He Turned Down $14.5 Million for a 3 A.M. Truth | Matthew McConaughey

Academy Award winner Matthew McConaughey, author of the memoir Greenlights and founder of the just keep livin foundation, joins Lewis Howes to discuss his 20-month departure from Hollywood, the goals he handwrote in 1992, and the spiritual reckoning he experienced during a solo trip through the Amazon.

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

• 0:02Lewis Howes?

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• 0:46Lewis Howes?

  I'm so grateful that you have continued to step out from your industry of being, you know, a world-class actor and creative artist and being, expressing yourself more, sharing your art, your poetry, your stories, your lessons and your truths. So it's been a beautiful journey to watch you continue to impact lives, not only on screen, but also off as yourself. So I'm really grateful that you're doing this.

• 1:12Matthew McConaughey?

  Cool. Thank you. I'm glad it's landed that way for you. It's been challenging and gratifying for me, but that it started with the book. You've written books, you know, what I wanted to do is when I'm acting, I'm going, I have five filters between my raw expression and what you see on screen.

• 1:33Lewis Howes?

  Five.

• 1:33Matthew McConaughey?

  Someone else's script, someone else's character, someone else behind the camera, someone else directing, someone else editing. That's five filters between me and the raw expression. What wrote the book was I said, I want to get rid of some of those filters. Now, a book is one filter. It's still a written word.

• 1:49Lewis Howes?

  Yes.

• 1:49Matthew McConaughey?

  But in the ultimate is like when people do stand-up or performances are like this, we're live. This is no filter. And so that's what I wanted to do where I could direct my own story, be the main character in my own story, edit it through my lens. And it's stuck in a way, which was nice to hear the reverb and hear people here, come back to me about what they got from it, questions they still have about it, and how it helped them along their own path in some ways.

• 2:18Lewis Howes?

  Did you have any fear doing this?

• 2:20Matthew McConaughey?

  Yeah.

• 2:20Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 2:21Matthew McConaughey?

  Yeah.

• 2:22Lewis Howes?

  What was the biggest fear?

• 2:23Matthew McConaughey?

  I don't like looking back over my shoulder, man. I, I, I mean, I haven't even seen all my movies.

• 2:31Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 2:31Matthew McConaughey?

  I like making them more than I like watching them. You know, so to look back over 50 years of my life, 40 years of writings, was a scary proposition for me because I feared I'd be having some embarrassment. I feared I'd be shamed about, feel shameful about some things. And I always, I'd always, I've always written and had the journals, but my excuse was, oh, you know, postmortem, maybe Camilla, my wife will dig that out.

• 2:59Lewis Howes?

  And read them.

• 2:59Matthew McConaughey?

  I think, oh, this is worth putting out. It was always an excuse, right? And finally, I got the confidence to go, you know what? No, go, go away, take those boxes of journals and those chests of journals and go see what you got. And I looked at them and I was embarrassed about last.

• 3:15Lewis Howes?

  Yeah. What was the thing that you were most embarrassed about?

• 3:19Matthew McConaughey?

  Being a wise, thinking I knew stuff, proclaiming I knew stuff, when I would contradict myself right after. Or I had, you know, times where I would say, ooh, very, I look back, I'm very arrogant. Very, you know, but I, but I've come to understand now that I was doing that to find an identity. And it's youth and the revolutionaries of youth do that. You try it out. Let's test it. I know this. It fails. Okay, to the next. Something I don't think we should forget as we get older. We just start to understand context and innuendo and two things can be true at the same time. When you're younger, it's black and it's white. And so I had things that I was embarrassed about that.

• 4:03Matthew McConaughey?

  And what I, what happened after about 10 days of writing the book and going through some embarrassment and quite a bit of shame, where I also didn't walk the walk, but talk the talk to myself even. I started to notice that, oh, actually, if you wouldn't have been that sort of all-knowing and what I would call arrogant at this point, you wouldn't have put yourself in the position to learn better or to get humbled or to find out, oh, I thought I had it figured out. I didn't. So I was like, okay. So all of a sudden the embarrassment turned into chuckles. So now I'm starting to laugh at myself. You stepped, you talked, you didn't back it up. You ate crow. And that rhythm happened a lot through, through my life.

• 4:48Matthew McConaughey?

  And I think it happens to, to, to all of us in certain ways. And I think one of the things that people got from the book that I got from writing it was, people will come to me and said, look, I'm taking more risk now. And I think that's, that's part of it. But when we fail, which is why so many of us don't take as many risks, it's never really, not never, but almost always never as really bad as we thought it was going to be.

• 5:09Lewis Howes?

  When we fail at the risk, yeah.

• 5:11Matthew McConaughey?

  Yeah. When we fail at doing it, it's never, the, the, the letdowns never, in a real measure, as bad as we thought it was going to be. And the people that are going, they're on the sidelines for a reason. You play football. They're over there, they're in the bleachers with the whistle in their mouth for a reason. But the ones that are on the field trying out stuff with you or the right there next to you going, hey, man, me too. I blew it over here or I blew it here, but thanks for taking the shot. Thanks for trying. That's what we're doing. And I think a lot, that's something that a lot of people got from the book. So the shame and the embarrassment turned into humor. And then I noticed that I consistently stepped in the same path just quite a few times. I think I've evolved somewhat, but I'm still working on the paths that I'm stepping in.

• 5:56Lewis Howes?

  When did you feel like you were the most wounded? Wounded, like internally wounded, where maybe you had, you thought you had it all figured out or you thought like, I'm successful, but really on the inside, maybe you felt like you were full of, you know.

• 6:10Matthew McConaughey?

  Oh, well, there's been a few, but I'll say, look, Australia, the year I had there, you know that story from the book, that was a really tough year. But that was not a year when I thought I had it figured out. That was a big year. The early questions of youth are why, why, why, why? You learn some things, you start to define your hows and wins and your wheres. But when I was rolling in my career later on in life and was rolling in rom-coms in, in, in Hollywood, I was enjoying them, but I didn't feel like they were feeding me back. I didn't feel like they were the right kind of challenge for me. And it came to me at a time when I, Camilla and I had fallen in love and she was pregnant with our first son.

• 6:55Matthew McConaughey?

  So all of a sudden life's vital, man. It's like real, right? My laughs are louder, my tears are, are wetter, my, my joy is bigger, my pain is deeper. Rom, that's not where rom-coms are built. Rom-coms are built to be buoyant up here, keep it light, bounce cloud to cloud. Don't go so deep or so high. They're built that way on purpose. But my life was extremely, getting extremely dramatic and I liked it. And I would, I said, I started to feel like, well, what am I doing in my career? I mean, I remember saying this, I'm like, just an entertainer? And I made sure to look myself in the mirror and go, and if you are, is there anything wrong with being just entertainer? That's okay too.

• 7:37Matthew McConaughey?

  But I just wanted to see if my career could challenge the vitality of my life that I was living at the time. So I tried to find dramas that I wanted to do that more represented the man I was becoming. Hollywood was saying, no, thank you. You stay in your lane, McConaughey. We got other people that'll do this. So I'll take a, I'll take a massive pay cut. We said, no, thank you. Stay in your lane. So because I couldn't do what I wanted to do, I pulled up and quit doing what I was doing. And I took a one-way ticket out of Hollywood, not knowing if it'd be a one-way ticket or a return ticket, but it, not knowing how long I was going to be dry and without work.

• 8:15Lewis Howes?

  It's a 20 months, right?

• 8:16Matthew McConaughey?

  20 months without, without any work.

• 8:18Lewis Howes?

  That's unbelievable. When was the time where you felt like, or when you felt like people stopped talking about you or you weren't as relevant or they stopped calling you for auditions?

• 8:27Matthew McConaughey?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 8:28Lewis Howes?

  You weren't in the gossip news or whatever?

• 8:30Matthew McConaughey?

  Hell, no, I wasn't. And I remember I'm coming from Hollywood at that time. I was living in Malibu, living on the beach. And my rom-com run was parlayed with paparazzi getting shots of me on the beach all the time. So McConaughey shirtless on the beach was synonymous with McConaughey and the rom-coms. It was like, his life is his rom-coms. Rom-coms is his life, right? So I moved Camilla to Texas and we, and no beaches there, no paparazzi there. The first six months, all I got offered was rom-coms. I said, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. So then they said, okay, we got the message. They quit offering rom-coms. So what did they offer? Nothing.

• 9:10Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 9:11Matthew McConaughey?

  I call it eight months. I hadn't heard from my agent. He says, buddy, you hadn't heard from me because I hadn't heard about you. Call it 10 months. He goes, man, I hadn't even heard your name in two months. I call it a year. He's like, buddy, I hadn't even heard your name. No one's interested. So I'm like, okay. I start thinking about, do I need to start another, find another career or another vocation?

• 9:35Lewis Howes?

  No.

• 9:36Matthew McConaughey?

  Oh, yeah.

• 9:37Lewis Howes?

  Really? Like stop acting all in all?

• 9:39Matthew McConaughey?

  Well, I didn't know. I knew, I had already made the covenant with myself and my wife that I was not going back. Was I wobbly at that time? Was I looking for some, something to achieve and find some significance and purpose? Right. Thankfully, I've got a young child on the way. Or was probably maybe at 12 months born, just born at that time. So that's given me real resonance and purpose to keep me at least.

• 10:04Lewis Howes?

  Focused somewhere.

• 10:05Matthew McConaughey?

  Focused on something I could rely on being, having meaning and value. But still, I needed my own personal thing to get off to, my own craft, and I, and I, and I didn't have it. What was I going to do? So, you know, I can make it wind chimes. You know what I mean? It was serious. I was like, and I've said this before, the old bottle of my favorite spirits started looking a little bit better earlier in the day. Cause the days were long, bro. Days were getting long.

• 10:30Lewis Howes?

  You started one of the.

• 10:31Matthew McConaughey?

  And Monday and Saturday were melding into each other. And you know what a lifelong of Saturdays can do to us? Make a tyrant out of us, bro. So I was looking for.

• 10:41Lewis Howes?

  But you were on the top, man. You were like.

• 10:43Matthew McConaughey?

  I was the top, uh, rom com. Yeah, that was my, I, I, I owned that lane. And I was the go-to rom com guy, but I was not gonna go back and do that. I'd made the truth that I had, that three AM truth that hit me and stuck with me for months before I made the decision to step out of Hollywood. I knew it was true. It was a quiet truth and tears have been shed on my wife's shoulder with myself going, wow. This is a decision we're making in my soul. We're gonna make it and stick to it.

• 11:08Lewis Howes?

  And no matter, I think you talked about, you know, I think there was like someone offered you 15 million or somewhere around there.

• 11:12Matthew McConaughey?

  Right around month.

• 11:14Lewis Howes?

  Testing you.

• 11:15Matthew McConaughey?

  Eighteen.

• 11:16Lewis Howes?

  And it starts testing you. It's like, hell, five million, 10 million, 12 million. And then you said it starts to.

• 11:21Matthew McConaughey?

  Well, I'll tell you the story. So, um, but a year goes by, nothing. And I said, I'm starting to think I had different vocations, but I'm gonna stick to my guns. Fifteen months, 18 months.

• 11:34Matthew McConaughey?

  Another rom com comes in, but my agent says, this one's really good. And check out this offer. A offer, an eight million dollar offer. Let me read that. Now before, first year, I wouldn't even read, no, no to the genre, no. But I read it.

• 11:52Matthew McConaughey?

  Pretty good, man. No, thank you. They come back, 10 million dollar offer. I said, no, thank you. They come back with a 12 million dollar offer. I said, no. Thank you. They come back with a 14.5 million dollar offer for the same script.

• 12:06Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 12:07Matthew McConaughey?

  That they sent first with the eight million dollar offer. And what did I say?

• 12:12Matthew McConaughey?

  Let me read this again.

• 12:15Matthew McConaughey?

  And I read it again, and it was funnier.

• 12:17Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 12:17Matthew McConaughey?

