Matthew McConaughey:
And I do believe there is some science to satisfaction because I’ve found too many consistencies. I’ve seen too many people that have consistent habits that find satisfaction.
Dr. Mark Hyman:
Welcome to the Doctor’s Farmacy. I’m Dr. Mark Hyman. That’s Farmacy with an F. F-A-R-M-A-C-Y, a place for conversations that matter. And if you’ve ever wondered about your life story, what it means, where you been, where you’re going, how to get to happiness and figure it all out, I think you’re going to love this conversation with a guy you might know. His name’s Matthew McConaughey. He’s an Academy Award winning actor. He’s a married man, the father of three beautiful children, a loyal son, a brother. He’s a storyteller by occupation. He thinks it’s okay to have a beer on the way to temple. Feels better with a day’s sweat on him and is an aspiring orchestral conductor. Holy cow! That’s impressive.
Dr. Mark Hyman:
In 2009, he founded with his wife Camila something called the Just Keep Livin Foundation, which I think was inspired by his dad. And it’s this beautiful work to take kids who are underserved, disadvantaged and struggling and give them an opportunity to actually dig into meaning and purpose in afterschool programs and healthier lives in mind, body, and spirit, and it’s really great because these kids are struggling.
Dr. Mark Hyman:
He’s also a professor. You’re a professor of something called practice. I don’t know what that is, at the University of Texas-Austin and [crosstalk 00:01:26]-
Matthew McConaughey:
Experiential learning, sir.
Dr. Mark Hyman:
And he’s also, you might have seen on Lincoln ad commercials for Lincolns. He’s also a co-creator of his favorite bourbon on the planet, Wild Turkey Longbranch, and just, Matthew, welcome to the podcast.
Matthew McConaughey:
Good to be here, Mark!
Dr. Mark Hyman:
So I have a fun connection with Wild Turkey. I was doctor in training in Northern California, and this woman came in who had terrible emphysema, and she was a chronic smoker. And I took her medical history, and she was a skinny little lady. And her husband was this big guy with a big cowboy hat. And she had been admitted to the hospital with emphysema, and I asked her her history, and it’s like, “What do you do? What are your medications?”
Dr. Mark Hyman:
“Well, I take two shots of Wild Turkey every night before bed.” And I’m like, this woman was like 75. Am I going to change that? So I wrote in the medical orders, two shots of Wild Turkey before bed every night. And I think that’s the only time I’ve ever written that prescription in my life.
Matthew McConaughey:
I’ve got my mom is 89 with us, and she gets into her white wine. And some doctors when they hear, like, “Well, that’s quite a bit. Maybe that’s too much.” I’m like going, “Do you see how good of shape this woman is for 89? She ain’t changing. Whatever it is, just put that in the prescription.”
Dr. Mark Hyman:
That’s right. That right. No changes. So your book just came out a little while ago, Greenlights. A fantastic, it’s kind of a, it’s almost like a scrapbook of your life with poetry and bumper stickers and aphorisms and insights, and it lays all that into a beautiful storytelling about how you got to be you. And you’ve come with this idea which, I think, without really being specific in naming it, you’re really talking about how do our souls and spirits and minds evolve through our life? How do we evolve and grow and become who we are, and how do we take the notes that come to us and the signs that come to us and the invisible threads that connect everything, and how do we follow those in an authentic way that can lead us to have an authentic life.
Dr. Mark Hyman:
So in a way, this book was beautiful to me because it was talking about your own life, but it was an example of how you build an authentic life that is based on your values and based on curiosity and hunger to know and wanting to explore the way the universe is and what the meaning of life is. And I think most people haven’t had the possibility of knowing that side of you as an actor because you’re out there, and you fulfill these roles. And they may have seen you just for that role, but as a human being, you’re very complex and quite extraordinary, and I think, you came up with this concept of greenlights. And it’s sort of a memoir, but it’s really sort of an approach to life book. And you talk about how do you deal with the tragedies in life, and you’ve had them, and how do you deal with the obstacles that you’ve had? I mean, we all have them, what you call red lights. How do you turn those into moments of growth, understanding, success, or what we call greenlights?
Matthew McConaughey:
Yeah.
Dr. Mark Hyman:
And then how do turn the red lights into greenlights? So how did you come up with this whole idea, and how did you sort of figure out that this was how you wanted live your life?
Matthew McConaughey:
Yeah, so this is based on, and you said it earlier, sort of a scrapbook of my life. The book’s based on 36 years of keeping journals and diaries. So I’ve been keeping them since I was 14, now for 37 years, and threatening to go see if everything in those journals or parts of those journals were worth sharing, but never had the courage to go do it. For 15 years, I’ve been like, “Ah, let’s go see. Maybe there’s a book there.” And my excuse, “No, no, no, no, no, no. You’ll die, and maybe Camila will look at, and if something’s worth sharing, she’ll put it out there.”
Matthew McConaughey:
Well, finally [inaudible 00:05:07] I got the courage to go, well, let’s go see. And I went out, and I had an idea of what I thought was going to be in there. I actually thought it was going to be quite academic. And as I’m going through it for my first three days in solitary confinement, I was like, this is more sort philosophical and poetic. It’s not academic. And I was like, well, let’s back off of this, and let’s just see what it is. Instead of you trying to tell it what it should be, let the journals reveal to you what it should be or what it is.
Matthew McConaughey:
And I started finding categories, consistent categories. I had a big stack of a bunch of stories, big stack of a bunch of people, places, prescribes, poems, prayers and bumper stickers. And I was like, okay. So there’s my lanes. There’s my categories. Let me sift through those and see if I find a common denominator, a baseline, and that’s where Greenlights came from.
Matthew McConaughey:
I saw that there were ways that I engineered greenlights in my life, like decisions I made, risks I took, sacrifices I made today that paid off tomorrow, that were kind and cool to my future self, my decisions I made, responsibilities. I found that, man, I’ve gotten lucky a few times. Sometimes greenlight opportunities fell in my lap, and I was like, “Oh, what’s the reason for this?” And I said, when I-
Dr. Mark Hyman:
Like Dazed and Confused, you mean?
