Greenlights

Matthew McConaughey, 1969-

Book - 2020

"Drawing on the Academy Award-winning actor's journals and diaries from the last 40 years, this book presents a uniquely McConaughey approach to achieving success and satisfaction"--

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Subjects
Genres
Autobiographies
Personal narratives
Diaries
Published
New York : Crown [2020]
Language
English
Main Author
Matthew McConaughey, 1969- (author)
Edition
First edition
Physical Description
289 pages : illustrations ; 23 cm
ISBN
9780593139134
  • Outlaw logic
  • Finding your frequency
  • Dirt reads and autobahns
  • The art of running downhill
  • Turn the page
  • The arrow doesn't seek the target, the target draws the arrow
  • Be brave, take the hill
  • Live your legacy now.
Review by Kirkus Book Review

All right, all right, all right: The affable, laconic actor delivers a combination of memoir and self-help book. "This is an approach book," writes McConaughey, adding that it contains "philosophies that can be objectively understood, and if you choose, subjectively adopted, by either changing your reality, or changing how you see it. This is a playbook, based on adventures in my life." Some of those philosophies come in the form of apothegms: "When you can design your own weather, blow in the breeze"; "Simplify, focus, conserve to liberate." Others come in the form of sometimes rambling stories that never take the shortest route from point A to point B, as when he recounts a dream-spurred, challenging visit to the Malian musician Ali Farka Touré, who offered a significant lesson in how disagreement can be expressed politely and without rancor. Fans of McConaughey will enjoy his memories--which line up squarely with other accounts in Melissa Maerz's recent oral history, Alright, Alright, Alright--of his debut in Richard Linklater's Dazed and Confused, to which he contributed not just that signature phrase, but also a kind of too-cool-for-school hipness that dissolves a bit upon realizing that he's an older guy on the prowl for teenage girls. McConaughey's prep to settle into the role of Wooderson involved inhabiting the mind of a dude who digs cars, rock 'n' roll, and "chicks," and he ran with it, reminding readers that the film originally had only three scripted scenes for his character. The lesson: "Do one thing well, then another. Once, then once more." It's clear that the author is a thoughtful man, even an intellectual of sorts, though without the earnestness of Ethan Hawke or James Franco. Though some of the sentiments are greeting card--ish, this book is entertaining and full of good lessons. A conversational, pleasurable look into McConaughey's life and thought. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

This is not a traditional memoir. Yes, I tell stories from the past, but I have no interest in nostalgia, sentimentality, or the retirement most memoirs require. This is not an advice book, either. Although I like preachers, I'm not here to preach and tell you what to do. This is an approach book. I am here to share stories, insights, and philosophies that can be objectively understood, and if you choose, subjectively adopted, by either changing your reality, or changing how you see it. This is a playbook, based on adventures in my life. Adventures that have been significant, enlightening, and funny, sometimes because they were meant to be but mostly because they didn't try to be. 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. I'm not perfect; no, I step in shit all the time and recognize it when I do. I've just learned how to scrape it off my boots and carry on. We all step in shit from time to time. We hit roadblocks, we f*** up, we get f***ed, 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. What is a greenlight? Greenlights mean go--advance, carry on, continue. On the road, they are set up to give the flow of traffic the right of way, and when scheduled properly, more vehicles catch more greenlights in succession. They say proceed. In our lives, they are an affirmation of our way. They're approvals, support, praise, gifts, gas on our fire, attaboys, and appetites. They're cash money, birth, springtime, health, success, joy, sustainability, innocence, and fresh starts. We love greenlights. They don't interfere with our direction. They're easy. They're a shoeless summer. They say yes and give us what we want . Greenlights can also be disguised as yellow and red lights. A caution, a detour, a thoughtful pause, an interruption, a disagreement, indigestion, sickness, and pain. A full stop, a jackknife, an intervention, failure, suffering, a slap in the face, death. We don't like yellow and red lights. They slow us down or stop our flow. They're hard. They're a shoeless winter. They say no , but sometimes give us what we need . Catching greenlights is about skill : intent, context, consideration, endurance, anticipation, resilience, speed, and discipline. We can catch more greenlights by simply identifying where the red lights are in our life, and then change course to hit fewer of them. We can also earn greenlights, engineer and design for them. We can create more and schedule them in our future--a path of least resistance--through force of will, hard work, and the choices we make. We can be responsible for greenlights. Catching greenlights is also about timing . The world's timing, and ours. When we are in the zone, on the frequency, and with the flow. We can catch greenlights by sheer luck, because we are in the right place at the right time. Catching more of them in our future can be about intuition, karma, and fortune. Sometimes catching greenlights is about fate . Navigating the autobahn of life in the best way possible is about getting relative with the inevitable at the right time. The inevitability of a situation is not relative; when we accept the outcome of a given situation as inevitable, then how we choose to deal with it is relative. We either persist and continue in our present pursuit of a desired result, pivot and take a new tack to get it, or concede altogether and tally one up for fate. We push on, call an audible, or wave the white flag and live to fight another day. The secret to our satisfaction lies in which one of these we choose to do when. This is the art of livin. I believe everything we do in life is part of a plan. Sometimes the plan goes as intended, and sometimes it doesn't. That's part of the plan. Realizing this is a greenlight in itself. The problems we face today eventually turn into blessings in the rearview mirror of life. In time, yesterday's red light leads us to a greenlight. All destruction eventually leads to construction, all death eventually leads to birth, all pain eventually leads to pleasure. In this life or the next, what goes down will come up. It's a matter of how we see the challenge in front of us and how we engage with it. Persist, pivot, or concede. It's up to us, our choice every time. This is a book about how to catch more yeses in a world of nos and how to recognize when a no might actually be a yes. This is a book about catching greenlights and realizing that the yellows and reds eventually turn green. greenlights. By design and on purpose . . . Good luck. Excerpted from Greenlights by Matthew McConaughey All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.