Matthew McConaughey

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1:00When you are pioneering anything or introducing new ideas to the culture, You get criticized. You do? Yeah. Did you hear about that? I didn't find the one. I found someone I respected and we made it the one. In the sort of longing kind of view of love, people understand each other as if by magic. Nothing in itself is addictive on the one hand. On the other hand, everything could be addictive if there's an emptiness in that person that needs to be filled. I now know that nobody changes until they change their energy. And when you change your energy, you change your life. I'm Gwyneth Paltrow. This is the Goop Podcast, bringing together thought leaders, culture changers, creatives, founders, and CEOs, scientists, doctors, healers, and seekers, here to start conversations, because simply asking questions and listening has the power to change the way we see the world.

1:55Here we go. Welcome to the Goop Podcast. I'm Gwyneth Paltrow, and today I'm joined by a voice we all know, the unmistakable draw, equal parts grit and charm. We talk about resilience, individuality, and his continual pursuit of the best version of himself as a man, a husband, and a father. It's soulful, surprising, and very much Matthew McConaughey.

2:26Well, I'm really excited to talk to you. I'm excited to talk to you. And this is so beautiful, this collection of poems that you've done. And you've had such an interesting life and such an interesting career. And I admire you a lot. So I'm really happy to have you on the podcast today. I'm excited to be on it too. And you know what? It's been exciting to watch you from a distance too. Just how you... Affirmative choices forward and identity for yourself when the rest of the world's going, wait no just stay why wouldn't you stay in your lane you know awesome it's true and you know a lot of what you what you wrote really resonates with me around that around this kind of like abject strength around individuality and you know leaning into your yourself and your and your own identity and i i find that i find that really inspiring okay so i would love to start just a little bit with, like, take me back to the beginning, because you started to write this book or these poems, I believe, in 1989.

3:37So at a young age and before you were discovered, before Hollywood discovered you. So will you tell me a little bit about kind of, you know, because I imagine this idea of masculinity in Texas in the 80s. Like, I can't imagine it sort of neatly folding into such a poetic heart. Friday nights around the keg at the tailgate. So can you tell me a little bit about your upbringing and what it was like to hold this world of poetry and spirituality in your soul? Sure. Sure. So, I mean, you know, spiritually and religiously, we were raised Methodists, and it was go to church, the ritual of church every Sunday and grace before dinners.

4:32And Methodists is not very fire and brimstone. It's very much gratitude and be thankful for what you had and compound that. And, you know, growing up, like probably most kids, didn't listen that much in church, but it was the ritual that on Sunday, you're at the highest number two. And I don't care what you did Saturday night or up Sunday morning as a family going there in fellowship, which I thought was a wonderful practice and got a lot of ethics from it, etc. I was very much an extrovert. But part of the reason. I mean, I was always I was writing even at 16. and but I would say part of the reason that that I that I continued to write more confidently in things like poems and prayers was part of the same reason I ended up ended up in Hollywood and saying I wanted to be in the storytelling business in front of the camera those were not you know poetry and art and storytelling were not on the front line of expectations of my family growing up, which, you know, I remember when I called my dad to say, I don't want to go to law school.

5:38I want to go to film school. I thought he was going to go, bullshit. That's a hobby. You can do that on Saturdays, but that's not a real job. In hindsight, he didn't. He actually said, don't half-ass it. So I also had a friend that I made there, Rob Bendler, a Jewish friend of mine, who was not in the popular groups. And I was. I was student council. I was an athlete. I was buddies with all kinds of different walks of life and school. At the same time, I was an extrovert and I was a partier. And Friday night, it was like, hey man, go get the tailgate. You know, chase the girls. Let's have a great time.

6:13My buddy Rob was not that. So when we became friends in art class, he introduced me to, hey, you want to come to my place on Saturday night and we'll watch a movie. I was like, watch a movie on Saturday night? So he would come with me on Friday. I'd bring him out. And then on Saturday, we go to his place and talk about life and watch a movie and talk about art and stuff. So he was actually the one who gave me the confidence to even say, I want to go to film school or what if I could audition for that part? So part and parcel, that was around the same time that I became more confident to write poems or prayers or love songs and things like that.