Matthew McConaughey:
Like being in the right place, even going and introducing myself to a guy who turns out to be a casting director who turns out to offer me a role which has three lines, which turns into three weeks work, with which, if I didn’t meet that guy that night, would I be sitting here talking to you with the life I have right now. Probably not. So I saw times where greenlight opportunities fell in my lap and I did something with them. I saw times where maybe a moment fell in my lap and I didn’t do anything with it, and I’m still wondering, ooh, what would have been the outcome if I’d have taken advantage of that?
Matthew McConaughey:
And then I noticed that all the hardships in my life, the places where there was sickness or death or loss or failure or struggle, that each one of them had a lesson in them, that I either noticed a little bit at the time or a year or later or five years later, 10 years later or I’ve not yet to learn but trusting that I will learn them later in this life or my kids will in another generation. So then I was like, oh, well look, all the red and yellows. They may not be what we want, but inside them, they have something that we need and therefore, they are inherently greenlights.
Matthew McConaughey:
And so that sort of became the theme. That became the Autobahn theme of the book in a way that I try to approach life in an optimistic, a realistically optimistic way. Because as you see the book, I’m an optimist, and I think it’s more than just looking on the bright side. I think it’s absolutely essential for survival. But I don’t want to be foolish with it.
Matthew McConaughey:
So what you trust, as you said, what signs do trust? Which ones do you not trust? It’s a constant art. But I do believe there is some science to satisfaction because I’ve found too many consistencies. I’ve seen too many people that have consistent habits that find satisfaction. I’ve been proven, I’ve been unsatisfied consistently in times and looked at my habits and I was like, oh yeah. I see the math. I see why. So just trying to uncover some of the science in this riddle called life, like we’re all trying to do to some extent.
Dr. Mark Hyman:
Yeah. It’s a work in progress clearly from the book. You’re halfway through, and you’re like looking back to look forward and figure out what you do next. And I think what the beautiful story within it is that the red lights and the yellow lights actually in their own way greenlights. And it reminds me of the story of this guy way back in the day who was out in the fields and had found this incredible black stallion and took him home and everybody said, “God, what a blessing! You found this wild stallion. How wonderful!”
Dr. Mark Hyman:
He said, “Oh, what seems like a blessing could be a curse, and what seems like a curse could be a blessing.” And then he rides the stallion, and he falls of often he breaks his leg. And then everybody goes, “Oh, how terrible! What a tragedy!”
Dr. Mark Hyman:
He says, “Oh, what seems like a curse could be a blessing. What seems like a blessing could be a curse.” And then this big war breaks out, and the government comes to recruit all the young men. He’s got a broken leg. And you’re like, Oh, see. So it’s like, you never know what’s going on. And I think-
Matthew McConaughey:
And yeah, and right? There it is. Is that an answer? No. But it’s a framework.
Dr. Mark Hyman:
Yeah.
Matthew McConaughey:
It’s a perspective that it sure helps with some sanity and getting what we want and maybe being able to deal with what we don’t want a little bit better. My approach, I think of that, and I bring it up earlier, is that when faced with the inevitable, get relative. That’s just basic a play off of what Confucius said about dealing with what we can and not worrying about what we can’t. When is that time when we deem an outcome inevitable?
Matthew McConaughey:
Well, if we deem an outcome… if we’re going after something and we’re not getting it… If we say, “Oh, well, it’s inevitable. I’m not going to get it” too soon, well, we’re quitters. We needed some endurance. We needed to have more giddy-up and break a sweat more. We didn’t want to work as hard.
Matthew McConaughey:
But on the other side, if we’re banging our head against a wall trying to get what we want, trying to get the same outcome over and over and never getting it, we’re acting out the definition of insanity, and we call the inevitable earlier and back off and pivot or raise the white flag and move on to fight another day.
Dr. Mark Hyman:
Yeah. I mean, one of the striking things I found in your story was that you clearly have understood a very simple concept which most people don’t, which is that you are the author of your own life. You’re not the victim of your life. And I’m really curious about how you came to that conclusion because this is something that most people I think don’t get to. They feel at effect of their life, not at the cause of their life.
Matthew McConaughey:
Well, let’s unpack that because this one, I don’t get-
Dr. Mark Hyman:
I know. I’m going deep, Matthew.
Matthew McConaughey:
No, let’s unpack it because it’s a great one because on the very simplest level, the alternative sucks, man!
Dr. Mark Hyman:
Yeah, it does! Might as well-
Matthew McConaughey:
I mean… We should all grab a hold of and grasp our ability to self-determine and look that in the eye. Life’s a hell of a lot more fun. It’s a little a hell of a lot more hard in the right kind of ways. It’s more entertaining. The alternative, I just don’t get it. It’s like doom and gloom.
Dr. Mark Hyman:
Were you born that way, or did something happened to you where you had the insight to-
Matthew McConaughey:
I don’t know if was born that way because I don’t remember, but I do know that, we were taught a lot of resilience. We were taught be more you because you’re the only one, and if everybody could just more them and invest in yourself, get to know thyself, then you’re an original. In that way, I did have an outlaw sort of renegade upbringing, sort of a libertarian, you take care of yourself. You are not… You will be done unto, but you also will do unto. And you are responsible for that, for whatever those consequences are, whatever. There’s a cost. There’s a cost for those things.
Matthew McConaughey:
Now for me, I’d just rather be in the know, even when I screw up or fail. I like looking in the mirror and going, “Yep, guilty.” But I also, on the other hand, when I pull something off like to look in the mirror and go, “Yep, there we go. You had something to do with that.” So-
Dr. Mark Hyman:
[crosstalk 00:12:45] Well, that sort of speaks to your concept of being selfless and selfish-
Matthew McConaughey:
Selfish.
Dr. Mark Hyman:
… how they’re not contradictory, right?
Matthew McConaughey:
No, not ultimately. Look, selfish has gotten a bad rap. We bash that word. It’s gotten a bad rap along through the years. Everyone’s like, “Don’t be selfish.” It’s like humble. Be more humble. Oh yeah? But who wants to be humiliated? Nobody. Well, hang on a second, these things go part in parcel. So selfish, what do you mean get rid of the ego? No, don’t get rid of the ego! You’ll have no judgment. You’ll have no identity. You have to have the ego. You’re a singular organism. You are an original.
