Matthew Quick

have instead of what we do. We think things that hold us back and dampen our spirit. But it's not just about thinking. Our actions matter. It takes conscious, consistent, and creative effort to make a life worth living. This podcast is about how other people keep themselves moving in the right direction, how they feed their good wolf. Welcome

to the show. Our guest today is Matthew Quick, New York Times best selling author of many novels, including The Silver Linings Playbook, which was made a New An Oscar winning film. His work has been translated into thirty languages, and I'm sure this interview will be as well. Matthew, or Q as he is often called, has a new novel called The Good Luck of Right Now, Eric, let's hear the interview. Hi, Matt, Welcome to the show. Hey,

thanks so much for having me. So our podcast is based on the parable of two wolves, in which there is a grandfather who's talking with his grandson and he says, in life, there are two wolves inside of us that are always at battle. One is a good wolf who represents things like kindness and love and joy, and the other is a bad wolf, which represents things like hatred and greed and fear. And the grandson stops and he thinks, and he says, Grandfather, which one wins? And the grandfather says,

the one you feed. So I'd like to start off by just asking you what that parable means to you in your life and in your work. I feel like I could talk about that for hours. Um, you know, it's it's one that I've I've heard before, and I've I've thought about deeply. I'm somebody who has struggled with anxiety and depression for pretty much my entire life, but I only began talking openly about that when I started to publish for the first time, and largely because I

was writing about those things. So I had to kind of come out if you will. Um, I'm someone you know who writes fiction for a living. So I'm very interested in narrative and the stories that we tell ourselves. And I think that it's a perfect example, the parable of the Wolf. UM remind us that we're constantly telling

ourselves a story about who we are. UM. I grew up in a working class neighborhood and I was told at the age of sixteen seventeen eighteen that, you know, a career in fiction writing was was not necessarily for me because they didn't have the pedigree, because the people that raised me were not fiction writers. But that was a narrative that I didn't choose to believe. You know.

I tried to feed the other narrative, and it was it was it was hard to believe that I could transcend the expectations of my community and do something that people were not doing at the time, which was writing fiction. UM. But it took a while and I kept feeding that and feeding that narrative. Now in my life, when um, you know, I sit down to write fiction, every every

new novel, is is a leap of faith. And I find myself not only trying to monitor this story that I tell myself, but also monitor the stories that other people are telling me. I tried to surround myself with people who make me feel that I can make good art, and the people who make me feel as though I can't,

or the people who feed the bad wolf. I try to keep away from those people, which is hard, um, but necessary if you want to do things that um, not everybody does, and try to live an examine life exactly. And you talked there about the stories that we tell ourselves and in your books, one of the things I noticed is that the characters tend to uh do I don't know if the word I would use in some cases is pretending or telling themselves stories that allow them

to carry on in the face of face of trouble. Yeah, and that's that's um. That's something that I'm I'm very interested in, um, not only as a as a storyteller, but also as a human being. I grew up in a very religious home. UM. I was raising a Methodist church. I no longer it's in any church now, UM. But you know story and religion, and you know the tales and the mids uh that that we we embrace, I mean,

tell really do do shape our lives. And so as a re teller with my characters, I'm very interested in not only the myths and the stories that they inherit, but also the ones that they invent for themselves. Um. And I find myself doing this both as a novelist and as a human being as well. Um. The story and the narrative that I buy into evolves and it

changes as you progress. When I was sixteen, I thought, Um, you know that I was a kid from a blue collar neighborhood that would probably never get to be a novelist. That was That was a story that I was told. Now, um, you know a published novelist who obviously buys into a

very different narrative. So it's it's involved. So your latest book is called The Good Luck of right Now, and in a in a quick summary for the readers, it's a book about a main character named Bartholomew, who is a little bit off and he's lived his entire life with his mother. He's he's he's a he's a grown man. I'm not sure how old he is, uh, maybe in his forties and late thirties and his mother. Finally, his mother dies and he's sort of confronted with what does