  I read it again. It was funnier. It was, I could see myself in that character. I was like, this is, could be a pretty good idea, buddy. What are you, da, da, da, da? But I ultimately said no. And when I said no to the 14.5, I think what it did is it sent an invisible sort of lightning bolt through Hollywood execs that McConaughey just turned down 14.5. He hasn't worked in 18 months and he just turned down 14.5. What's he up to?

• 12:44Lewis Howes?

  Interesting.

• 12:44Matthew McConaughey?

  What's that guy doing? He's on to something. To turn that down.

• 12:50Matthew McConaughey?

  It shifted. It was like, he's definitely not bluffing. Okay. So one of two things could happen. Okay. Thanks for your run in Hollywood, McConaughey. See you next life. Or what did happen is two months later, I get a call for the Lincoln Lawyer, Killer Joe, and, and, and, and, and Mud, and True Detective, Dallas Buyers Club, all these things. And so what happened is I became, I unbranded in those eight, in those eight 20 months. Where is he? Now he just turned down the 14.5. Wait, this guy is making affirmative action. That, that, that isn't a recessive move. That's like, Hollywood, that's like, you're doing what?

• 13:34Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 13:35Matthew McConaughey?

  What do you got going? So all of a sudden I became a new good idea for possibly these dramas I was looking for, because I've been gone so long.

• 13:43Lewis Howes?

  Interesting.

• 13:44Matthew McConaughey?

  Because you didn't, I wasn't getting recorded on the beach, shirtless, mountain boat. I wasn't in your theater, your home in a rom com each night. I was persona non grata for a while. Well, when you're gone long enough, you get forgotten, or you become a new novel, good idea, maybe for what you were looking for. And that's what fortunately happened to me.

• 14:04Lewis Howes?

  I love this because you talked about, uh, planting gardens to attract butterflies as opposed to chasing them. You also talk about this idea of being the target versus.

• 14:16Matthew McConaughey?

  The target draws the arrow?

• 14:17Lewis Howes?

  Yes.

• 14:18Matthew McConaughey?

  Yeah.

• 14:19Lewis Howes?

  So is that kind of what you were doing? It's like you were, you were, you know, tending to your own garden, your own inner world, you're developing yourself, shedding the old skin and becoming a new during that time and allowing the right things to come to you?

• 14:32Matthew McConaughey?

  Well, I was definitely doing the first. But I couldn't rely on the second. Okay. I was definitely tending to my own garden.

• 14:40Lewis Howes?

  How do, how do we learn to have that trust and the faith that there might be something great coming to us? When we draw a line in the sand, we say, we're not going back to this personality we had, these habits, these behaviors, this industry that we were in, that served us so well.

• 14:54Matthew McConaughey?

  Yeah.

• 14:54Lewis Howes?

  For so long.

• 14:55Matthew McConaughey?

  Yeah.

• 14:55Lewis Howes?

  But now I'm saying no to that old way of being and trusting that something greater is going to wash over me. How do we trust? Cause it could have not happened for you.

• 15:05Matthew McConaughey?

  It could have not happened. We might not be sitting here right now. I might not have gone on to do the work that I've been doing since then. I might not have had the courage to go write the book. I might, I might be that high school football coach that I was thinking about being.

• 15:16Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 15:17Matthew McConaughey?

  Yeah. I might be that wildlife guide in Africa that I was thinking about being. I might be that conductor of a symphony that I was thinking about becoming. And not sitting here. How do we trust it?

• 15:30Matthew McConaughey?

  I think. Look, to

• 15:34Matthew McConaughey?

  when the decision came to me,

• 15:37Matthew McConaughey?

  it came, I was, I was in a position to hear the truth. I was, I was in, I was in, my, my heart was looking and my mind were looking and I was giving myself room to cut out all the outside stimulus.

• 15:48Lewis Howes?

  Yes.

• 15:49Matthew McConaughey?

  And you know how when those truths come, they land like a lightning bolt and a butterfly at the same time. But you know they're true and they're true for you when they land. And you go, oh, that was a direct line. Whether you're religious or you're called the prime mover, the way maker, the universe, whatever you want to call it. That was a direct line and that, that's true to me. And then comes the hard part. Trust in that truth when the sun rises and you're back in the middle of the masses, then they're all going, hey, try this. What are you doing? And they, they, they weren't there for that truth last night. Their truth that they think of you was the same when you had the day before, but now your truth's different.

• 16:30Matthew McConaughey?

  So trust in that and not letting your onion get peeled, because that's what happens. It starts to strip away. You know, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's why, I think why people have, you know, church once a week. Cause you're good on Monday, but come Friday, you don't need to, you know what I mean? You start to forget the things, you know? Um, that's why we need to update, maintain ourselves with our mental health, spiritual health and physical health. Understanding it is one thing, but then keep it in action and trusting in it. Uh, and have the patience to trust into another. So it hit me in a clear way that I knew it was true. I had someone in my life, Camilla, that was close to me that I could share and understood it.

• 17:10Matthew McConaughey?

  And understood in the way that I shared it with her. She was like, okay, I hear you. You're not negotiating. You're not asking me a question. You're sharing with me the truth for you. So I can be by your side and say this, so I can be by your side and make sure you stick to it because I know how important this is to you.

• 17:27Lewis Howes?

  What was that truth that you heard or that came to you at that time?

• 17:31Matthew McConaughey?

  That I needed to do something different, more. I needed more to fulfill me at that point that

• 17:40Matthew McConaughey?

  while I was happy that I was getting off so much to the vitality of my real life, more so than my work, I even looked in there and said, well, it's gotta be one way or the other. Congratulations. Cause a lot of times I've had the times where you're getting off to your work more than your real life.

• 17:56Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 17:56Matthew McConaughey?

  Right? But I was like, I believe my work can challenge the vitality of my life. I hope that my life is more vital than my work for as long as possible. Please. I hope, I hope it is. But I think I can get my work to challenge the vitality and make me sweat my boots in the right way, in the same way that my life is. To give me the joy and the pain and all that, the way my life is. And so I was like, well, we'll bet on it. And don't, and make it non-negotiable, make one bet and stick to it.

• 18:27Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 18:28Matthew McConaughey?

  And you know, it's sometimes it's endurance. So trust in that. I was never, I never questioned going back on my decision.

• 18:35Lewis Howes?

  No matter, no matter how much money.

• 18:36Matthew McConaughey?

  No.

• 18:37Lewis Howes?

  20 million, 30 million, 100 million. You'd be like, it's just not worth it.

• 18:40Matthew McConaughey?

  No. Because as the number, trust me, when that number went from eight to 10, 12 to 14.5, I started getting a little.

• 18:48Lewis Howes?

  Ooh, maybe I got a little.

• 18:49Matthew McConaughey?

  Was like, here we go. Here we go.

• 18:51Lewis Howes?

  You want me.

• 18:52Matthew McConaughey?

  It didn't go from eight to six to four to two.

• 18:54Lewis Howes?

  Right. Went up.

• 18:55Matthew McConaughey?

  It went up. And I was like, okay. I got, I'm getting leverage in this. And I realized when I turned down the 14.5, I said, I got a sneaky suspicion. This may give me a little leverage. Because that's a big number.

• 19:08Lewis Howes?

  And that's for, you know, there's a small community of the agents and the managers and the directors in Hollywood, and everyone's gonna hear that you turned this down.

• 19:15Matthew McConaughey?

  I was sure hoping so. And I believe they did.

• 19:18Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 19:19Matthew McConaughey?

  Now Hollywood could come tell me how much my hypothesis on that is true. But I've heard from quite a few whispers like, no, you turned that down.

• 19:31Lewis Howes?

  That was.

• 19:32Matthew McConaughey?

  People went, double took and went, he did what?

• 19:34Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 19:35Matthew McConaughey?

  Which

• 19:37Matthew McConaughey?

  I don't know, made me more attractive in a new way. You know, or maybe, you know, when someone does that and you go like, oh, they got their own thing going. They didn't just remove themselves and sitting out there wandering in the desert. They're on to something. I don't know what it is, but you can become more attractive. And in a way, I think I became more attractive for that reason. They were like, turn out 14.5, he's got something going on. He's got a point of view. He's doing this for a reason. He's got some purpose with which he's doing this.

• 20:06Lewis Howes?

  Now, you had, you had your first, uh, first kid right around then or a year before then?

• 20:10Matthew McConaughey?

  Yeah, no, right, right in there. It's about a year, a little over, a little less than a year into that.

• 20:14Lewis Howes?

  One of the things I respect and admire about you is, yes, your career is incredible, but the fact that you, you know, have been in a loving, committed relationship for, I don't know.

• 20:24Matthew McConaughey?

  Sixteen years.

• 20:25Lewis Howes?

  Sixteen years. You've got three kids. Um, and you have found a lot of fulfillment in the richness of living, not just in making money and the career and the success and the fame. It's one of the things I respect about you. It's one of the things me and Martha were talking about this morning. About how you, you know, you, you could have had, you could have been the bachelor forever.

• 20:46Matthew McConaughey?

  Yeah.

• 20:47Lewis Howes?

  Where do you think your life would have been in that year, had you not had the loving, committed relationship? Child as well, first child. Where do you think temptation would have led you? Or do you think you would have made the same decision with the sand on the ground? Or was it having a committed, conscious, loving relationship and partner and teammate? That allowed you to have the courage to act with that line in the sand?

• 21:14Matthew McConaughey?

  Well, the only reason I pause here is because I'm trying to wonder how little of credit to give the relationship, because I'm not going to say it's a hundred percent, but it's up there. The relationship, having her and be now about to become a father, which was the only thing I ever wanted to be, had great resonance for me. I, one, had a relationship which gave me, just singularly with Camilla, gave me more the licensing courage to fly. But now I'm going to become immortal, so to speak, with a child coming into the world. It's the one thing I ever dreamed of being, become a father. That's, was at the top of my list since I was a kid.

• 21:57Matthew McConaughey?

  Now I'm like, well, this is what I'm doing. This part of life has always taken precedent before anything I did since got famous, won this or won that. My career was always in front of a Hollywood career, always. That's what I mean by JK, JK living. That's why JK, just keep living has always been sort of a mantra. What, at the end of the day, argue with that, at the end of the day, that wins out. I've always wanted to have a life that I'm leading first.

• 22:29Matthew McConaughey?

  And I became an actor and a movie star and famous, but not, oh, I'm an actor, movie star and famous. So now, what do I do? How do I live my life according to that? No, I wanted to keep those in order.

• 22:41Lewis Howes?

  If you didn't have that relationship at that time, where do, what do you think would have happened?

• 22:44Matthew McConaughey?

  That's a good question. What would have happened? Um.

• 22:47Lewis Howes?

  Do you think it would have been more tempting to take the money and let me just?

• 22:50Matthew McConaughey?

  Yeah, I mean, yeah, the nights would have been even longer. The, the, the, the, I think it would have definitely got more wobbly. I would have really had to.

• 23:03Matthew McConaughey?

  I mean, I, I believe I could have pulled it off. I'm glad I didn't have to find out if I could have pulled it off on my own. I might have, I might have run off to the monastery and still be there.

• 23:16Matthew McConaughey?

  I, I, I, um, you know, or, because I had, I look, I had very somewhat reliable temptation from people very close to me going, what's your malfunction? My brothers and family were like, what is your major malfunction? What are you doing? You own this land and the wrong, but why are you making a straight line crooked, which is lying on the old, why are you making this complicated? Do you know how many people would dream to even be doing this? And so I did have that understanding, which I bring up in the book about being less impressive, more involved. I was very thankful. I was never disrespecting the rom com. I was just like, I don't know. I didn't make this up, this feeling in me.

• 24:01Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, you're a new season.

• 24:01Matthew McConaughey?

  Well, I want more and there's a new chapter to come. So I don't, what would I have been, what would I have to be doing now? If I didn't have Camilla and she, she, we didn't have our first child on the way.

• 24:12Matthew McConaughey?

  I don't, I don't know. That two, that eight, that twenty months would have felt like twenty years if I'd, if I'd have stuck with it. And would I have had the patience? Would I have had the fortitude? Would I have been able to stay still in the long, lonely nights where I didn't feel like I had purpose, where I didn't feel significant? Where I didn't have a newborn child and a relationship to look at and go, because I knew then, I was like, you put time into that, you cannot go wrong.