Matthew McConaughey:
That does not mean, well, then I cannot be utilitarian. That does not mean, well then, I don’t give a damn about others. And that’s what I bring up, in college I wrote this term, a paper in paper called The Egotistical Utilitarian. And I was like-
Dr. Mark Hyman:
Oh, yeah, unpack that. That sounds like a mouthful.
Matthew McConaughey:
Okay, well, there’s been many great people that have walked the earth that have been it, but for one, let’s just pick out one of the prophets, Jesus. Egotistical utilitarian. He was doing for the eye what was best for the we. His acts, even the root of a religious belief and existence if you are that is that the life we live matters for what happens, if you’re a believer, in an afterlife, it matters what we do here, right?
Matthew McConaughey:
So wouldn’t be a very selfish act if you’re a believer to act in a certain manner now so that you can have life everlasting? What would be the more selfish act? To act in a way that you have better chance for life everlasting or to act in a way to where it’s over, and you’re going to hell or purgatory, whatever it is? I mean, [inaudible 00:14:26] more selfish act is to act in a way that you can live longer.
Matthew McConaughey:
So, that’s just on a religious front, but even nonreligious, delayed gratification. Delayed gratification, there are choices that we can make for us selfishly that are also the most selfless choice and best for the most amount of people if we just think far out enough. What’s a more selfish thing as a, let’s stereotype for a second, as a white male, okay, with a certain amount of power that I’ve either created or I’ve got? To hoard it right now and lock out opportunity or let’s just say, very selfishly, to maybe work to create more opportunities for woman or minorities to be able to get what they want?
Matthew McConaughey:
Well, even on very the most selfish level, I got a daughter. Well, I’d say it’s probably more selfish to create more opportunity-
Dr. Mark Hyman:
For her.
Matthew McConaughey:
… so she and other people can go out. I’ve got friends that are minorities. It’d be more selfish act to create more opportunity than it would be to hoard away and put up walls and say that I’m going to hold to mine, and I’m not sharing it.
Matthew McConaughey:
So I think it’s just extension of the long, having a longer view of understanding what selfish really is. Selfish has to do with delayed gratification if we project far enough ahead of us, and it’s not just immediate gratification. If I pick your pocket and steal your wallet, well, what’s more selfish? Doing that and now the next time I’m in Maui I’m going, “Jeez, I hope Mark ain’t here, man, because he’s after me”?
Matthew McConaughey:
Now, I’ve bought time. I’ve created stress, created yellow lights in my future because I now have to go through life looking over my shoulder. Well, which one’s more selfish? To live in a way where I don’t have to go into the future looking over my damn shoulder at the crumbs I’ve left.
Dr. Mark Hyman:
Yeah. Yeah. That’s so true. So I think that’s a very unique perspective because most people will think of them as opposite. You’re either selfish or selfless. And I think it’s important to remember that our own personalities are the wedge through which we go through the world and actually have impact on things. And I agree. I think I see that in my own life, where things that I’ve had to do for myself have also benefited others, right?
Dr. Mark Hyman:
I got really sick when I was younger and had to figure out what was wrong with me. Well, it was very selfish because I wanted to feel better, but what I learned helped me help so many other people.
Matthew McConaughey:
Right.
Dr. Mark Hyman:
All right, I want to change-
Matthew McConaughey:
And also this, though, let’s bring up this, I think everyone, if you don’t want to purchase yet what I’m talking about about being selfish out there, I think we can all admit that we do a hell of a lot more and we have a lot more true and better when it’s personal.
Dr. Mark Hyman:
Yeah, that’s true.
Matthew McConaughey:
It’s got to be personal. That doesn’t mean it’s not relatable and good and something that can translate to more people.
Speaker 3:
Hi, everyone. Hope you’re enjoying the episode. Before we continue, we have a quick message from Dr. Mark Hyman about his new company Farmacy and their first product, the 10 Day Reset.
Dr. Mark Hyman:
Hey, it’s Dr. Hyman. Do you have FLC? What’s FLC? It’s when you feel like crap. It’s a problem that so many people suffer from, and often have no idea that it’s not normal or that you can fix it. I mean, you know the feeling, it’s when you’re super sluggish, your digestion’s off, you can’t think clearly, or you have brain fog or you just feel rundown. Can you relate? I know most people can. But the real question is, what the heck do we do about it?
Dr. Mark Hyman:
Well, I hate to break the news, but there’s no magic bullet. FLC isn’t caused by one single thing, so there’s not one single solution. However, there is a systems-based approach, a way to tackle the multiple root factors that contribute to FLC, and I call that system the 10 Day Reset.
Dr. Mark Hyman:
The 10 Day Reset combines food, key lifestyle habits, and targeted supplements to address FLC straight on. It’s a protocol that I’ve used with thousands of my community members to help them get their health back on track. It’s not a magic bullet. It’s not a quick fix. It’s a system that works. If you want to learn more and get your health back on track, click on the button below or visit getfarmacy.com. That’s get farmacy with an F, F-A-R-M-A-C-Y, .com.
Speaker 3:
Now back to this week’s episode!
Dr. Mark Hyman:
All right, let’s take a different tack, because one of the things that struck me is your incredible ability to witness notes in your life, you can call them notes from God or the universe or life or whatever, and pay attention and then follow them in ways that transform your life. And one of the most extraordinary stories that I loved in the book was when you were having these dreams. You had these recurring dreams of floating down the Amazon River with wrapped in anacondas, surrounded by crocodiles, and African tribesmen on the shore. And you’re like, “What is this dream?” And then you’re like, well, I don’t know, but you had the dream again. And then you’re like, “I better do something about it.”
Dr. Mark Hyman:
So you did something that most people would never do. Let’s see, that looks like Africa. I’m going to go to Africa. I don’t know where the fuck I’m going to go. Oh, I know this one guy who’s a musician, and maybe I’ll go see him and follow the rabbit hole and see where it goes. And I want you to answer two things. One is, who are you that you would actually do that, and what does that take to actually have a sign and follow it, and what is that lesson for the rest of us? And two, what the hell happened on that trip, and how did that transform you into who you are now, because that seemed like a giant greenlight?