he do with his life now? And the framework that you set the book up in is he is writing letters to Richard Gear, who is his mother's favorite actor, and he actually believes at points that Richard Gear is inspiring him and helping him. And that's sort of the pretending that that goes on. One of the things that the title of the book, The Good Look of Right Now, is based on a philosophy that Bartholomew's mother had. Could you tell us more about that? Yeah, it's really about

about balance. Um. She comes up with this idea that when things happened to them that are are tragic are bad, that they should believe that other good things are happening to other people around the world. Uh, simultaneously, it's the equal at out and so she almost celebrates when something bad or tragic happens to them because she believes that in order for them to be bad and something good

must be happening elsewhere, and vice versa. When something good happened to them, she feels a little bit of shame or she worries that something bad is happening to someone else. And the concept of balances is something that um, I've been thinking a lot about because I was in the process of transitioning from UM, a relatively unknown writer, to a writer who was succeeding UM beyond most people's expectations.

And during the time of the sivin Landings playbook being adapted into a film, UM, I I was going through this phase where I was accomplishing things that many of my mentors had not accomplished. And I realized that, you know, the Oscars is a perfect example. You know, only certain movies get selected and only certain people win, and that means that other people aren't selected, and other people will lose. And only certain books get adapted into into films, and

that means that others will not UM. And so this whole idea of you know, balancing UM. You know, the the lack of success I had in my life for a long time with this sudden success that I was being confronted with made me think deeply about about these things. And you know, for Bartholomew's mother, it's it's really also

a survival mechanism as well. Like she's someone who is constantly experiencing UM tragedy and negativity and a lot of bad things, and so in order for her to cope in order for her to get her son through these really difficult situations. She comes up with this philosophy that they can both embrace in order to to deal with, you know, some of the horrific things that are going on in their lives. And a couple of times throughout the narrative, Bartholomew muses that it might not even matter

if it's true or not, but the story helps. That gets back to the idea of the to some degree, we are telling our stories really about anything. I mean, most of the narrative that goes on in my head and most people I know is is a is a version of some story, and and about being conscious about choosing a story that's actually that actually serves us well versus plenty of stories that don't service well. And I'll

use that to to transition into Bartholom. You has a um he calls it the angry little man in his stomach who when when something is happening, the angry little man tends to do two things. One is, he yells at him like moron, retard miserable failure. And at the same time, you have many different ways of describing how he's kicking his internal organs or or digging his uh

you know, his claws into his stomach. And when I was reading that, I was thinking a little bit about that sounds like a perfect description of the bad wolf for some of us. Yeah, absolutely. Um, you know, I had a powerful realization in my twenties where I finally realized that my thoughts could make me physically ill, um

to the point where it was completely debilitating. Um. You know, the things that I was thinking about could make me feel nauseous or you know, keep me from being able to perform or uh, you know, send me into a panic attack, just because I was having certain thoughts. And it's really powerful to think that. Um, you know, the narrative in our head can literally affect not only our mental health, but also our physical health as well. Um, you know, just by the thoughts that we're thinking. It's

really really powerful concept, you know. And to to get back to the idea of the bad wolf um inside of us, you know, Bartholomy and my character, it could very easily be synonymous, you know, the angry man or the bad wolf. It's this thing that's constantly um telling

him that he's not good enough. It's affecting his mental health, it's affecting his physics, go health, and he realizes that it's it's the force of the narrative that that he has to overcome, that he has to beat Um, that he has to in some ways appease as well UM, and he does battle daily with it. Yeah, there's a part in the book where you talk about um synchronicity. So one of the things that that Bartholomy is wrestling with is the idea of synchronicity, also called unus mundus,

which is based on a theory that Young had. Can you expound upon that one? You know, the idea that Bartholomew latches onto is this idea that um things happen. You know, two events can be related not not by their their cause, but by their meaning to a certain individual, which of course is what Young proposed. And so Bartholomy becomes obsessed for for looking for these bits of synchronicity, almost as if to like bread crow to lead him

to something. And of course the first bit that he finds is is this letter from Richard Gear at this time when he needs a mentor, and so you know, he kind of graphs a narrative onto that and and so you know, for me, um, you know, again it gets back to the stories that we tell ourselves. And I do believe that there are rhythms to the universe, you know, Um, there are patterns that emerge often in hindsight.