• 24:39Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 24:39Matthew McConaughey?

  I looked at my newborn child. I looked at Camilla. I was like, you put time into this, you are in the black. You, there, there is no debit, no matter how, you can't overdo that. So that gave me something. If I didn't have that,

• 24:52Matthew McConaughey?

  no, I'm not sure, I'm not sure.

• 24:53Lewis Howes?

  There's a lot of men that are driven men. I'm in LA, so I see this in LA where they, they feel like they need to be single for a long time, or they need to jump from partner to partner or have multiple partners at the same time, all these different things. No judgment, no right or wrong here, but I'm curious. What have you learned about sixteen years in a relationship that has taught you about how much more successful you can be in other areas of life versus single life when you were also extremely successful, but maybe there was something missing, you know, emotionally or spiritually?

• 25:24Matthew McConaughey?

  Yeah. Well, I'm, I'm piggyback on where you first started. I don't, I've got friends that are poly and I've got friends that are perpetually single and uh, to see them when they do pull it off and still have a healthy spirit and a healthy body and a healthy mind, I applaud it. Right on. I do, I have seen a lot of them have to, oh, I gotta recalibrate. I got, you know, I got, I got off. I got spread too thin.

• 25:55Lewis Howes?

  Energy everywhere.

• 25:56Matthew McConaughey?

  One bunch of little campfires, but no bonfires, right? Um.

• 26:02Matthew McConaughey?

  You can do it. I think, I think a person can do it on their own. I think a person can do it in solitude. I think a person can do it even with a relationship with just themselves. If you, it can be done. Um.

• 26:18Matthew McConaughey?

  But when you have a relationship that you're committed to, that you want to make work, that it's part of your decision. Especially when you have a child that is not only you're committed to, is dependent on you. That goes to the top of the value system. And so career choices can go into the two hole or maybe the three hole. Now, I would argue that I got better at my career when it went to the two and three hole and wasn't in the one hole.

• 26:46Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 26:47Matthew McConaughey?

  Because I didn't, and I feared this. I was like,

• 26:53Matthew McConaughey?

  well, I was having a family and the fact that when we had kids, my wife said, if we have kids on one condition, Matthew, when you go, we go. So my family comes with me. When she said that to me, I remember going through my mind, wait a minute. I'm an artist. I'm a lone wolf. When I go to work, I'm in my airstream all alone. It's me and my dog, maybe. But nobody else. And as I'm saying that in my head, this other little smarter voice comes in and goes, Nadia didn't say, yes, ma'am. And I said, yes, ma'am. It was the greatest decision I've ever made.

• 27:18Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 27:19Matthew McConaughey?

  Because seeing my kids or leaving before they woke up and seeing them when I got home after work was the, was a beautiful, energizing reset for me at the end of the day. That filled me up with real life and made me more creative going into work the next day. To tell a child, when you're doing something like True Detective and they go, what was the scene about today? And you go, I better tell a good parable because I can't tell them the real thing. It's some heavy R stuff, right? So I became a better storyteller and how I'd make it a nursery rhyme or something. Um. But you're living for something, for, for, for someone else and something more. And, you know, for Camilla and I, I live for the covenant that for her and I

• 28:00Matthew McConaughey?

  to do what we can to, to stay together and keep promoting each other and ourselves in a relationship and then to have the kids, I'm living, you live for something else. And that empowered me and made me better as an individual.

• 28:10Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 28:10Matthew McConaughey?

  And when I go out the door, I have more courage because I know I've got that stability at home.

• 28:16Lewis Howes?

  Wow. Where do you think you would have been if you would have been in a relationship, you know, five, 10 years prior?

• 28:20Matthew McConaughey?

  Yeah.

• 28:21Lewis Howes?

  And it'd be twenty-five years opposed to sixteen. Do you think you would have been better in your career or you'd made that shift sooner? Or do you feel like, you know, being a lone wolf, you had its time and its place and its season?

• 28:32Matthew McConaughey?

  I think it had its time and its place. I'm not arrogant enough to say, oh, if I go back and change time. Um, I mean, I've thought about that. I, I, I was with and dated seriously some, some wonderful women before I met Camilla. Um, I think it wasn't the time for me and it wasn't the time for them, for us to take it further, to take it as far as, say, getting married or something. But eh, you know, I often wonder, what if, what if it was, what if I felt like it was time that I never did? What if I did?

• 29:06Matthew McConaughey?

  You know, do we meet the right person sometimes, but it's just not the time for us?

• 29:10Lewis Howes?

  Interesting.

• 29:11Matthew McConaughey?

  Do we, or is it, it's, the, the two play. It's got to be the right person and the right time for each person, but I, I, I know, I, I cannot go back, you know, going forward to mystery, looking back to science. When I connect the dots, I don't dare to go back and go, if I had changed 10 years earlier, I'm thinking about who I was dating, if we had got married, I mean, who, who, who knows? I, I don't think, I don't think it would have been the same realization 10 years earlier. I was a different man.

• 29:39Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 29:40Matthew McConaughey?

  I was, I was seeing the world differently.

• 29:43Matthew McConaughey?

  And we'll never know, but I don't, I don't, I think it was the right time for me when this happened. And my single years were the right amount of time for me when I was there. And those relationships before that, that ultimately ended, that was the right time for them to end.

• 30:00Lewis Howes?

  So how old were you when you met your wife?

• 30:02Matthew McConaughey?

  We're sixteen. Sixteen, fifty-three, forty, thirty-seven.

• 30:06Lewis Howes?

  Thirty-seven. So when you were thirty-seven, before the moment you met her.

• 30:10Matthew McConaughey?

  Yeah.

• 30:11Lewis Howes?

  I think you met her at a bar on Sunset.

• 30:12Matthew McConaughey?

  Club on Sunset.

• 30:13Lewis Howes?

  Stars Club on Sunset.

• 30:15Matthew McConaughey?

  Club.

• 30:15Lewis Howes?

  Let's call it that morning.

• 30:17Matthew McConaughey?

  Um, don't go to many clubs. Glad I went to the club this night.

• 30:20Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, it was good. Let's call it that morning or that season right before you met her.

• 30:24Matthew McConaughey?

  Yeah.

• 30:25Lewis Howes?

  What was it that made you feel loved?

• 30:27Matthew McConaughey?

  Yep.

• 30:28Lewis Howes?

  Then?

• 30:28Matthew McConaughey?

  Yep.

• 30:29Lewis Howes?

  And what is it today that makes you feel the most loved today?

• 30:33Matthew McConaughey?

  Okay. What has it made me feel the most loved before?

• 30:35Lewis Howes?

  Yes.

• 30:36Matthew McConaughey?

  About her? Okay. When I was spiritually strong.

• 30:40Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 30:41Matthew McConaughey?

  And look, I was.

• 30:45Matthew McConaughey?

  I had some relationships that were loving relationships that, or I loved the woman she loved and cared for me. And those were real.

• 30:54Lewis Howes?

  Yes.

• 30:56Matthew McConaughey?

  I also had a season where it was just affairs. It wasn't about love. It was lust.

• 31:05Lewis Howes?

  It's fun. Yeah.

• 31:05Matthew McConaughey?

  It was fun. And it was, it was healthily, it was a healthy, fun transaction. And we laughed and kept it light. And that was all it was ever gonna be. And we're not even, you know? And that was okay, too. Um, I am happy to say that through most, most of that, I was able to keep somewhat spiritually strong.

• 31:24Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 31:25Matthew McConaughey?

  Um.

• 31:27Lewis Howes?

  How did you stay?

• 31:27Matthew McConaughey?

  And had no, and didn't really have trouble sleeping alone in my own bed. Cause I've had those times, I think we all have, if we've had this single life, where there's times where if you're, you're rolling like that, especially if it's like affairs and flirt popping around here and there. Boy, all of a sudden, you end up in bed alone. You can't sleep. And you're like, whoa, wait a minute. Now I'm the company I can't stand being with? If it's only me, that would always be a trigger for me, like, you better bend a knee and go.

• 31:59Lewis Howes?

  Go inward.

• 31:59Matthew McConaughey?

  Catch your breath and go inward here. So.

• 32:04Lewis Howes?

  So what made you feel the most loved before you met her?

• 32:07Matthew McConaughey?

  Yeah, what was it? I mean.

• 32:10Lewis Howes?

  Was it the success or the, the fame?

• 32:12Matthew McConaughey?

  No.

• 32:12Lewis Howes?

  Chariot? Was it the, you know?

• 32:14Matthew McConaughey?

  No, it wasn't the chase and catch. I knew what, I, I knew what that was. I, that, that always felt like a stop and not a stay.

• 32:23Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 32:25Matthew McConaughey?

  To me, it was a season.

• 32:27Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 32:27Matthew McConaughey?

  I understood it to be a season. And I gave myself freedom and license to have that season as healthily as I, as, as I could. Um, I don't think I was any more shallow.

• 32:40Lewis Howes?

  Right, right.

• 32:42Matthew McConaughey?

  Um, I didn't think, oh, this is all there is.

• 32:50Matthew McConaughey?

  I did have a dream where I thought, where I was eighty and eighty-eight-year-old bachelor, but had a lot of children.

• 32:59Lewis Howes?

  You did?

• 33:00Matthew McConaughey?

  Yeah. And it wasn't a nightmare.

• 33:01Lewis Howes?

  Eighty-eight-year-old bachelor? And you had a lot of children? And that wasn't a nightmare?

• 33:04Matthew McConaughey?

  On a porch. And it wasn't a nightmare.

• 33:06Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 33:07Matthew McConaughey?

  And I woke up from that dream not going, yippee, that's what I'll do. I did wake up with it going, that's possible. And soon as I said, that's possible.

• 33:25Matthew McConaughey?

  I did quit looking so hard. And when I quit looking for her so hard.

• 33:33Matthew McConaughey?

  That's when she came.

• 33:34Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 33:35Matthew McConaughey?

  Because before that, I will say, in my thought of, I do wanna find someone to fall in love with and start a family.

• 33:45Matthew McConaughey?

  I mean, every red light, bro.

• 33:47Lewis Howes?

  In LA?

• 33:48Matthew McConaughey?

  Possible, possible, produce section. You know what I mean? Possible, poss, every, you know, you just.

• 33:54Lewis Howes?

  Younger class, Whole Foods.

• 33:55Matthew McConaughey?

  You're just checking, you know, everywhere. And I was looking, I was leaning in, leaning in. And then said, well, Mac, maybe that could work, like that script, well, maybe that could work, you know? Um, and then when I had that dream, it did, it was like, oh, on spiritual sense, I was like, well, you might end up being an eighty-year-old bachelor. And if you've got spiritually, if you're spiritually strong, your relationship with God is strong, that's, that's okay. It didn't make me go, that's what I wanna do.

• 34:21Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 34:21Matthew McConaughey?

  But just saying, that could be a reality for you. Let me exhale. And I quit looking everywhere and everywhere. I quit looking in the produce section. It was like, and I, what happens when you do that? You become more attractive. You allow yourself to be loved. You allow yourself to see someone who actually you might love.

• 34:40Matthew McConaughey?

  But mainly, you allow yourself to be someone that can be loved. And you're not selling, you're not soliciting yourself. You're not in a rush about anything. You wanna meet somebody. You also, what you look at, you wanna see how they move. How far back are their shoulders? How do they talk? What do they say in between the lines? Not what they say, what do they say in between the lines? And I remember when I saw Camilla walk across the club that night, it was the way she moved.

• 35:03Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 35:04Matthew McConaughey?

  I saw history. I saw dignity. I saw somebody that was not for sale. I saw somebody that, that, that, that, that didn't even, that, that when I called her over was not happy to meet me, wasn't over the, wasn't, wasn't impressed with my vocation. And she knew who I was. Wasn't impressed with that. She was about a lot more than that. So I, my eyes were open to seeing what I wanted and needed. And I also was able to, in that moment, completely be myself, not oversell myself. Not undersell myself.

