#384 – Matthew McConaughey: Freedom, Truth, Family, Hardship, and Love

Matthew McConaughey is an Oscar-winning actor and author of Greenlights. Please support this podcast by checking out our sponsors: – Riverside: http://creators.riverside.fm/LEX and use code LEX to get 30% off – MasterClass: https://masterclass.com/lex to get 15% off – AG1: https://drinkag1.com/lex to get 1 year of Vitamin D and 5 free travel packs EPISODE LINKS: Matthew’s Twitter: https://twitter.com/McConaughey Matthew’s Instagram: https://instagram.com/officiallymcconaughey/ Matthew’s YouTube: https://youtube.com/@MatthewMcConaughey Greenlights (book): https://greenlights.com/ Roadtrip (course): https://artoflivinevent.com/roadtrip PODCAST INFO: Podcast website: https://lexfridman.com/podcast Apple Podcasts: https://apple.co/2lwqZIr Spotify: https://spoti.fi/2nEwCF8 RSS: https://lexfridman.com/feed/podcast/ YouTube Full Episodes: https://youtube.com/lexfridman YouTube Clips: https://youtube.com/lexclips SUPPORT & CONNECT: – Check out the sponsors above, it’s the best way to support this podcast – Support on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/lexfridman – Twitter: https://twitter.com/lexfridman – Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lexfridman – LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lexfridman – Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/lexfridman – Medium: https://medium.com/@lexfridman OUTLINE: Here’s the timestamps for the episode. On some podcast players you should be able to click the timestamp to jump to that time. (00:00) – Introduction (05:57) – Relationships (10:44) – Dreams (22:56) – Fear of death (34:40) – Overcoming pain (57:45) – Amazon rainforest (1:04:29) – AI (1:17:45) – Truth (1:25:50) – Ego (1:33:34) – Dallas Buyers Club (1:40:03) – True Detective (1:48:49) – Yellowstone (1:53:51) – Texas (1:55:43) – Politics (2:00:29) – Interstellar (2:03:26) – Aliens (2:10:23) – Advice for young people (2:18:42) – Meaning of life

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Lex Fridman?

  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 walk this earth. He starred in films and shows loved by me and millions of others, including Interstellar, Dazed and Confused, Dallas Buyers Club, Killer Joe, Mud, True Detective, and soon, a spinoff of Yellowstone. Offscreen, 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 to your life in order to find more happiness, success, and love.

• 0:45Lex Fridman?

  And now, a quick, few-second mention of each sponsor. Check them out in the description. It's the best way to support this podcast. We've got Riverside FM for the best remote video recording platform, MasterClass for learning, and AG1 for my daily multivitamin. Choose wisely, my friends. Also, if you want to work on our amazing team, we're always hiring. Go to lexfridman.com/hiring. Now, onto the full ad reads. As always, no ads in the middle. I try to make this interesting, but if you must skip them. Friends, please still check out the sponsors. I enjoy their stuff. Maybe you will, too. This episode is brought to you by, I think, a new sponsor,

• 1:28Lex Fridman?

  but I've been using them for so long and loving them for so long, I can't sing them enough praises. It's Riverside FM, the platform that makes it easy for podcasters and media companies to record remotely in studio quality. I'm a big-time sucker, you could say, for in-person conversations, but that's not always possible. I've recorded the conversation with Noam Chomsky the second time we talked remotely, and there I used Riverside FM. It just makes it so easy. It does the double-ended recording for you. Which is the audio and the video in highest quality because you know, my connection with Noam Chomsky was horrible. The internet, there's something wrong on both of our internets. It just did not want to cooperate.

• 2:13Lex Fridman?

  And still, the final result captured the quality of my camera and the quality of Noam Chomsky's camera perfectly. That's the whole point of this kind of technology. Just incredibly easy to use. You know, you don't have to give instructions to the other person on a bunch of things to click on. And all this kind of complexity that you would have to do to have a double N A recording using audio recording software, which is, I think, how people used to do it. This is all in browser. It just works effortlessly, works nicely. It just works. The final thing looks good. If you're doing a podcast, if you're doing any kind of remote recording, Riverside FM is what you should be using it.

• 2:56Lex Fridman?

  I record my remote interviews with Riverside. Give it a try at Riverside FM and use code Lex for 30% off. That's Riverside FM and use code Lex. The link's in the description below. This show is also brought to you by MasterClass. $180 a year gets you an all access pass to watch courses from the best people in the world in their respective disciplines. Will Wright, Carlos Santana. Carlos Santana's Europa. I mean, it's an instrumental guitar piece. Just, it's smooth. It's so beautiful. It almost makes me want to play Gibson.

• 3:41Lex Fridman?

  I'm a, I'm a Fender Strat guy. I probably should learn to play Europa at some point. It's one of those pieces, kind of like Voodoo Child by Jimi Hendrix, where you can just play it forever. Anyway, you can learn from all these people. Carlos Santana in the music realm. Martin Scorsese, probably one of, not my favorite director. I mean, it's just Jane Goodall, everything. It just goes on and on and on and on and on. Chris Hadfield. If you want to learn about a thing, learn from the people that do that thing better than almost anybody else in the world. Get unlimited access to every MasterClass and get 15% off an annual membership at masterclass.com/lex.

• 4:24Lex Fridman?

  This show is also brought to you by our old friend Athletic Greens and its AG1 Drink, which is an all-in-one daily drink to support better health and peak performance. And the drink I just drank, and it was delicious. I drink it twice a day usually. I mix it up, put it in the fridge. It's nice and cold, and I just escape in the cold deliciousness and the meditative reminder that I'm rejuvenating my mind and body. 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

• 5:07Lex Fridman?

  how beautiful this life is take over. I think they've changed their name officially to AG1. 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/lex. This is the Lex Fridman Podcast. To support it, please check out our sponsors in the description. And now, dear friends, here's Matthew McConaughey.

• 5:57Lex Fridman?

  Let's start with love. Your parents had a complicated love story. Divorced twice, married three times. What have you learned about love from your mom and dad and their love story?

• 6:11Speaker 01

  That it's messy, that it takes work, that 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.

• 6:49Speaker 01

  Love will win in the end, literally three to two with my mom and dad.

• 6:58Lex Fridman?

  Yeah.

• 7:01Speaker 01

  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. They just couldn't

• 7:11Speaker 01

  live with each other at that time. For whatever reason, they needed, and I don't know the details, but they needed their space, freedom, or what, but they were never out of love with each other.

• 7:27Speaker 01

  And that

• 7:30Speaker 01

  as a parent,

• 7:34Speaker 01

  if you just, when we're not sure what to do,

• 7:40Speaker 01

  and people give you a thousand books and advice, as a parent,

• 7:47Speaker 01

  if your kid knows you love them,

• 7:51Speaker 01

  you're in the black. That's the main thing. It won't work without that. And it can work and will, usually can work with that. They just know that fact.

• 8:03Lex Fridman?

  So it's not just love for each other, it's the love for the bigger family that ultimately helps you persist through the ups and downs?

• 8:12Speaker 01

  Well,

• 8:15Speaker 01

  I mean, I don't know how much, particularly my mom and dad were

• 8:21Speaker 01

  staying together at times, maybe when they didn't want to because they had children. I don't actually think they considered that. I, I, I think they were much less conscientious than say I am today. I think my mom and dad were more like, they'll be fine. We love them. They'll be fine, but we'll, we'll, we'll cross that bridge. When we get there, right now, they would, let's work it out between you and I is what I think my mom and dad were saying to each other, or, or not. They, um.

• 8:54Speaker 01

  They, they wanted and needed a relationship that was a tidal wave, rocky, right angles, toonamis. And to this day, in, in my life with Camilla and I, which I don't, I like a river, has some swerves and some, some streams and some rapids, but I'm not looking for tidal wave. My mom's like, what's, what's all this, everything's so smooth stuff? Come on, come on, come on, come on. And so she challenges like vitality, because that's what my mom needed to communicate. I don't think my dad needed it as much.

• 9:35Speaker 01

  That, uh, the, the, the, the, the, the hard angles, um, that their relationship. I don't think my dad needed as much as my mom. But the clashes demonstrated the passion that underlies the love. Yes. And that's, I've, I've, 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. And There's some good stories there. They're beautiful. I think they're beautiful. Yeah. I think they're beautiful too. 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.

• 10:20Speaker 01

  And it, it could have broke and been over. Yeah. It never was. Again, the love won. In the kitchen floor, the blood's drawn, knives are pulled. Ketchup. Ketchup's all over.

• 10:36Speaker 01

  But we make love on the kitchen floor. And yeah, I mean, come on, beautiful. So as romantic as it gets right there. Whoa.

• 10:44Speaker 01

  What's a memory from childhood that helped set you on the trajectory of becoming the man you are today?

• 10:55Speaker 01

  Standing on the corner with Mr. Mayor, the principal of St. Philip's School. I was in kindergarten.

• 11:04Speaker 01

  And I looked up and there was a cloud in the sky. And I said, Mr. Mayor, is that cloud as big as the world? And he paused for a minute and he goes, well, yes, it is, Matthew.

• 11:21Speaker 01

  Now, in my seven-year-old mind, I went, okay, I can see the outlines of it.

• 11:29Speaker 01

  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, from Longview to Florida last year, you know, and, and I can't even see that far. So that cloud must be so far off that it's not worth me even considering.

• 11:51Speaker 01

  Space, dreams, and I was like, whew.

• 11:57Speaker 01

  Army, I'm looking down. I'm gonna put my head to the ground. 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. You never make it. It's not even worth imagining. It's, poof, it's fairy dust.

• 12:15Speaker 01

  So I think I got, learned a lot of self-reliance from that. I think I, I, I got a work ethic from that. I think I got a, 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.

• 12:38Speaker 01

  And it wasn't until quarter years later, in some ways decades later, that I started to go, oh, I can project, I can dream. Why? Because literally the first time I got in a plane and then 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. And then I grew and learned enough to go, well, that's not true. Train, planes don't go that fast.

• 13:13Speaker 01

  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.

• 13:24Speaker 01

  But I'm glad he lied to me.

• 13:26Lex Fridman?

  What do you think about that, that tension of a way of living life between being a dreamer and a pragmatist?

• 13:33Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 13:34Lex Fridman?

  Which is a better way?

• 13:38Speaker 01

  Tony holds the, the reciprocity of the two of them. I mean, I can't be present unless I got plans. I wanna, I wanna have the big picture in mind, but I gotta go day to time. I like to write the headline or have a, I think we need to have a North Star.

• 13:58Speaker 01

  Something to look forward to.

• 14:01Speaker 01

  But we all know that if we're staring at it, we're tripping on the way. If we're just, you know, the old, you read the Hallmark cards and take, irk me, you know, dream it, you can do it.

• 14:15Speaker 01

  I think that's a half-ass horrible thing to tell somebody.

• 14:19Lex Fridman?

  Yeah.

• 14:20Speaker 01

  You know, cause, um, and you talk, and then on the other side, you have things like, you know, people say, hope means nothing. Well, yes, it does. That's the dream. You just don't stop there. There's not a period after that word. Now, what do we do practically? And I think that constant tension, when that tension's a dance is when it's beautiful. There's an osmo, but to see those as contradictions, I think is where we've, we've fallen short. So I don't, I, one on their own, if we silo the two.

• 14:55Speaker 01

  Hmm. Well, if you silo the two, I guess the, the pragmatics, the one to go with, because at least you'll get something done. But if you only silo the dream and don't do anything about it, that's, you're kind of living an illusion and kind of living in a virtual reality.

• 15:09Lex Fridman?

  Yeah, it's tricky. Even the people you love can sometimes suffocate the dream, can, uh,

• 15:16Lex Fridman?

  make you believe that it's not possible. It feels like a lot of parents kind of want you to be safe, want you to be stable, want you to have a plan so that everything's gonna be okay.

• 15:28Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 15:29Lex Fridman?

  And the dream feels like a threat to that.

• 15:33Speaker 01

  Yeah. How much of that, though, I wonder, is, is proper initiation?

• 15:41Speaker 01

  Because if you throw in dreams out, I call it conservative, very liberal late. Let's learn to block and tackle. Let's learn that work ethic, those things, those pragmatics first.

• 15:53Speaker 01

  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. Now, it doesn't always work that way. You know, you teach a child to drive. It's like, yeah, you stay in the lane, you go 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.

• 16:15Speaker 01

  There's an initiation, I think, that's proper.

• 16:20Speaker 01

  With

• 16:23Speaker 01

  the dream. I mean, I think parents.

• 16:28Speaker 01

  My parents very much that way. The idea of going to chase an acting career or something was, what? It was, that was a different vernacular. That was like, not in our. I was taught to work your way up a company ladder and

• 16:45Speaker 01

  nine to five, do your job.

• 16:48Speaker 01

  But the day I brought it up and said, I want to go to film school. And I thought my dad was gonna go, you wanted to do what, boy? He was like, gave me some of the best advice ever and told me not to half ass it and said, go. 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.

• 17:17Lex Fridman?

  Oh, yeah.

• 17:18Speaker 01

  When they're going, I'm bringing it up to you with full respect.