And I often think about stories. And when I was in the m f A program, one of my advisors, Paul Selik, he said that, um, you know, a story should make sense in retrospect, so the readers should be going through and then you have that aha moment and you look back and you see all the signs that we're leading to that inevitable conclusion. And I think in a lot of ways that's that's really what Bartholomy is

trying to do. He's trying to to see the signs as they're they're not in retrospect and try to figure out his life. And I think to some extent, we all do that, whether we buy into the concept of synchronicity or coincidence or signs. Um, you know, we're all looking for, you know, the rhythm to our lives that give us meeting and help us make sense of all of these you know, chaotic things that are happening to us. I think that's largely what I do as a fiction writer.

You know, I think fiction writing is a form of therapy. For me. I always say, I take all of the chaos in my chest in my mind, and I try to make order on the page. And I think that's exactly what my characters are doing as well. We had a conversation a couple of weeks ago with with a woman who wrote a book about the self help industry, and we were talking back and forth a little bit about the idea of positive thinking and when does that

crossover into denial? And I think that's really interesting in in what we're talking about where you've got, uh, whether it's in our own lives or characters lives, where we're telling ourselves a story, and yet at some points that that crosses over into not addressing or dealing with things that need to be need to be dealt with. Do you have any thoughts on that? I do. UM. You know, it's it's a fine line, um. And you know, I think that if you ask several different people where that

line is, they're all gonna tell you a different answer. UM. Maybe I can answer the best with an anecdote. When I was UM in the m f A program. I had quit a senior teaching position and I had moved in with my in laws to be a you know,

full time fiction writer. And for you know, sow and a half years, I was an unpaid fiction fiction writer, not making any money, living with my in laws, and you know, many people in my family, UM, and my friends were convinced that I had made this huge mistake, that I was completely delusional, that I was irrational, and that at the age of thirty three, I shouldn't be you know, sitting alone in a basement with fictional characters trying to pretend that I was some type of artist. Uh.

They were convinced that I was wrong. And one day I went for a run and I was feeling completely dejected. Um. You know, when you live in America and you're a man, and you're thirty years old, and you tell people that you are an artist and that you are a full time fiction writer and you're not making any money, people make you feel as though you're committing a crime. Um. And you know, that's largely how the people in my

life made me feel. That I was irresponsible, illogical, selfish, Um, you know, in denial, and so I was on this run, and I was really that worried about my future. My bank account was at zero. Um, you know, I didn't know what I was going to do next. I had kind of worn out my welcome with my in laws, and I didn't want to live with them forever. And so while I was running, I was thinking about, you know, the possibility of giving up my dream of being a

fiction writer. And I was running and running and running, and I looked up into the sky and it was this gray winter day and there was this beautiful cloud and it was illuminated by the sun that was behind it, and so it was kind of, uh, you know, there was a silver lining around it, and it was absolutely breathtakingly gorgeous, to the point where I thought to myself, maybe it's an omen or a sign um that I'm going to make it as a fiction writer, that I

should keep going. And immediately I started to yell at myself in my head. Maybe the bad wolf was speaking, so to speak, and you know, that voice said, that's delusional, that's silly, that's magical, thinking, like you can't believe that, you know, you can't believe that because you saw a beautiful, you know cloud you know lined in silver that that