Matthew McConaughey:
It was, absolutely. Well, look, my life, like probably yours and most of our lives, I’ve had a lot of successes by, one, writing the headline first, setting the goal then going after it. And then I’ve had a lot of success doing things like this example you’re talking about, chasing down, literally chasing down a dream, jumping off the cliff and saying I’m going to figure out how to fly on the way down, go down that rabbit hole. And we’ve all know this. What’s the hardest part about going into something that looks hard or going to the damn gym? Putting your shoes on. That’s the hardest part. Getting out the door. There’s time where I just instead of putting them on the backpack and I’m heading out, I don’t know what the answer is, but I’m going.
Matthew McConaughey:
Now, why did I listen to it? Well, one… and look, I believe we got signs around us all the time, and we can make poetry of the signs, but they’re to make poems of, make the rhyme of the reason or give reason to the rhyme all the time. We don’t notice them all, but they’re there. How do we connect the dots? When do we connect the dots to say, “Oh that’s a truth, that’s a place, that’s a vision, this is where I need to go for me”?
Matthew McConaughey:
Well, in this particular story you’re talking about, the alarming thing is it was the exact same dream. It wasn’t a dream… I remember, I had the dream in 1993 I think first, and then I had the same dream in ’96, three years later, the exact same dream. Not like that dream in ’93, the exact same dream, with same outcome.
Dr. Mark Hyman:
Yeah.
Matthew McConaughey:
You just… floating down the Amazon wrapped in anacondas, African tribesmen, piranhas, sharks, and everything, sounds like a nightmare, right?
Dr. Mark Hyman:
Yeah.
Matthew McConaughey:
Well, if you read the book, it was the opposite of a nightmare. That’s alarming to me. I’m like, there’s nothing sexual about that. What was that about?
Dr. Mark Hyman:
Yeah, right.
Matthew McConaughey:
And it was the exact same dream. 11 frames, when I mean frames, like camera frames, click, click, click. 11 frames, exactly and then the same outcome of the dream, and I awake. Well, the second time I had that dream, I immediately wake and go, “That is the exact frame-for-frame dream with the exact outcome I had three years ago. Whoa! Okay, somebody’s telling me something.” I’ve never had the exact same dream like that that was that odd that would-
Dr. Mark Hyman:
Somebody, I don’t know who that somebody is.
Matthew McConaughey:
Somebody or something, I don’t know. I don’t know, but this is a sign. So let me go down to now, what are the facts? What’s the script given me? I know two things geographically. It’s the Amazon River, and there’s African tribesmen. So I go the atlas of Africa to look for the Amazon River, and as you know, you can look a mighty long time. You’re not going to find it. It’s the wrong continent.
Dr. Mark Hyman:
No, maybe the Nile or the Zambezi River.
Matthew McConaughey:
So I then find the Amazon obviously in South America and say that’s my first check, I’m going to go float the Amazon. Put on a backpack, head out, go down there, hike, hitchhike, bah, bah, bah, bah, bah. Have my trip, 22 days.
Matthew McConaughey:
I come back. Ah, I did it. I chased down the dream. I chased down… And I was so fulfilled. The brown eye, the wet eyes of the South Americans and the Peruvians. I learned a lot about humanity and culture.
Dr. Mark Hyman:
Well, you’re married to one of them now.
Matthew McConaughey:
Yeah. And I got a wave from her, from her tail down there in that trip in ’96. So now cut to 1999. And this is three years later. I’ve forgotten it. That all worked. I’m in Dublin, Ireland, stayed at the Morrison Hotel, and I have the same dream again. The exact same dream with the exact same outcome! Now I’ve had it three times. I’m like, “What the!”
Matthew McConaughey:
Well, what do I know? There’s only… Oh, I chased down the first half to Amazon in ’96. What’s the other thing I know? African tribesmen. Oh, where do I go in Africa? Mighty big continent. Listening to Ali Farka Touré one night, and I go, “Wait, he’s African. Where’s he from?” Open up liner notes, Niafunké. Great, maybe that’ll be a start. Let me just get, again, put on my shoes and get out the door. I’ll go find him and see where that leads me.
Matthew McConaughey:
And as you see in the story, it was another 22-day trip that was glorious, and it finished off the other half of the dream. Now 2021, I’ve not had the dream since. I believe I’ve fulfilled the prophecy of the dream by following down the two, by chasing down the two geographical places and things that the dream gave me. And spiritually they were the most awakening trips I’ve ever had, and adventurous and wild and fun.
Dr. Mark Hyman:
Yeah, well tell us about Michael or Michelle [inaudible 00:24:38].
Matthew McConaughey:
Michelle. Well-
Dr. Mark Hyman:
Because you, I mean, that didn’t sound like a spiritually awakening moment with this guy.
Matthew McConaughey:
But it was, I mean-
Dr. Mark Hyman:
But it was, it was!
Matthew McConaughey:
It was bloody, but it was-
Dr. Mark Hyman:
Yeah.
Matthew McConaughey:
Yeah. So in the [Banjiagata 00:24:57] in Mali where I went in Africa, we would hike, me and my guide Isa, from village to village. And the villages were eight to 15 miles apart. Now, I had just come off a film, Rain of Fire, where I was playing a dragon slayer, and I had a bald head and a big beard. And I was in really good physical shape. Seeking anonymity as I have done before and did on this trip, I went over under a different name and said my name is David. I’m a writer and a boxer.
Dr. Mark Hyman:
Boxer, that’s a dangerous occupation to advertise.
Matthew McConaughey:
Well, that’s what I found out, because trust, those Africans didn’t give a damn about the writer. They were quite keen on the boxer part, right?
Matthew McConaughey:
So even when I landed, was there a few days, I’d notice when I’d show up places that my being there, my story had proceeded me. So I would show up places, and they would go, “Ah, you are Dowda” which is Bambara for David. “Strong white man named Dowda, the boxer. Yes.” And so they loved to wrestle, so they would come up. And they’d just kind of give push, and I was in a couple of circumstances where I was, there was a few of the blokes where I was like, I really don’t want anything to do this. And so I’d take a stance like was I Bruce Lee or something, and it looked really technical, and they would all just jump back and go, “Chuck Norris! Chuck Norris! No, no, no, no!”
Matthew McConaughey:
But this one night, I hiked to this… I hiked this long hike, about a 12-mile hike, and I get to this place called [Benjiamatu 00:26:28], this great little village on top of this mountain that was part Muslim, part animist, and part Protestant. And I show-
Dr. Mark Hyman:
That’s an interesting combo.