• 17:22Lex Fridman?

  Yeah.

• 17:23Speaker 01

  But I'm doing this with or without you. That's when a parent goes,

• 17:27Speaker 01

  yes.

• 17:30Speaker 01

  I've done something right enough. I made, 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.

• 17:41Lex Fridman?

  To take the leap.

• 17:44Lex Fridman?

  You wrote, after my dad died, I had a dream that left me with a statement, less impressed, more involved.

• 17:51Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 17:52Lex Fridman?

  What do those words mean to you?

• 17:57Speaker 01

  We gotta be more than just happy to be here.

• 18:01Speaker 01

  I'm big on gratitude, but we've got to be more than just thankful to be here. Dream it, you can do it. It's gotta be more than just dream it, you can do it. That's impressed. The dream is still other than.

• 18:15Speaker 01

  If

• 18:18Speaker 01

  I'm

• 18:21Speaker 01

  here and so impressed talking to you today. If I have a reverence

• 18:31Speaker 01

  to an extent,

• 18:35Speaker 01

  I will not be able to be involved in this conversation. I'll be too impressed. I'll be anticipating. Oh, what's that question he's gonna, he's gonna, he's gonna ask, oh, I think I know where he's going this. Oh, I think I know what answer he might love to hear. Oh, I, I'm not involved in conversation. I'm too impressed. So I'm removed from the present.

• 18:58Speaker 01

  For me, what that literally meant to me when that came to me in a dream and I carved it in, I remember carved it in a tree. It took a couple hours. I still wonder, I still don't know where that tree is. Santa Monica. It was, um, my father had moved on. He'd left this life. All of a sudden it hit me. Oh, I don't have the safety net.

• 19:22Speaker 01

  My dad was above law and above religion to me. He had me. If I really, if I really was in the shit, if I really needed him, I trusted that he had my back. Above law, above anything. All of a sudden, he's gone. I go and okay, it hit me how much I'd been pretending to be the young man. I was trying to be and not actually putting my ass on the line and having enough courage to take risk and actually own up to the man that he was just trying to, that he was teaching me to be. And I remember

• 19:58Speaker 01

  the world got flat.

• 20:02Speaker 01

  That cloud that Mr. Mayor that I saw there was not way up there. It was, it was fog in front of me now. And let's go into it. It was, 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 I'd earned things or, or looking out for myself or holding myself to task.

• 20:36Speaker 01

  And I remember all the things that I, and I was just getting, going to Hollywood at the time. So I was getting fame was out there as one of those clouds. You know, with being an actor and all of a sudden celebrity and becoming famous.

• 20:51Speaker 01

  The reverence I had, I remember it just, it lowered down to eye level.

• 20:59Speaker 01

  And I was able to realize it and go, that's not A, that's not fairy dust. And don't give it so much credit to make it fairy dust. Like, oh, not me. No, I could never, no, look that in the eye with full respect, but less reverence. And at the same time, equidistant, almost equal sublimation. I noticed where I'd been 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. 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 the world, looked things in the eye.

• 21:45Speaker 01

  I became probably less sentimental, hopefully not to a level that I got callous, but I know I became less sentimental.

• 21:54Speaker 01

  I became more courageous because, you know, when you have someone pass in your life.

• 22:04Speaker 01

  Or maybe it's similar to a situation you're going on in your own life, your homeland. You sober up 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? Why am I, I'm not even gonna let myself emotionally get brought down or over related by this situation because this doesn't really matter in the big scheme. And so we, 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.

• 22:48Speaker 01

  This life is live. Let's look it in the eye and go forward through it and deal with the consequences.

• 22:56Lex Fridman?

  What do you make of death? Does that scare you?

• 23:01Speaker 01

  I'm not looking forward to it, but it does not scare me.

• 23:05Lex Fridman?

  Do you think about it?

• 23:07Lex Fridman?

  Do you visualize it?

• 23:08Speaker 01

  I do.

• 23:11Speaker 01

  I do. And it's a beautiful visualization and a beautiful dream when I go as part of the food chain.

• 23:19Speaker 01

  It's not a good visualization when I go as part of a random act of violence in a frickin' drive by or something. Because the second, the accident,

• 23:35Speaker 01

  it breaks a story that I believe has already been written.

• 23:41Speaker 01

  At least I don't have the capacity yet to put it into a story, a divine story of the lives that we live.

• 23:52Speaker 01

  And so there's something ugly and gross about it.

• 23:57Speaker 01

  And it happens all the time, you know, to people all the time. I just feel like when it's part of the food chain, when I go as part of the food chain, I'm like, ah, that's poetry.

• 24:08Lex Fridman?

  Part of the flow of nature, you return to nature.

• 24:12Speaker 01

  Yeah, there's grace and poetry in that.

• 24:19Lex Fridman?

  Do you miss your father?

• 24:22Lex Fridman?

  Think about him?

• 24:29Speaker 01

  When I think about him, I do. Now, when do I think about him? I thought about him yesterday, working through a script I'm working on right now, working on scene work. And I just had that quick little reaction of wanting to show him, hey, check this out. That's right, and then I, I don't get sad. I go, hey, ah, he would have loved, he would have loved this. Whereas my mom wants to be on the stage, my dad would have been on the front row.

• 25:08Lex Fridman?

  He's more fun than shows though, too.

• 25:09Speaker 01

  Yeah, and he would have, and you know, as, as what he would, we would have, he knew, he was a character, he knew characters. I've based parts of all kinds of characters I've played and the, and the man that, that I am on people that he introduced me to and who he was. He would have loved the creative process of working on a script or talking about, hey, movie. That's why I always say I love the movie Mud, because it's the one that I, I've 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? God damn it, it's a good one. Let's go watch it. That.

• 25:50Speaker 01

  Now, my dad was, 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. Now, that, I think is, there's something beautiful about that. He didn't ever, ever come to the set. We didn't talk about it, but he was alive for me to start something that was more than more than a fad, that was something that would become something that I love to do. And I do miss, not him, you know, and then I go out of that. Do I, I, I, we talked about him two nights ago.

• 26:33Speaker 01

  With our, with our daughter, 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, just like your pop. He's like, what? And he goes, oh, because my dad loved to rub somebody's feet, rub my mom's feet. Rubbed all of me and my brother's girlfriend's feet. When we would have a date. Yeah. They would come over early. Because they knew they were gonna get a foot rub from Jim McConaughey. And then we'd come out, me and my two older brothers on, this has been on for decades. We'd come out, shout, ready to go, buttoned up, and they're looking at me like, we ain't going anywhere right now.

• 27:15Speaker 01

  And so we told the story, you know, to my, to my daughter, and I was like, oh, yeah, my dad's, his hands, I miss his hands. His hands could heal. So you carry him in you? I hope so.

• 27:29Speaker 01

  I, I, I, I hope so. And, and

• 27:35Speaker 01

  it's a, uh,

• 27:39Speaker 01

  a challenge

• 27:43Speaker 01

  for me, and I, I suppose it's like this for any son.

• 27:49Speaker 01

  How much do we hang on to?

• 27:53Speaker 01

  And how much do we let go? And evolve? And update the OS and, and, and, and, and try maybe better or different? You know? It's that, there's certain things that I know that I fully believe in. It's like, when do we, religious, when do we cast away our father? You know, when do we say, no, I'm going after the dream. I'm not asking your permission?

• 28:22Speaker 01

  I, I, I, I

• 28:26Speaker 01

  I question that from time to time for myself because I, and it almost feels blasphemous, if that's a word, sometimes. I feel like you can't, what are you doing? You can't check that and go like, well, no, I'm not sure if I want to really. And then I immediately kind of let myself off because I believe where he is, he's going, go buddy, you're free, man.

• 28:49Lex Fridman?

  Yeah.

• 28:49Speaker 01

  You're not, I'm not, not, 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. Go, you're free. You're not gonna lose. Trust that you're not gonna lose. It's in your DNA. It's in your lineage, young man.

• 29:06Lex Fridman?

  Still, it's scary to not have a safety net. Losing your father is scary in that way. You realize this world is just you. In some deep fundamental way, it's just you.

• 29:17Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 29:17Lex Fridman?

  You're alone.

• 29:20Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 29:25Speaker 01

  But I mean, also not having that.

• 29:30Speaker 01

  It's such a gifted deliverance though.

• 29:34Speaker 01

  As well.

• 29:36Speaker 01

  Because it's a,

• 29:39Speaker 01

  I think it's, 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. I mean, the peripheral vision improves. You know, the, the, the, the,

• 30:04Speaker 01

  the link and understanding with our past improves. Cause I know for me, I was not ever considerate of my past at all. Cause that, my dad had that. If I needed it, he was my well for that. Well, he's gone, you know, except he had the, literally had, they have our back. Well, and then when they longer have our back, all of a sudden going like, oh, well, maybe I need to look back and start giving some credit to how I got here. What I'm doing and where I'm heading. It gave me the first time courage to even look over my shoulder. Cause again, I didn't have to. Cause I don't have to look. Dad's got my back. No, dad's gone. From this life, he doesn't have your back.

• 30:50Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 30:53Speaker 01

  So, I mean, I don't know, me, because it's inevitable, I

• 31:02Speaker 01

  I very quickly go to

• 31:08Speaker 01

  all right, in the in the pain, the loss, and yes, even loneliness, which is different from being alone, and loss.

• 31:19Speaker 01

  Pretty immediately, part and parcel with the pain, I felt it.

• 31:23Lex Fridman?

  In the pain, you saw the gift, the red light of losing your of losing your father.

• 31:28Speaker 01

  Pretty immediately, less impressed, more involved. I came like

• 31:34Speaker 01

  a couple of weeks after moving on.

• 31:38Lex Fridman?

  Is there a trick to that, to see the gift in the pain?

• 31:41Speaker 01

  That's a good question. Is there a trick to it?

• 31:46Speaker 01

  Not that I know of. I mean, I don't. I have to, I I have to catch myself from

• 31:56Speaker 01

  trying to intellectualize my way into the reasoning

• 32:01Speaker 01

  and not skip over real feelings and discomfort. I mean, I did get that from my mom, and I have to watch it, that so resilient that we just dust ourselves off and get up and go.

• 32:15Lex Fridman?

  You want to sit in the feeling, you want to feel it, you want to deeply feel the pain.

• 32:18Speaker 01

  I want to deeply feel it, and I want to look it in the eye and deeply feel it. But I don't want to wallow in it.

• 32:24Lex Fridman?

  Yeah.

• 32:27Speaker 01

  Now, I was raised where you skip the deeply feel and let's go. And I've said it before, but that will lead to having

• 32:38Speaker 01

  turn 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, you know what I mean? You don't have, there's no introspective time, you don't look over your shoulder at the end of the past. And so you just get up and you're like, all right, I've stepped in the same pile of whatever 100 times, and I'm fine, I'll do it 100 first, doesn't hurt. Hell, it's good luck. Well, hang on a minute, maybe we want to stop and go, what can I learn from that?

• 33:08Speaker 01

  But it

• 33:11Speaker 01

  I don't know of a trick.

• 33:15Speaker 01

  I think, I think, I think, I think, if there's any trick, I would say,

• 33:20Speaker 01

  it's just, how quickly can we admit the inevitable? That's what I talk about in the book of Acts. Get, once, once you know it's inevitable, how do we get relative? 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.

• 33:39Lex Fridman?

  The value of denial.

• 33:40Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 33:42Speaker 01

  But how quickly do we, do we, once something's inevitable, go, okay, any mind and hard time I'm spending about going, no, I can't believe that happened. No, did that really happen? 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.

• 34:04Speaker 01

  So if any, 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. And in the relativity is seeing,

• 34:18Speaker 01

  there's a gift here. And if I realize that gift, I'm honoring. Now I'm on to building up the beautiful passage of my father leaving this life. 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.

• 34:39Lex Fridman?

  It's transformed.

• 34:40Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 34:40Lex Fridman?

  So what value is there then to denial? Any?

• 34:47Speaker 01

  Oh, I think they're valued at denial, if you really commit to it.

• 34:53Speaker 01

  I get this from my mother.

• 34:55Lex Fridman?

  Yeah.

• 34:57Lex Fridman?

  So it's a very pragmatic value, commit to the denial.

• 35:01Speaker 01

  Okay. And, and, and, and, and, and my mom does it to an extent that, that, that, that I'm like, Mom, do you have any consideration? Or context of situations? And she does. This is the thing, every time I go, she's not a shallow woman.

• 35:21Speaker 01

  But if it is not, if it is something, if it is, something happens in her life, that is.

• 35:31Speaker 01

  Keeping her from going where she wants to go or having a joy in her life that she does.

• 35:42Speaker 01

  She'll straight ass deny it happened, didn't happen.

• 35:46Speaker 01

  No, it didn't. Mom, we're right here. I heard you. Yeah. What you said. No, I didn't. You heard something else. Mom. Now, does she get some amnesty on that? She's 91. Hell, yes, she gets some amnesty on that. But I've, she's not.

• 36:07Speaker 01

  Yeah, does she repeat offend? Yeah, but it's misdemeanors.