• 35:39Lewis Howes?

  Did you feel like you needed to oversell yourself before then, even though you had all the success and the fame and the hits and the money and?

• 35:44Matthew McConaughey?

  I think, I think when, just to sped, it's a sped up process, you know? Especially if you're like, in, you know, if it's a, a more of a string of short-term relationships. It's like, it's not overselling. It's just like, let's skip the, let's skip a lot of the real stuff. Let's skip a lot of the, the, you know what I mean? I don't wanna take that. Come on. We're just here, we're laughing. We're having a good time. You know what I mean? Um, uh, and that's all, that's all we're both in this for. So, you know? Um, so you speed up the process a little bit. Um. So I don't know. When you say, what did I love? It wasn't my fame. Did I, did I feel more, did I feel more loved if my movie did well?

• 36:29Matthew McConaughey?

  And more people came up and was like, that was great? Sure, sure. But that was never my top source of.

• 36:37Lewis Howes?

  Feeling loved.

• 36:38Matthew McConaughey?

  Affirmation of feeling loved. Um, did I feel less loved? Movie bombed? Or people were like, I, like, sure. But that was never my.

• 36:47Lewis Howes?

  Main thing.

• 36:48Matthew McConaughey?

  The, the source of my lack of confidence or lack of significance. It was mainly, I was spiritual. And then I always had, look, I always had family at this time, being my brothers and my mom and stuff. There was always that, um, that I knew was a hundred percent reliable.

• 37:03Lewis Howes?

  Uh huh.

• 37:03Matthew McConaughey?

  Uh, but mainly, I'd say spiritual. And then your follow-up question to what makes you feel more loved now?

• 37:08Lewis Howes?

  Well, yeah. When do you feel the most loved now?

• 37:11Matthew McConaughey?

  Oh, the good night group hug with my three kids and my, my wife. After we've just talked about what her day was like, what we're looking forward to tomorrow. And we've had a few fun disagreements. And somebody said something real honest that they didn't have the courage to say maybe a week before. And for the first time, noticed that if they shared that, they weren't gonna get in trouble.

• 37:35Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 37:35Matthew McConaughey?

  That they were just going. And to see them grow and going, you got the courage. We, me and, then to feel like a dad and going, me and your mother are giving you a place to feel like you can go.

• 37:47Matthew McConaughey?

  We, I, I, I did like her. And it, and it, and it, my heart hurts because she doesn't like me. To be able to, for a child to be able to say that to you, it's like, okay, we're doing something right. There we go. That's a feeling of love. To have an honest talk, not just about all of the happy times, but about the stuff that sucks in my kids' lives as well. And even from my wife to share it and it not be like, dun, dun, dun, dun.

• 38:09Lewis Howes?

  Right, right.

• 38:10Matthew McConaughey?

  To be like, yep, we're going through this. And one thing we know is, we're going through it together.

• 38:14Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 38:16Matthew McConaughey?

  That, that, that's.

• 38:16Lewis Howes?

  That's beautiful. That's beautiful. One of the things that you talk about is, in the book, in the last couple of pages, was this list of goals that you wrote down.

• 38:27Matthew McConaughey?

  Hmm.

• 38:29Lewis Howes?

  One of them.

• 38:30Matthew McConaughey?

  Isn't that wild?

• 38:31Lewis Howes?

  Ten goals in life, nineteen ninety-two.

• 38:33Matthew McConaughey?

  Ninety-two.

• 38:34Lewis Howes?

  One of them, becoming a father. And, and number two, finding and keeping the woman for me, the woman for me.

• 38:39Matthew McConaughey?

  Yep.

• 38:40Lewis Howes?

  Um, and you had ten of them. I'm curious, how important is it to write down our visions, our dreams, our goals? In order to manifest what we want in our lives? Because this whole book is a.

• 38:52Matthew McConaughey?

  Yeah.

• 38:53Lewis Howes?

  A journal of you writing down.

• 38:54Matthew McConaughey?

  Yeah.

• 38:54Lewis Howes?

  Everything.

• 38:55Matthew McConaughey?

  Yeah.

• 38:56Lewis Howes?

  And all ten of these, you, you've accomplished all of them. And you're still accomplishing and living into them.

• 39:01Matthew McConaughey?

  Yep.

• 39:02Lewis Howes?

  So how important is it to write down our dreams, our goals, our values in order to manifest and attract them?

• 39:08Matthew McConaughey?

  I think it's a lot more important than we give it credit for. Look, writing things down, it seems like this old-fashioned sort of archaic things. Type it. It's on the screen. Put it on, put it in a Word doc. Save it. Put it in a folder.

• 39:22Matthew McConaughey?

  It, it can be lost back there. To actually write it with the hand.

• 39:28Matthew McConaughey?

  Does, is a different kind of objectivity you get. Cause it's come out of you, you've put it down. Now you're looking at, it's outside of you. It's freed up now. It's alive. It's moving now. More so than having that goal by your bedside every night.

• 39:46Matthew McConaughey?

  Which is can be good. But to write it down. If you're writing down true goals. There they become written in your lineage, they become written in your body. Whether you know it or not, in your subconscious, they exist. It's a way to get it into your subconscious to write it down. Now it's out of me, it's on a page, I'm objectifying it now, I'm looking at it. So now I'm having a dialogue where before it was just Socratic. But now I'm having a dialogue and it starts to reciprocate. Those 10 goals, I wrote those down in the top bunk in the Dell House. University of Texas, 1992, my roommate was Monty Wills. I remember the night I wrote them down.

• 40:23Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 40:24Matthew McConaughey?

  I never looked at them again.

• 40:27Matthew McConaughey?

  I found those in writing this book and found out that, oh my gosh, all 10 you actually did and and and four you're still doing.

• 40:33Lewis Howes?

  That's crazy.

• 40:34Matthew McConaughey?

  I never looked at them.

• 40:35Lewis Howes?

  30 years later, you found them.

• 40:36Matthew McConaughey?

  Yeah.

• 40:37Lewis Howes?

  That's crazy.

• 40:39Lewis Howes?

  But they all happened.

• 40:40Matthew McConaughey?

  They all happened.

• 40:43Matthew McConaughey?

  I don't think they happened if I don't write them down, I don't think. They do.

• 40:49Matthew McConaughey?

  So. That practice of writing something down. That you into that you want or that you yearn for. And to add to it or subtract from it along the way, if you want to, or just write it down, fold it up, tuck it away. So you can find it 30 years later when you go wanna. Share a journal or write something about it. Like I did. Um, I don't think it happens, but then just go back and see the invisible contract I made with myself.

• 41:19Lewis Howes?

  Gosh, I love that.

• 41:20Matthew McConaughey?

  Cause obviously I did, cause I mean, I those 10, people go, you've done all 10, I said, well, no, I'm in the middle, I'm still, I have to maintain, I'm still maintaining for them, but I have engaged. Some of them I've just done. But I have engaged, I am in full engagement with all of them.

• 41:37Lewis Howes?

  Well, it's an invisible contract until it becomes a a physical written contract.

• 41:40Matthew McConaughey?

  Right.

• 41:41Lewis Howes?

  You know.

• 41:41Matthew McConaughey?

  But it's with yourself, I guess it becomes, there's an invisible way it becomes subconsciously non-negotiable with yourself.

• 41:48Lewis Howes?

  And here's the interesting thing on this, I don't, is this the exact image or is this a recreated image?

• 41:53Matthew McConaughey?

  No, that's it.

• 41:54Lewis Howes?

  This is the photo of it or? You signed it.

• 41:57Matthew McConaughey?

  Yeah.

• 41:57Lewis Howes?

  And that's what I think is actually really important because you did create a contract with self.

• 42:01Matthew McConaughey?

  Right.

• 42:01Lewis Howes?

  You signed the goals at the bottom, you have 10 goals in life. 9192 and you bottom, at the bottom, you signed it. And I think that's really important in creating a. You know, uh, this contract with self is putting your name on something that you write down from the ideas in your mind into paper.

• 42:19Matthew McConaughey?

  Yeah.

• 42:19Lewis Howes?

  So that you can actualize this in life. And I think that's what's beautiful. And you were like, what, 20 years old when you did this?

• 42:24Matthew McConaughey?

  2021 and and folks, anyone who thinks so, that sounds like, you know, Mike Tyson talking about Mike Tyson when he's himself, I'm a third person. Do it, don't worry, sign your stuff to yourself. You know what I mean, right, just write to yourself and sign it. It's a great practice to do, you know, you are then, you are then. Getting a third person objective view of yourself. Where, so you will have a better chance of subjectively. Creating those and activating those things and having them happen.

• 42:54Lewis Howes?

  One of the things in here, um, number seven, stay close to mom and family. I know there's a period, I think you said six or eight years where you pulled away from your mom. I think you're still close with your brother, but you pulled back because she was kind of.

• 43:06Matthew McConaughey?

  Loving my fame.

• 43:07Lewis Howes?

  Loving the fame and it was making it about her as opposed to supporting your son. Um, so that was something that kind of came and went and you you danced with, but you know, now it's seems like you guys are, you know, in a great place.

• 43:18Matthew McConaughey?

  She's living with us four years now, she's 91.

• 43:21Lewis Howes?

  And then also you had number eight, win an Oscar for the best actor. How do you at 20, 21? Write down a goal of winning an Oscar when I think.

• 43:29Matthew McConaughey?

  And I wasn't even acting at that time.

• 43:30Lewis Howes?

  That's nuts, you didn't even do the first movie yet?

• 43:33Matthew McConaughey?

  No.

• 43:35Lewis Howes?

  Why did that come in your mind? Why was that even a thought, a dream, a goal?

• 43:40Matthew McConaughey?

  So this is, I believe, right after I had, soon after I had called my father to say, I don't want to go to law school anymore, I want to go to film school. Now, I'm looking back.

• 43:49Lewis Howes?

  And he said a great line back to you.

• 43:51Matthew McConaughey?

  He said a great line.

• 43:52Lewis Howes?

  He said, don't half ass it.

• 43:52Matthew McConaughey?

  Don't half ass it.

• 43:53Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 43:54Matthew McConaughey?

  Which was. Three, whatever, four, however many words is the best words I've ever heard. From the man who I ultimately really wanted my ultimate approval from. And he didn't give me, he gave me a lot more than approval with that line. He made a kick in the backside, privilege, freedom, responsibility, kick, go do it. Um. And I suppose. Kind of know consciously, but probably subconsciously too, there's things that I've done where. I wanted to let something slide and those words came on, I was like, uh-uh, no way. Uh-uh, that'd be half assing it. So those words have lived with me. Um. I I decided I want to go to film school.

• 44:35Matthew McConaughey?

  And I went back through these journals and I find something like that, I was like. Dude, you always wanted to be an actor.

• 44:41Lewis Howes?

  Oh, interesting.

• 44:42Matthew McConaughey?

  Like you just wouldn't admit it. And I remember. Always being sheepish about. Someone go like, well, you just want to, why don't you perform? I think, nah, I don't, I don't, I don't. Something about it and I had felt. Fraudulent. Then. Something about being behind the camera to go to director's school, learning story felt like. Well, that's my. I'll sneak in the back door to the acting, right? But that's the better way and I, I'm I'm glad I went that path. But I think I wanted to, and I'm talking about buddy Rob Binler, who I bring up often in this book about it. And he was like, yeah, you were wanting to, you, he kept reminding me of talks we'd have late night. And he was already NYU film school. He was like reminding me of, yeah, you were already wanting to. At this time. When you first went to film school.

• 45:28Matthew McConaughey?

  So. I write that down to myself, I'm I'm not afraid to write it down to myself, but I'm afraid to say anything like that out loud. I'm not, I'm afraid to even say I would, I'm interested in going into acting at this point.

• 45:39Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 45:40Matthew McConaughey?

  But yet I write down. I want to win an Oscar for best actor.

• 45:44Lewis Howes?

  That's crazy.

• 45:46Lewis Howes?

  Wow. So when you saw this paper, you'd already won.

• 45:51Matthew McConaughey?

