Lex Fridman Podcast #384 - #384 – Matthew McConaughey: Freedom, Truth, Family, Hardship, and Love Machine transcription by Qwen3-ASR 0.6B (MLX, local, Apache-2.0). May contain recognition errors. The following is a conversation with Matthew McConaughey, a legendary Oscar winning actor and one of the most unique, charismatic and inspiring humans and Texans who walk this earth. He starred in films and shows loved by me and millions of others, including Interstellar, Days of Confused, Dallas Buyers Club, Killer Joe, Mud, True Detective, and soon spinoff of Yellowstone. Off screen, his words carry wisdom and power in his book called Green Lights and his new video course called Road Trip, where Matthew expands on the philosophy in his book and shows how to apply to your life in order to find more happiness, success, and love. And now a quick few second mention of each sponsor. Check them out in the description. It's the best way to support this podcast. We got Riverside FM for the best remote video recording platform, MasterClass for learning and AG1 for my daily multivitamin. She's wisely my friends. Also, if you want to work on our amazing team, we're always hiring. Good to lexfreeman dot com slash hiring. And now onto the full ad reads. As always, no ads in the middle. I try to make this interesting, but if you must skip them, friends, please still check out the sponsors. I enjoy their stuff. Maybe you will too. This episode is brought to you by I think a new sponsor, but I've been using them for so long and loving them for so long. I can't sing them enough praises. It's Riverside FM, the platform that makes it easy for podcasters and media companies to record remotely in studio quality. I am a big time sucker, you could say, for in person conversations, but that's not always possible. I've recorded the conversation with Nome Chomsky the second time we talked remotely, and there I used Riverside FM. It just makes it so easy. It does the double ended recording for you, which is the the audio and the video in highest quality because you know my connection with Nome Chomsky was horrible. The internet, there is something wrong on both of our internets. It just did not want to cooperate. And still, the final result captured the quality of my camera and the quality of Nome Chomsky's camera perfectly. That's the whole point of this kind of technology, just incredibly easy to use. You know, you don't have to give instructions to the other person on a bunch of things to click on and all this kind of complexity that you would have to do to have a double ended recording using audio recording software, which is I think how people used to do it. This is all in browser. It just works effortlessly, works nicely. It just works. The final thing looks good. If you are doing a podcast, if you are doing any kind of remote recording, Riverside FM is what you should be using it. I record my remote interviews with Riverside. Give it a try at Riverside FM and use code Lex for thirty percent off. That's Riverside FM and use code Lex. The links in the description below. This show is also brought to you by MasterClass one hundred and eighty dollars a year gets you an all access pass to watch courses from the best people in the world in their respective disciplines. We'll write Carlos Santana. Carlos Santana's Europa. I mean, it's an instrumental guitar piece. Just it's smooth. It's so beautiful. It almost makes me want to play Gibson. I am a I am a fender Strat guy. I probably should learn to play Europa at some point. It's one of those pieces, kind of like Voodoo Child by Jimi Hendrix, where you can just play it forever. Anyway, you can learn from all these people: Carlos Santana in the music realm. Marcos Cési, probably one of if not my favorite director. I mean, it's just Jane Goodall, everything just goes on and on and on and on and on. Chris Hadfield. If you want to learn about a thing, learn from the people that do that thing better than almost anybody else in the world. Get unlimited access to every MasterClass and get fifteen percent off an annual membership at MasterClass dot com slash lex. This show is also brought to you by MasterClass one hundred and eighty dollars a year gets you an all access pass to watch courses from the best people in the world in their respective disciplines. We'll write Carlos Santana. Carlos Santana's Europa. I mean, it's an instrumental guitar piece. Just it's smooth. It's so beautiful. It almost makes me want to play Gibson. I am a I am a fender Strat guy. I probably should learn to play Europa at some point. It's one of those pieces, kind of like Voodoo Child by Jimi Hendrix, where you can just play it forever. Anyway, you can learn from all these people: Carlos Santana in the music realm. Marcos Cési, probably one of if not my favorite director. I mean, it's just Jane Goodall, everything just goes on and on and on and on and on. Chris Hadfield. If you want to learn about a