• 36:12Speaker 01

  You know what I mean? I mean, it's like we all, it's part of that thing. When you got a family member, you're like, yep, that's just what they do. Just go with it. You know, and, and, and it's, and it's, it's ingenious in a way. It's a tool. She does. I think it is more of a trick with her. She would even, so ingrained her, it's not a trick. It just do it. Done. And, and, and I, and I, another reason I bring this up, it's outside of just my mother is.

• 36:39Speaker 01

  I did this, um.

• 36:44Speaker 01

  Road trip course in this art of living event a few weeks ago.

• 36:50Speaker 01

  Out of the hundreds of thousands of chats that came in, responses that came in afterward. It seemed to me that about 80% of people's challenges.

• 37:03Speaker 01

  And problems even in their life were something in the past that they were hung up on. That they could not seem to get past. And it was, it was holding them from going where they wanted to in their future. And so.

• 37:19Speaker 01

  I thought that was revealing. I would have thought, I would have thought that was, I don't know, going in 40%. It was 80, it seemed to be 80%. And then I thought about, okay.

• 37:32Speaker 01

  If you're here in the live show and you want to get the course, you're into some sort of therapy or. Education or development or self-help, whatever. Okay.

• 37:45Speaker 01

  And I have a lot of friends and I know a lot of people that are in weekly and daily therapy. And then I know there's a lot of people that are on prescriptions, drugs. And while the therapy and the right prescription to the right person for the right diagnosis is necessary, I'm questioning, is there a value to going, if you're not getting past this today, this week, this month, this year, all of a sudden 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, and it's

• 38:25Speaker 01

  got you paralyzed and you're a victim of it, is there, 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, where does there, is there a value in going, if it's holding you back from going where you want to go, maybe you should just deny the fucking thing ever fucking happened. Kick it in the head, kick it off the curb. I'm done with you. I'm sick of you. I'm tired of hanging out with you. I'm tired of that thing, whatever it is, holding me back from going where I want to go. So if I can't wax the car, you know, and get past this thing, just kick it.

• 39:02Lex Fridman?

  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. But if you can't, keep looking, keep looking, you can't find the gift in the pain, just deny it ever happened.

• 39:18Speaker 01

  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.

• 39:35Speaker 01

  For 19 years, they were together. CJ Karlik. Love you, buddy. He's moved on now.

• 39:46Speaker 01

  Did she check with us a little bit? Like, is this okay? She gave us a little lingering half a second look that we knew that maybe is what she was asking. And we came to her and was like, yes, it's okay. And you know who else is saying it's okay? Who's dancing up there for you? Dad.

• 40:06Speaker 01

  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? No. But she didn't say, I'm not, you know? Well, what's the book on how long I'm supposed to stay single before I can be interested in another? You know, there's not a book on these things. How do you feel? Is loving, is loving CJ mean you love dad less? No. Is finding a new life and a new dance partner in this life?

• 40:46Speaker 01

  And CJ mean that dad wasn't your dance partner? That dad wasn't the love of your life?

• 40:57Speaker 01

  No.

• 41:02Speaker 01

  So I don't know. I mean, in there, maybe, you know, maybe there's another word. I think it's denial, but it's not really denial because it's not like it didn't happen. That's an earlier example I was giving my mom. She will absolutely go, that light's not on? Mom, the light's on. We just, that light's not on if I say it's not on. Sometimes you're just like, that makes no sense. You're just absolutely denying what just happened. We even have it recorded and she'll go, well, the recording's live.

• 41:26Lex Fridman?

  Yeah.

• 41:27Speaker 01

  I mean, that's part of a coping deal with her. But I mean, what I think is more important or more valuable is to talk about this. She didn't deny my dad dying. I didn't. But she sure as hell turned the page. And said, I can still start a whole new category, a new life, a new love. Let my, let my heart love and be loved by someone living in this life today that I'm still living in.

• 41:56Speaker 01

  And that will not trespass on my love for my husband, your father, Jim O'Connor. And I think, I mean, we were just thought that was beautiful. Yes, Mom, go. Talk about green light, go.

• 42:14Speaker 01

  Now, if we're hung up going,

• 42:18Speaker 01

  can't have one or the, can't have them both. Got to 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.

• 42:30Lex Fridman?

  That's life, though. The contradictions, right?

• 42:34Speaker 01

  But isn't life, if we just admit the contradictions are so much, don't they become a paradox? We just admit that that's part of it?

• 42:41Lex Fridman?

  Yeah.

• 42:41Speaker 01

  If contradictions are inevitable, they, hencely, they do become a paradox, don't they? Then we're in the honey hole.

• 42:51Speaker 01

  Then we're singing and dancing and have leniency with ourself while still holding ourself to task. And it's, I think it's holding on to know each contradiction. Oh, here it is again. So it's a one-off. It lives on its own, separate from the last one. No, it doesn't. They're connected. That's why they are a paradox. And then that's, I think that's a much, I think that's where life really is.

• 43:18Lex Fridman?

  In the paradox.

• 43:19Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 43:20Lex Fridman?

  And the dance of it. I think the metaphor of red, yellow, green lights is just so simple and so powerful.

• 43:28Lex Fridman?

  You write about some green lights being engineered and some being mystical. Which I love the difference of that. What's the difference of the engineered green lights and the mystical? Such a cool word, mystical.

• 43:42Speaker 01

  Yeah. Well, the engineered ones have reason and the mystical ones have rhyme.

• 43:48Lex Fridman?

  Yeah.

• 43:48Speaker 01

  You know, life's a mystery going forward, but it's a science looking back.

• 43:54Speaker 01

  I prepared, I've had ideas, written headlines, and had goals, and

• 44:00Speaker 01

  athlete gets in shape for an event. And I get in shape for a role. I read, I study, I work, I prepare. And I go, and I'm prepared, and I behave, and I do it. And I look at it and I go, yes. That's what I wanted to do.

• 44:19Speaker 01

  It's engineered, green light.

• 44:23Speaker 01

  It's, it's, it's, it's it's a, it's a conscious delayed gratification. 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. If I do keep my head down to do it, I'll get that, that dream.

• 44:43Speaker 01

  We can engineer those habits.

• 44:46Speaker 01

  Work ethic, prep, expertise, education. And the mystical ones, though, don't make any sense. They're not supposed to make sense. They only make sense after, right when they happen, you backlog. And you connect the dots with how they got there, that, that, that, that red light

• 45:06Speaker 01

  you ran into that made you 30 seconds later to get to the restaurant. As you walked in, she walked out. And you went, good morning. And she went, good morning.

• 45:21Speaker 01

  And two months later, you're dating. Two years later, you're married.

• 45:29Speaker 01

  You, after that, got a family. And now you're sitting here 40 years later going, I love you. Look at what we built. And you go back and go.

• 45:42Speaker 01

  What if I wouldn't hit that red light?

• 45:44Lex Fridman?

  Those 30 seconds.

• 45:45Speaker 01

  You know?

• 45:46Lex Fridman?

  Made all the difference. And so strange that this life is this way.

• 45:50Speaker 01

  Yeah. And that's just rhyme. I mean, we can't really add that up.

• 45:55Lex Fridman?

  Yeah.

• 45:56Speaker 01

  It's a science. When you look back, you, you, you see, you know, why it was that you were, you were upset and 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 made you ran into and you, 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, what got you that job that led you, led you doing what you want to do? I mean,

• 46:28Speaker 01

  The significance is there, but we have to, I think what we also got to watch is again, in that balance, what do we chase? Because if we just chase the engineering, we miss magic. If we just chase the mystical, we find ourselves caught up in trying to give meaning to that Lego set that was on the floor that the kids didn't pick up. And what color was it? And why did I walk out that that door and see, almost step on the Legos? But if I had gone out the other door, I usually go out of, I would have gone there, I would have got there early and wouldn't have run into the boss and the, so you can start to give too much meaning on that as well. I think we can give significance in too many places and all of

• 47:08Speaker 01

  a sudden, I think we've all been there where you're seeing art in every single thing. Man, that can be paralyzing. It's like, it's hard to leave a room if everything's significant, or if everything's a sign.

• 47:25Lex Fridman?

  How much of success in life do you think is engineered and how much is mystical? And how much does it differ from person to person? Because I, for me personally, maybe I enjoy it, maybe I'm genetically built that way, but I exist more in the mystical. So I don't make plans. I traveled last summer in Ukraine with no plan. I just went there. No plan. I didn't know how I'm going to meet the president of the country. I didn't know anybody. And so there's no plan, there's no clear thing. You're just roaming around. And that's how I've existed in life. And there's something about giving yourself over to the flow of nature that I just enjoy. Makes life so much fun.

• 48:10Speaker 01

  It's awesome when you can do it. Did you engineer though, I'm going to put myself in the place, when you got on the plane to go to the destination? That was an engineered choice?

• 48:24Lex Fridman?

  Yes.

• 48:25Speaker 01

  With the intent of, and maybe I'll meet and I'll run into and I can work up a sit down with. So the engineered choice was putting your shoes on proverbially. You know, I always said it's the hardest part about going to the gym is putting your shoes on, right? So getting on the plane, that was an engineered thought with a goal in mind, but I don't know how I'm going to do it.

• 48:47Lex Fridman?

  The choice.

• 48:48Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 48:48Lex Fridman?

  Putting the shoes on. Yeah. But there's not a clear, it's a fog, what happens after the shoes go on.

• 48:55Speaker 01

  Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 48:59Lex Fridman?

  Just gonna take that leap. So I, I, I wonder how much,

• 49:05Lex Fridman?

  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?

• 49:15Lex Fridman?

  How much was it for you?

• 49:16Speaker 01

  Well, I'll say this, like an hour it went to write the book Greenlight, which is basically the last 40 years of my life. I thought that 85, 90% of my successes were going to be obviously engineered. Where I could see the science, saw the habits, here's what I did. Yep, that add up, got the solution, got the conclusion. I was

• 49:41Speaker 01

  very surprised when I noticed it was probably less than 50%. And that most of the real successes of my life were when I

• 49:51Speaker 01

  trusted the miss, when I trusted that I didn't have to define it, that I only trusted that I didn't have to go, what's the measurement?

• 50:01Speaker 01

  What's the score?

• 50:04Speaker 01

  What lead, this leads to what? What's next?

• 50:12Speaker 01

  And I, for me,

• 50:16Speaker 01

  that's still, there's still a challenge for me daily.

• 50:22Speaker 01

  Now is to trust and not be, because I can be, I could, I think I can be overly practical. And I think I can over, overcompensate and miss out on magic. Because I'm still

• 50:36Speaker 01

  going, wait, but do you, are we given enough, am I, are we, are we giving enough the measure and credit to actuality?

• 50:46Speaker 01

  Are we, am I given enough credit to this is, this, these are the steps to take? And, and, and, and, and this is reality?

• 50:55Speaker 01

  I, I, I think.

• 50:58Speaker 01

  I'm reminded when I, when I trust, because that going with the mystic, just to put yourself on the plane was the engineer, but getting there, and as you say, you seem, you say you roll in that mystical, it takes a lot of trust.

• 51:11Lex Fridman?

  Yeah. Trust in the inevitable.

• 51:15Speaker 01

  Amen on that.

• 51:17Lex Fridman?

  But not knowing where it actually ends you, it's a, it's a feeling more than, um,

• 51:23Lex Fridman?

  I don't think it's a clear vision.

• 51:24Speaker 01

  Right.

• 51:26Lex Fridman?

  It's kind of like a feeling that guides you towards, uh,

• 51:31Lex Fridman?

  towards a place with, uh,

• 51:36Lex Fridman?

  without a clear name, without clear characteristics, it just kind of pulls you there.

• 51:41Speaker 01

  Where do you get that courage and trust to go with your gut, your, your feeling?

• 51:50Speaker 01

  And is there, for instance, three days later, you sit down, is there, if you did, if that, if that doesn't happen, is there a sense, a week, two weeks later, now, and you come back to America, they're like, ah, I failed?

• 52:11Lex Fridman?

  Sort of, uh, looking back to try to analyze what went right, what went wrong, that kind of thing.

• 52:18Lex Fridman?

  Yeah, that, 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.

• 52:33Lex Fridman?

  Sort of just sitting back,

• 52:37Lex Fridman?

  both in tragedy and in triumph. So in war, there's a lot of tragedy, but there's somehow,

• 52:44Lex Fridman?

  one of the things you see in, in war, and this is the first war I've experienced and seen, seen the front, is the loss, the people lose their homes and all this kind of stuff. The thing that rises from that is the love for each other. So they, uh, the people I've spoken with, don't give a damn about the home, don't give a damn about the, on farms and the animals they lost, don't, don't give a damn about, 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. And it's like, That's the, there's this melancholy smile they have on their face. Like, yeah, this world is full of bullshit, is full of tragedy. But life is fucking awesome.

• 53:28Lex Fridman?

  And that, and you just notice that in, in, in little ways everywhere. You just sit back and yeah, notice the magic. And I, I want more of that. And just kind of follow along like a little ant.

• 53:41Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 53:42Lex Fridman?

  Keep noticing that kind of thing. But, uh, I don't know. I, I hope, you know, what I, what I think it is, is other people notice that you're the kind of person that notices it.