Matthew McConaughey:
Yeah, and they have, there’s two rock walls, and there’s the three religions, and I don’t even know what the other one, what the fourth one was for, but they lived pretty harmoniously. And I’m doing what I would do after a hike each day. I’m laying over there stretching on the ground. And the villagers walk up. I’m a novelty to look at. I’ve got lighter skin. I’ve got this beard. “I’m strong white man named Dowda that they have heard of in the past.” And they’re looking and they’re talking Bambara to you, and all of a sudden, these two younger men, about 18 to 20 start talking in a way that I can tell that they’re talking at me, and I can tell in their tone that they’re challenging me.
Matthew McConaughey:
And I say to my guy, Isa, I said, “Are they trying to start something?” He said, “Yes, Dowda. These two men say they are the champion wrestlers of the village, and they want to challenge strong white man named Dowda to a wrestling match.” And I’m like, “Ah, jeez. Okay, all right.” So I’m laying there thinking, mulling this over, stretching.
Matthew McConaughey:
Well, all of a sudden, I hear the crowd just go crazy berserk. And I look up, and those two young men run. Why do they run? As the crowd separates, somebody steps up in the middle with the burlap bag wrapped around their waist, no shirt, no shoes, because this is Michel. And I find out Michel is the true champion wrestler of the village. And those two boys didn’t like, they were getting busted for saying they were champions.
Matthew McConaughey:
Well, Michel doesn’t say a word to me. He just comes and stands over me, points down at me, points to his chest, and then points over to the right. Now, I’m laying on the ground, looking up at this man, Michel, with his tree trunk legs and a burlap bag, or a burlap sack wrapped around his waist, and I look to where he points. And as I look over there, I see this big dirt pit. And my heart starts going up. I just got challenged to a wrestling match.
Matthew McConaughey:
And in this ear, I’m going, “Are you kidding me? Don’t you dare.” And in this ear, I’m going, “Are you kidding me? If you don’t, you’ll never know!” And so I start-
Dr. Mark Hyman:
Well, just before you go on with this story, the beginning of the book talks a lot about your rough and tumble upbringing and fighting and a lot of stuff just sort of came naturally to you.
Matthew McConaughey:
Well, I always felt like, look, I had two older brothers. I had to take care of myself. I had to defend myself. I learned to wrestle. I had pretty good leverage. I’ve always liked wrestling. But I don’t know the rules of this game. I don’t know if you can hit, bite, gouge. I don’t know what’s going on. But I’m getting up to engage in this, and my heart’s starting to race.
Matthew McConaughey:
And as I start to get up, the crowd gets up, too, and they’re getting excited. So I stand in front of Michel. I point to his chest, point to my chest, and turn and walk towards the pit. Well, as soon as I made the turn to the pit, the crowd is like, “Woo-hoo! The show is on tonight!”
Matthew McConaughey:
And I walk in the middle of the pit. Next thing I know, the chief’s out there. He’s got a hand on top of my head, a hand on top of Michel’s. We’re locked ear to ear. I’ve got a hold of his waist. He’s got a hold of my waist. We’re like two bulls in the middle of this dirt pit. And the chief says, “[foreign language 00:29:34]!”, which I take to mean, ding-ding, which I was correct.
Matthew McConaughey:
Well, we go around, around, and around. He flips me. I flip him. I can’t him pinned. He can’t get me pinned. It goes on for what feels like about five minutes, but if you’ve ever been in a ring with somebody, it’s probably more like two minutes, maybe 90 seconds, but it felt like forever. Anyway, all of sudden, crowd is going crazy. The chief separates us.
Matthew McConaughey:
I get up. I’m basically hyperventilating. I’m dripping sweat. I had had these talismans that were woven into my beard. Two of them are ripped out. I’ve got-
Dr. Mark Hyman:
Tore your beard off!
Matthew McConaughey:
… [crosstalk 00:30:04] rubbing down my chest. My knees are bleeding. My ankles are bleeding. And the crowd is going crazy, and I look at Michel, and he’s just standing there staring at me. And he’s barely got a glaze of sweat on him. And he’s just looking-
Dr. Mark Hyman:
No blood either.
Matthew McConaughey:
No blood, no. And as I see this and he’s upset that, oh, this wasn’t over. I can tell that he’s like-
Dr. Mark Hyman:
Yeah, round two.
Matthew McConaughey:
… and the crowd is excited. I’m feeling this went well. Now I see the chief go, “[foreign language 00:30:31]!”, which means ding-ding for round two. Hands on waist, head and shoulders, ding-ding, we’re off again. Same thing goes on. He gets me in a massive leg lock where I almost lost my breath and blacked out. I slide out of that, get him in a Boston crab, flip over, I flip him over, he flips me, calls it. They call the round. I come up in a daze seeing stars. The chief grabs both our hands, raises both to the sky. The crowd is going crazy, and I feel like I did pretty good. And as I look over to Michel, he looks at me, slight bow, and he runs off.
Matthew McConaughey:
Now the crowds envelops me. “Dowda! Dowda! Dowda! Dowda!” And so I’m like, okay. I think I did all right. That was really fun. That hurt, but it was good. Anyway, that night, I go to bed. I think I just had the greatest day. Wow, I just, that was [inaudible 00:31:20] challenge. You know-
Dr. Mark Hyman:
Your definition of a great day is getting beat up and bloody. I don’t know.
Matthew McConaughey:
It was-
Dr. Mark Hyman:
It was invigorating. It was alive.
Matthew McConaughey:
It was highly invigorating, and it was out… I took a risk, and it was a healthy risk. I mean, there was no gouging. There was biting. You weren’t trying to hurt the other one, you know?
Dr. Mark Hyman:
Yeah.
Matthew McConaughey:
And I’m glad that’s how it went, because that’s a good wrestling match. Well, anyway, I go to bed that night, there’s another funny story about what happens that night when I think maybe I’m in the cradle of truth but find out that was probably thinking too highly of myself.
Matthew McConaughey:
The next day, I get up, and the whole village is, “Dowda” still, “Oh my gosh, Dowda.” They all walk me to the edge of the village to say goodbye to walk the 12 miles to the next village. And as I’m leaving the village, who is waiting for me on the path? Michel. The guy I wrestled last night who ran off at the end of the match. As I approach him, he doesn’t say a word. He looks me in the eye. As I walk to him, he turns, and as he turns, he grabs my hand, and he holds my hand and walks me 14 miles to next village. We get to that village. Without saying a word, he slightly bows, turns around and walks home.