6:57I then took a year off as an exchange shooting in Australia, which was a wild and lonely, lost-looking and wobbly year. And when I was my only friend I had, I wrote to myself. I was losing my mind, but I was writing 14-page letters to myself with way too many adjectives and adverbs. And I was returning letters to myself of 15 pages to outdo my original letter to myself. So it was a Socratic dialogue and it was a way to cope. It was a way to deal. It was a way to get it out on a page, trying to figure out the existential why questions. What the hell's going on? Is there meaning in this life? Am I stuck here?

7:45No, you're not. Trust that if you go through this. There's a golden pot on the other side. Trust that, Matthew. It gave me resilience and strength. And so I continued to write. So where did that come from? Do you think this, you know, because most teenagers, you know, they can default to, you know, woe is me. I'm lonely. I'm in a foreign country. And where do you think that comes from this idea that pain can be a teacher. Good question. I mean, look, we were raised to be very resilient. I mean, get up and dust yourself off. Quit asking me for a new pair of shoes. I'm going to introduce you to the kid with no feet.

8:32Oh, shit. Okay. It was baseline gratitude. Don't come in here to breakfast until you're ready to see the rose in the vase instead of the dust in the table. Get your ass back in bed. It was very baseline gratitude from my mother, especially. Now, the challenge, and I think one of the problems with that kind of resilience is you become a repeat offender of the same problem. You step in the same pile of shit around the same turn because you never stop to go, well, hang on a second. Let me have a look here. Why am I feeling this way? Let me get objective about why do I keep tripping on the same damn pothole every time around the bend?

9:10And if you just get up and dust yourself off and keep going, you never stop to look, right? So I would say I've been a repeat offender. At the same time, I've got great resilience. I also honestly believed that the trials and the tribulation that I was in when I was lost in that year, I started to gain a little bit of almost confidence and sort of reverence for the fact that, oh, the longer this goes, the greater the reward on the other side. I'll endure this. And I started to get kind of, my ego got even full of like, okay, to an extent where I know when I came back in the reverse culture shock of coming back to America, if people and friends wanted to talk about just, hey, the weather or partying, I would almost like, what kind of conversation is that?

10:00I was too serious almost. I had been in the trenches, And it was like I had skipped and I had to find my sense of humor again to actually come back and enjoy small talk for quite a bit of time when I came back. I think it came from how I was raised. I think it also came from whatever inherent faith I had. I think resistance and a little discomfort and sweat equity was always kind of bred into me to be like, ah, that's how you earn it. The experience, that's how you'll remember it. that's how it'll be part of your lineage you know i didn't in school i made good grades but you know i don't remember how the liberty bell cracked but i passed that test life's experiences where i got burned or hurt or one that's what i remember and my parents were pretty i guess courageous on the height of the limbs they would let us walk out on to fall from and go there now you understand they would not the ones that go no no no come down come down they're like no no go ahead you know so i guess it was part of my how i learned how what i understood about learning lessons and i will say this gwyneth it it like i said it overcompensated later for me in life when i became successful in hollywood i didn't want to deal with it was whoa when it was easy street when it was champagne and caviar and red carpets and i love yous i like i like felt like i needed to like trip myself and like you know like fall down and screw the thing up you know when it was easy.

11:31Obviously later on I learned and I'm still learning that no, when it's easy, you can enjoy the downhill because the uphill will be coming anyway. You don't have to trip yourself running downhill. Do you think that you, when everything was really easy in Hollywood, do you think that that was, you know, do you think you, you changed? Do you think, you know, you had a period of, you know, when things, when it was easy street, like things. Yeah. Yeah. I let myself off the hook for things. I rode. I still engaged. I didn't work any less hard. I wasn't any less committed. But it's that double-edged sword with gratitude we were talking about.