  Yeah.

• 45:51Lewis Howes?

  These goals, you, you know, for the first time after, I guess. On close to 30 years, you'd won it, I think, I don't know, six, seven years prior to that.

• 45:58Matthew McConaughey?

  Yeah.

• 45:59Lewis Howes?

  Um. What did that feel like when you read this and you saw win an Oscar for best actor?

• 46:05Matthew McConaughey?

  Oh, I was, I was like, ah, are you kidding, get out of here, Camilla, check this out. Are you kidding me?

• 46:13Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 46:14Matthew McConaughey?

  And then I went whoop, right back to the night and I remember sitting in the top bunk.

• 46:20Matthew McConaughey?

  We'd just come from the arcade, me and Monty Wills, my roommate, he was in the bottom bunk, I was in the top bunk. Like a two Thursday night. I've been journaling, I wrote in this little journal, I remember.

• 46:35Matthew McConaughey?

  That night.

• 46:37Matthew McConaughey?

  Other people were actually going out for a late, we'd been out. Kind of partying, other people went to the next party and I decided to come home and sort of Monty.

• 46:45Matthew McConaughey?

  All of the top bunk, I brushed my teeth, went out. From shores, kind of bed, kind of covers set up there and I have a window right here and I have my little diary on the little window seal. With a pen.

• 46:55Lewis Howes?

  Bunk bed.

• 46:56Matthew McConaughey?

  Yeah. That we made, we made these bunk, we were the first bunk beds in the Dell House. And, um. Pulled over and I wrote it and I think I had, I think I even, um. A form of a headlamp, if they even had headlamps, I loved headlamps, still do love headlamps. Um, and written that and I wrote that down.

• 47:15Lewis Howes?

  Curious, if you didn't create this contract for yourself. Do you think you would have accomplished? All 10 of these goals and dreams for your life? Or would some of them maybe fall through the cracks because you didn't create that? Turn the invisible contract into a physical written contract and make it real.

• 47:32Matthew McConaughey?

  I don't know, I mean, I have to believe that writing them down.

• 47:37Matthew McConaughey?

  Subconsciously led to me actually, I I knew what they were. I couldn't recite them to you. Cause I never looked at them again. But I knew what they were. And it tells me I had good goals because I actually, they they they were true. And I mean, we all write down goals that we go like. Later on, I know you were bullshitting yourself. You were, you were just. Writing down what you think someone wanted you to say. And I, and and and this particular night, I. I obviously wrote things down that were, had real. I mean, I told my future in a way.

• 48:10Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 48:10Matthew McConaughey?

  I don't, trust me, when I write, every time I put a pen to paper, I'm not, I'm, I betted a thousand on this one. I got 10 for 10, I don't, I don't go 10 for 10 all the time. You know what I mean, but writing them down the right ones. If I, and even without looking at it, I don't, I I doubt I would have. Pulled these things off.

• 48:28Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 48:28Matthew McConaughey?

  Um.

• 48:30Lewis Howes?

  How do we learn to listen to? The true. Highest version of ourselves and write the right goals and and follow that path.

• 48:39Matthew McConaughey?

  Yeah.

• 48:40Lewis Howes?

  As opposed to chasing the, you know, the stuff that leads to a lot of red lights.

• 48:43Matthew McConaughey?

  Yep.

• 48:44Lewis Howes?

  And actually. Create a lane of green lights.

• 48:47Matthew McConaughey?

  Yeah.

• 48:48Lewis Howes?

  For us.

• 48:49Matthew McConaughey?

  Yeah.

• 48:50Lewis Howes?

  Obviously you had obstacles to overcome on this journey and that's part of the human condition, but. You actualized all these. How do we, how did, how did you, you know, you were listening to yourself and you authentically said, become a father, finally keep the woman from me. Keep my relationship with God and chase my best self is your first four. You didn't say become a billionaire. You know, have, have 20 mansions, have three, you know. Maseratis.

• 49:15Matthew McConaughey?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 49:16Lewis Howes?

  Which, what do you think a 20 year old might, I mean, that's probably what I was thinking when I was 20, you know, it's like. How did you think about these?

• 49:24Lewis Howes?

  You know, the first four and the sixth one, take more risks, it's like stay close to mom and family. Then number eight was a more material thing, win an Oscar, it wasn't win an Oscar first.

• 49:34Matthew McConaughey?

  Right, right. Um. We got asked to what? We we all, I think we all agree, we all want more, we have dreams, we have goals. We got asked to. First.

• 49:48Matthew McConaughey?

  More what?

• 49:49Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 49:51Matthew McConaughey?

  And that starts, I think, by going and answering that question, well, what do I value the most? And so look at the things that you already got in your holster that you value. Cause you don't wanna be reckless with those things and cast them off and let all the weeds grow around those. Then often you can't even recognize that garden. So if you, I think that the first things were about taking care of things that I, that I valued, they were very personal. They would take care of myself, they would take care of my mom, take care of the family, take care of my relationship with God. They were very, very, very personal things to me that I knew and believed would be lifelong maintenance journeys. And that things that I believed at that time that no, taking care of those is never gonna go out of style for you, bud.

• 50:36Matthew McConaughey?

  Pick out the things that are not, not, not the fads, because we'll write things down. Those three Maseratis.

• 50:40Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 50:40Matthew McConaughey?

  Hey, man, you get twenty years from now, you ain't gonna like Maserati, you're like a Bugatti. You know what I mean? So all right, Maserati. You know what I mean? Watch out what proper nouns we're using. Cause they, some of them may be just fickle. You know what I mean? So those are the proper nouns, family, God, myself, Jesus. Those are things that I gave value to and gave me value and meaning in my life. And so I was like, I was already in the, I was already in the midst of those. And those are things I said, I'm not gonna forgive these. And I'm not gonna, no matter who I become, I'm not gonna say, oh, these are no longer on my plate. I don't need to worry about these. Like you said, the Oscar, that's a new one. That's something that was out there.

• 51:17Lewis Howes?

  That's big.

• 51:18Matthew McConaughey?

  Um, becoming a father, that's out there. But I, I, since I was eight years old, the one thing I knew I wanted to be was a father.

• 51:23Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 51:24Matthew McConaughey?

  Um, I knew I wanted to meet the right person, right woman for me.

• 51:31Matthew McConaughey?

  Didn't have her, hadn't met her yet at that point, far from it. Um,

• 51:39Matthew McConaughey?

  so start with the things that we got in our saddle, a saddle that you do already give about, that already give you meaning and value in your life. And double down on those, project forward. And if that happens, what will, what will, what, what I, what I dreamed it to become?

• 51:57Matthew McConaughey?

  And then if you're gonna talk about, I think, when we're talking about a career,

• 52:06Matthew McConaughey?

  we gotta ask ourselves first, I think this would be really valuable for everyone to ask themselves first. What do you have an innate ability for? An innate talent for?

• 52:19Matthew McConaughey?

  And what are you willing? Is that the same thing you're willing to work your ass off for? And then thirdly, which is a little bit more of an asterisk. Is that something that the world would demand?

• 52:32Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 52:33Matthew McConaughey?

  We're gonna go straight capitalism.

• 52:34Lewis Howes?

  Mm hmm.

• 52:35Matthew McConaughey?

  Supply and demand.

• 52:36Lewis Howes?

  Mm hmm.

• 52:37Matthew McConaughey?

  But we often look at things. And I've done it. I'll bust my hump for it, but I'm like,

• 52:45Matthew McConaughey?

  I'm really not that good at it.

• 52:46Lewis Howes?

  Mm hmm.

• 52:48Matthew McConaughey?

  Okay. Or I've got something that sometimes we have things that we're really good at, or like, I just, but I'm, I'm kinda just a natural, I don't wanna work at it.

• 52:57Lewis Howes?

  Mm hmm.

• 52:59Matthew McConaughey?

  If you can find something that you have an innate ability for, and we love doing things we have an innate ability for, right? We have an innate talent in our DNA for. And then go, now I'm ready to educate myself, learn, hustle, go after, seek, create opportunities. Bam, bam, it's gonna be in the prism of my, how I measure every situation where I am going forward. Hunt it down. And do what you gotta do to get better at it. And then if it's hopefully something that the world could demand, you're

• 53:27Lewis Howes?

  Right, that's a sweet spot.

• 53:27Matthew McConaughey?

  Now you're, now you're, now you're paying your rent, man. Now I got food on the table, now, now, now we're rolling, now we're waking up with some purpose. Now we're waking up with, um, you know, yeah, it's gonna be a hard day today, but I don't, I can't, I'm not dreading Monday morning.

• 53:41Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 53:42Matthew McConaughey?

  You know?

• 53:42Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 53:43Matthew McConaughey?

  Um, maybe wanna sleep in, but I got, I'm building something, I'm building something here, I'm in construction.

• 53:49Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 53:51Lewis Howes?

  One of the things that you, uh, I wanna connect that to this thought here. Six twenty-two, Matthew six twenty-two, if nine I be single, the whole body will be full of light.

• 54:00Matthew McConaughey?

  Yep.

• 54:00Lewis Howes?

  I believe that's your favorite passage.

• 54:02Matthew McConaughey?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 54:03Lewis Howes?

  Um, you went on a journey, you know, after the, it was either in the middle or at the end of, tail end of your rom-com, you know, stardom. And you went to, on a trip, went on a journey with yourself.

• 54:15Matthew McConaughey?

  Yeah.

• 54:15Lewis Howes?

  I think for twenty

• 54:16Matthew McConaughey?

  Twenty-two days.

• 54:17Lewis Howes?

  Twenty-two days, uh, in the Amazon.

• 54:19Matthew McConaughey?

  Yeah.

• 54:21Lewis Howes?

  And there was a moment in the book where you talk about, essentially you had to kind of have a coming to, you know, moment with yourself where you had to shed all the identities that you were holding on to, your rings, your heritage, your background, your clothes, your, I'm, I'm famous, I'm a rom-com guy, I'm an actor, I'm a, you had to shed all of it.

• 54:39Matthew McConaughey?

  Yep.

• 54:40Lewis Howes?

  And what was the thing that you found when you let go of your identity in the outer world?

• 54:45Matthew McConaughey?

  That I was a mammal.

• 54:50Matthew McConaughey?

  A mammal, and for me, as a believer, a child of God.

• 54:53Lewis Howes?

  Uh huh.

• 54:54Matthew McConaughey?

  That's it.

• 54:57Matthew McConaughey?

  Uh, baseline.

• 55:02Matthew McConaughey?

  And the mammal, we can all agree on, right? The child of God, that was for me and any other believer, but the baseline it. I got rid of, I remember my dad's ring, which had M on it, gold melted down from their, my mom and dad's class rings and gold from my mom's teeth. Meant a lot to me.

• 55:18Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 55:19Matthew McConaughey?

  But it was an identity marker, I'm a McConaughey, this is about my dad, I had my American cap that I'd worn for two decades. I'm an American, I'm gonna get rid of that, got rid of all these little talismans that were identities and titles that meant something. They weren't random, they were healthy ones.

• 55:35Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 55:36Matthew McConaughey?

  But I stripped them all off. It was like, bull? And no, you're not famous, and no, it's not, you were, what, before you were ever an actor, before, what are you? What were you? Before you were McConaughey, before you were a Texan, before you were an American, before you were an actor, before you were a movie star? Before you were a celebrity?

• 55:55Matthew McConaughey?

  Well, well, come on, get it all off. And I, and it was a purge, basically. And I ended up, that was, I was a naked sweating mammal.

• 56:08Matthew McConaughey?

  I was like, you're a mammal, child of God. And that's what you are. So we've stripped off all the accoutrements, we've stripped off the ornaments. Here we are. And that is the night that I was like, this happened a couple of times in my life. And I think this is important for us all to do so at some point. That's when I was like, okay. And what other truth do we know, McConaughey? Tell you what, another truth I'm realizing right now is that

• 56:40Matthew McConaughey?

  you're the only son of a can't get rid of.

• 56:43Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 56:44Matthew McConaughey?

  So we're gonna duke it out for the rest of our life here? Or we're gonna figure out, get along?