thing, learn from the people that do that thing better than almost anybody else in the world. Get unlimited access to every MasterClass and get fifteen percent off an annual membership at MasterClass dot com slash lex. This show is also brought to you by our old friend Athleta Greens and his AG1 drink, which is an all in one daily drink to support better health and peak performance. And the drink I just drank, and it was delicious. I drink it twice a day usually. I mix it up, put it in the fridge. It's nice and cold, and I just escape in the cold deliciousness. And the meditative reminder that I am rejuvenating my mind and body. I just sit down on the couch for a minute. And reflect on my past, my present, and my future, and just let the gratitude for how beautiful this life is. Take over. I think they've changed their name officially to AG1, so you should go check them out and they'll give you a free one year supply of vitamin D and five free travel packs with your first purchase when you go to drink AG1 dot com slash lex. This is the Lex Friedman podcast to support it. Please check out our sponsors in the description. And now, dear friends, here is Matthew McConaughey. Let's start with love. Your parents had a complicated love story, divorced twice, married three times. What have you learned about love from your mom and dad and their love story? That it's messy. That it takes work. That it's ugly. That. No matter how ugly or messy it is, don't go to bed until you've come back together to either embrace or admit that you truly love each other, even if you hadn't solved what the hell you are bitching about. That love will win in the end, literally three to two. With my mom and dad. Yeah. Um. And that even in the two divorces and in the two times where they couldn't live with each other, they still loved each other. They just couldn't. Live with each other at that time for whatever reason they needed, and I don't know the details if they needed their. Space freedom or what, but they were never out of love. With each other. Um. And that. As a parent, if you just when when we're not sure what to do. And people give you a thousand books and advice. As a parent, if your kid knows you love them, you are in the black. That's the main thing. It won't work without that. Um and it can work and will usually can work with that. They just know that fact. So it's not just love for each other. It's the love for the bigger family. That ultimately helps you persist through the ups and downs. Well, I mean, I don't know how much particularly my mom and dad were. Staying together at times, maybe when they did want to because they had children. I don't actually think they considered that. I think they were much less conscientious than say. I am today. I think my mom and dad were more like. They'll be fine. We love them. They'll be fine, but we'll we'll cross that bridge when we get there. Right now they would let's work it out between you and I is what I think my mom and dad were saying to each other or or not they um. They they wanted a needed relationship that was a tidal wave, rocky, right angles, tunnamies. And to this day, in in my life with Camille and I, which I don't I like a river has some swerves and some some streams and some rapids, but I am not looking for tidal wave. My mom's like. What's what's all this? Everything's so smooth stuff. Come on, come on, come on, come on. So she challenges. Like vitality because that's what my mom needed to communicate. I don't think my dad needed it as much. Of that the the the the the hard angles that their relationship during I think my dad needed as much as my mom. But the clashes demonstrated the passion that underlies the love. Yes, and that's I've I've always been asked you know when I talk about my parents' love relationship I tell the stories. That are actually sometimes quite violent. And there is some good stories there. They're beautiful. I think they're beautiful. Yeah, I think they're beautiful too. But I've had people go, wait a minute, that was unhealthy. You can't. And I was like, no, that's again back to the beginning. Love's messy, and that what I love about those stories is. That's where the love was actually. It was tested, and it it could have broke and been over. Yeah, and it never was again. The love won in the kitchen floor, bloods drawn. Knifes are pulled, catch ups all over. But we make love on the kitchen floor and yeah, I mean come on, beautiful. So as romantic as it gets right there. What's the memory from childhood that helped set you on the trajectory of becoming the man you are today? Standing on the corner with Mister Mayor, the principal of Saint Philip's School. I was in kindergarten. I looked up and there was a cloud in the sky. And I said, "Mister Mayor, is that cloud as big as the world?" And he paused for a minute, and he goes, "Well, yes, it is Matthew." Now in my seven year old mind, I went, okay, I can see the outlines