would have to be useful.
6
SPEAKER_00
I have to be useful in the right way.
6
SPEAKER_00
And is that my lane to be most useful?
6
SPEAKER_01
It s a good question for a leader to ask.
6
SPEAKER_01
How can I be useful?
6
SPEAKER_01
I have to ask you.
6
SPEAKER_01
about Interstellar.
6
SPEAKER_01
So I think it s an incredible film.
6
SPEAKER_01
I ve seen it inspire so many scientists and engineers.
6
SPEAKER_01
It s just philosopher, everybody, humans.
6
SPEAKER_01
It explores space travel, physics of space time, human nature, human condition, human connection.
6
SPEAKER_01
How has that film expanded your understanding of the universe and our place in it?
6
SPEAKER_00
Well, it s the,
6
SPEAKER_00
It s got the old Mr. Mayor on the corner, how big is that cloud metaphor in it?
6
SPEAKER_00
Because that was the character I played, Cooper s, that was the existential question for him.
6
SPEAKER_00
Head down, practical, stay here, be a father to my children.
6
SPEAKER_00
But his dream before his children were to go explore space.
6
SPEAKER_00
So when he s taking that truck out and the countdown s going down, that s the hinge of the,
7
SPEAKER_00
existential question that we all face in some form.
7
SPEAKER_00
The sense of time, which I think everyone loves, that sense of where time can run at different speeds.
7
SPEAKER_00
And there s an incredible scene where Cooper as a father is getting video feed from his children who have
7
SPEAKER_00
aged and he s realizing he s missed all that.
7
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
7
SPEAKER_00
I mean, overall, that concept makes me consider and imagine.
7
SPEAKER_00
We talk about mystical successes instead of engineered ones, like the engineered ones, there s ethos from that film and what
7
SPEAKER_00
Nolan put into that film and theories that make me go, yeah, what does any of this matter?
7
SPEAKER_00
What do we, maybe we are, maybe we re, it makes me go, maybe this is all, it s already all been, it s already all been written.
7
SPEAKER_00
What s happening right now in this blip of time you re here, 53 years so far, we ll see how many we get.
7
SPEAKER_00
What other parallel timelines are happening out there?
7
SPEAKER_00
Is it small-minded of us to define life on other planets as only something that can live within a climate that has water in this amount of O2?
7
SPEAKER_00
Those terms may be too small.
7
SPEAKER_00
What do you mean?
7
SPEAKER_00
Are we saying only life has to have water in this amount of oxygen and carbon dioxide?
7
SPEAKER_00
Maybe there s a whole redefinition of the ingredients that other life forms need.
7
SPEAKER_00
It sure, in a similar way to Contact, which is a movie I did with Bob Zemeckis, inspires me that the universe is more active and lively and God s backyard s bigger than I thought.
7
SPEAKER_00
And wow, that s exciting.
7
SPEAKER_00
And people go now, yeah, you believe in extraterrestrial life?
7
SPEAKER_00
I said, yes, man, I think it d be arrogant not to.
7
SPEAKER_00
I sure hope so.
7
SPEAKER_01
You think there s alien civilizations all out there, intelligent ones, just far on distant stars?
7
SPEAKER_00
I hope so.
7
SPEAKER_00
And I think it s possible.
7
SPEAKER_00
We have many among us right here.
7
SPEAKER_00
And I go for the why not in that, just to keep that train of thought open to learn and consider, you know, those existential questions.
7
SPEAKER_00
I didn t mean to be arrogant not to.
7
SPEAKER_01
hundreds of billions of planets just in our galaxy.
7
SPEAKER_01
I can t imagine there s not life out there.
7
SPEAKER_01
But I suspect it s very different, like you said, than we are.
7
SPEAKER_01
And we have to have a humility to open our eyes to how different life could be.
7
SPEAKER_00
And if and when we cross it, unlike we ve had a tendency to do when we try to go with some
7
SPEAKER_00
nation takeovers, I think it would be our inherent glitch to go in believing that any other life form civilization wants to take over territories, to go into it with thinking that, okay, this is an opposition.
7
SPEAKER_00
I mean, I think that s a human trait of ours
7
SPEAKER_00
and to consider that another life form would have an interest that more land or more territory is good for them, I think is a shallow idea.