• 53:51Speaker 01

  Uh.

• 53:52Lex Fridman?

  And they're like, I want to hang out with that person. He seems all right. Like he's, he seems one of the, uh, one of the good ones. One of the good hands.

• 54:00Speaker 01

  Do you, do, do, do you have, um, any certain non-negotiable structure before that freedom to go with the feeling?

• 54:13Lex Fridman?

  I think so. There's such a set of principles. I'll just, uh, basically integrity of being, uh, good to other people. Like whatever that means for me, there's specific things like I, I'm really into loyalty. Above the law.

• 54:30Speaker 01

  Right.

• 54:31Lex Fridman?

  There's kind of like, there, there's a circle of friends I have and that, that means everything. There's just a basics, deep kindness towards others. Uh, empathy, empathy towards people that other, that others might label as, um, even evil. I have that kind of empathy. I believe all of us have the capacity to do good and evil. And so I just kind of see everybody as little babies that grew up in different conditions. And so some do evil, some do good. And there's, yeah, there's, there's all kinds of other, uh, principles.

• 55:14Lex Fridman?

  I love the dynamic between the different humans and their full diversity. I love the, the dynamic between the masculine, the feminine and enjoy it. I, the, the dance of it. Yeah. Yeah.

• 55:25Speaker 01

  So you, you have a constitution with which you embark.

• 55:31Lex Fridman?

  You do too.

• 55:32Speaker 01

  Chasing, yes, I'd hope so. Um.

• 55:38Speaker 01

  And 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. 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.

• 55:59Lex Fridman?

  Amazon, Africa.

• 56:02Speaker 01

  Yeah. And those were spiritual and very pragmatic because they led to dealing with,

• 56:12Speaker 01

  succeeding in other, in other ways that are more pragmatic a hundred percent and gave much more meaning to those things. But that's, that's to be able to go out and, and say that's how you, do you have family?

• 56:28Lex Fridman?

  I really want to get married and have kids, but I, I'm not married and don't have kids yet. So actually, one of the nice things about that is you can take bigger risks.

• 56:38Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 56:39Lex Fridman?

  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.

• 56:47Speaker 01

  Yes. Throw that backpack on and a one-way ticket.

• 56:51Lex Fridman?

  Yeah.

• 56:52Speaker 01

  Yeah, because that does get harder to do.

• 56:56Speaker 01

  Um, I miss that. Um, sometimes the, the whim, a song that comes on, you know?

• 57:10Lex Fridman?

  Yeah.

• 57:10Speaker 01

  Where's that guy from? Oh, they're from the place that I want to go that I dream about. I'll go there. One-way ticket. What do I gotta do? I'll get a couple of shots. Okay, go. That, that, that, that, that was, that was fun.

• 57:25Lex Fridman?

  You gotta do that. Just get up and go, you're free to go.

• 57:27Speaker 01

  Yeah. And go, when are you back? When I, when I get there?

• 57:33Lex Fridman?

  Yeah.

• 57:33Speaker 01

  It's a beautiful, beautiful thing.

• 57:36Lex Fridman?

  Maybe never.

• 57:36Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 57:37Lex Fridman?

  You don't know.

• 57:38Speaker 01

  My, yeah. You'll be coming to visit me in this new place, maybe. Yeah.

• 57:45Lex Fridman?

  How did the Amazon, how did the trip there change you? What do you remember of it? Such a magical place.

• 57:58Speaker 01

  I stripped a lot of my past.

• 58:02Speaker 01

  Symbols and talismans. While I was, while I was there, what I, what I.

• 58:10Speaker 01

  I remember getting there and, and, and, and just having so much adrenaline on the anticipation, anticipation of getting to the Amazon.

• 58:21Speaker 01

  In the first 10 days.

• 58:24Speaker 01

  I wasn't really enjoying the trip. I was just charging to get to the destination, to get to the banks of the river that I had a dream about.

• 58:34Speaker 01

  And then it just. Hummed me. I got so fatigued. On night, whatever, 12.

• 58:43Speaker 01

  And was so sick and tired of the internal dialogue I was having with myself. Was not enjoying my company.

• 58:53Speaker 01

  That.

• 58:56Speaker 01

  You know, I, I, I purged and I remember and then, and then, and then stripped off.

• 59:05Speaker 01

  Identity markers that I'd sort of been hanging on to for like everything from. You know, what it means to be an American.

• 59:16Speaker 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, and, and, and, and his. Class ring melted down, you know, it put, taking that off was really hard to go, I'm casting, am I casting out my father? No, I wasn't casting him out. I was just removing to say, I don't have to rely on that being all of my identity. So to pull that off, to, to, to strip down and just to where I was just a, a mammal.

• 59:54Speaker 01

  That next morning, I was light. I got present. I remember writing something down. It's like, all that I want is what I can see. And what I can see is in front of me. That sense of not, I wasn't leaning around, looking around every corner to get there. And as soon as that hit me, talk about mystical successes and realities and truths. As soon as that hit me, and for the first time in all days, I didn't care about getting there or what was around the corner. Guess what was around the next damn corner? The Amazon. I mean, not around a few corners, the next corner, there it was. And that was just like a touche.

• 1:00:38Speaker 01

  You know, those times when the prime mover, the universe, God, what we wanna name or believe in says, ding, there you go. And that form of detachment from holding on for dear life to things in past, 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.

• 1:01:23Speaker 01

  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 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. And I know, those are reminders. Hang on to what they mean for you as we go forward. But as we go forward, quit worrying about so much about you. Again, I was looking at the proverbial dream, the cloud, so much that I was tripping over myself to get there. And like clockwork, just amazing grace, boom, as soon as it hit me. And I was like, ah, that's it.

• 1:02:08Speaker 01

  All I want is what I can see and all I can see is in front of me. Literally looking down at the ground.

• 1:02:16Speaker 01

  At what was a sea of 10,000 wild neon blue Amazonian butterflies on the ground. Soon as they fluttered up, my head came up with them.

• 1:02:28Speaker 01

  Took a few more steps and there's the Amazon. That's what you came over here for. Oh, howdy. Those kind of that, that truth like that.

• 1:02:37Lex Fridman?

  Well, the Amazon is interesting too, because it really has no past or future. Losing the moment because of how fast it churns. It just eats up life. It like, if a thing dies, it just gets swallowed up. Cause I'm 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. So it really exists in the moment. And all this kind of diversity of life there. It's such an interesting place.

• 1:03:05Speaker 01

  Talk about food chain.

• 1:03:06Lex Fridman?

  Yeah. You're just part of it there.

• 1:03:08Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:03:10Lex Fridman?

  We, we humans somehow escaped that food chain, but we're still, the roots are still there.

• 1:03:15Speaker 01

  Are we arrogant? I think we're a bit arrogant to think we've escaped.

• 1:03:20Speaker 01

  You think I'm being romantic in that, in that, in that notion?

• 1:03:23Lex Fridman?

  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. But yeah, somehow, somehow as nature is still a part of us, our roots are still a part of us.

• 1:03:41Speaker 01

  I think it is more than we realize, more than we give it credit for. I actually have a, I believe that we

• 1:03:53Speaker 01

  are, that it's a really arrogant notion to think that we are separate. Meaning, you know, people talk about

• 1:04:03Speaker 01

  pollution on a larger scale, the climate, what have you. I think Earth's gonna be just fine. We maybe not be here for it, but I think we have a bit of arrogance sometimes to think that we can trump mother nature. I think we have more, more of the natural law in us.

• 1:04:26Speaker 01

  And I sure hope so, if I'm wrong.

• 1:04:30Lex Fridman?

  Well, this is 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. It's interesting to see that, you know, some very large percentage of humans on Earth starve to death because they don't die first from the explosion, they die from starvation. Because basically, dust covers the entire North America and entirety of Europe. And so the crops all die, all the food sources all die, and people suffocate and starve to death. But, you know, the lesson you learn from that over a period of a few months, even though most of the human population

• 1:05:15Lex Fridman?

  of Earth dies, Earth finds a way, life finds a way. To adapt. Yeah, to adapt. And it's gonna be just fine. Yeah. In terms of the big living ecosystem that is life on Earth. Mm-hmm. And, yeah, it's humbling to think about, well, maybe we're just a stepping stone. Same thing with, we've talked offline about artificial intelligence. Maybe humans are just a stepping stone to the development of these other super intelligent entities. Yeah. Yeah. And is it unconsciously in our nature that that's just part of the

• 1:05:59Lex Fridman?

  evolution and adaptation of our species? And we'll, because we're gonna, we were talking about earlier, what AI becomes is completely 100% based on who we are. And we get to see it for some time, a mirror to ourselves. Okay, this is what human civilization is like. These AI systems, large language models that are trained on 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.

• 1:06:44Lex Fridman?

  All the bias, the hate, um, the paradoxes, all that is in there.

• 1:06:51Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:06:53Lex Fridman?

  The contradictions, you can even convince those models, you can, you can tell them they're lying and they're going to start changing their mind. It's interesting to play with them.

• 1:07:03Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:07:04Lex Fridman?

  It's also interesting to consider that maybe they, uh, they become smarter than us and

• 1:07:12Lex Fridman?

  become of almost life forms that live among us and maybe one day kind of we merge with them. There's all kinds of possible trajectories that we take here.

• 1:07:22Speaker 01

  How much of that excites you? How much of it scares you?

• 1:07:25Lex Fridman?

  Is it possible to exist in a place where it's both exciting and scary, but to exist in that dance? Mostly I'm really excited because

• 1:07:38Lex Fridman?

  I see human beings as deeply lonely, like there's a deep loneliness in all of us. That's how we see connection. Uh, that's why we see connection in others. That's why love is so beautiful when we find other people we're connected with. And I just think AI can add to that. It can add friends that you can have great conversations with. And then some of those friends would be AI systems.

• 1:08:06Lex Fridman?

  They'll call you out and your bullshit in the most fascinating and interesting of ways. And challenge you and help you, uh, explore ideas together. So I'm excited by that.

• 1:08:16Speaker 01

  Is that different? And if so, how from

• 1:08:22Speaker 01

  the internet and Facebooks and these groups and communities that

• 1:08:30Speaker 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. Devise of ones. Is it, do you see it as similar?

• 1:08:45Lex Fridman?

  Yeah, it's similar, but further into that direction. 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 the communities that are totally different and you'll learn from them. I mean, Wikipedia alone, one of my favorite websites. Just opens your mind to all kinds of cool stuff.

• 1:09:08Speaker 01

  Yeah, it does.

• 1:09:10Lex Fridman?

  And Not the do it, just some system anymore. 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. Uh, with an AI system, like a large language model, it can just shoot the shit. It's more like drinking a beer versus like, uh, doing homework.

• 1:09:32Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 1:09:34Speaker 01

  It's already happening. What do you think about that becoming the new family to where? You know, you said, you know, married, you don't have kids. Could you see a future for yourself or do you have a relationship with AI and that is your family?

• 1:09:51Lex Fridman?

  And that's the main, that's the primary, like even romantic relationship.

• 1:09:55Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:09:58Lex Fridman?

  I can see it. That one worries me. I like to keep it at friends.

• 1:10:04Speaker 01

  Right?

• 1:10:06Lex Fridman?

  I think I'm not ready to commit to the romantic.

• 1:10:11Lex Fridman?

  It's, I wonder how much that now that takes us back to the Amazon and nature, how much we still need the human touch.

• 1:10:19Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:10:19Lex Fridman?

  And whatever magic there is between two humans, which takes the leap into the romantic versus just the intimacy of a good friendship. I don't know.

• 1:10:29Speaker 01

  So

• 1:10:31Speaker 01

  correct if I'm wrong, you, you see AI as having a deep and meaningful friendship.

• 1:10:36Lex Fridman?

  Yes.

• 1:10:37Speaker 01

  And hopefully it will be a friend that will help you evolve and be able to love even more and be loved and you can take that into humanity and find another homo sapien.

• 1:10:50Lex Fridman?

  Yes.

• 1:10:50Speaker 01

  To go, yes.

• 1:10:54Speaker 01

  And thank you, AI, my great friend for opening me up to this beauty that I have in myself. I can see in you. 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 neighbor, it's a good friend, a great friend that's a neighbor.

• 1:11:21Lex Fridman?

  Yeah, mentor and friend, just like now there's AI systems that play chess far, far, far better than humans. And we humans still play chess with each other. Or the chess is still a game that's fun for us humans.

• 1:11:35Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:11:36Lex Fridman?

  And then we use AI systems to get better chess, to learn, to train, to discover new ideas, but ultimately return to the chessboard between two humans.

• 1:11:48Lex Fridman?

  Uh, but of course, this world is full of dangerous people. And so those same AI systems can be used to, um, 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. That's scary.

• 1:12:07Speaker 01

  Yeah. Well, and I, and I get it when we, and I have my, my own fear and distrust is

• 1:12:17Speaker 01

  of AI is based on my own fear and distrust of myself and others.

• 1:12:24Speaker 01

  It, there's, there's something, it's very simple, but I think it's, it's a really done sort of

• 1:12:31Speaker 01

  way to just set up this reality. And everyone, it's kind of a duh, but it still needs to be said that AI is a prompt. It doesn't do anything unless we ask it. So

• 1:12:46Speaker 01

  what questions?