of it. And that must mean it is so far away because if that's as big as the world, I remember it took fifteen hours just to drive from from Longview to Florida. Last year, you know, and I can't even see that far. So that cloud must be so far off that it's not worth me even considering. Space, dreams, any that I was like army. I am looking down. I am going to put my head to the ground. I am going to look right in front of me and deal with what's in front of me because dealing with. Dreams and what's out there and not on this earth that gravity holds down not worth considering you never make it it's not even worth imagining it's it's fairy dust. So I think I got learned a lot of self reliance. From that, I think I got a work ethic from that. I think I got a, hey focus on what's right in front of you. Do the deed, take care of what's in front of you one at a time and slowly notch up your way and hopefully there is some ascension to that. And it wasn't until quite years later, in some ways decades later, that I started to go. Oh, I can project. I can dream. Why? Because literally the first time I got in a plane and in thirty seconds I was in a cloud. I am like, whoa, we must be going a trillion miles an hour because we're already in that cloud that was as big as the world that I saw the edge of. And then I grew learned enough to go well that's not true. Trains don't go that fast. Oh, what Mister Mayor said wasn't really true. That cloud is not as big as the world and it's not near as far away as I thought. But I am glad he lied to me. What do you think about that that tension of a way of living life between being a dreamer and a pragmatist? Yeah, which is a better way. The honey holds the the reciprocity of the two of them. I mean, I can't be present unless I got plans. I want to I want to have the big picture in mind, but I got to go day to time. I like to write the headline or have a I think we need to have a North Star. Something look forward to, but we all know that if we're staring at it, we're tripping on the way. If we're just you know the old you read the hallmark cards which I. Irk me, you know, dream it you can do it. I think that's a half-assed horrible thing to tell somebody. Yeah, you know because um and you talk and then on the other side you have things like you know people say hope means nothing. Well, yes, it does. That's the dream. You just don't stop there. There is not a period after that word. Now what do we do practically? And I think that constant tension when that tension to dance is when it's beautiful. But to see those as contradictions, I think is where we've we've fallen short. So I don't. I want on their own if we silo the two. Oh, if you silo the two, I guess the the pragmatics the one to go with because at least you get something done. But if you only silo the dream and don't do anything about it, that's you are kind of living an illusion and kind of living in a virtual reality. Yeah, it's tricky. Even the people you love can sometimes suffocate the dream. Can make you believe that it's not possible. It feels like a lot of parents kind of want you to be safe, want you to be stable, want you to have a plan so that everything's going to be okay. Yeah, and the dream feels like a threat to that. Yeah, how much of that though I wonder is is proper initiation? Because if you throw in dreams out, I call it conservative very liberal late. Let's learn to block and tackle. Let's learn that work ethic. Those things, those pragmatics first. Learn the rules of the road, the rules of the game, the things that we can all kind of rely on. This is how the world supposed to work. Now it doesn't always work that way. You know you teach a teach a child to drive. It's like yeah, you stay in the lane, you go the speed limit. That's all helpful, but that doesn't guarantee that no one else is running the red light. But you learn that later. Um. There is an initiation I think that's proper. With the dream, I mean you I think parents. My parents very much that way. The idea of going to chase an acting career or something was what. It was it was that was a different vernacular that was like not an R. I was taught to work away up a company ladder and nine to five do a job. But the day I brought it up and said I wanted to go to film school, and I thought my dad was going to go. You want to do what boy? He was like, gave me something best advice ever and told me not to half-ass it and said go. In between the lines, what he heard from me was that made him so happy as a father. I believe and makes any parent happy. Is when our child doesn't ask us permission to go chase a dream. Oh yeah, when they're going, I am bringing it up to you with full respect. Yeah, but I am doing this with her without you. That's when a parent goes, oh yes. I've done something right enough. I made I helped my child be secure enough in the pragmatics to have a foundation enough where they have the courage to go. I