12:11You got, you know, yes, be thankful, but you got to be more than just happy to be here. You know what I mean? And I think, you know, I had such a, you know, when I first got successful in Hollywood, I was like, had a little bit of whatever it's called, the imposter. So why me yeah oh my gosh this amount i just i just made 48 5 schedule f they're paying me 48 500 to go play baseball for 11 weeks is that legal you know what i mean you know what i mean is what i deserve this do you know what i mean yeah so i've it got to a a point where i called it on myself i said look you've got to be less impressed and more involved mcconaughey and that came to me after my father died.

12:56It was something like - How old were you when he died? 21. I'm sorry. 21. And the gift from that was, whatever, I lost my crutch. I lost the person in my life that was above law, that was above religion, that would have my back if it really came down to it, I knew someone had my back and that person was gone. So it was like, okay, Matthew, better man up. You better quit acting like one and be one and quit talking about what you think you ought to do and start doing it. Now, that was a process for and still is. But, you know, that took a while, but become less impressed and more involved. So with my work and with success, as much as I was thankful and going like, I mean, what else do you want?

13:44This is more than you ever imagined. As you know, you got to get hopefully past that. look it in the eye and go, well, I don't know, just because I can, do I want to? And you've got to get kind of, it's more mature. You've got to be more mature and start discerning. Well, okay, I may have a lot. I may have more than most people, but is it what I want? And then you start saying no to things that are a great paycheck, but not their success, but they're not profit. You know what I mean? You start going to notice things when you go like, I just feel like I'm going in circles here. It's a great circle.

14:25It's a high class problem that I'm having, but I don't feel like I'm growing. And so that led to me taking a couple of years off. Yeah, which is so, which is an interesting parallel that we have as well, because I really hit a wall and took a bunch of years off and the birth of my first child really precipitated that. And I think maybe because I'm a woman, it was sort of the first time I felt like I had permission to stop and slow down, stop, you know, running so fast towards a goal. but it seems like you kind of looked at the sum of your career and had some deep philosophical questions around the kind of art you were making.

15:14Is that, am I projecting or? No, no, you're not, you're, you're projecting what you're right on a hundred percent. And I don't think it's coincidentally that it was at the time when Camilla was pregnant with our first child. Right. Interesting. I mean, there's a real revelation, you know, of having a first child that But all of a sudden, everything else becomes number two, probably in the three hole. And all of a sudden, acting became like third thing that was giving me identity. So I was looking at my life and how vital it was. How much the ceiling of my joy was so high. The basement of my anger and rage and pain was so low.

15:53It was wider. It was taller. It was deeper. Real life was dramatic. And I got a child coming in. I've got the woman I love. The tears are wet or everything. And then I was doing the rom-coms, which are a compressed frequency of emotions. They're supposed to be buoyant. They bounce from cloud to cloud. If you drop anchor in a rom-com, you sink the ship. Whoa, don't go there. You know what I mean? So that frequency, I was like, ah, my life is so much more vital than my work. And I remember looking in the mirror going, well, congratulations, McConaughey. Glad it's not the other way around. But is there a way that I can get my work to challenge the vitality of my life?

16:36And then I was like, that would be in dramas. Well, I was saying no, thank you. Like, was that hard to sort of, you know, because I do think like you touched on it before. People like you in a box, right? And everybody was so comfortable with you as like this hilarious, affable, you know, sexiest man alive guy. Right. So were you were you concerned about trying to shift that how you were perceived? Yes. I took a big risk and I was trying to, you know, I was offering found dramas I wanted to do and was offering studios massive pay cuts. They're like, no, thank you. Just stay in your lane there, bud.

