Greenlights

by Matthew McConaughey

I have hope, and the man I want to be sleeps in the same bed with the man I am, in head, heart, spirit, and body. I don’t always enjoy my company because of that son of a bitch Jiminy Cricket, but I am rarely able to knock him off my shoulder either. And for good reason. Even when I’m out of tune, off frequency, having trouble feeling any traction or viscosity between my being and my actions, or, alternately, when I am so lost in the music that I am unaware, my best self is always there, and he will start the Socratic dialogue sooner than I choose to hear him and long after I want to, because he’s insatiable. I, of course, eventually do hear him, then the challenge becomes, to listen. Once I do, and stop pitting fate against responsibility, truth against fiction, sins against who I wish I was, selfishness against selflessness, mortality against eternity, I learn, and then begin just being who I am, and doing what I do, for me—not for anyone else and for everyone else at the same time. For me and God, together. Then I realize I am responsible for fate, fiction is truthful, a sinner and saint I am, an egotistical utilitarian as well. I’ll be mortal forever. Now, each step at a time has the big picture in mind, and I am the man I want to be, Jiminy Cricket is a bluebird on my shoulder, and Socrates has one voice.