am flying the nest to take the leap. You wrote after my dad died, I had a dream that left me with a statement less impressed, more involved. Yeah, what do those words mean to you? We got to be more than just happy to be here. I am big on gratitude, but we got to be more than just thankful to be here. Dream it you can do it. It's got to be more than just dream it you can do it. That's impressed. The dream is still other than if I am here and so impressed. With talking to you today, if I have a reverence to an extent, I will not be able to be involved in this conversation. I'll be too impressed. I'll be anticipating. Oh, what's that question he's gonna he's gonna he's gonna ask? Oh, I think I know he's going this. Oh, I think I know what answer he might love to hear. Oh, I am not involved in conversation. I am too impressed, so I am removed from the present. Um, for me, what that literally meant to me when that came to me in a dream and I carved it in. I remember carved it in a tree. It took a couple hours. I still wonder. I still know where that tree is Santa Monica. It was a um, my father had moved on. He'd left this life. All of a sudden, it hit me. Oh, I don't have the safety net. My dad was above law and above religion to me. He had me. If I really, if I really was in the shit, if I really needed him, I trusted that he had my back above law, above anything. All of a sudden, he's gone. I am going okay. It hit me how much I've been pretending to be the young man. I was trying to be and not actually put my ass on the line and have enough courage to take risk and actually own up to the man that he was trying to that he was teaching me to be. And I remember. The world got flat. That cloud that Mister Mayor that I saw there was not way up there. It was. It was fog in front of me now, and let's go into it. It was, I kept. I'd say I probably gained even more respect. For people and things, but I lost a certain amount of reverence. That was keeping me from feeling like I deserved or earned things or or looking out for myself. Or holding myself to task. Um. And I remember all the things that I and I was just getting going in Hollywood at the time so I was getting fame was out there. As one of those clouds, you know with being an actor and all of a sudden celebrity and becoming famous. The reverence I had. I remember it just, it lowered down to eye level. And I was able to realize it and go that's not a that's not fairy dust and don't give it so much credit to make it fairy dust. Like oh not me no I could never no look that in the eye with full respect but less reverence and at the same time equidistant almost equal sublimation I noticed where I had been. Condescending people and things and patronizing and and sluffing things off as like less than me and not worthy of my time it. Raised up to eye level and so they were all flat in front of me and the world was flat and I was able to shoulders went back my heart rose up my chin lifted up I looked the world looked things in the eye I became probably less sentimental. Hopefully not to level that I got callous but I know I became less sentimental. Um, I became more courageous because. You know when you have someone pass in your life, or maybe it's similar to a situation you are going on in your own life with your homeland. You, you sober up. On these mendacities that we deal with every day and this this this bullshit that we that we that we we give too much credit or too much significance to and you are like what am I what am I doing? Why am I I am not even let myself emotionally get brought down or overeleted by this situation because I am. This is it doesn't really matter in the big scheme, and so we certain things that I found reverence for and hesitated from in my life. I was now engaging with because I was like oh it's live this life is live let's look in the eye and and go forward through it and deal with the consequences. What do you make of death? The scary. I am not looking forward to it, but it does not scare me. Do you think about it? Do you visualize it? I do. I do, and it's a beautiful visualization and a beautiful dream when I go as part of the food chain. It's not a good visualization when I go as part of a random act of violence in a freaking drive by or something because. The second the the accident. It it it it breaks a story that I believe is already been written. At least I don't have the capacity yet to to to put it into a a story a divine story. Of the lives that we we live, and so there is something ugly and gross about it. And it happens all all the time, you know to to people all the time. I just feel like when it's part of the food chain. When I go as part of the food chain, I am like ah that's poetry. Part of the flow of nature, you return to nature. Yeah, there is grace and poetry in that. Do you miss your father? Think about him. When I think about him, I do. Now when do I think about him? Thought about him yesterday, working