• 56:50Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 56:51Matthew McConaughey?

  What are we gonna forgive right now? And what are we gonna say, the buck stops here, no more, I'm not putting up with it. Cause I'm tired of playing crap with yourself, I'm gonna, cut the shit, man.

• 57:03Matthew McConaughey?

  Let's get along. I can't get rid of you, everybody else, every other relationship out, there's a choice, you're the one person I don't have a choice hanging out with. So let's work this out.

• 57:13Matthew McConaughey?

  And

• 57:16Matthew McConaughey?

  just like going back and seeing the embarrassment and shame turn into giggles, I began to go like,

• 57:22Matthew McConaughey?

  man, maybe you're being too hard on yourself on this thing. You know what, get that monkey off your back, you're human, man, forgive yourself. And these other things, dude, you've been a repeat offender, it hadn't been paying you back. You've been regretting that choice every time you make it and you keep fricking making it. Cut the, man, evolve, turn the page. No more. And next morning,

• 57:43Matthew McConaughey?

  I remember even the, the Sherpas and stuff in Peru. I came out of the tent and they all started going, la luz, la luz.

• 57:54Lewis Howes?

  Light?

• 57:55Matthew McConaughey?

  The light, light. And they were talking about me and the way I was moving. And I went for a walk. And for the first time during that trip,

• 58:06Matthew McConaughey?

  I didn't give a damn where I was around, about what was around the next corner.

• 58:10Lewis Howes?

  You weren't thinking about the destination?

• 58:11Matthew McConaughey?

  I wasn't thinking about the destination, getting to the Amazon. And now it's been eleven days, when are we gonna get there? And mind you, this eleven days prior, I had not really been present in the trip, cause I was thinking about the result, getting to the destination so much. And then this morning, after that night, I'm walking, I'm not even thinking about what's around the next corner. And when I did turn the corner,

• 58:36Matthew McConaughey?

  I was stopped by this sea of atomic plugged in neon blue, like a puddle, like a bubbling puddle in the middle of my jungle path. And it stopped me. And I looked at it, I've never seen colors this, this neon and bright. It was like it was not man-made. It was glowing. I'm completely soaked this time, no, I wasn't, no, this is straight-eyed, right?

• 59:04Matthew McConaughey?

  And it stopped me and as I stared at it for about thirty seconds, all of a sudden it started to flutter and rise and

• 59:14Matthew McConaughey?

  dissipate. It was tens of thousands of these Amazonian butterflies.

• 59:20Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 59:22Matthew McConaughey?

  And I stayed there for a minute. And then this

• 59:27Matthew McConaughey?

  little word, words came into my brain from Prime Uber that said, all I want is what I can see and what I can see is in front of me.

• 59:37Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 59:40Matthew McConaughey?

  I was free, I was light, it was magical. I walked, I turned the corner, went down the trail. There was the Amazon, I finally made it. Made it to the river. Right after that moment.

• 59:52Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 59:52Matthew McConaughey?

  Did not know if I was still days away, weeks away, what?

• 59:58Matthew McConaughey?

  And stuff like that happens,

• 1:00:02Matthew McConaughey?

  we gotta listen.

• 1:00:03Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 1:00:04Matthew McConaughey?

  Those are some of those truths that come that you go, nobody else was here to witness that.

• 1:00:08Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 1:00:08Matthew McConaughey?

  That was not for the whole class, that was not on the speaker, that was not on the bulletin, that was not on the nightly news. That was not even at church on Sunday with the congregation, that wasn't at school, that wasn't sitting around the dinner table with mom and dad, learning lessons. Those are from a mentor.

• 1:00:28Matthew McConaughey?

  That was for me in this moment.

• 1:00:34Matthew McConaughey?

  I must heed that truth.

• 1:00:40Lewis Howes?

  You've been on this journey of a lot of people seeing you on screen and your personalities on screen and your talent in characters, but now over the last three to four years, you've been revealing yourself more and more through your book, through all of your amazing content online, all the interviews you've been doing and all the solo content, which I think is amazing. Please keep doing that.

• 1:01:00Matthew McConaughey?

  Oh, good. Thank you.

• 1:01:01Lewis Howes?

  I think it's amazing, these lessons that you share. You know, the last story you just told, you know, had the entire room just like in awe and shock and just silent here as you were talking about this truth that you realized from within, essentially came through God and you realized from within, no one was around you. And I, and I mentioned this quote before that, "If thine eye be single, thy whole body will be full of light."

• 1:01:26Matthew McConaughey?

  Right.

• 1:01:26Lewis Howes?

  Matthew 622. What does that mean to you? If thine eye be single, thy whole body will be full of light. And that light came to you in that moment and these Sherpas were saying, you know, la luz, la luz, you were radiating light after this came to you. Why is this your favorite passage? And, and what does it mean for you? And how can we start to step into that?

• 1:01:55Matthew McConaughey?

  So the mandorla, this is what the mandorla is. So we, we, we see, we're, we so often are seeing life in contradictions, right? Future, the past, heaven, hell, technology, culture. And we see them as contradictions. And when in truth, that's, that's two eyes, right? And there's judgment on either side and there's a duality there, but the truth

• 1:02:29Matthew McConaughey?

  is in that third eye.

• 1:02:31Lewis Howes?

  Interesting.

• 1:02:31Matthew McConaughey?

  Where they overlap. And that's not a shade, so we go, oh, that's a shade of gray. No, it's not a shade of gray. What the verse is saying, what I get from is that's where all the colors live. All the colors of the truth live. That passage, when I always tell myself, keep a high eye, it's, keep the high eye. It's third eye, it shows up in all the religions too. It shows up everywhere. Um, it, it, it's, it's a way of perceiving the truth, I think, which lives in the paradox. And paradox is a word that some people go, oh, don't get into paradox, that's too, I don't know, academic or whatever. No, paradox is where it's, it's, both are true. Two things can be true at the same time. It's today, we could utilize it.

• 1:03:16Matthew McConaughey?

  It's like, if I seek to understand you and where you're coming from first, I'm probably gonna, before I seek to be understood.

• 1:03:28Matthew McConaughey?

  We don't usually, it has to do with listening, has to do with how we see things, it's how, it's how we judge. We, it's very easy and especially today, I think we love to be judge and jury on others and ourself. And it's a very arrogant thing for us to do. And this passage, if the eye be single and not a dual contradiction and seeing the contradiction of things have gone, oh, this is true and that's true. And instead of or, right? There's, that's where the truth lives, I believe. Um, and it doesn't mean that you just straddle the fence and you're noncommittal about anything.

• 1:04:06Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 1:04:07Matthew McConaughey?

  That's not what it means. It doesn't mean you're, you're, you're just Mr. In between. So that's true and that's true and it's all okay. No, you can then have judgment, but see both first. See the overlap of the truth and understand it from both sides and then be understood. And you can then have judgment, but see it through that lens first. We go, we just don't do it. We come in with one eye or we, me, us versus them. Me versus you. My idea versus yours. Left versus right. Democrat versus Republican.

• 1:04:40Matthew McConaughey?

  Even, how far can you go? Can you go down to right versus wrong, good versus bad? I mean, we, we see them as contradictions and they're, and they're not. We all, we all know. We all got a little good ends, we all got a little bad ends. It's a choice we make where we then have judgment. Um, so that passage has elevated my POV quite a bit. And after, and it was one that I daily remind myself of. Um, if I'm getting a low eye on somebody, if I'm condescending people, if I'm objectifying people, I'm like, whoa, whoa, whoa, high eye, buddy. Come on, open that third eye. You're not, it's not, it's not open. My kids can see it in my eyes when I'm talking to them.

• 1:05:24Matthew McConaughey?

  If I'm talking at them or if I stop and really look at them and maybe there's something, maybe it's, it's a form of discipline.

• 1:05:32Matthew McConaughey?

  But then they can see if I'm looking at them like, I love you, man. This is why I'm trying to teach you this. All of a sudden they go, my son said it. I see you at their after five.

• 1:05:42Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 1:05:43Matthew McConaughey?

  622. I'm like, yeah, yeah. He's like, I heard you. I didn't hear you before when you were talking just at me.

• 1:05:54Matthew McConaughey?

  You know, so it's a great, it's, it's a great reminder. Matthew 622. The whole body will be full of light and you will move lightly and with discernment. Does it take away discernment? It doesn't take away judgment. Just saying, see it through that lens first and understand that that truth is where those overlap.

• 1:06:11Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 1:06:12Matthew McConaughey?

  And then make your decision.

• 1:06:14Lewis Howes?

  Wow. I think it's beautiful that you're, I believe it's your son that was born at 622.

• 1:06:18Matthew McConaughey?

  622.

• 1:06:19Lewis Howes?

  It's crazy, man.

• 1:06:20Matthew McConaughey?

  So there's another one.

• 1:06:21Lewis Howes?

  I'm all about the, I'm all about the, the symbols and the signs and the synchronicities of life. And me and my girlfriend Martha, we, we talk about how, how impactful it is to listen and watch for the signals and signs and synchronicities. And, you know, and I think you would probably say that that might be a green light that you should be looking towards when you see those things kind of coming in your peripheral.

• 1:06:44Matthew McConaughey?

  I think so, but let's talk about this because I was writing this yesterday. Seems our greatest strength is our greatest Achilles heel. And if you overcompensate for something that works for you.

• 1:06:59Matthew McConaughey?

  All of a sudden you go into the equal and same amount into the debit section. Meaning on this instance, if you're, we've all been there. If you're looking for the signal and the significance in every situation, you start creating ones that aren't real.

• 1:07:19Lewis Howes?

  Making them up.

• 1:07:19Matthew McConaughey?

  And it's like, wow, you're getting stimulus from everywhere. Oh, that was a sign. Oh, that was a sign. Oh, and I remember writing this line about, everything has significance, but not everything is significant. Right? And so we have to watch that fine line of where do we intuit?

• 1:07:37Matthew McConaughey?

  Where do we feel a truth? But if we're, again, like, like we were talking earlier about finding, remember when I quit looking for, if we're hunting for the significance in every single thing, it could be mental meditation. We can, the subplots become unmanageable.

• 1:07:53Lewis Howes?

  Yes.

• 1:07:53Matthew McConaughey?

  You know what I mean?

• 1:07:54Lewis Howes?

  How do we know when it's significant?

• 1:07:55Matthew McConaughey?

  Right. Put it, can we put ourselves in that place to receive it? And be aware to see it.

• 1:08:01Lewis Howes?

  You gotta be light.

• 1:08:01Matthew McConaughey?

  You gotta be light and you gotta be in a place where you can hear it, feel it and see it. But if we're out there going, well, you know, we've all been there. Look at that heart. Wow, that tree. And all of a sudden you look up three hours later and you, and you, you were on your way to the bathroom, but you didn't move six inches because you were so, oh, wow, wow. And that's, we've been around those people like, whoa, subplots are a little unmanageable, bro.

• 1:08:23Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 1:08:24Matthew McConaughey?

  You know? At the same time, gotta be open to that, that mystical math that comes to us. Cause there's a metric to that mystical math. There's a metric to that spiritual, those gifts that come to us. We don't know how to put them in a category and go, there's how their currency, there's the credits and debits, there's how they bring us ROI and this is what they're worth. They don't come in numbers like that, but there is a real, true valuable metric to them. And I think again, art of living, how are you aware to them, aware of them and be open to them and put yourself in a place so you can receive them? At the same time, not go hunting them down in every single.

• 1:09:10Matthew McConaughey?

  Shape, size and smell. Cause then you'll be just, you'll just spin in circles, you know?

• 1:09:16Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 1:09:16Matthew McConaughey?

  And it's, that's an art, you know? And, and, and I don't know, explain what that art is. Got times where I feel like I'm in the, people call it maybe the flow state where you're kind of, intuition's right on time, man. I don't know what time it is. I don't even wear a watch, but I was right on time again, wasn't I? Whatever that is, you know? Your reactions, you, you, you, you understand what someone's saying, even if it's not what they're saying. Kind of come back, you see where they're coming from, you're, you're taking care of yourself, but you're taking care of others at the same time. It's a wonderful flow.