Matthew McConaughey:
So I’m sitting there with Isa, my guide that night. And I’m going like, “Let’s talk about last night, man.” I go, “What went down? I mean, I think I did pretty good. I grew up wrestling with my family and stuff.”
Matthew McConaughey:
He goes, “No, no, no, no, no. Dowda, you do very, very good. Very, very good.”
Matthew McConaughey:
I go, “Yeah?”
Matthew McConaughey:
He goes, “Yes.” He says, “Everybody think Michel is going to have strong white man named Dowda on his back in 10 seconds.” He goes, “And the thing is Michel not only champion of this village, he is champion of this village and three village back.”
Matthew McConaughey:
And I go, aha!
Matthew McConaughey:
He goes, “Yes, Dowda. You come back, we make money!”
Matthew McConaughey:
So when I said to him, I was like, “So what was it? Why’d I get all that adulation of the ‘Dowda’?”
Matthew McConaughey:
He goes, “You were big man in the village as soon as you stand up and walk toward pit. Is that you accept the challenge. When you accept the challenge, Dowda, you were a big man in the village.”
Matthew McConaughey:
It was great lesson because that whole wrestling match wasn’t about winning or losing. That whole wrestling match was that as a stranger, I accepted the challenge from the village champion. And there was a great lesson in that, and I’ve tried to carry it with me.
Dr. Mark Hyman:
Which is, take a risk. Show up.
Matthew McConaughey:
Take the risk. Go find out. Yeah, we feel fear of failure. Yeah, I feared getting an arm broken or [crosstalk 00:34:10]-
Dr. Mark Hyman:
For your life!
Matthew McConaughey:
We had no idea what it was!
Dr. Mark Hyman:
I mean, you’re in the middle of the jungle in Africa, it’s like-
Matthew McConaughey:
But I measured it, and I could tell it wasn’t, Michel… I’d been around the people enough to know that it wasn’t a venomous fight like, I want to hurt you. I had to trust that it was going to be a wrestling match and it wasn’t about gouging or breaking someone’s arm or killing somebody. I trusted that. I didn’t know, but I had a pretty good sense that, no, that this is about the sport. And-
Dr. Mark Hyman:
So most people don’t actually follow their dreams, being at a sort of psychological level. You literally followed your dreams, your actual dreams, and-
Matthew McConaughey:
Yeah, I literally, literally followed-
Dr. Mark Hyman:
… that led to this experience. And how were you transformed as a result of that? What were the things that really you took home with you that have stayed with you to now?
Matthew McConaughey:
That me, like most of us, talk too much.
Dr. Mark Hyman:
So walk 14 miles with someone without saying a word and holding his hand?
Matthew McConaughey:
Well, and also, I’m 22 days, they don’t speak English. So the form of communication turns into charades, which can actually be quite relaxing when you don’t… It’s quite frustrating early when you don’t have the use of verbal language, but it becomes, or I became a better communicator by showing and since then have taken, done silent fasts or gone, saying, hey, Camila and I will go a week, and we’ll go no talking. And you start to notice how much you need words but also how much you use too many words too often.
Matthew McConaughey:
I learned from that trip that satisfaction or happiness, joy doesn’t really, isn’t as much about money as we think it is. I’m out there with those villagers, and they have no electricity. They have a community. And you know what else that I really noticed that I got from the trip in Africa and the trip to the Amazon? The importance of humor. Sense of humor. They have humor.
Matthew McConaughey:
Every day… they don’t have a video game. They don’t have a TV. They don’t have electricity. Every day, it’s like, make fun of the person who had the foible, and make fun of them. That person doesn’t like it, but they kind of like it that they’re getting the attention being made fun of. And that’s the night’s entertainment. And you laugh and you play games, or you find rocks. You get creative. They’re not bored. You plant today to eat tomorrow. They’re not saving up. They don’t have bank accounts, but boy they have a smile, heart and community, and they have something to wake up and look forward to, and that’s each other, and what’s that crop going to be doing today, tomorrow.
Matthew McConaughey:
And this, architecture like life is a verb. They live in places where the rains come and wipe out their entire community, and they don’t go. “Oh!” They go. This, this is part of it. So let’s rebuild.
Dr. Mark Hyman:
Right.
Matthew McConaughey:
It’s that time of the season. Architecture is a verb. Life’s a verb.
Dr. Mark Hyman:
I’m wondering if it helped you focus on the things the matter most to you. What impressed me through reading the book is that you were able to sift through the things that really mattered to you and prioritize those and go after those with a one-pointed focus. And the story in the book where you were taking the sabbatical from filmmaking. It was very courageous to say… You’re a highly successful actor. You’re making tons of money, and you were doing roles that you didn’t really, fed your soul.
Matthew McConaughey:
Right.
Dr. Mark Hyman:
They fed your bank account but not your soul. And you’re like, “I’m done with that, and I’m going to take the risk of hitting the Pause button and maybe my phone will never ring.” But you did it, and really what struck me was that you made the choice to simplify and call in what you want. And you also said in your book, which I thought was beautiful was that the arrow doesn’t seek the target. The target seeks the arrow, which speaks to this idea.
Dr. Mark Hyman:
And you share a little bit about how when you were getting back into things, you had this production company, you had a record company, you had your foundation, you had acting, you had your family, and then you just did something very courageous, which I find very challenging to do, which is to say no. Basically like got a call on your phone from your production company, like “I don’t want to do this anymore. It’s too much. I want to simplify and be really good at the things that I’m good at and not get a B or a C. I want to get an A in the areas that matter the most to me.” And I think, you said, “I’m shutting down the production company. Pay everybody a good severance. Shutting down the record company, and I’m going to focus on family, being the greatest actor I can be, and serving in the world by giving back to kids.” And it was just, you know….
Dr. Mark Hyman:
And I personally struggle because there’s so much I want to do. There’s so much that needs to be done in the world. There’s so much that draws me in. You remind me of the elephant child with the insatiable curiosity, and I have that same pathology. And it can take you down a lot of rabbit holes, but you’ve managed to sort of go, “Wait a minute. I’m going to get really clear about my values, what I want.”