through a script I am working on right now, working on scene work. And I just had that quick little reaction of wanting to show him. Hey, check the scene. I tried it not there and then I. I don't get sad. I go, he would have loved, he would have loved this. Whereas my mom wants to be on the stage, my dad would have been on the front row. He's more fun to show stuff too. Yeah and he would have and you know as as what he would we would have he knew he was a character he knew characters I've based. Parts of all kinds of characters I've played in the in the man that that I am on people that he introduced. Me too and who he was, he would have loved the creative process of working on a script or talking about hey movie. It's why I always say I love the movie Mud. Because it's the one that I I visualized and seen my dad come to me so many times as a twelve year old and put his arm around me go hey little buddy you see in this movie called Mud damn it it's a good one let's go watch it. That now my dad was never got to see me start a career in film but he was alive five days. Into the over he overlapped the first five days of me working on my first film days confused now that I think there is something beautiful. About that he didn't never ever come to the set. We didn't talk about it, but he was alive. For me to start something that was more than a more than a fad that was something that I would become something that I love to do. And I do miss, not him, you know and then I go out of that do I I I we talked about him two nights ago. With our with our daughter I was I was rubbing my daughter's feet. And my mom who's living with us ninety one comes in and goes oh look at you just like your pop. He's like what and he goes oh because my dad loved to rub somebody's feet rub my mom's feet rubbed all of me and my brother's girlfriend's feet. When we would have a date yeah. They would come over early because they knew they were going to get a foot rub from Jim McConaughey and then we'd come out me and my older brothers on this has been on for decades we come out of shot ready to go buttoned up and they looked I am like we ain't going anywhere right now. And so we told the story you know to my to my daughter and I was like oh yeah my dad's his hands to miss his hands his hands could heal so you carry him in you. I hope so. I I hope so and and. It's a a challenge. For me and I suppose it's like this for any. Son, how much do we hang on to, and how much do we let go and evolve and update the OS and and and and and and try maybe better or different. You know, it's that there is certain things that I know that I fully believe in. It's like when do we religious when do we cast away our father. You know when do we say no I am going after the dream I am not asking your permission. I I I. I question that from time to time for myself because I and it almost feels blasphemic if that's a word sometimes I feel like you can't what are you doing you can't check that and go like well no I am not sure if I want it really. And then I immediately kind of let myself off because I believe where he is he's going. Go, but you are free, man. You know I am not not I am not going to hold you back if you misread that or I didn't teach you that as well as maybe I wish I could have go you are free. You are not going to lose trust that you are not going to lose it's in your DNA it's in your lineage young man. Still it's scary to not have a safety net losing your father is scary in that way you realize this world is just you in some deep fundamental way it's just you. Yeah you are alone. Yes. But ah I mean also not having that. It's such a gift of deliverance though. As well, because it's I think it's I mean, it's an awesome feeling to know. To know we're alone, to know we don't have that to know you don't have take two. Or take three, that it's one take. I mean the peripheral vision improves. You know the the the the the link and understanding with our past improves because I know for me I was not ever considered of my past at all because that my dad had that. If I needed it, he was my well for that. He's gone you know like said he had the literally had they have our back. Well then when they long or have our back all of a sudden I am going like oh well maybe I need to look back and start giving some credit to how I got here. What I am doing and where I am heading it gave me the first time courage to even look over my shoulder. Because again I didn't have to because I don't have to look dad's got my back. No dad's gone from this life he doesn't have your back. Okay, so I mean I don't know me because it's inevitable I. I very quickly go to. All right in the in the pain the loss and yes, even lone loneliness which is different from being alone. And loss, pretty immediately part and parcel with the pain I felt it. In the pain you saw the gift the the red light of losing your, a losing your father pretty immediately less impressed