17:16We're doing good here with the rom-coms, man. They cost thirty five. We're making fifty. We're making all this all this stuff. It was working. And so because I couldn't do what I wanted to do, I said, well, look, I'm going to stop doing what I'm doing. Now, what did I have going for me? I'm in love. Camille's pregnant. Got this coming. So that helped me stay a little grounded. Now, I didn't know how long this period of stepping out was going to take or when Hollywood and if Hollywood was going to call back. and you know after I remember calling my agent Jim Tom and I said Jim I don't want to do any more rom-coms or action comedies he goes okay and I go what do you mean okay you just said it like real quick I said dude I'm bringing in a nice dime on the dollar to the agency what are you going to say Monday morning to the bosses I mean I've been I've been paying this and he goes no no no I work for you not them I said okay we'll set up I need you to just be my guard here because I'm saying no and I need to get the signal out to Hollywood that I'm not doing any more of the rom-com that's all that came in i said no i said no i said no i said no um i didn't remember calling after six months he goes matt you haven't even heard your name in three months so i'm starting to think did i just write myself a one-way ticket out of hollywood here babe and i'll tell you this story i don't know if you've heard it or not i think it's worth telling again and i think you'll know what i mean i had this offer come in after about a year It was an action comedy.

18:49Good script. Big franchise thing. Came in with an$8 million offer. I said, no, thank you. Came back at a$10 million offer. I said, no, thank you. Came back at a$12 million offer. I said, no, thank you. Came back at a$14.5 million offer. I said, let me read that again.

19:11hey and when it was it was the same words as that eight million dollar offer script but it was better right it was i could see myself this could work i might be able to i ultimately said no though wow and i think that no had a reverberation in hollywood of oh mcconaughey's not bluffing i don't know what he's doing but he's playing he's playing offense on something You know, back to what we were talking about earlier. I don't know if we were on camera, not about how I was talking about your affirming choices of identity. You, that becomes attractive when it's not like someone's receding. No. Oh, what's he doing?

19:47Well, cut to 20 months total. And after saying no to that, I think I became a new novel. Good idea. Well, what about him and Lincoln Lawyer? What about Killer Joe McConaughey? Yeah. Oh, well, we haven't seen him. We don't know where he's been for two years. He hasn't been in our living room in our theater in a rom-com. We haven't seen him on the beach in People Magazine in another shirtless shot looking like he's living a rom-com too. Where is he? And I think the anonymity that I got in the 20 years, all of a sudden I became like, huh, that'd be an interesting idea for a dramatic role. And then that's when they started coming and I just ferociously said yes and charged.

20:32but I will say those 20 months as much as I had Camilla and newborn it was wobbly I thought of other vocations I thought of high school teacher nature guide going back to law school and the days got long I did suffer for some significance but I think I wrote probably some of these poems and prayers along that way in that two years because I needed them and did you find yourself sort of hearkening back to your days in Australia and what you learned from that unmoored time? Interesting. I think so. I mean, I never, as hard as maintaining the decision was, it was non-negotiable. I was never going back.

21:18I remember over tears when I decided to make the decision of, all right, I'm stepping out. I'm not doing that. I remember the tears with Camilla and her and I sitting there and praying and just letting it out until 3 in the morning. And then once the decision was made, I was never going back. It was not because we knew, we even talked about it. If this goes on for a while, you don't know how long you're going to be in the desert here. You're going to be tempted to go back. The decision's made. So we never went back. So because it was non-negotiable, does not leaving a parachute, it does help us endure, I think, in these times.

22:04When you go, I don't have the option. I'm not giving myself an option to go back. It was very much like the Australian. I had people who were like, you could go back. You can fly home. I said, no, I gave the guy's hand before I left. And I said, I'm going the full year. yeah but you didn't know this was gonna happen and you know it's gonna be this hard no no no like my word meant something and spiritually with the decision to step out of hollywood with camilla and it meant something and it was it was done so there was never a question of going of going back and going okay i concede i tried it out i'm back what's the wrong you know

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23:51Did you ever like, were you a student of the Stoics or anything? Like, I'm just trying to. Not, not directly. No, I've been, I've been asked that before. Yeah, because there – and some things are just organic and come out of your own DNA and wisdom and life experience, but there's a real – there's a calling back to a lot of the Stoic philosophies and outlook. Yeah, I mean, Emerson, Solomon, Meister Eckhart. I mean, I think there's always been a certain understanding I've felt, even living in excess, that minimalism and hunger and thirst and keeping away from the full satiation mentally and spiritually is good.