Dr. Mark Hyman:
And how do you sort of get to that place? Because it seems like you were very much all over the place. You were in a million different things. You were kind of a renegade. You were acting out. You were doing all kinds of crazy (beep). And somehow kind of got, “Wait a minute, I need a course correct here.”
Matthew McConaughey:
Well, and look, I’m going through a time right now, a challenge right now where I’m looking going, “I’ve got 14 campfires here.” Which ones are feeding a singular vision that I’m going after, and let’s get rid of the others, so when I have fewer fires, they’ll have higher flames. As you said, making As instead of the Bs or Cs and too many. And I’m going through a wonderful challenging time right now dealing with that and trying to disseminate that. How and when? I mean, I would say, back to what we were talking about earlier, learn how to get selfish and say what, spend time quarreling over making up my mind about what really matters.
Matthew McConaughey:
Piggybacking on what the African trip and what the Peruvians and the Amazon trip were, which lead to this clarity of when it has been there for me, and it hasn’t always been there for me, is those trips reminded me of the impermanence of mortality, of these things that we want and need daily that give us, make us feel better or we gain respect from or adulation from. They’re wonderful. I’m for them. I’m not boo-hooing those at all. I am rich and famous. I’m not boo-hooing that at all. I won an Oscar. I have that trophy. I am in great reverence of those things and highly respect those things. But I also realize that, well, that’s not what it’s about. That’s a… This little time that we’re on Earth as Earth’s spinning, and this little planet that’s in this little galaxy that’s in this universe of many universes over the history of time, what’s all that (beep) matter? I mean, what’s it really matter?
Dr. Mark Hyman:
Does not.
Matthew McConaughey:
So in that place, I felt like I’ve gone, I was like, oh, okay. So that’s why it all matters. So let’s define what really matters because these mortal things that we want, these mortal gains, these acquisitions, these things we can get is helpful in tools they are and awesome as they can be, they’re the fringe. They’re the tinsel on the Christmas tree. They’re like, okay, cool, but that’s not the big show.
Dr. Mark Hyman:
Yeah, the big show. The big show.
Matthew McConaughey:
[crosstalk 00:42:22] going on, what’s going to shine on after this life? What things can I build that can be handed down? What things can I build that I’m only coming on, stepping on the shoulders of giants that built before me? What’s that lineage? What’s the long and the long view? So in those ways, when I’m in that frame of mind and spirit, I think I’m, I think we all are better equipped to look at things on our proverbial desk and go, does that really matter or is that just me in a capitalist society, commerce world saying, “Oh, that’s supposed to matter, and I need to really make that paramount”?
Matthew McConaughey:
When you go, “Well, that’s kind of just a tool for a larger machine in the big show.” So well, let’s get rid of that. And it’s not a big deal if we get rid of it. And actually I found by going, “I’m going to get rid of it,” now I’ve lowered on my tier of priorities, I got usually I find more of it.
Dr. Mark Hyman:
More of it. Yeah, right.
Matthew McConaughey:
It is no coincidence or accident that I became a better actor after I became a father and acting became number two or number three in my priority list. I wanted it, but I knew I didn’t need it for my existence and identity.
Dr. Mark Hyman:
Yeah, yeah.
Matthew McConaughey:
So it’s like a mate. You find if need them so much, we’ve all, I mean, I’ve been told no many times because I was too eager. I needed it too much. No, get back. Sit back at yourself. Understand that you don’t have to have that other thing for to survive, to have identity.
Dr. Mark Hyman:
Yeah.
Matthew McConaughey:
And so, you end up getting the girl or the guy or whatever.
Dr. Mark Hyman:
Yeah, that’s right.
Matthew McConaughey:
You know what I mean?
Dr. Mark Hyman:
Another thing that struck me about you Matthew is after reading your book was a question that came up for me, and it reminded me of when I was 17 I was riding a train I think in Italy, and I was sitting next to this professor of English from Cambridge University. And he said to me, “Mark,” he said, “an unexamined life is not worth living,” which I think he quoted from Shakespeare or somewhere else. But he said, “You need to write your life.” I was 17, I started writing a journal. And like you, I’ve been keeping a journal for decades.
Dr. Mark Hyman:
And the question I have for you is, did that introspection and exploration of your own mind help you become who you were? In other words, without that… was that the tool? Because it’s not just, “Oh, I’m just writing my story.” You’re literally using it as a spiritual tool to wake up and notice your mind and notice what’s going on in your life and to think about it differently and ask questions. And most of us just go through and we’re on our devices and we’re distracted and we’re not present. And when you sit and you write, you really call in your higher self. You’re like, “Hey, what do you think up there?” as opposed to your lower self which is constantly operating in a monkey reactive way.
Matthew McConaughey:
Yeah. And look, I think I’m very good at reacting in the baser self, too. There’s times where I’m like, “I’m not open for enlightenment right now. I got to put my head and break a sweat and just get this done. I know I’m running on reserve. I’ll be there in a minute. I’ll be back in a minute.”
Dr. Mark Hyman:
I’ll be back.
Matthew McConaughey:
You know what I mean? Let me finish this thing. But I think I’m able maybe to, I think we all are able to go do that, sort of spend that time in our baser selves, doing that manual labor if we prepared the temple well enough to transcend itself, where we’ve taken some stock, knowing our self, examining our self. I mean, who’s more fun or more entertaining or more necessary to get to know than ourselves? The one person we’re stuck with. The one person we can’t get rid of even though, damn it, I’m sick of your company! And I get sick of my company a lot. I’m like, well, let’s work it out then. Let’s have our own wrestling, Socratic wrestling match because you’re the one son of a (bleep) I can’t get rid of!
Matthew McConaughey:
So I mean, that place of writing down, the tool of writing of the journal. And again, to everyone out there that thinks it’s laborious, it doesn’t have to be laborious. I mean, look, everyone’s got mobile devices now. Just go into Notes, and if you’ve got something you walked through the day and you giggle at, write that down. If you’ve got something you say, “That’s cool,” the color of a car, someone’s shoe, write it down.
Matthew McConaughey:
It’s just little specifics and one of the challenges that I think we have to own up to is that when we do see something we like or we cross a truth and we go, “Yeah,” we immediately think “Oh, I got it. I’ll never forget that.”