more involved I came like. Couple weeks after moving on. Is there a trick to that to see the gift in the pain? That's a good question. Is there a trick to it? Not that I know of. I mean I don't I have to I I have to catch myself from. Trying to intellectualize my way into the reasoning. And not skip over real feelings and discomfort. I mean I I did get that from my mom and I have to watch it that that so resilient that we just dusted herself off and get up and go. You want to sit in the feeling you want to feel it you want to deeply feel the pain I want to I want to deeply feel it I want to look at the eye and deeply feel it. But I don't want to wallow in it. Yeah. Um now I was raised where you skip the deeply feel and let's go. And I've said it before but that will lead to having. Turn into a person who is a repeat offender of the same crimes because you you just get up and you don't. You don't have a winter in your life. You know what I mean. You don't have you. There is no introspective time. You don't look over your shoulder in the end of the past and so you just get up and you are like. All right, I've stepped in the same pile of whatever a hundred times and I am fine. I'll do it one hundred first doesn't hurt hell it's good luck. Well hang on a minute maybe want to stop and go what can I learn from that. But it it it I don't know of a trick. I think I think that I think that I think there is any trick I would say. It's just it how quickly can we admit the inevitable. I want to talk about in the book of back. Once you once you know it's inevitable, how do we get relative? Not skip it, not throw it to the side, not deny it, which I'd love to talk about that here sometimes too about the value of denial sometimes. The value of denial. Yeah. Um but how quickly do we do we? Once something's inevitable, go okay. Any mind and heart time I am spending about going no I can't believe that happened no did that really happen. Any time we spend trying to deny that what has already happened that seems to me to be I am not sure the value of that time. So if any there is any trick I would say once you know something's inevitable even though how painful it is or how awesome it is. Start getting relative with that and then the relativity is seeing. There is a gift here and if I realize that gift I am honoring now I am on to building up. The beautiful passage of my father leaving this life now I am on the march to go. Yes, let's let the legacy let this become omnipresent. Let him live through me. Let me become more him that. It's transformed. Yeah, so what value is there then to denial? Any, oh I think there is value to denial if you really commit to it. I get this from my mother. Yeah, so it's a very pragmatic value commit to the denial. Okay, and and and and and and my mom does it to an extent that that that that I am like. Mom, do you have any consideration or context of situations? And she does this is the thing every time I go she's not a shallow woman. But if it is not if it is something if it is something happens. In her life that is keeping her from going where she wants to go or having a a joy. In her life that she does, she'll straight ass deny it happened didn't happen. No, did mom? We're right here. I heard you. Yeah, what you said. No, didn't you heard something else, mom? Now that she gets some amnesty on that she's ninety one. Hell yes, she gets some amnesty on that. Um, but I've she's not. Yeah, does she repeat offend? Yeah, but it's it's misdemeanors. You know what I mean? I mean it's like we all it's part of that thing when you got a family member you are like yeah that's just what they do just go with it you know and and and it's and it's. It's ingenious in a way. It's a tool. She does I think it is more of a trick with her but she would so ingrained her it's not a trick. It just do it done. And and and I and I another reason I bring this up it's outside of just my mother is. I did this road trip course in this art of living event a few weeks ago. Out of, hundreds of thousands of chats that came in and responses that came in afterward. It seemed to me that about eighty percent of people's challenges. And problems even in their life were something in the past that they were hung up on. That they could not seem to get past and it was it was holding them from going where they wanted to in their future and so. I thought that was revealing. I would have thought I would have thought that was I don't know going in forty percent it was it seemed to be eighty percent. And then I thought about okay. If you are here in the live show and you want to get the course, you are into some sort of therapy or education or development or self help whatever okay. And I have a lot of friends and I know a lot of people that are in weekly and daily therapy. And then I know a lot of people that are on prescriptions. Drugs and while a therapy and the right prescription to the right person for the right