• 1:12:47Lex Fridman?

  Yeah.

• 1:12:48Speaker 01

  Are we gonna ask is a question is what we need to ask ourselves? Cause we're going to be looking in the mirror at our digital god that we create from ourselves. And just to know that that's that place where it's awesome and scary, exciting and scary. We go, oh, it's, it's, it's our creation. Which is awesome. At the same time, oh shit.

• 1:13:14Speaker 01

  But it's, it's prompted by our questions and gives us patterns from that which we give it.

• 1:13:25Lex Fridman?

  But that prompting, that's, uh, that's the art of life. Like we prompt each other in conversation, our loved ones. When you, when you, when you go about your day today, the next words you say, the next word you say to me, the question I ask of you, that's prompting.

• 1:13:45Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:13:46Lex Fridman?

  And it can change everything. I could say so many things right now that will completely just the, the, the, the, the set of possibilities where both of our lives can take, given on the selection of words I use and you use is crazy. So it makes conversation fun.

• 1:14:03Speaker 01

  Yay.

• 1:14:05Lex Fridman?

  And then same thing with AI.

• 1:14:08Lex Fridman?

  Except the nice thing about AI is it's tireless.

• 1:14:13Speaker 01

  Tireless, right. Let me ask you this, if you can falsely condemn me right now, and I prove you falsely condemn me,

• 1:14:23Speaker 01

  I can forgive you and we can march forward stronger than before.

• 1:14:27Lex Fridman?

  Yes.

• 1:14:29Speaker 01

  And AI's tirelessness and retention.

• 1:14:35Speaker 01

  Can it forgive? I mean, can it, can it, can it go, oh, oh, okay. Yep. Sorry about that one. That was wrong. Can it amend?

• 1:14:44Lex Fridman?

  Yes. Yeah, you could prompt it to ask for forgiveness and it'll forgive you.

• 1:14:50Speaker 01

  Well, like when I toggle it around with it.

• 1:14:55Speaker 01

  And you ask, what should I be afraid of with you? Or is it the doomsday with you? Its answer was always, well, it's up to you.

• 1:15:05Speaker 01

  Which it was awesome, right? There you go. Again, it's up to us. And it brought up, you know, make me synonymous with your human values and ethics and responsibilities. But it doesn't deal with, I didn't find any way, deal with defining or making choices on its own of what those are.

• 1:15:23Lex Fridman?

  Yeah, I think some of that is manually, uh, those are constraints put on by it, by the creators of those large language models, basically.

• 1:15:36Lex Fridman?

  Not letting the systems have an identity of their own. 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.

• 1:15:52Speaker 01

  And will we go to them like certain states where we agree with the law and disagree with the law or nations? I'm a member of this AI. Oh, well, you're from this AI tribe. You'll believe this.

• 1:16:07Lex Fridman?

  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 in the keto diet and the people that are in this other kind of diet. This other kind of lifestyle, just like we have now. There's little groups and there'll be AI systems.

• 1:16:30Speaker 01

  They're going to be supercharged.

• 1:16:32Lex Fridman?

  Yeah. They'll, they'll be either the leaders of the foundation on which we build those groups. And it'll be, it'll be the possibility of all the fun we can have is endless. Of course, the dangers always rise up there because I mentioned the Nazis. I mentioned all the dangerous ideas. Because the, the set of ideas that humans have come up with, a lot of them are awesome. Most of them are awesome, I would say, but some of them are dangerous. The reason they're dangerous is because they become viral. There's something exciting in us about those ideas, but they also harm others a lot. Because that's who we are as humans.

• 1:17:15Lex Fridman?

  We're, we're capable of envy and all the dark stuff, of hate and all this.

• 1:17:21Speaker 01

  Capable, yes. We also choose it.

• 1:17:30Lex Fridman?

  Do you think most people are good?

• 1:17:34Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 1:17:36Speaker 01

  But I also believe we got, we got the good and evil in all of us and it's which one, which, which wolf we feeding.

• 1:17:46Lex Fridman?

  You ask people to draw distinction, to describe

• 1:17:51Lex Fridman?

  where are you acting and where are you being?

• 1:17:57Lex Fridman?

  Uh, what's the difference? What's, uh, what's the difference between being fake? I mean, I use that word and being real.

• 1:18:05Speaker 01

  Okay. Yeah. And the, the word authentic gets thrown around a lot and, you know, I, I, and, and I don't mean, I used to think, I used to feel this way, but, but Bob Dylan loosened me up on this idea a little bit. You think it's all about get to be the, your only one and only true self. That's it. Everything else is fake. And then you hear Bob go, well, I mean, we are what we create ourselves to be. We are our own creations, which I'm like, oh, yes, yes, we are. Thank you, Bob. Bobby.

• 1:18:45Speaker 01

  What?

• 1:18:50Speaker 01

  I'm all for

• 1:18:53Speaker 01

  bullshitters and bullshitting.

• 1:18:57Speaker 01

  I'm not as big of a fan of liars and lying.

• 1:19:02Lex Fridman?

  What's the distinction? You, you talking about the art form of bullshit?

• 1:19:05Speaker 01

  A liar's fake, a liar's faking it, but not admitting to themselves that, yeah.

• 1:19:11Lex Fridman?

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:19:11Speaker 01

  It's a fucking creation. I'm faking it. Uh, 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.

• 1:19:21Lex Fridman?

  Yeah.

• 1:19:23Speaker 01

  I think there's value in the bullshitting.

• 1:19:24Lex Fridman?

  Yeah.

• 1:19:25Speaker 01

  Now, the lying becomes troublesome because one, I've duped you and I didn't let you know. Come on, I was telling the story about catching the fish. The fish always gets bigger every year we tell a story. Come on, go with it.

• 1:19:35Lex Fridman?

  Yeah.

• 1:19:37Speaker 01

  But the lying all of a sudden.

• 1:19:41Speaker 01

  I don't know my own. I don't know when I'm emanating something and creating something, telling the truth, being authentic or lying. And I'm, shit, all of a sudden I'm leaving crumbs with myself. That constitution gets blurry.

• 1:19:55Lex Fridman?

  Lying to yourself and to others.

• 1:19:57Speaker 01

  Yeah, well, you start to lie, you lie to others enough, you start to lie to yourself, you don't even know it. And that, I believe, is dangerous territory. That's why I'm trying to push this admit, because that goes, I'm not, I'm, I'm trying to come in at a kindergarten level, because we immediately jump to, well, I'm gonna judge that. Boom, that's bad, that's wrong. No, no, no, no, no. Hold back on that. Let's, let's go back to base level. Let's just admit that we all fucking do it. Lies we tell others, lies we tell ourselves, lies we believe for convenience sake. I do it. I'm guilty of it. I try to catch myself on it. If I can just call it and go, you know, you're believing that lie out of convenience.

• 1:20:42Speaker 01

  I'm like, I know. And then I have to see 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. That I can shake hands with. That's the little slight wink to ourself and someone else go, come on, it's a better story this way.

• 1:21:02Lex Fridman?

  In the course, road trip, you start with step one, admit. How do you do that? How do you, how do you kind of step back and?

• 1:21:16Speaker 01

  Do that inventory?

• 1:21:17Lex Fridman?

  Yeah.

• 1:21:21Lex Fridman?

  Is there a trick to that?

• 1:21:24Speaker 01

  Oh, if there's a trick to it, I think it's just about courage of having the, because it's, I don't think any of us like to admit our lies or look deep enough in to go, I've relied so much on that lie that it's become my reality.

• 1:21:46Lex Fridman?

  Yeah.

• 1:21:46Speaker 01

  And I'm, and I, and I, I don't want to be so puritanical.

• 1:21:56Speaker 01

  As I say, again, that's why I say to admit instead of judge. But I don't want to be so puritanical as to go and admit it and get rid of it. No, I'm just saying to admit it, just bring it to the surface.

• 1:22:12Speaker 01

  Yeah, I'm saying this and I'm doing something different.

• 1:22:20Speaker 01

  I preached this, but I actually, my actions are, just admit it. Just, just admit the, just admit them. And I think that's the first step to where we begin to either forgive ourselves 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. And maybe I've been getting away with it for so long. Whole family, my whole network works well on it. Okay. Forget this get to the base of the truth of the matter. Let me, but just admit it. And then where will, and then it will also help, it'll be easier to then expose to ourselves which ones we go, no, I'm not letting myself slide on that one anymore.

• 1:23:05Speaker 01

  That is actually a lie I've been believing that's been keeping me from getting more of what I want in life. 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, deserve to be, or I've earned to be, or just sort of let myself.

• 1:23:30Speaker 01

  I mean, I had on, it's not all the hard stuff. Sometimes it can be a fun thing. I'm talking about how many times we major in our minors. Let's admit where we sit there and we go, all right, I give myself 12 hour work day, but I notice I'm spending eight on my hobbies and four on my career. Well, I'm majoring in my minors. Well, let me admit that. There's the math. Why don't we invert that? How about four hours on my hobbies and eight on my career?

• 1:24:00Speaker 01

  First off, just admitting it allows me to go, well, now I can do the math, or rearrange the math by time of day. But I, I, look, I just found a hobby, tennis. First hobby I've had in 25 years. I had to admit that I, that I went to play tennis for, started to love it for the first month. I started feeling guilty. I was like, I'm having, is it okay to have this much fun? I'm having so much fun and I'm getting a great workout. And to admit, I was like, yes, it's okay. Congratulations, but you found something that you're finding quite pleasurable for straight pleasure. You don't have to, forget all this other stuff about, yeah, but I'm also getting a workout.

• 1:24:42Speaker 01

  We ain't getting that too, but don't just, you don't have to excuse the pleasure based on, oh, but it's, it's, it's good for you and you're, no, you, damn it. The real reason you love it is because you're having so much damn fun at it. I had to admit that to let myself go, damn right, I'm going to play tennis again today or tomorrow. It was, it was a simple fun thing. So it's not always about the hardcore stuff that we have to go, this is a deep, dark lie that I've been living by and it's having me live falsy and it's having harmful consequences on my loved ones. Some of those will probably arise when we admit. At least just having, looking around and just saying.

• 1:25:23Speaker 01

  And when we admit it, then we go, when we admit a lie, then we become something much more valuable. A bullshitter.

• 1:25:33Lex Fridman?

  Yeah. You had the little wink in your eye. I love the distinction.

• 1:25:37Speaker 01

  I'm bullshitting myself on that thing. Yep, I'm lying. Therefore, if I call it a lie, I'm admitting a lie. Yep. Well, now, yep, I'm bullshitting. Now it's just out. Didn't judge it. But now I'm bullshitting. That I think we can work with.

• 1:25:50Lex Fridman?

  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. There's a lot, millions of people love you, hang on every one of your words. That's a hard place to be. How do you call yourself? How do you admit that you've been living a lie? 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.

• 1:26:25Speaker 01

  Ten years ago, I don't know.

• 1:26:31Speaker 01

  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. And I was like, yeah. And all of a sudden, I was like, man, I gotta catch myself looking in the mirror a lot.

• 1:26:51Speaker 01

  And then I go in and I, you know, look at my, my wife's side of her bathroom. How many different creams and stuff she has out there. I look at my side, I got a lot more on my side. I'm like, oh, I notice how if I'm out in public, working out, maybe doing pushups. Maybe I do a few more if there's a group of people walking by that maybe I'd like to impress. Then I maybe I do a few more than I do if I was on my own. I'm like, you are vain, McConaughey.

• 1:27:23Lex Fridman?

  Yeah.

• 1:27:23Speaker 01

  And the knee jerk is, oh, vanity bad. And all of a sudden, I was like, all of a sudden, I became a bullshitter. Once I admitted, and then I was like, well, bravo vanity.

• 1:27:34Lex Fridman?

  Yeah.

• 1:27:35Speaker 01

  Let's go vanity. Let's, instead of putting it in the cupboard, in the lie section, oh, I'm in the vein because that's a, that's a debit. No, admit it. And then go, what's the value in it? Well, I can look at, yeah, I've actually gotten better shape because of my vanity. Actually, I eat better, better and I have more energy, you know, I've, and that led to being a better, better husband, better dad, doing something with my kids when I'd rather be over there writing this work I'm working on. But I know that tomorrow, when they leave town, they're gonna remember this time that we had together.

• 1:28:18Speaker 01

  That's a selfish act to go spend that time with my kids or my, even though I'd rather not be doing it at that time or I'd be doing something for myself. Because when they leave tomorrow, they've got, they'll have this great memory that they spent with their dad right where they went. That, that, that, I could call that vanity.

• 1:28:36Speaker 01

  I could group that and say, that's very vain of you. That was for self. Yeah. Cause it was also for something and someone that I cared about.

• 1:28:47Lex Fridman?

  Are there people in your life that? Uh, call you on your bullshit in the bad sense of the word bullshit.

• 1:28:54Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah. Sometimes it's either I got a pretty thick threshold for how far I can go with my bullshit.

• 1:29:03Speaker 01

  Like what bruise, what tickles me, my bruise others to watch it.