Dr. Mark Hyman:
It goes away.
Matthew McConaughey:
No, you will forget it, or it will be stripped away. I do this all the time. Our talk right now, you say something cool, I’m going to pick up my phone, and I’m going to write it down. You’re going to go, “McConaughey, what are doing? Writing somebody else?” I’m going to go, “I’m not writing somebody else, Mark. I’m actually, you said something, and I’m going to write this down.” Why am I writing it down now? Because if I don’t write it down now… I’m writing it down so I can forget it, because if I don’t write it down now, the rest of our conversation, I’m going to have 10% of my brain going, “Don’t forget that thing he said. Don’t forget that thing he said.” And I’m not going to be present.
Dr. Mark Hyman:
Yeah, yeah.
Matthew McConaughey:
So I write things down so I can forget them. So jot things down knowing that you will forget them if you don’t so you can forget them and be more present when you write them down in the situation. And then when you get home at night in bed or the next day or on the weekend, go back over your notes. Have a read of them. You’ll start to find little lineage of poetry, or you’ll find things where you’ll go like, “Wow, I think that’s right. I laughed that line in that movie that I thought was the funniest line when nobody else in the entire theater laughed. But you know what? The one where everybody laughed is the one that I didn’t think was that funny.” Well, does that make me odd? Maybe.
Dr. Mark Hyman:
Probably.
Matthew McConaughey:
But dive into those places where you’re the individual. Dive now those places where… Many times I’ve written, why do I cry so much at birth but not so much at death?
Dr. Mark Hyman:
Mm-hmm (affirmative). Yeah.
Matthew McConaughey:
Why I am the one weeping over here at the birth or someone getting let out of prison because they were wrongly convicted? That’s the stuff that makes me just bawl. But death I don’t really cry. I’m like, I have to find out I can mourn. But so little things where you find your specific, and it’s not a wrong or right thing. Don’t judge yourself on it I guess is what I’m saying if you write things down. It’s awareness.
Matthew McConaughey:
And the simple act of writing something down, which you know, lets us become slightly objective. And we have the subjective, and we have the objective. It just puts us on the Jumbotron for a second. Have a look see at our self going, how we doing there? And it’s a good view for awareness. It’s why I’m a proponent of people speaking in the third-person. It’s a form of awareness. We call it arrogance, but it’s actually going, no, I’m having a little look back. Tell you what’s in the future, Mike Tyson. It’s just Mike Tyson [inaudible 00:49:57]. Why’s he doing that? But it’s a little pop out. It’s a little projection, having a look back down at ourselves.
Matthew McConaughey:
Now, I would say this, and I’d love to hear your opinion on this, sometimes today with all of our devices and the world that is a mirror, we have to fight against being objective too often, meaning we’re living in the third-person more than ever before. And the third-person should never be ahead of or spent more time on than the first-person.
Dr. Mark Hyman:
Yeah.
Matthew McConaughey:
Deceptive.
Dr. Mark Hyman:
When I think of the third-person, perhaps I’m thinking of like maybe a fourth-person, which is your higher consciousness, your higher witness and self that kind of knows it’s connected to spirit or God or your soul or whatever you want to call it. That-
Matthew McConaughey:
Jiminy Cricket.
Dr. Mark Hyman:
Jiminy Cricket! Yeah. And most of us are too in the doing and not enough in the being to actually listen to that quiet, still voice. And you talk about it in the book, and we don’t have time to go through it on the podcast. I wanted to read it, but you have this beautiful about why we all need a walkabout.
Matthew McConaughey:
Right.
Dr. Mark Hyman:
And walkabouts, for those who don’t know are these journeys, spiritual journeys and quests that the Aboriginals in Australia will do. But it’s something that came up in your book multiple times where these times of retreat, going to a monastery, going on a walkabout, going to Australia and putting yourself in a tough, difficult situation away from everything you know and love as way to kind of meet yourself, as a way to pull away all the distractions, all the noise, all the things that take us out of being who we are and who we want to be. And who Matthew McConaughey is not who Mark Hyman is or who Joe Smith is Sally Jones is. They’re all they’re own amazing human beings, but in order for each of us to find that out, we need to pause and hit that Pause button.
Dr. Mark Hyman:
I just recorded a podcast about Ram Dass who used to live in Maui, and he has this whole theme of becoming nobody. We spend our whole lives becoming somebody, but we also sort need to drop all that somebody we are in order to get to nobody so we can actually have an authentic relationship with what is. And I think-
Matthew McConaughey:
[crosstalk 00:52:02] and the anonymous soul is the healthy soul.
Dr. Mark Hyman:
Yeah. And that’s such a beautiful thing that you laid out for us in this book. I could talk to you for hours Matthew. So Matthew, you’ve created a great gift for us with this book, Greenlights. I really think it’s an inspiration, not just to learn about you and your life, but it’s like an example of an owner’s manual for how to live an authentic life. And all of us want to do that more, and all of us need that more, and especially in this time of COVID where we’re all disrupted, and we have to reevaluate everything we’re doing. And it might just be time I encourage people to sit down and pick up a pen or maybe on your iPad or phone just write, and that’s a simple, simple-
Matthew McConaughey:
Anything.
Dr. Mark Hyman:
Yeah, write anything. It could be, listen, any of the same stupid (beep) over and over, that’s fine.
Matthew McConaughey:
Yeah.
Dr. Mark Hyman:
But it’s really important to take those times and to take the pauses and to take the breaks. And I come to Maui for the winter to do a little bit of becoming nobody and to take a pause and to sort of… And life gives us these moments. They’re different for everybody, but I’m so grateful that you wrote this book. I’m really inspired by it. Everybody’s got to get a copy wherever you get your books. Matthew, thank you for what you do and who you are and the example you’ve shown us all and your bright, authentic, fun, and joyous spirit.
Matthew McConaughey:
Mark, great talking to you. Enjoyed getting to know you better here today. I’m looking forward to the next.
Dr. Mark Hyman:
All right, buddy, well see you soon. And thank you all for listening to Doctor’s Farmacy. If you loved this podcast, please share it with your friends and family on social media. Leave a comment. We’d love to hear from you. How do you connect with your authentic soul? Subscribe wherever you get your podcasts, and we’ll see you next time on The Doctor’s Farmacy.