diagnosis is is necessary I am questioning. Is there value to going if you are not getting past this today this week this month this year almost in a decade goes by and you are still hung up and you can't get rid of that thing in your memory where. And you it's got you paralyzed and you are you are a victim of it. Is there and you are doing the therapy and you are doing the work and you are taking a prescription if that's what you are taking. Where does there is there value in going? If it's holding you back from going where you want to go, maybe you should just deny the fucking thing ever fucking happened. Kick it in the head, kick it off the curb. I am done with you. I am sick of you. I am tired of hanging out with you. I am tired of that thing, whatever it is, holding me back from going where I want to go. So if I if I can't wax the car. You know and and and and get past this thing, kick it. That's so powerful. So one thing to do like with the loss of your father is to try to transform it or discover the gift in it. The gift in the pain, but if you can't keep looking, keep looking, you can't find the gift in the pain. Just deny it ever happened. You could call that a trick, but I think it's more than a trick because let me say this. My mom, after my father died, went on and found a second love of her life. For seven nineteen years, they were together. CJ Carlet, love you, buddy. He's moved on now. Did she check with us a little bit? Like is this okay? She gave us a little lingering half a second look that we knew that maybe was what she was asking and we came to was like yes it's okay. And you know who else is saying it's okay? Who's dancing up there for you, Dad? So, was that her denying that the man she was divorced from twice, married two three times, and had three children with? Had moved on, no, but she didn't say, "I'm not," you know. Well, what's the book on how long I'm supposed to say single before I can be interested in another? You know, there's not a book on these things. How do you feel? Is loving is is loving CJ mean your love dad less? No. Is finding a new life and a new dance partner in this life and CJ mean that dad wasn't your dance partner? A dad wasn't the love of your life. No, so I don't know. I mean, in there, maybe you know, maybe there's another word. I think it's denial, but it's not really denial because it's not like it didn't happen. That's a earlier example. I was giving a mom, she will absolutely go. That light's not on, mom. The light's on. We just that light's not on. If I say it's not on, sometimes you're just like that makes no sense. You're just absolutely denying what just happened. We even have it recorded, and she'll go, "Well, the recordings line." Yeah, I mean, that's part of a coping deal with her. But I mean, what I think is more important or more valuable is to talk about this. She didn't deny my dad dying. I didn't, but she sure as hell turned a page and said, "I can still start a whole new category, a new life, a new love. Let my let my heart love and be loved by someone living in this life today that I'm still living in and that will not trespass on my love for my husband, your father Jim Connahay." And I think I I mean we were just thought that was beautiful. Yes, mom, go talk about green light. Go. Now if we're hung up going, can have one of the, can have them both. Got have one of the other. Now we start to make a contradiction of the two ideas again, which doggone contradictions get us in trouble all the time, man. That's life though, the contradictions, right? But isn't life if if if we just admit the contradictions? So much don't they become a paradox? We admit that that's part of it. If if if contradictions are inevitable, they hensely they do become a paradox, don't they? Then we're in the honey hall. Then we're singing and dancing and have leniency with ourselves while still holding ourselves to task, and it's it's. I think it's holding on to know each contradiction. Oh, here it is again, so it's a one off. It lives on its own, separate from the last one. No, it doesn't. They're connected. That's why they are paradox, and then that's I think that's a much. I think that's where life really is in the paradox. Yes, in the dance of it. I think the metaphor of red, yellow, green lights is just so simple and so powerful. You write about some green lights being engineered and some being mystical. Which I love the difference of that. What's the difference of the engineered green lights and the mystical? Such a cool word, mystical. Yeah, well, the engineered ones have reason and the mystical ones have rhyme. Yeah, you know life's a mystery going forward, but it's a science looking back. I prepared. I've had ideas, written headlines, and had goals. And athlete gets in shape for an event. I get in shape for a role. I read, I study, I work, I prepare, and I go. I'm prepared and I behave and I do it. And I look at and I go, yes, that's what