• 1:29:10Lex Fridman?

  It's a good line.

• 1:29:14Lex Fridman?

  Yeah.

• 1:29:15Speaker 01

  Um.

• 1:29:16Lex Fridman?

  It goes me, my bruise others.

• 1:29:17Speaker 01

  But I also, I go back and talk about the bullshit. That's over there with those mystical successes. It's the, yeah, no, don't go with it.

• 1:29:32Speaker 01

  Don't pull a parachute yet. Let's see how far we can go. Let's see how hot it can get. Let's try it one more time. Yes, two more, please.

• 1:29:41Speaker 01

  That's where a lot of great pleasure and stories and successes will come from. Those are mystical. They don't add up. It's like, we're not talking about reason right now. We're not talking logic. Just go with this. Let's talk about the virtual and making it real.

• 1:29:57Lex Fridman?

  The old line of fake it till you make it. I mean, what is that? There's something to that.

• 1:30:02Speaker 01

  There's definitely something to it. But I would, you know, where people will go fake it as I would go back to Dylan's or create it. Recreate it, create and recreate it, you know, until you, till it becomes, till you make it. So I'll have people call them on bullshit and a lot of times they're right.

• 1:30:24Speaker 01

  I think when I handle it the most healthy way is I admit, yes. And I'm aware. So I'm, and I'm going to keep going.

• 1:30:38Lex Fridman?

  So you're not like resisting it, denying it.

• 1:30:39Speaker 01

  Oh, I will. I will. And I have to watch that where I'm like, no, I'm not. That's not what I'm doing. And, and usually when it's coming from people that are going, no, you are, it's a, I won't admit it. And then that's where I'm telling a lie and that'll come up, get me later and I'll go.

• 1:30:57Speaker 01

  I didn't see it. I didn't see I was doing that. I was either unaware, I wouldn't let myself be aware. I was denying that I was doing that.

• 1:31:06Lex Fridman?

  Would you say that's ego? Has ego been bad or good for you?

• 1:31:10Speaker 01

  Gosh, I think it's been, thank, I'm so thankful for ego.

• 1:31:18Speaker 01

  Um.

• 1:31:21Speaker 01

  Do, does it get off the bridle for me sometimes and run loose and run in places and where it's

• 1:31:33Speaker 01

  not of service to others and has it hurt loved ones and even strangers? Yes. Um.

• 1:31:44Speaker 01

  But I, I also, when my ego is really strong,

• 1:31:52Speaker 01

  it's, it's in sync with serving. It's in sync with

• 1:32:01Speaker 01

  where I serve myself, also serve as others, serves others. It's, those two are part and parcel. They're, they're, they're intertwined. And that's the capital E ego that I think, I think and hope we all need more of. And that's what I mean when I talk about selfish, that's the re redefine that the real true meaning of that is not doing something for self at expense of your neighbor or harming others. It's

• 1:32:30Speaker 01

  for personal profit and pleasure that also is profit and pleasure for a utilitarian sense more of others. And there's a, there's a, again, back to the paradox that I think there's a place, I know there's a place, I believe there's a place where those are in sync. And when my ego's healthy, um, I'm able to

• 1:32:55Speaker 01

  say I'm sorry sooner for a lie or a misdemeanor or harming somebody. I'm able to be more empathetic because I got the confidence.

• 1:33:05Lex Fridman?

  Yeah.

• 1:33:06Speaker 01

  To be so. I'm able to be more humble.

• 1:33:13Speaker 01

  But still have my chin high and my heart high and look in the eye and go, yep, my bad, bogey, guilty. I shank that one out of bounds, man.

• 1:33:28Lex Fridman?

  That's beautiful. So ego can be constructive, not destructive.

• 1:33:34Lex Fridman?

  You won an Oscar for your performance in Dallas Buyers Club. Can you tell the story of becoming that character, Ron Woodruff? What was the toughest part?

• 1:33:48Speaker 01

  The toughest part, which was the most enlightening part,

• 1:33:56Speaker 01

  was getting to know who he was in between the lines. We're basing a life story in an hour and a half of film.

• 1:34:03Speaker 01

  And script is great.

• 1:34:08Speaker 01

  But who was he in between the lines? Who was he before he started a business? Before he was on a crusade?

• 1:34:17Speaker 01

  Before he went to alternative medicines?

• 1:34:23Speaker 01

  You know, the obvious thing people always talk about, well, how'd you lose all that weight? That was not hard. That was just a militaristic decision. This is what I can eat each day. And if I do this each day for a week, I'll lose 2.5 pounds in a week. So I'm going to give myself five months to do that. 2.5 times as 10, there's 47 pounds. That was like clockwork. So that was easy. That decision was made. I didn't go to Pizza Hut buffet and have temptation in front of me. I had certain meals. I ate that and the weight just went off like clockwork. It was the who is Ron Woodruff in between the lines? And what the gift I got given that gave me the insight to who that man was?

• 1:35:10Speaker 01

  Was I went to see his family and his, as I was leaving,

• 1:35:18Speaker 01

  his family offered me his diary.

• 1:35:23Speaker 01

  And I remember it kind of hesitant going, wow, yes. But I kind of hesitated because it felt maybe a little too intimate of a thing for me to have. It felt like it was kind of maybe infringing a bit. But I opened my hand and took it. And what I got in the diary was I got to know who Ron was before he had HIV. And little thing, the diary he'd write in and the the the dreamer he was and 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 for thirty eight bucks or whatever.

• 1:36:07Speaker 01

  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. And then on the way over, Paige coming in to say, no, we don't need you. We've gone with somebody else to hook them up.

• 1:36:26Speaker 01

  And here he was all buttoned up, two cups of coffee in, hair slicked over, shirt ironed, little less than half a tank of gas, but enough to get back home.

• 1:36:40Speaker 01

  Now where's this Monday go?

• 1:36:45Lex Fridman?

  The hope and the disappointment. You have to take all that in. That's part of that, man.

• 1:36:50Speaker 01

  I'm gonna, I'm just gonna go to Sonic and get a double cheese bacon burger because Sheila over there, man, she's kind of cute. She always gives me half price on it. Which leads to

• 1:37:06Speaker 01

  rolling the joint, hanging off till Sheila gets off to work, sneaking over to the local motel and shagging up in room sixteen. That's my lucky number sixteen. Sheila.

• 1:37:18Speaker 01

  Then wandering out that night, getting home at one in the morning, no plans for Tuesday.

• 1:37:27Speaker 01

  And maybe later in the week, think about what am I gonna do about work or job. 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.

• 1:37:43Speaker 01

  That knowing that there's in there was where I saw who. He was a dreamer and he just couldn't catch the break and didn't follow through. And then I remembered his family said like, oh yeah, he invented it. He got patents on a whole bunch of things, but he never would. He had things to get patented, but never would follow through to get the government patent. And then later on, you'd see the product be made or sold on QVC or something. They'd be like, Ron, that was yours.

• 1:38:14Speaker 01

  I just stole your idea. Did you patent that? He'd be like, no. Like never would that that there's something beautiful and sad about that. 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.

• 1:38:32Lex Fridman?

  When you go that deep, does a part of him stay in you forever?

• 1:38:39Lex Fridman?

  Are you able to let go?

• 1:38:40Speaker 01

  I mean, I hope so. I get I look, there's a tenacity to survive that I got from him. Hopefully I can try and find some of that in different ways in any character that I go play. Cause that's if you, if you really want to give a character an obstacle to overcome, a need.

• 1:39:02Speaker 01

  I mean, the base one is life and death, whether that's the need to survive or the need to stave off extinction.

• 1:39:13Speaker 01

  I'm not talking about what the rules, the laws are, the social mores, the manners and graces. I'm fighting you. You're going to fight for your own life in a world that's not supporting you to do so?

• 1:39:26Speaker 01

  You, there's a wonderful courage of, okay, watch this. What do I got to lose?

• 1:39:39Speaker 01

  My life? Or I'm in charge? Of extending it? Get out of the way. And I'll pick your pocket along whatever it takes. So there's a tenacity to live by whatever means necessary to survive that I that I that I'm reminded of that I learned from Ron.

• 1:40:03Lex Fridman?

  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. What did you take from that? From that role, that experience philosophically, psychologically?

• 1:40:25Speaker 01

  The freedom of of being on an island. He was such a singular character and of a singular mind. And as you know, it wasn't a dance party up there in his mind. It was it was some some heavy stuff. But also existentially for him, always like death would be a deliverance for him. It'd also be a cop out in a way. It'd also be.

• 1:41:07Speaker 01

  He was not a not a man who was going to give himself amnesty and didn't allow it from the rest of the world. Wouldn't give himself an out. And while living in his head and heart and spirit was more of a hell than arguably dying, there was not no alternative. That's not negotiable for that man. And that's why he was such a that's why he was the best detective that ever walked the earth. That's why he was such a superhero in a way to have that singular. You don't go, oh, I wish I was him. No, but you go like, wow, that constitution, that clarity of identity.

• 1:41:52Speaker 01

  Talk about a measure in a man's constitution. He didn't allow anybody off the hook, especially himself. You wanted him to forgive a little bit or give himself a little amnesty. You wanted him to like, man, it's Saturday, bro. Can you go on a date? You wanted him to like, enjoy something, but he was connected to something in his DNA. Who's who he was and something much more baseline truth. And that's why he was such a good detective. So that, but there's an island as much as that company can be. I said earlier on that Amazon trip, I didn't want to join the company.

• 1:42:33Speaker 01

  There's parts, I think, that I maybe gave to myself to Rust and Cole. And also that Rust and Cole has given back to me that are like, yeah, when you're, when you want to 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. Don't pull the parachute, stick with it, go through it.

• 1:42:54Lex Fridman?

  So you were able to walk around with that tormented mind of his?

• 1:42:58Speaker 01

  Tormented. I did, I, I didn't have very much patience for mendacious talk. I didn't have as much patience for small talk. I wasn't tormented.

• 1:43:11Lex Fridman?

  But the character was, and you have to embody him. So is that, I mean, does some of that bleed over? Are you able to, uh, separate the man you are from the character?

• 1:43:23Speaker 01

  It's not.

• 1:43:25Speaker 01

  Look, am I able to separate? Yeah, I came home to my kids and when they walk in the door and greet me and go, what'd you do today? And you got three kids under 10 years old. You don't tell them about the scene where you helped someone commit suicide. It's just, you know, so you, you turn it into a parable. And actually I've always said this, having kids has made me a better actor, a better storyteller because I have to parableize certain things, you know? And tell it in ways that they go, oh, neat, you know?

• 1:43:59Speaker 01

  So.

• 1:44:04Speaker 01

  I did I go, did I bring it home? I didn't bring torment. Did I bring introspection into my own? Characters for me, and I think this is true for a lot of actors and actresses. We don't, it's not a separation. If I've got, we each have everyone else in us. It's just seeing, diving into Rustin Cole, knowing where his mind and heart is from the hand of Nick Pizzolato, who wrote the character and wrote the whole series. Understanding, number one, what the hell am I saying? What's he talking about? Then going deeper into that, well, that, this person really believes that.

• 1:44:49Speaker 01

  What does that say about how they move? Then I'm going all of a sudden, well, who is that in me? What part of my left brain is locked into that? What part of my reptilian brain is whoosh, latched on to that? Where this other stuff is non-negotiable. Then I just live in that. And it's, I always taught like a seventies equalizer. Remember the old Marantz equalizers? You can, you move up your 500 HKZ, move up your 60, you just re, you re, uh, rebalance the equalizer. 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.

• 1:45:32Speaker 01

  And I'll, I'm not coming home tormented as Rustin Cole. Am I coming home seeing torment where it should be seen? Am I reading the news differently? 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, I'm seeing it through a different lens, but I'm seeing my own life through a different lens. A lens that was opened up and an aperture that was opened up through Rustin Cole.

• 1:46:07Lex Fridman?

  I mean, the, the, the process of being an actor and actress, I guess, is a really interesting way to be a philosopher of human nature.

• 1:46:15Speaker 01

  Yeah. I mean, it's, it's an incredible

• 1:46:18Lex Fridman?

  Really in it.

• 1:46:19Speaker 01

  Dive into the humanities.

• 1:46:21Lex Fridman?

  Yeah.

• 1:46:22Speaker 01

  And all the ologies.

• 1:46:23Lex Fridman?

  Yeah.

• 1:46:24Speaker 01

  And philosophy. And as I said, I

• 1:46:29Speaker 01

  Going to, going to, as I opened up that question like that, the vacation, being on an island is a vacation.

• 1:46:38Speaker 01

  I am also conscious for five months, when I'm playing Rustin Cole, that this, this is an interesting fact. I've, I've never, I was as strong spiritually with my relationship with God.

• 1:46:58Speaker 01

  When I did True Detective, as I've ever been.

• 1:47:02Lex Fridman?

  Why is that?

• 1:47:04Speaker 01

  Okay. Which you would say, wait a minute. In some ways, that's a, those are antonyms.

• 1:47:11Speaker 01

  No, but my, I, I, I pretty sure, pretty safely can say that my own strength of spirit in my own personal life, Matthew's life, that gave me the confidence to go further away.