• 1:09:47Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 1:09:47Matthew McConaughey?

  Um, and it starts, I think a lot, a baseline for that would be to be in that position to see those mystical sort of, uh, gifts that come. Starts with gratitude.

• 1:09:58Lewis Howes?

  Yes. I love in your acceptance speech, one of the first thing you said was, it's a scientific fact that gratitude reciprocates.

• 1:10:07Matthew McConaughey?

  Pays back.

• 1:10:08Lewis Howes?

  I love that you said that in your speech, by the way. Thank you for putting that out in the world because I feel like gratitude is the path, it's the doorway that opens to the pathway of abundance, of love.

• 1:10:20Matthew McConaughey?

  Coming in and going out.

• 1:10:21Lewis Howes?

  Yes. It, to light all these different things. And so it's the, the magnifier and the magnet.

• 1:10:28Matthew McConaughey?

  Yeah.

• 1:10:28Lewis Howes?

  To what you want in a conscious, healthy way. You could also magnify in other uncon- unconscious, unhealthy ways, but I think that's what it does. So I'm so grateful that you said that on a big platform, a big stage, because I feel like when people see someone accomplish a big thing, a big award or a big, you know, fame or success, they want that. But I'm glad you fed people the peas and carrots right away.

• 1:10:55Matthew McConaughey?

  Right.

• 1:10:56Lewis Howes?

  And talked about gratitude. It's gratitude. It's gratitude. It's a scientific fact. When did you realize that gratitude was the key for you? In, in opening up so many doors?

• 1:11:07Matthew McConaughey?

  My mom's big on, on gratitude and I mean, she instilled it in us at an early age. I remember it was, you know, you get up grumpy in the morning, you come into the kitchen from your bedroom for breakfast and you wanted to sleep long and you're kind of grumpy and she'd see it, the way we would walk and if we were kind of, she'd turn around from the kitchen making breakfast. She goes, go back to your bed and don't get out of bed until you're ready to come in here and see the roses in the vase instead of the dust in the table. And you'd be like, oh geez, okay, gotta go back. I rearranged and she would preach just the very baseline basics, like you, who do you think you are to think you were guaranteed the sun was gonna rise for you today?

• 1:11:46Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 1:11:47Matthew McConaughey?

  Geez, mom. I remember, mom, I got this old pair of snotty sneakers with holes in them and stuff. I need another pair of sneakers. Oh yeah, you think another pair of sneakers? Let me introduce you to the kid with no feet. Oh geez, mom. You see, always like baseline sober to sup on stuff like that, right? So it started with the very baseline stuff. Now, we get more fluid in life. We have things. I don't think we should take even those things for granted.

• 1:12:16Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 1:12:16Matthew McConaughey?

  But a lot of us are out there going, okay, I get that part, but how do we become thankful for, you know, more things we have around us in our life? Um, I think that the more we are, give thanks for, it's, it's, we give more value to that thing or that person or that place or that entity. You give more value to it, it means more to us. If something means more to us, we tend it. We take care of it. When you take care of something, something grows, so it scales. So actually gratitude is the root of generosity. Coming in and going. And it's a self-serving thing.

• 1:12:59Matthew McConaughey?

  It's not just a self less serving. It is self-serving. I applaud that it is. And if you're gonna give gratitude out for selfish reasons, I say bravo. You know, because it will reciprocate the same way back out. Um, it just, it, it, it, you know, in our foundation, we have these young kids that we give them a safe place to go up to school. They learn nutrition. Uh, they make a physical goal and they do community service. These are Title I schools. And at the end of every one of those classes, they all just sit around in a, in a circle and share something out loud they're thankful for. And these are high school students. It ain't cool to say thank you for stuff in your high school, right?

• 1:13:39Matthew McConaughey?

  Well, when they first started saying thank you, they were being like, I'm, I'm thankful for the Just Good Life Foundation. I'm thankful. And they all repeat themselves. You're like, no, no, no, no, no, guys, you're, you're thinking, you're feeling like this is too serious. So one day it got to me and I was like, I'm thankful I got, I got a kiss from my wife this morning before I got out of bed. And they all started hooting and hawing, woo. And I was like, see, you can be thankful for fun stuff too. So they all started saying thankful, thankful Halloween's coming. I'm thankful I got, I'm, I'm looking so sharp, da, da, da. Everyone laughed. What that led to was then people started to feel free to go. I'm thankful my mom is out of the hospital.

• 1:14:17Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 1:14:18Matthew McConaughey?

  I'm thankful my sister got into that college. I'm thankful my dad got a job. And when we asked them, what's your favorite thing about the gratitude circle? This is the coolest answer. They started coming up to us and saying, well, my favorite thing about it is that I'm for the first time hearing peers of mine say thank you for something in their lives that I have in mind that I've always taken for granted. There's that reciprocity again.

• 1:14:47Lewis Howes?

  Where do you think you would be if you had zero gratitude in your life?

• 1:14:51Matthew McConaughey?

  Oh geez, zero gratitude in life.

• 1:14:54Lewis Howes?

  If you never expressed it, if you never experienced it, if you never talked about what you're grateful for?

• 1:14:59Matthew McConaughey?

  I'd look, I'd look a lot older. I'd feel a lot older. I'd have less energy. I'd, I'd, I'd be a cynic. Which is a great disease of getting older that we all should stave on. Um. You wouldn't want to be hanging out with me, man. I don't know. You wouldn't. I mean, I, I, I, I, I'd probably write about a lot of things.

• 1:15:22Lewis Howes?

  Righteous, yeah.

• 1:15:23Matthew McConaughey?

  And you'd be like, good for him. I don't want to be around this stuff. You know, um. Yeah.

• 1:15:35Lewis Howes?

  Do you think we can manifest abundance and the things we want, the goals we want without gratitude? Is it possible?

• 1:15:41Matthew McConaughey?

  Yeah, you, I mean, you could mathematically compound things that are technically good or should, should come in abundance, I think. But you're not gonna enjoy it.

• 1:15:59Lewis Howes?

  Right, right, right. That inner abundance won't be there.

• 1:16:03Matthew McConaughey?

  It'll be a little antiseptic.

• 1:16:08Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 1:16:10Matthew McConaughey?

  It'll be all treble, no bass. It won't have much, won't have any feeling to it. I don't think you're gonna be, why, why cheat yourself out on the, on the, on the,

• 1:16:23Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 1:16:23Matthew McConaughey?

  The great feeling of being thankful for something. It's, it's, it's, it's there to be thankful for.

• 1:16:29Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 1:16:29Matthew McConaughey?

  And again, I don't mean when I bring up earlier, be less impressed, more involved. I don't mean, I don't mean that by, oh disrespect, don't be, because we have to be more than just happy to be here. We can't just all run around going, it's just so great. I'm what, I'm just so happy to be alive. We got, we want to be more than that. I mean, again, have some discernment. Make a choice, have some identity, define what you want more of. I mean, you want more value of in your life and set goals, go after things, create things. So we have to be more than just happy to be here.

• 1:17:05Lewis Howes?

  Yes.

• 1:17:06Matthew McConaughey?

  But that doesn't mean that if we are ambitious, that we quit respecting and giving gratitude for the fact that I'm happy I'm here.

• 1:17:14Lewis Howes?

  Oh.

• 1:17:15Matthew McConaughey?

  I respect this situation. I respect the, the, the, the position I'm in, the, the, this table to talk to you, that we're here to talk, that everyone here set up the camera, that we're able to do this. I'm not in jail right now. There's a whole list of a long things I'm happy I'm not, you know, um. We can, we can, that's, that's never, that never goes out of style to go, go underneath where we are to, to, to lesser, harder situations and just realize this is cool.

• 1:17:47Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 1:17:48Matthew McConaughey?

  This is cool to be here. So what, so when we, when we do that, we're gonna give more, again, more meaning to this, more, uh, more value to it. I'm gonna be more generous. I'm gonna, it's gonna, it's gonna work not only for me, it's gonna work better for you. It's gonna work better for you. It's gonna work for all, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's the kind of epidemic we want.

• 1:18:06Lewis Howes?

  It's a, it's a win, win, win.

• 1:18:07Matthew McConaughey?

  Yeah.

• 1:18:08Lewis Howes?

  Win for us, it's win for others in the world.

• 1:18:09Matthew McConaughey?

  Gratitude epidemic is not being a delusional optimist. And no, don't, don't be a fool. You know, I'm not running around going, no, nothing's ever hard. Everything's always great. No, it's not. You know, no, no, I'm always happy. No, you're not. Maybe you're not digging deep enough. Cause you're always happy. Are you really chasing the things that have meaning in your life? Because things that have meaning take maintenance. They break down.

• 1:18:36Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 1:18:36Matthew McConaughey?

  It hurts. It sucks. We get bruised. We try to tickle, but we end up pinching. It, it doesn't always come and go and it doesn't always, doesn't always work. It takes maintenance.

• 1:18:50Lewis Howes?

  What's the thing you struggle with the most in your life right now? After all this success outwardly?

• 1:18:54Matthew McConaughey?

  Yeah.

• 1:18:55Lewis Howes?

  All the, the, it's what seems like a lot of love, a lot of inner peace, a lot of family, community, connection, service impact now, greater than just your talent and your on screen, but also changing lives and touching people emotionally and spiritually with your, your message. What is your biggest struggle at this season of life?

• 1:19:15Matthew McConaughey?

  Am I doing enough and is what I'm doing, am I doing it the right way?

• 1:19:17Lewis Howes?

  Hmm.

• 1:19:18Matthew McConaughey?

  The best way? Um.

• 1:19:28Matthew McConaughey?

  I I I need accomplishment. For significance.

• 1:19:36Matthew McConaughey?

  Oh, we should didn't as much. At the same time, like. Glad you do need that. You didn't have that again, like the times I was talking earlier, being arrogant, put me in situations to get humbled. If I didn't want to accomplish, I was like, okay. Wrong with that, but I but I I I. You know, I say this, um, we talk about a. Midlife crisis is, and then I heard there's this thing called quarter life crisis. Now, okay, we're gonna ten like ten year old, right, whatever, whatever these prices are. The the the the original one, which was kind of titled the midlife crisis, right, I think.

• 1:20:11Matthew McConaughey?

  One. Bravo.

• 1:20:15Matthew McConaughey?

  Way to go, you're you're you're turning the page, you're wanting to do more, you want to find more, something different. Bravo. Way to make it hard on yourself. At the right way, at the right time, after you usually have already accomplished. Quite a bit, but don't forget this, let's go back to gratitude, and this is where a lot of people, I think, get hung up in the midlife crisis.

• 1:20:37Matthew McConaughey?

  Wanting to do more and something different. It's great. But not at the expense of disrespecting what you've already done.

• 1:20:43Lewis Howes?

  Right. Not discounting what you've done.

• 1:20:45Matthew McConaughey?

  No, and too many of us discount. Oh, I've done nothing. Oh, that's not worth anything. Oh, what's the stuff I built? Uh, when usually, no, that is something. No, that is something. And when I say give yourself credit for that, that doesn't mean trust that you're not gonna go. Oh, okay, then, hum, I actually don't want to do more new stuff, I'm cool, it's not like you're gonna go just retire. And go to the beach or play golf or quit doing anything. But it doesn't cancel that your ambition's out. But we need to be more, give more respect to what we've already built. And then we'll take on our midlife crisis, which I'm gonna return that something. Crisis, I don't like the word crisis on that, but you're still ambitious, you can be ambitious and have an entrepreneurial spirit to want to go change things in your life.

• 1:21:29Matthew McConaughey?

  While still respecting, I think you actually think you'll find more and do more of what you want to do the the best way for yourself. When you do have a respect and a connection to your lineage of what you actually have built and the Craig, give yourself credit for what you have built to this point. It's not cancel that out. So I need to feel like I'm barren to go forward. No, that's gonna help you.

• 1:21:51Matthew McConaughey?

  This next story is connected to that one. All right, then it's not a new book, it's the same book, it's just a new chapter we're looking for, right? Those stories are connected, it's the same hardcover. We don't start over in our lives and start a new book.