7
SPEAKER_00
I think of it more like, you know, when I think of heaven, those considerations are not in anyone s mind, heart, or intent in the heaven that I think of.
7
SPEAKER_00
You know, so in other civilizations, these things, I don t, I mean, I, I hope that we would just see and learn that would be the natural side of welcoming.
7
SPEAKER_00
It wouldn t be a primate response to, no, I have fire and you re coming over trying to put it out or I have food and you re trying to steal my food.
7
SPEAKER_00
I don t, I don t think it would be.
7
SPEAKER_00
I think it s a shallow thought to think that, oh, it s gonna be about ownership and we d be trespassing.
7
SPEAKER_00
I think it would be, I don t think there.
7
SPEAKER_00
would have a sense of borders as we do.
7
SPEAKER_01
I just hope we humans are smart enough to detect and to see aliens.
7
SPEAKER_01
Because of how different they are.
7
SPEAKER_01
We often have a very narrow definition of what is intelligence.
7
SPEAKER_01
It s very possible that trees are extremely intelligent if we kind of zoom out at a different time scale.
7
SPEAKER_01
Just look at stuff from a bigger perspective that s outside of being so human-centric.
7
SPEAKER_00
It s a great quote that someone told me, this astrophysicist told me this, how accurate it is or not, someone else can argue the validity of what I m about to say or not, but I thought it really was a perspective grabber for me.
7
SPEAKER_00
Like look, see the universe was created at midnight.
7
SPEAKER_00
Humans came around at 11.59 and 36 seconds.
7
SPEAKER_00
I love the little analogies that frame, like that make, oh, yeah, the pale blue dot, there it is, that perspective.
7
SPEAKER_00
Something so relaxing and empowering about that at the same time, and humbling, but confidence-boosting, you know, allows forgiveness, allows ambition.
7
SPEAKER_00
I just love the perspective of that, that picture, to picture it that way in our timeline.
7
SPEAKER_01
do you hope humans become a multi-planetary species, as we re trying to do, as SpaceX is pushing forward, traveling out to Mars, potentially colonizing Mars, colonizing other planets?
7
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
7
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, go explore.
7
SPEAKER_00
I love the ambition of it.
7
SPEAKER_00
I love the pioneering.
7
SPEAKER_00
I love the extension of what we consider as our backyard becoming more four-dimensional like that.
7
SPEAKER_00
Not at the expense of, we still got stuff to take care of.
7
SPEAKER_00
We got gardens to tend right here.
7
SPEAKER_00
And sure as hell not to go, not to quit on us, to go, oh, let s get out of here because this isn t really working.
7
SPEAKER_00
No, no, no, no, no, no, no.
7
SPEAKER_00
We got a tithe we re still supposed to pay here.
7
SPEAKER_00
That s part of this pressure testing us as a civilization and a species.
7
SPEAKER_00
Whether you call that restoration order or whether you call that let s figure out how to adapt best we can.
7
SPEAKER_00
No, not at the expense of quitting.
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here on Earth.
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But we ll let a few select folks explore.
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Yeah.
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Because that s like a... I say go for it, please.
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One of the coolest things that we humans do is kind of embodies the human spirit, reach out into the unknown.
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But it s hard.
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I mean, as interstellar shows and so on.
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Yeah.
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It s painful.
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Well, and Elon talks about it, it s not gonna be a...
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weekend daisy trip.
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And he s just speculating how hard it could be.
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Much harder in different ways that he doesn t understand yet.
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You know?
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Yeah.
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Well, that, you know, that dance between the impossible and the inevitable, that s definitely there with what SpaceX is doing, with all the folks who are trying to become a multi-planetary species are doing.
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It s really hard.
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It s like,
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Build rockets that fight off gravity in a cost-effective way is really hard.
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SpaceX is close to being bankrupt several times.
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It s just hard.
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But it s also inspiring that some people are just crazy enough, bold enough to keep trying.
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What advice would you give to young folks?
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What advice would I give?
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in high school and college that are thinking of how to make their way in this world.
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If you haven t already, can you define what you have an innate ability for and match that with what you re willing to hustle to get?