25:00And I think that's part of where just keep living comes from me. Then I'm always on the come. Then we're always on the approach. And I don't succeed at it all the time. There's times I look around and go, I'm full all over. Well, does that mean I'm getting complacent Or does that mean I need to get something out of my life, you know, that's taken up room in my day, in my life that I don't need? But on the approach, I love, then life feels like a verb. Then relationships feel like a verb. Then the journey feels like it, you know. I did because if I feel like I get, if I've landed almost with anything, relational art, career, spiritually, if I feel like I've landed, ah, if I ever feel the ta-da, well, I'm going, oh, you're being lazy.

25:56Because there ain't no ta-da. You know what I mean? Think a little higher. Take the roof off. Fly a little closer to the sun. It ain't, the wax ain't near melting yet. You may think it is you got a lot further to go. One of the things I really loved reading about was how you hold marriage with such reverence and this idea of, by your definition, what it means to be a good husband. And part of this is this agreement between the two of you. It seems that just as you say, there is no finish line. There's no exhale. There's a deep acknowledgement of the road and all of the things that life brings.

26:43So I guess what strikes me so much is the innate wisdom that you bring to all of these aspects of your life. And is Camilla, she must be. I mean, just by very, I really believe that, and maybe this is like weird or heteronormative or old fashioned, but I really believe that like a woman really helps like draw the energy for the man in the house and help set the course for the man. And so I'm wondering like, well, first of all, how did you two meet? And did you, is it, was this like a deep resonance that you felt with her very quickly? I'll tell you the story. It's a good one. So at the time, I was very healthily single.

27:37Okay. Getting it out of your system. Yeah. And like I say, in a healthy way. I was taking care of myself. But I was feeling, about six months before, I was feeling the clock tick. I'm like, I want to find her. And you see when a man's doing that, I mean, it's like every red light who's next to me in the produce section, who's getting over there. It's like, you know, we go to a party. I come to your place. You're going to be introducing people. I'm like, you know, you're on the – you're measuring. So the one here, is that – not very attractive thing to be when you're always looking. You're kind of – you see someone out of their space.

28:27You know what I mean? And looking to find some completion for them. And I remember I had a wonderful, wild dream. I can tell it because I wrote about it in the book. But I was an 88-year-old bachelor in my wheelchair and into my property, which was a horseshoe gravel driveway with St. Augustine Yard. I remember this very clearly. The St. Augustine grass was overgrown and on purpose. And cars were coming in in a procession. And in each one, a woman would get out and two kids would get out. A woman would get out and two kids would come out.

29:12and all the kids gathered around me, 88 of them and 44 women. And they were the mothers of all my children and I was not married. And it was a beautiful celebration and all the kids gathered and all the mothers were getting along and it was a celebration of my birthday and took a picture. and I woke up and it was a beautiful dream. It wasn't a nightmare. Okay. It was a beautiful dream. And that, I remember waking up and laying in bed going, what does that mean? And what I heard and understood was, it's okay, Matthew. Don't press to try to find the one to marry. If you end up an idiot at your bachelor, well, that's what you end up, but don't quit pressing.

30:03It's okay for Leonardo DiCaprio, you know. Yeah, he's doing fine, you know. But that dream and the grace that I got from the dream gave me, it took away that looking around the corner, where is she? At the produce section, at the party, at the red light. And I was like, okay, I'm not racing, it's time. So I now settle into myself. And as you know, you know, it's the right time for us and it's the right person. Sometimes we probably may have met the right person. It wasn't the right time for us. You know, sometimes it was the right time for us. We never met the right person. I was very settled in myself.

30:46I go out to a club with my friends on sunset. I'm sitting there mixing margaritas at the table. Music's going. I've had just enough tequila in me to see clearly, if you know what I mean.