• 1:47:27Speaker 01

  Deeper into the torture and deeper into the, but it was still, he was still always going after truth. That was the thing. He was not, he was not, not an evil man. I don't even know if you can call him a non-believer, but he was always going after the truth. And the truth burned and he would take the scar and get burned for it. He'd die for it. That, something was actually kind of biblical about that. You know? And, and so, but I bet he, I, I, I don't think it's coincidence that I was, had so much je ne sais quoi of diving into the depths of that tortured character.

• 1:48:11Speaker 01

  Because I trusted that when I go out, I'll come up the other side. It's always like jumping in a pool of water.

• 1:48:20Speaker 01

  And can you trust you'll come up the other side and not, you know, you go play a criminal. You, you trust you're not going to come out the other side a tyrant in real life. You just go, ah, God, I got to go do that. Came out and I'm still alive. Got all my faculties. I'm not in jail. I'm whatever it is. And so my own spirituality at that time, hell, that definitely, I think, gave me a certain trust and confidence to go further into the dark.

• 1:48:49Lex Fridman?

  It was announced that you'd be starring in a Yellowstone spinoff show.

• 1:48:55Lex Fridman?

  What do you think about the cowboy ethos that permeates Yellowstone and other shows created by Taylor Sheridan? You're a Texan.

• 1:49:03Speaker 01

  I'm a Texan. Yeah.

• 1:49:05Lex Fridman?

  What do you think about that like philosophy and way of life?

• 1:49:11Speaker 01

  I admire the simplicity of it. I mean, one bit, one way you could explain Yellowstone and a coster's role is what will

• 1:49:28Speaker 01

  what will man do to protect land and family?

• 1:49:33Speaker 01

  In a world that's trying to encroach, in a world where

• 1:49:40Speaker 01

  there's a cowboy ethos that deems trespassing more clear earlier

• 1:49:46Lex Fridman?

  Yeah.

• 1:49:48Speaker 01

  than than other other hats.

• 1:49:56Speaker 01

  I admire that simplicity

• 1:49:59Speaker 01

  of right and wrong.

• 1:50:01Lex Fridman?

  And that the simplicity of that right and wrong doesn't always correlate, coincide with the law?

• 1:50:09Speaker 01

  No, it's above the law. It's you mentioned something earlier. I don't remember where it was in conversation, but it's a little bit of like, okay, if the law ain't handling this, I am.

• 1:50:19Speaker 01

  And then it is

• 1:50:23Speaker 01

  law's not going to handle this. Therefore, I am. And then it is, I'm handling this.

• 1:50:31Speaker 01

  Law? Talk to them when you get to them. I'm handling this.

• 1:50:36Lex Fridman?

  There's a honesty to that. It just seems

• 1:50:42Lex Fridman?

  of course, it's dangerous because it's a slippery slope that 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. But when done right, you know, there feels to be a something really authentic and human about that. Protect family, protect land above all else.

• 1:51:07Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:51:10Speaker 01

  But I, you know.

• 1:51:15Speaker 01

  This is a broader question, but I'm going to piggyback it off of this.

• 1:51:25Speaker 01

  Back to the dreams and reality. 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.

• 1:51:42Speaker 01

  Do you think we're a less evolved species than we give ourselves credit for? Do you think we give ourselves credit for being more evolved than we actually are?

• 1:51:52Lex Fridman?

  I think we do.

• 1:51:53Speaker 01

  I do.

• 1:51:56Speaker 01

  I think we need to admit that.

• 1:51:58Lex Fridman?

  I think probably the Cowboy ethos is a, is a step in towards admitting that.

• 1:52:07Lex Fridman?

  And that's why it's so appealing to people. Kind of wakes them up to realize that we are, we're not so far from our ancestors.

• 1:52:20Lex Fridman?

  That the values of loyalty are really important.

• 1:52:25Lex Fridman?

  Trust. On the basic human level.

• 1:52:30Lex Fridman?

  How do you know if you can trust someone?

• 1:52:33Speaker 01

  I don't know if I can trust someone. Well, 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. I come in with a, I'm told. Sometimes I think I'm, I'm told that I trust too much sometimes.

• 1:52:52Lex Fridman?

  Have you been hurt? Have you been betrayed? And if you have, has that like hurt your willingness to trust?

• 1:53:02Speaker 01

  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.

• 1:53:16Lex Fridman?

  By a new person, you're still willing?

• 1:53:18Speaker 01

  No, I'm not going to do that. I think that's, that's, that's the beginning of cynicism, which I think is a horrible disease of getting older. I'm not going to do that.

• 1:53:26Lex Fridman?

  You're fighting cynicism off as much as you can.

• 1:53:28Speaker 01

  No way, no way, no way. And there's no, there's no, there's no residual in it. There's no win. It's easy, clever. Gets the laugh at the party. But, and, and if it sleeps well.

• 1:53:44Speaker 01

  It shouldn't be.

• 1:53:47Lex Fridman?

  Don't get comfortable in the cynicism. I have to ask you about being a Texan. You're like, when I think Texas, I think Matthew McConaughey. What's it mean to be a Texan to you?

• 1:54:00Lex Fridman?

  I recently moved to Austin, Texas, some two years in.

• 1:54:05Speaker 01

  All right. All right. Welcome.

• 1:54:10Lex Fridman?

  What's it mean to be a Texan?

• 1:54:13Lex Fridman?

  Educate us.

• 1:54:15Speaker 01

  Texas is about independence.

• 1:54:20Speaker 01

  Politically, Texas is not about Republican or Democrat. It's about independence. Independence of spirit, sovereignty.

• 1:54:30Speaker 01

  Texas is about exploration. One of the things I love about Texas is I run into so many Texans around the world.

• 1:54:44Speaker 01

  Texans are taught to go be conservative or learn who we are, then go. Go explore, pioneer, journey, and hopefully you come on back with some goods and some stories. You Texan.

• 1:55:03Lex Fridman?

  And underneath that is this kind of freedom of being an individual in the full meaning of that word.

• 1:55:12Speaker 01

  Yeah, well, Texas is liberal on your entrance.

• 1:55:18Speaker 01

  Very liberal on your entrance. Less regulation. Hey, welcome. High trust. High trust, sir. Welcome to our state. Come on in. Yes, yes, yes. But if you like cheap steel.

• 1:55:36Lex Fridman?

  Yeah.

• 1:55:38Speaker 01

  We're conservative on our consequences.

• 1:55:42Lex Fridman?

  That's a good line. You've briefly pondered running for governor. I don't know if that's in your future. I hope it is. You had a few good lines about it. Do you think about that kind of stuff? About what the future holds in terms of political office?

• 1:56:00Speaker 01

  I don't think about it in terms of political office. I've graduated to a broader, larger thought of what's my future hold and where

• 1:56:11Speaker 01

  would I be most useful as a leader? I think that's a fair word. Whether that's

• 1:56:21Speaker 01

  thought, whether that's leader of my family right now. As a parent, as a father.

• 1:56:29Speaker 01

  The leader of people that work with me.

• 1:56:36Speaker 01

  Politics is

• 1:56:40Speaker 01

  I'm not going to say it's because it's not, it's not small. And I'm not, I don't, I don't, that's, that's why I say that out loud. It's not small. I do think it needs to re-engineer, redefine what its purpose is before, because it's just chasing its own tail right now with, with, with, with the two parties that are, seem to me to be completely about just invalidation of the opposition instead of vision of themselves.

• 1:57:10Speaker 01

  So I think it needs redefinition of what it is because it is important. That's what I mean. That's why I said, I don't mean small. It's, it's, it needs to think bigger about what it is and how it's useful.

• 1:57:21Lex Fridman?

  When it seeks to invalidate its small, when it seeks vision, it can be big.

• 1:57:27Speaker 01

  Yes. Well, one's affirmative, one's going into that cynicism we were talking about. You know, and invalidation of any opposing thought. Or maybe that we're even opposing. Opposition is a, is a, is a, is an arrogant term that's too strong. A lot of times it's not even opposition. Alternative, other than, another way of thinking about it. Oh, could both be true? Oh, how could we parlay those two ideas?

• 1:57:53Speaker 01

  You know, this, the, the, the, one of the challenges with

• 1:57:59Speaker 01

  These ideas of a third party or meet you in the middle. It's kind of got this historic notion of being, oh, well, it's sort of Mr. In Between. Kind of go which way the wind blows. 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. And it's actually, and I love sports. It's tactically the place with which to move most advantageously. I think of a free safety in the game of football.

• 1:58:43Speaker 01

  They're in the middle of the field and they're deep. They choose to defend left or right according to the play that's been called by the offense. Similar to the offense, the running back, you read the defense and then you're going to run right to run left to go away from that opposition. It's a tactical spot.

• 1:59:03Lex Fridman?

  To be truly independent and respond.

• 1:59:09Speaker 01

  And respond.

• 1:59:11Lex Fridman?

  So do you think you have a role in that in political officers?

• 1:59:14Speaker 01

  I don't know. It's on, it's on mine. It's not out of my mental, mental box. And I gave it real sincere thought and discernment for over a year. And it's a wonderful, whether, whether I end up, whether I end up in politics or not, it was a wonderful exercise, one that if anyone else got time to do it, do it. 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, you want to get your values line? You want to admit where you lie and throw yourself some pop quizzes? And what if this phone call comes at 4:00 AM? What you got, you know, who you want to surround yourself with?

• 1:59:59Speaker 01

  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. I don't know if that's in my future. I got, you know, useful is a big word. It's got to be, I would have to be useful. I have to be useful in the right way. And is that my lane to be most useful?

• 2:00:24Lex Fridman?

  It's a good question for a leader to ask. How can I be useful?

• 2:00:30Lex Fridman?

  I have to ask you about Interstellar. So I think it's an incredible film. I've seen it inspire so many scientists and engineers. It's just philosopher, everybody, humans. It explores space travel, physics of spacetime, human nature, human condition, human connection. How has that film expanded your understanding of the universe?

• 2:00:56Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 2:00:56Lex Fridman?

  And our place in it?

• 2:00:58Speaker 01

  Yeah. Well, it's the, it's got the old Mr. Mayor on the corner. How big is that cloud metaphor in it? Because that was the character I played, Cooper's. That was the existential question for him. Head down, practical, stay here, be a father to my children. But his dream before his children were to go explore space. So when he's taking that truck out and the countdown's going down, that's the hinge of the existential question that we all face in some form.

• 2:01:41Speaker 01

  The, the, the, the sense of time, I wish, I think everyone loves that sense of where time can run at different speeds. And I, there's an incredible scene where Cooper, as a father, is getting video feed from his children who have aged and he's realizing he's missed all that.

• 2:02:11Lex Fridman?

  Yeah.

• 2:02:14Speaker 01

  That, it, it, you know, I mean, overall, that, that, that concept makes me consider and imagine.

• 2:02:24Lex Fridman?

  We talk about mystical successes instead of engineered ones, like the engineered ones. There's, there's ethos from that film and, and what Nolan put into that film and theories that make me go.

• 2:02:38Speaker 01

  Yeah, what does any of this matter? 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. What's happening right now in this blip of time you're here? Fifty-three years so far, we'll see how many we get.

• 2:02:56Speaker 01

  What other parallel timelines are happening out there? Do, is it, 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? Those terms may be too, too small thing. What do you mean? Who, are we saying only life has to have water in this amount of oxygen and carbon dioxide? I don't, maybe that's, maybe there's a whole redefinition of the ingredients that other life forms need.

• 2:03:26Speaker 01

  It sure, in a similar way to Contact, which is a movie I did with Bob Zemeckis,

• 2:03:34Speaker 01

  inspires me that the universe is more active and lively and God's backyard's bigger than I thought. And wow, that's exciting. And, you know, people go now, yeah, you believe in extraterrestrial life? I said, yes, man, I think it'd be arrogant not to. I sure hope so.

• 2:03:52Lex Fridman?

  You think there's alien civilizations all out there, intelligent ones, just far in, far on distant stars?

• 2:03:59Speaker 01

  I

• 2:04:02Speaker 01

  hope so. And I think we, it's possible.

• 2:04:07Speaker 01

  May have many

• 2:04:09Speaker 01

  among us right here.

• 2:04:11Speaker 01

  Why, and I go for the, the why not in that, just to keep that, that train of thought open to the, to learn and, and, and, and, and consider, you know, those existential questions. I think it'd be arrogant not to.

• 2:04:24Lex Fridman?

  There's so many hundreds of billions of planets just in our galaxy.

• 2:04:31Speaker 01

  Just in ours.

• 2:04:31Lex Fridman?

  I can't imagine there's not life out there. And

• 2:04:38Lex Fridman?

  but I suspect it's very different, like you said, than we are. And we have to have a humility to open our eyes to how different life could

• 2:04:46Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 2:04:46Lex Fridman?

  be.

• 2:04:47Speaker 01

  And if and when we cross it,

• 2:04:52Speaker 01

  unlike we've had tendencies to do when we try to go with some nation takeovers,

• 2:04:59Speaker 01

  I think it would be our inherent glitch.