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Yeah.
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We have an innate ability but we don t wanna work for it, we take it for granted.
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And we end up doing something that may work, may pay the bills, may get us by day to day.
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But we don t really like it, we have trouble finding a way to enjoy it.
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Definitely don t love it.
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And then sometimes we don t know what our innate ability is and we re hustling and working our tail off and breaking a sweat to do something that we really aren t that good at.
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on an innate level, and that s a good challenge.
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And you can work and become good at something that you don t have an innate ability for, but if you can match those two, what do you have an innate ability to do?
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Because we have an innate ability to do, when we do that well, we do kind of enjoy it, yeah.
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And one of the things that requires is to kind of be really honest with yourself at what your innate ability is.
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Because oftentimes, there s a lot of noise when you re growing up, people telling you what you re good at and not good at.
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Like really, you have to look at yourself, listen to yourself, that inner, like a deep, rigorous self-analysis of what am I actually good at?
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Not what I hope to be good at, but what I m actually good at.
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And then if you look at that and you can define those two, hopefully, you can activate it in a way where there s a demand for what you supply.
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You fell in love with Camila Elvis McConaughey.
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What advice would you give to people on how to do just that?
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How to find love?
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This wonderful subject s been discussed since the beginning of time, hadn t it?
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Love it.
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So I can tell you what things I ve kind of learned and I m still learning.
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You know, love is one of those mystical successes.
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It doesn t make sense.
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It,
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You know, when I was, before I met Camilla, I had had, I was coming on to my late 30s.
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As much as I m not a person that is guided by timelines, I was, my life had not really added up to what I thought it was gonna be relationship-wise.
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I thought by that time I would have met the woman I loved, got married and started a family, and that hadn t happened.
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And I did find myself
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doing that thing I was doing at the Amazon, looking around the corner.
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Any prospective possible female I met that I was attracted to, I was like, maybe this is the one.
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I make the joke, but it s true.
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It s like at every red light, I m like checking out who s next to me in the produce section of the supermarket.
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I m like, chose down the produce section.
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You know, it s like looking.
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When you re in that zone,
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You can also be a little intrusive.
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You can trespass on people s, you can get outside of yourself.
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You can be overly impressed and not as involved and have your own constitution and sit back.
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And therefore, if you re outside of yourself, you re less attractive to your possible mate.
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I ve got a series of
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dreams that are written about, but I had one then that was very spiritual, that was me as a 88-year-old bachelor who never got married, and it was a beautiful dream.
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Where on paper, I thought that should be a nightmare, it wasn t.
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What that dream did for me was allowed me to go, you may not find the woman for you and get married.
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and had a life with her.
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That may not be.
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And for the first time in my life, I was okay with that.
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More than intellectually, spiritually, I was grounded.
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I was like, okay.
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Then I m moving through the world and on this particular night, as myself, not intruding, I was inviting.
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I did see her move across the room and did not say, who is that?
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I said, what is that?
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and then did move to call her across the room.
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So I did invite, but I was not outside of myself.
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And I was able to be myself with her.
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What my eyes saw, everything that she turned out to be when the lens got zoomed in, more details got known, and we began to talk and got more intimate and closer together and spend more time, became true and then some.
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but not every single thing that I imagined when I saw her move across the room turned out to be true, and then some.
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In the, just the image.
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We found a, had a moral, similar moral bottom line about life, each other, how we treat ourselves, what we respect, what our own constitutions were.
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We had similar,
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perspectives on raising children, which is very important to me and her.
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And then we just enjoyed each other s company.
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Yeah.
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And we laughed together and we support each other and we promoted more of each other and we lit each other s fire.
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And we, if one was rolling, we kept dishing, you go, go, go again, take the next shot, more, more, more, more.
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This was a biggie too.
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Getting excited for each other s success.
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Yes, yes.
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To be able, I think it s very important.
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We all have jealousy.
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I get it, but it s very important to be able, if you can, be happy for your lover when they succeed, or are succeeding, or are across the room at the party laughing with a stranger, to be happy for them when it has nothing to do with you.
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She was, I would be away, she would, the questions and the talks we would have, she was happy for me about how excited I was about my day and my day had nothing to do with her.
