Life is not Easy - Matthew McConaughey's Motivational Speech

Life is not easy

Don't try to make it that way. Life's not fair. And it won't ever be. Do not fall into the trap. The entitlement trap of feeling like you're a victim. You are not yet over it and get on with it.

"Unbelievable" is the most stupid word in the dictionary

Think about it to say, oh, wow, what an unbelievable play. It was an unbelievable book. Unbelievable film. An unbelievable act of courage. It may be spectacular, it may be phenomenal. Most excellent or outstanding, but unbelievable. Give others and yourself more credit. It just happened. You witnessed it. You just did it. Believe it.

What about the other side of unbelievable? You know that that side when we humans underperform or act out of our best character. For instance, man flies a suicide jet into the World Trade Center. Millions die from diseases every day that we have cures for. Bob the builder swears that he's going to have your house built by Thanksgiving and you can't move in until Christmas the next year. Our best friends lie to us. And we lie to ourselves all the time.

Unbelievable. I don't think so. Again, it just happens and it happens every day. Nothing that we homo sapien earthlings do is unbelievable. And if there's one thing you can depend on people being. So we shouldn't be surprised we us are the trickiest mammals walking the planet. I'm not worried about the monkeys. I'm worried about you and me. So acknowledge the Axum greatness as real and do not be naive about mankind's capacity for evil nor be in denial of our own shortcomings.

Happiness is different than joy

If I win, I will be happy. If I don't. I won't. It's an if then. Cause and effect. Quid pro quo. Standard that we cannot sustain because we immediately raise it every time we attain it. You see happiness. Happiness demands a certain outcome. It is result reliant. And I say, if happiness is what you're after, then. You're gonna be let down frequently and you're gonna be unhappy.

Much of your time. Joy that joy is a different thing. It's something else. Joy is not a choice. It's not a response to some results. It's a constant. Joy, is the feeling that we have from doing what we are fashioned to do no matter the outcome. Now, personally, as an actor, I started enjoying my work and literally being more happy when I stopped trying to make the daily Labor a means to a certain in. It's under construction. It is in constant approach alive and well in the doing of what we're fashion to do and enjoying.

Define success for yourself

The question that we've got to ask ourselves is what success is to us? What success is to you? Is it more money as fine? I got nothing against money. I don't. Maybe it's a healthy family.

Maybe it's a happy marriage. Maybe it's to help others to be famous, to be spiritually sound. To leave the world a little bit better place than you found it. Continue to ask yourself that question. Now, your answer may change over time and that's fine, but do yourself this favor.

Whatever your answer is, don't choose anything that will jeopardize your soul. Prioritize who you are, who you want to be, and don't spend time with anything that antagonizes your character. Don't drink the Kool-Aid. It tastes sweet, but you will get cavities tomorrow. Life is not a popularity contest. Be brave. Take the Hill. But first, answer that question. What's my hill? So me, how do I fight? How do I define success for me, myself?

So first, we have to define success for ourselves and then we have to put in the work to maintain it. Take that daily tally. Keep the things that are important to us in good shape. Let let let's admit it. We've all got two wolves in a good one and a bad and they both want to eat. The best I can tell, we just got a feed that goes a little more than the other one. Here we go.

No far. Process of elimination is the first step to our identity, a.k.a. where you are not is as important as where you are.

Don't leave crumbs

And the beauty of delayed gratification. So what are crumbs or the crumbs I'm talking about? Are the choices that we make that make us have to look over our shoulder in the future? You didn't pay that guy back the money that you owed him, and tonight you just saw him three rows behind you.

You drank too much last night. You're too hung over to drive your Sundays. 8:00 a.m. Saturday morning. Baseball practice. These are the crumbs. They come in the form of regret, guilt and remorse. You leave trumps today. They will cause you more stress tomorrow. And they disallow you from creating a customized future in which you do not have to look over your shoulder.

So let's flip the script instead of creating outcomes that take from us. Let's create more outcomes that pay us back. Keep your fire lit. Turn you on. For the most amount of time in your future. These are the choices I'm talking about. And this is the beauty of delayed gratification to yourself.