Greenlights: Raucous stories and outlaw wisdom from the Academy Award-winning actor

About the Author Academy Award-winning actor Matthew McConaughey is a married man, a father of three children and a loyal son and brother. He considers himself a storyteller by occupation, believes it’s okay to have a beer on the way to the temple, feels better with a day’s sweat on him and is an aspiring orchestral conductor.

it ‘s the journey rather than the destination that will fulfill us.’

How to be fair. How to have less stress. How to have fun. How to hurt people less. How to get hurt less. How to be a good man. How to have meaning in life. How to be more me.

I’m an optimist by nature, and humor has been one of my great teachers. It has helped me deal with pain, loss, and lack of trust.

We all step in shit from time to time. We hit roadblocks, we fuck up, we get fucked, we get sick, we don’t get what we want, we cross thousands of “could have done better”s and “wish that wouldn’t have happened”s in life. Stepping in shit is inevitable, so let’s either see it as good luck, or figure out how to do it less often.

I’ve never felt like a victim.

if you didn’t, you didn’t get grounded, you got the belt or a backhand “because it gets your attention quicker and doesn’t take away your most precious resource, time.”

Life’s hard. Shit happens to us. We make shit happen.

It was a crisis for me. I just didn’t give the crisis credit.

The sooner we become less impressed with our life, our accomplishments, our career, our relationships, the prospects in front of us—the sooner we become less impressed and more involved with these things—the sooner we get better at them. We must be more than just happy to be here.

We have to prepare to have freedom.

We have to prepare for the job so we can be free to do the work.

“Don’t walk in there like you want the role, Matthew, walk in there like you own it!”

Sometimes we don’t need advice. Sometimes we just need to hear we’re not the only one.

we didn’t get in trouble for committing the crime, we got in trouble for getting caught.

They are not trying to win arguments of right or wrong. They are trying to understand each other. That’s different.

“You always look like you’re havin fun
when I see your work, Matthew, and that’s
what life’s all about, keep havin fun.”

“Staying active and social, Matthew,
that’s the key to longevity.”

a good plan is to first recognize the problem, then stabilize the situation, organize the response, then respond.

look at marriage not as a final destination, rather as a new expedition, an affirmative and heartfelt choice to become more, together, with the woman I wanted to spend the rest of my life with, and the only mother I wanted to be rocking with on my eighty-eighth birthday.