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Yeah.
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She wasn t there.
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And I found myself not telling myself to be happy for her, but being really, really happy for her when she would tell me about something that happened that day with her.
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And as much as I went through my head, oh, I d have been great if I would have been there.
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Yeah.
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I was like, not only trespass on that, that you had that.
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Yeah.
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Independent of me, bravo.
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That s a choice you make not to give any time to the jealousy, to the very natural jealousy that we humans have.
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It sure doesn t have any, I don t see the residuals in it.
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True.
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I ve got it, I ve had it, and I have it, I just don t, you know, I haven t seen where it has any payback.
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I gotta ask you the biggest possible question.
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What s the meaning of this whole thing?
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What s the meaning of life?
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Matthew McConaughey.
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Why?
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Why are we here?
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I don t know why we re here.
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I prescribe to, in a religious sense, the restoration order, the right to restore order.
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In a religious sense, I purchased that and love that incentive and love that view.
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But I don t really know why we re here.
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But I do know, to go back to the front, we are here.
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That part s inevitable.
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So now let s flip the script and go to the why not.
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Just keep living.
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What are we doing?
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The base of everything, Eric, and we can argue it all, at the base of it, all I can come up with is, well, just keep living, man.
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I mean, what else are we supposed to do when we don t have any idea what to do?
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When we know exactly what we wanna do.
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Make it matter.
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Even when it doesn t matter, that matters.
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For what?
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I don t know.
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For the fun of it, that matters.
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Yeah, our ability to create meaning and beauty in the mundane, in the absurd, it s kind of cool.
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Yeah.
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And we share it with each other.
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Yeah.
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We get excited.
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Yeah.
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And we create some pretty cool stuff along the way.
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I mean,
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I say I m confident enough, and I might be arrogant for me to say, but I do believe that we re here to, each generation, have a small ascension.
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Yeah.
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Or else, what s it for?
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And we re not really sure what the ascension is towards.
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Just kind of up.
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No, no.
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I just think it s up.
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I do think it s just up.
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I do think that
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It is definitely arrogant to think that we as a species or generation or people or humanity are going to reach the top of the ascended staircase and go, ta-da!
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I think that is not only false, but I think it s foolharded.
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And I think it s a recipe for having more angst and even cynicism, we talked about, and unrest and lack of seeing beauty and joy in this life while we re in it.
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I think life s a verb.
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live it as best we can.
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Hopefully.
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I mean, I don t know.
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Sometimes I m just, I don t have a grand plan, man.
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I m just trying to connect the damn dot.
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I m confused, frustrated.
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I don t know what, I don t feel any gravity or building or lineage towards what I m doing.
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And I m just like going,
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What s that Peterson line?
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If you don t believe in heaven, do what you can to get as far away from hell as possible sometimes.
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Yeah.
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It s a great line.
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Sometimes I m just trying to like, man, just don t sink the ship right now.
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Just keep your head above water.
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Maintain, just try and hold on.
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And hopefully give yourself a chance to notice the magic, the mystical.
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I try to do that.
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Yeah.
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When it gets rough.
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Because it s there.
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I do believe it s all around us all the time.
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just are we on a frequency and do we allow ourselves to receive it and see it?
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We gotta tune the radio.
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Yeah, because if we look for it too hard, we see false idols and if we don t look at all, we become callous and miss it all.
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It s a fun little life we got.
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Matthew, I m a huge fan.
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I think you re an incredible person.
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Thank you for everything you ve created in this world.
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Thank you for being a unique human that inspires millions, and thank you for talking today.
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I was nervous, but you made me feel at home.
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That was beautiful.
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Well, I felt at home talking with you as well.
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Thanks for sharing that with me.
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I could go on and on and on.
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Just two Texans.
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That s right.
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Having a little chat.
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Newly moved to Austin, Texas, here we go.
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All right, thank you, brother.
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Thank you.
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Thanks for listening to this conversation with Matthew McConaughey.
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To support this podcast, please check out our sponsors in the description.
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And now let me leave you with some words from Matthew McConaughey himself.
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Don t walk into a place like you wanna buy it.
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Walk in like you own it.
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Thank you for listening.
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I hope to see you next time.