• 1:22:07Matthew McConaughey?

  Start a new chapter, maybe. And those things that we like to tell ourselves, oh, it's a new chapter, they're usually just commas. Those things we like to say, oh, it's the end of the book, it's usually just a period at the end of the paragraph.

• 1:22:22Matthew McConaughey?

  And those things we go, no, it's a whole new, and uh, uh, uh, means of communicating, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a new encyclopedia, no, it's just a new chapter. In the same book, we only get one book.

• 1:22:35Lewis Howes?

  But I've got three final questions for you.

• 1:22:39Lewis Howes?

  The first one is about. Significance, because we mentioned significance. And. Everything has significance, but not everything is significant, yeah, means what you said. I I'm gonna butcher this, but something like. Twenty years ago, one of the the things that most kids grew up wanting to be was like an astronaut. Now it's the number one thing is a YouTuber. Or like an influencer. And it just seems like the the youth. Wants fame and success. And influence. More than ever before. Essentially wanting significance, right, wanting to be significant and significance. What is your thoughts on? Fame, you know, having.

• 1:23:22Lewis Howes?

  Been famous for a long time now and experienced probably the. The the juice of it, the pleasures of it, and also some of the stuff that's not so nice.

• 1:23:29Matthew McConaughey?

  Sure.

• 1:23:30Lewis Howes?

  What is your thoughts on fame that you want people to know? You whether in their youth or at any stage of life. On what it is.

• 1:23:40Lewis Howes?

  What it isn't, how to manage it when you got it.

• 1:23:42Matthew McConaughey?

  Sure. Fame. Before you go, I want to be. Famous, which is a great ambition. Fun, I'm famous, I'm I'm I'm glad.

• 1:23:53Matthew McConaughey?

  It's it's the access.

• 1:23:56Matthew McConaughey?

  It's given me.

• 1:23:59Matthew McConaughey?

  And it's it's it's it's definitely in the black in my, it comes with its. Harder. Sure challenging things like loss of anonymity, I don't meet strangers anymore.

• 1:24:10Matthew McConaughey?

  I do something, say something, it's out there. I can feel the energy of the world, whether it's pro or con. How they what they think about it, whether it's true or whether it's not, whether it's completely, or whether it's valid.

• 1:24:25Matthew McConaughey?

  But don't say, before you say, I want to be famous. Let's find the table that scoot that over. For what?

• 1:24:34Matthew McConaughey?

  We all want to be relevant.

• 1:24:38Matthew McConaughey?

  I do. You?

• 1:24:41Matthew McConaughey?

  Better damn sure ask yourself, relevant. For what?

• 1:24:46Matthew McConaughey?

  What do you want to do really well? What do you want to do, you have an innate ability for that you're willing to work for that? Maybe you can become an expert on them. Maybe you can, maybe you're just really good at winging it, but what do you want to do that? That that. Could. Give you fame, but. Fame without without a um. An understanding of a structure of a of a of a competence of a skill.

• 1:25:19Matthew McConaughey?

  In my experience.

• 1:25:22Matthew McConaughey?

  Is is a is a is a real. Sort of vapid barrage of a moving target. Because.

• 1:25:31Matthew McConaughey?

  There's, you know, the old word fifteen minutes of fame. There are fads that come in and out all the time, they're very seasonal, we could do. Heat seek and chase them, and we do all the time, I got nothing against that, but understand that.

• 1:25:44Matthew McConaughey?

  That may not be. Lasting and and and when you are going to do something that you think, oh, this is going to get me more likes or give me some fame. Just check in with yourself and go. Well, if that goes out of fashion. Or if in twenty, ten years, as far as you can project, twenty years, thirty years, four years, am I going to still feel like I will stand by that? Just just just just measure yourself, keep yourself a little projection before you go, because we can do stuff right now. To get famous. That we will absolutely regret tomorrow. But tonight, we gonna be famous, maybe.

• 1:26:23Matthew McConaughey?

  Have a little sense of delayed gratification and project forward of what the possible consequences of what you're doing. To get attention and fame will will be. And bet on yourself, just bet on yourself, because. The best way, if we can. Is to build something and be competent, something where it's a, even if it goes out of style, it will be looked back or like going, nope. That person did that really well, that's what they were known for. And even though we don't do that anymore, things have changed, or the medium has changed. When that was happening, that person was doing it well, so. Ask that because we're tempted and we're rewarded.

• 1:27:06Matthew McConaughey?

  For a lot of things that can make us famous. That are gonna give us a proverbial hangover one day. Check in with those things. Yeah, all right, it it it's it's. It's it's it's a, it's a, it's a slippery line, it's very tempting, but give yourself enough credit, give yourself more credit to go.

• 1:27:27Matthew McConaughey?

  Is this who? I really am, is this who I want to be? Am I doing this because I love it and I'm good at it?

• 1:27:35Matthew McConaughey?

  Or am I doing this because? I think it could get a lot of attention, even though I don't believe in it. Even though I'm gonna probably regret, deal with it later. Don't, hold on, don't, don't, don't press any of that, don't do, don't do, hang on. Um, time is more on your side than you think. So just watch what you put out, and also. Things was like. And I'm leaning back into social media that we just were simple reminders for all of us, adults and our children. Just remember those things you say. Those likes and those dislikes.

• 1:28:12Matthew McConaughey?

  They're gonna outlive you. They're gonna outlive me. They're gonna outlive all of us. They will be on our record. They will be on our great, great, great, great, great, great grandchildren's record. Just think about it a little bit. Just have a little, have a little touch to take a little inventory before you go.

• 1:28:34Lewis Howes?

  And a follow up to that, what's the number one skill you wish you would have either learned or mastered before, you know, becoming really famous?

• 1:28:44Matthew McConaughey?

  Ah, the number one skill.

• 1:28:45Lewis Howes?

  To be able to manage it or, or, you know, navigate it.

• 1:28:50Matthew McConaughey?

  That number one skill for me would have been, and I did learn this

• 1:28:57Matthew McConaughey?

  about five years in my career, but preparation. Um, I had a run early on my career where I thought I could just, I was better if I just winged it. Like, oh no, if I get prepared, I'm getting too mental. I'm thinking too much. I'm getting too hemless. You know, I'm getting, no, no, no, I'm an instinct.

• 1:29:13Matthew McConaughey?

  And I embarrassed it out of myself. In, in, in a movie, in a role. And I, one of the most regretful things I've ever done. It's so embarrassing. And I learned preparation on that day and I still prepare. And I prepare so I can have freedom, so I can wing it. So I can throw a chunk of the script away and go, let's dance, call audibles, game time. They didn't play the defense we thought they were. We're reading the defense, shock the playbook. Here's what we're running. Then it's really fun. You know, but that comes, you can only do that if you've prepared the right way. Your playbook or your roadmap, whatever it is. And I didn't understand that early. Luckily I figured it out and I still got to work and got it. Yeah.

• 1:29:57Lewis Howes?

  Sure, sure. I've got two final, two final questions. That was a follow up. So I'm adding two more real quick. I want to acknowledge you, McConaughey, for not half assing it. I know it's something that your dad talked about, is that, you know, if you're gonna go on this dream, this career, this path. Don't half ass it.

• 1:30:18Lewis Howes?

  And I love the, the nod you added at the end of your book about not half assing it. So I really acknowledge you for not half assing it in every stage and season of life that you've gone after. And I really acknowledge you for how you've been able to be successful and also have a really beautiful marriage and be a beautiful father. And I know you talk about how you have Cs in lots of these areas. You talked about not As. But the fact that you keep living the way you do and showing up with your heart, open hearted, in service to people. I really acknowledge that for you, Matthew, for, for your, your willingness to wanna teach constantly and at the same time being a student of life.

• 1:31:00Matthew McConaughey?

  Thank you. I'm trying. I'm trying. I said, I ain't making As now. I'm trying. As you know, part of us, the deal, if we can get the right playbook and just keep getting back in the game each day. We ain't gonna get there. We ain't gonna get to the ta-da moment of, oh, I got it all figured out. That ain't happening. But if we can see how far along we can get while we're here.

• 1:31:21Lewis Howes?

  I asked you this question before. So these final two questions, I'll ask them quickly. The first one is called my three truths question. I asked you this before. If people want to see what those are, we'll have linked up the previous interview. We can see and compare your, your last interview, what your three truths were. To today, a couple of years later, a lot has happened in the last couple of years. And here's the question. You get to live as long as you want. You get to continue to create, make art, write books, do programs, movies, everything you want to do, you get to do. For as long as you live, but then the lights go out at some point.

• 1:31:56Matthew McConaughey?

  Okay. When they do, not like, you're not saying like if you live forever.

• 1:31:59Lewis Howes?

  No, no, you're gonna live for as long as you want, you know, another 50, 100, whatever years, however long you can extend your life. Then one day you gotta turn off the lights.

• 1:32:06Matthew McConaughey?

  I'm pretty sure.

• 1:32:08Lewis Howes?

  And, um, and you create and accomplish everything. Let's say you've got another list of 20 goals that all happen, you know, just like you did in 1992. But for whatever reason, all of your work, all the movies, books, content is gone. Hypothetical.

• 1:32:25Lewis Howes?

  No one has access to it in this world anymore.

• 1:32:29Lewis Howes?

  But you get to leave behind three truths with the world. And this is all we would have of your wisdom.

• 1:32:38Lewis Howes?

  Three lessons, three truths.

• 1:32:40Matthew McConaughey?

  It's getting rolling right now? We're not taking a timeout before this answer? I get to come back, write this one in on an email? Oh my goodness.

• 1:32:48Lewis Howes?

  Three truths, whatever is.

• 1:32:49Matthew McConaughey?

  I answered this before last time?

• 1:32:50Lewis Howes?

  You did answer this before.

• 1:32:52Matthew McConaughey?

  Can you tell me what I said?

• 1:32:53Lewis Howes?

  I'll tell you afterwards.

• 1:32:55Matthew McConaughey?

  Three truths.

• 1:32:56Lewis Howes?

  Whatever's on your heart or your mind.

• 1:32:58Matthew McConaughey?

  Three truths.

• 1:33:02Matthew McConaughey?

  When in doubt, make sense of humor your default emotion.

• 1:33:11Matthew McConaughey?

  Don't make a straight line crooked.

• 1:33:18Matthew McConaughey?

  And

• 1:33:21Matthew McConaughey?

  loving your kids, mama.

• 1:33:25Matthew McConaughey?

  Is one of the best things you can do as a parent.

• 1:33:32Lewis Howes?

  Final question. What's your definition of greatness?

• 1:33:35Matthew McConaughey?

  Of greatness?

• 1:33:38Matthew McConaughey?

  Greatness?

• 1:33:40Matthew McConaughey?

  Greatness. Par excellence. What is greatness? Not perfection, greatness.

• 1:33:51Matthew McConaughey?

  Pursuit, capture and proof

• 1:33:55Matthew McConaughey?

  at the highest mortal level.

• 1:34:02Matthew McConaughey?

  Yeah, I like that one.

• 1:34:03Lewis Howes?

  That's good. Capture and proof at the highest mortal level. You want to say it one more time?

• 1:34:09Matthew McConaughey?

  Yes. Pursuit, capture and proof at the highest mortal level. Amen. I'll go with that.

• 1:34:16Lewis Howes?

  All right. I hope you enjoyed today's episode and it inspired you on your journey towards greatness. Make sure to check out the show notes in the description for a full rundown of today's episode with all the important links. And if you want weekly exclusive bonus episodes with me personally, as well as ad free listening, then make sure to subscribe to our greatness plus channel exclusively on Apple podcasts. Share this with a friend on social media and leave us a review on Apple podcasts as well. Let me know what you enjoyed about this episode in that review. I really love hearing feedback from you and it helps us figure out how we can support and serve you moving forward. And I want to remind you, if no one has told you lately, that you are loved, you are worthy and you matter.

• 1:35:00Lewis Howes?

  And now it's time to go out there and do something great.