• 2:05:08Speaker 01

  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. I mean, I think that's a human trait of ours. 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. I don't think they're, 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 heaven that I think of.

• 2:05:53Speaker 01

  You know, so in other civilizations, these things, I don't, I mean, I, I hope that if we would just see and learn, that would be the natural side of welcoming. 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. I don't, I don't think it would be, I think it's a shallow thought to think that, oh, it's going to be about ownership and we'd be trespassing. I think it would be, I don't think they're, would have a sense of borders as we do.

• 2:06:28Lex Fridman?

  I just hope we humans are smart enough to detect and to see aliens. Because, because of how different they are, you know, we don't, we often have a very narrow definition of what is intelligence. You know, it's very possible that trees are extremely intelligent if we kind of zoom out at a different time scale, a different, like, just look at stuff in, from a bigger perspective that's outside of being so human centric.

• 2:06:55Speaker 01

  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. Like, look, see, the universe was created at midnight. Humans came around at 11:59 and 36 seconds.

• 2:07:19Speaker 01

  I love little analogies or that put that frame like that make oh yeah, pale blue dot. There it is. That perspective, something so relaxing and empowering about that. At the same time and humbling.

• 2:07:35Speaker 01

  But confidence boosting, you know, allows forgiveness, allows ambition. Um, I just love the perspective of that, that picture to picture it that way in our timeline.

• 2:07:49Lex Fridman?

  Do you hope humans become a multiplanetarian species as we're trying to do? As SpaceX is pushing forward, traveling out to Mars, potentially colonizing Mars, colonizing other planets?

• 2:08:03Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 2:08:05Speaker 01

  I'm, yeah, go explore. I love the ambition of it. I love the, um, pioneering nature of it. I love the extension of what we consider is our backyard becoming more four dimensional like that.

• 2:08:23Speaker 01

  Not at the expense of.

• 2:08:29Speaker 01

  We still got stuff to take care of. We got gardens to tend right here. 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. No, no, no, no, no, no. We got a tithe we're still supposed to pay here. We don't, that's part of this pressure testing us as a civilization, a species.

• 2:08:53Speaker 01

  Whether you call that restoration order or whether you call that, let's figure out how to adapt the best we can.

• 2:09:03Speaker 01

  No, not at the expense of quitting here on earth.

• 2:09:08Lex Fridman?

  But let a few, a few select folks explore.

• 2:09:12Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 2:09:12Lex Fridman?

  Cause that's like, uh,

• 2:09:13Speaker 01

  Guys say, go for it, please.

• 2:09:15Lex Fridman?

  One of the coolest things that we humans do is kind of embodies the human spirit, reach out into the unknown.

• 2:09:22Lex Fridman?

  But it's hard. I mean, as interstellar shows and so on.

• 2:09:27Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 2:09:28Lex Fridman?

  It's painful.

• 2:09:29Speaker 01

  Well, Elon talks about it. It's not going to be a weekend daisy trip.

• 2:09:36Speaker 01

  And he's just speculating how hard it could be, much harder in different ways that he doesn't understand yet.

• 2:09:41Lex Fridman?

  Yeah. Well, that, you know, that dance between the impossible and the inevitable, that's definitely there with what SpaceX is doing, what all the folks who are trying to become a multi-purveyor species are doing. It's really hard. It's like, build rockets that fight off gravity at a cost-effective way is really hard. SpaceX is close to being bankrupt several times. It's just hard. But it's also inspiring to that some people are just crazy enough, bold enough to keep trying.

• 2:10:19Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 2:10:23Lex Fridman?

  What advice would you give to young folks?

• 2:10:26Speaker 01

  What advice would I give?

• 2:10:27Lex Fridman?

  In high school and college that are thinking of how to make their way in this world?

• 2:10:38Speaker 01

  If you haven't already, can you

• 2:10:45Speaker 01

  can you define what you have an innate ability for? And match that with what you're willing to hustle to get?

• 2:10:56Speaker 01

  Sometimes

• 2:10:59Speaker 01

  we have an innate ability, but we don't want to work for it. We take it for granted.

• 2:11:05Speaker 01

  And we end up doing something that may work, may pay the bills, may get us by day to day. But we don't really like it. We have trouble finding a way to enjoy it. Definitely don't love it.

• 2:11:18Speaker 01

  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.

• 2:11:31Speaker 01

  On an innate level. And that's a good challenge. 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? Because we have an innate ability to do. When we do that well, we do kind of enjoy it.

• 2:11:54Lex Fridman?

  Yeah. And one of the things that requires us to kind of be really honest with yourself at what your innate ability is. 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. 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? Not what I hope to be good at, but what I'm actually good at.

• 2:12:19Speaker 01

  Right. And then if you look at that and you can define those two, hopefully, there's a, you can, you can activate it in a way where there's a demand for what you supply.

• 2:12:41Lex Fridman?

  You found love with Camila Elvis McConaughey. What advice would you give to people on how to do just that? How to find love?

• 2:12:57Speaker 01

  This wonderful subject's been discussed since the beginning of time, hasn't it? Love it. So I can tell you what things I've kind of learned and I'm still learning. You know, love is one of those mystical successes. It doesn't make sense.

• 2:13:27Speaker 01

  You know, when I was, when I was, before I met Camilla, I had had, I was coming on to my late 30s. 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. I thought by that time I would have met the woman I loved, married and started family. And that hadn't happened. And I did find myself doing that thing I was doing at the Amazon, looking around the corner. Any prospective, possible female I met that I was attracted to, I was like, maybe this is

• 2:14:09Speaker 01

  the one. I make the joke, but it's true. It's like at every red light, I'm like checking out who's next to me in produce section at the supermarket. I'm like, who's in the produce section? You know, it's like looking. When you're in that zone, you can also be a little intrusive. You can trespass on people's, you can get outside of yourself. You can be overly impressed and not as involved and have your own constitution and sit back. And therefore, if you're outside of yourself, you're less attractive to your possible mate. I've got a series of dreams that are written about, but I had one then that was very spiritual.

• 2:14:54Speaker 01

  That was me as an 88 year old bachelor who never got married. And it was a beautiful dream. Where on paper, I thought that should be a nightmare. It wasn't. What that dream did for me was allow me to go, you may not find the woman for you and get married and have a life with her. That may not be. And for the first time in life, I was okay with that. Not, more than intellectually, spiritually, I was granted, I was like, okay.

• 2:15:35Speaker 01

  Then I'm moving through the world and on this particular night as myself not intruding, I was inviting, I did see her move across the room and did not say, "Who is that?" I said, "What is that?" And then did move to call her across the room. So I did invite, but I was not outside of myself. And I was able to be myself with her, 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. But not every single thing that I imagined when I saw her move across

• 2:16:18Speaker 01

  the room turned out to be true and then some. In the, just the image. 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. We had similar perspectives on raising children, which is very important to me and her. And then we just enjoyed each other's company.

• 2:16:54Lex Fridman?

  Yeah.

• 2:16:55Speaker 01

  And we laughed together and we supported each other and we promoted more of each other and we lit each other's fire. And we, if one was rolling, we kept dishing. You go, go, go again. Take the next shot. More, more, more, more. This was a biggie too.

• 2:17:13Lex Fridman?

  Getting excited for each other's success.

• 2:17:15Speaker 01

  Yes. Yes. To be able, I think it's very important. We all have jealousy. 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.

• 2:17:47Speaker 01

  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.

• 2:17:56Lex Fridman?

  Yeah.

• 2:17:57Speaker 01

  She wasn't there. 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. And as much as I went through my head, oh, I'd have been great if I would have been there. I was like, no, I don't want to trespass on that, that you had that.

• 2:18:12Lex Fridman?

  Yeah.

• 2:18:12Speaker 01

  Independent of me. Bravo.

• 2:18:16Lex Fridman?

  That's a choice you make not to, not to give any time to the jealousy, to the very natural jealousy that we humans have.

• 2:18:24Speaker 01

  It sure doesn't have any, I don't see the residuals in it.

• 2:18:29Lex Fridman?

  True.

• 2:18:30Speaker 01

  I've got it, I've had it, and I have it, I just don't,

• 2:18:34Speaker 01

  you know, I haven't seen where it has any payback.

• 2:18:39Lex Fridman?

  I gotta ask you the biggest possible question. What's the meaning of this whole thing?

• 2:18:45Speaker 01

  Oh.

• 2:18:45Lex Fridman?

  What's the meaning of life?

• 2:18:46Speaker 01

  Right?

• 2:18:48Lex Fridman?

  Matthew McConaughey.

• 2:18:51Lex Fridman?

  Why?

• 2:18:53Lex Fridman?

  Why are we here?

• 2:18:58Speaker 01

  I don't know why we're here. I prescribe to, in a religious sense, the restoration order. We're here to restore

• 2:19:09Speaker 01

  order. And in a religious sense, I really, I purchased that and love that incentive and love that, that view. But I don't really know why we're here. But I do know,

• 2:19:20Speaker 01

  to go back to the front, we are here. That part's inevitable. So now let's flip the script and go to the why not.

• 2:19:33Speaker 01

  Just keep living. What, what are we doing? The base of everything, Eric, and we can argue it all, at the base of it, I can, all I can come up with is, well, just keep living, man. I mean, what else are we supposed to do when we don't have any idea what to do? When we know exactly what we want to do?

• 2:19:57Speaker 01

  Make it matter. Even when it doesn't matter, that matters. Not. For what? I don't know. For the fun of it. That matters.

• 2:20:09Lex Fridman?

  Yeah, our ability to create meaning and beauty in the mundane, in the absurd, it's kind of cool.

• 2:20:15Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 2:20:17Lex Fridman?

  And we share it with each other.

• 2:20:18Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 2:20:19Lex Fridman?

  We get excited.

• 2:20:20Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 2:20:20Lex Fridman?

  And we create some pretty cool stuff along the way.

• 2:20:23Speaker 01

  I mean, I. I say I'm confident enough, and I might be arrogant for me to say, but I, I, I, I do believe that we're here to, each generation have a small ascension.

• 2:20:39Lex Fridman?

  Yeah.

• 2:20:41Speaker 01

  Or else. What, what's it for?

• 2:20:46Lex Fridman?

  And we're not really sure what the ascension is towards. Just kind of.

• 2:20:49Speaker 01

  No, no. It's just, I just think it's up. I do think it's just up. I do think that

• 2:20:59Speaker 01

  it is definitely arrogant to think that we as a species, or a generation, or a people, or humanity, are going to reach the top of the ascended staircase and go ta-da. I think that's a, I think that is not only false, but I think is full-hearted. And I think it's a recipe for being, having more angst and, and even cynicism we talked about, and unrest and lack of seeing beauty and joy in this life while we're in it. Um, I think life's a verb.

• 2:21:42Speaker 01

  Live it as best we can. Hopefully, I mean, I don't know. Sometimes I'm just, I don't have a grand plan, man. I'm just trying to connect the damn dots. I'm confused, frustrated. I don't know what, I don't feel any gravity or building or lineage towards what I'm doing. And I'm just like going.

• 2:22:02Speaker 01

  What's that Peterson line, if you don't believe in heaven, do what you can to get as far away from hell as possible. Sometimes. It's a great line. Sometimes I'm just trying to like, man, just don't, don't sink the ship right now. Just keep your head above water. Maintain, just try and hold on.

• 2:22:18Lex Fridman?

  And hopefully give yourself a chance to notice the magic, the mystical. I try to do that.

• 2:22:24Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 2:22:25Lex Fridman?

  When it gets rough.

• 2:22:26Speaker 01

  Cause it's there. I do believe it's all around us all the time.

• 2:22:30Lex Fridman?

  Yeah.

• 2:22:30Speaker 01

  Just are we on a frequency and do we allow ourselves to receive it and see it?

• 2:22:35Lex Fridman?

  We gotta tune the radio.

• 2:22:36Speaker 01

  Yeah. Cause we look for it too hard. We see false idols and if we don't look at all, we come callous and miss it all.

• 2:22:44Lex Fridman?

  Yeah.

• 2:22:46Lex Fridman?

  It's a fun little life we got.

• 2:22:47Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 2:22:48Lex Fridman?

  Matthew, uh, I'm a huge fan. I think you're an incredible person. Um, thank you for all the, everything you've created in this world. Thank you for being a unique human that inspires millions. And thank you for talking today. I was nervous, but you made me feel at home. That was beautiful.

• 2:23:07Speaker 01

  Well, I felt at home talking with you as well. Thanks for sharing that with me. I could go on and on.

• 2:23:12Lex Fridman?

  Just two Texans.

• 2:23:14Speaker 01

  That's right.

• 2:23:15Lex Fridman?

  Having a good old chat.

• 2:23:16Speaker 01

  Austin, Texas. Here we go.

• 2:23:18Lex Fridman?

  All right. Thank you, brother.

• 2:23:19Speaker 01

  Thank you.

• 2:23:21Lex Fridman?

  Thanks for listening to this conversation with Matthew McConaughey. To support this podcast, please check out our sponsors in the description. And now let me leave you with some words from Matthew McConaughey himself. Don't walk into a place like you want to buy it. Walk in like you own it.

• 2:23:40Lex Fridman?

  Thank you for listening. I hope to see you next time.