that means anything. You know, that's completely irrational. And then the Good Wolf stepped in and said, well, what if you allow yourself to believe it just so it gives you enough fuel to keep going. You know, you've been working every day. You know, you've been putting a lot of time and effort into this. Your stories are improving, You've been published in some small literary journals. There's a lot of positives here. You've been working towards an m f A. The Good Wolf stepped in and I started

thinking about it. You know, what if I pretended that this this this sign meant something and it just gave me the fuel of the courage to keep fighting. And then I had a moment as I was running, and I said, what if I had a character who believed that? And that's where I got the idea for pat People's

in the Silver Lightnings playbook. And I went home that night and I started writing, and um, you know, nobody was paying attention at that time, but the Good Wolf was winning, and you know, I was saying, you know, look, you know this is something you have an idea here. You've been working hard, You've been honing your talents see this through And I did, and I wrote a book called The Silver Linings Playbook, and you know, it was published and it was made into a movie. And a

few years later I was sitting a fiascars um. You know, that was born at a moment where if I had told people like, hey, I got this idea why I was running because I saw, you know, a silver lining in the sky, you know, people would have thought that was wildly irrational. But that's exactly what happened, and that

led to a lot of good things for me. And so it's hard because when you talk about the arts, um and you talk about pretending, and you talk about you know, positive thinking, and what is dangerously um you know, irrational? Uh you know, I think it's really hard to to answer that because any artists before they're making money seems like they're doing something wildly irrational and silly. And uh, you know, society is always going to tell you that, you know, you're a dreamer, you know that it's not

worth doing until until you make money, you know. And I think that that's a horrible a way too to qualify something, to to give something validity. But unfortunately in America. Before you make money as a fiction writer and artist, you know, people are always going to tell you that you're delusional. Yeah, I think what's interesting about that And I've I've I've been thinking a lot about this. When where is that line? And one of the things that

I've I've noticed is that there's a line. It seems to be if people are really doing the work, really engaged in it, really going after it. That's a that seems to me to be an indicator versus thinking about and pretending that we're going to be something without actually putting the effort in. And it's clear that you you put that work in. Yeah, and I think that that is. Um, It's definitely true whether we're talking about art or mental health or relationships. Um. You know, you've got to do

the work, you know. And I worked extremely hard on my fiction, and you know, I like to think that I work extremely hard on you know, myself as well, my mental health, my relationships with people. Um. But it's still a constant battle, you know. And I don't want to diminish the fact that I often, you know, felt so The Bad Wolf, if you will, was winning a lot, and there were times that I get very close to

quitting before Silver Linings took off. And you know, there have been times in life that I've I've come close to quitting, you know, on myself as well. And I would say that for most of my life, I've felt as though most people in society, um, we're feeling the bad wolf. And and that's troublesome for me because, um, you know, to be an artist oftentimes means walking alone.

It means flying in the face of convention. It means doing what other people think is irrational or silly, and you know, finding truths before others necessarily believe that they're they're true. It means believe wildly, um, and doing things that oftentimes other people, um just don't get. And so it's it's a tough line to walk because, um, you know, you always want to to be to be rational as well.

You don't every want to slide into into delusion. One of the things that I really enjoyed about your work is, uh, it's both humorous and really touching and and and poignant at the same time. And I read somewhere that you said, um, humor has saved you a million times. And I think the role of I've said before that levity is an unappreciated virtue. Can you tell us more about the role of humor in in feeding your good wolf? Yeah? Absolutely.

You know, I often tell a story about the the first year I was working out of college, I worked with teenagers diagnosed with severe autism in a classroom UM, doing job training and behavior therapy. And these were kids that were often violent, non verbal. Um. When we took them to the pizza hut, we could clear out the pizza hut in about five minutes. Um. You know, there

are great kids, and I love them. And one of the things that happened was the turnover was quite high because the pay was low and the work was really hard, and so we'd get new faculty and all the time, and on the first day when we had a new person working with our kids, we'd always laughed. We'd always watched to see if they would laugh, not laugh at the kids, um, but at the absurdity of some of the situations that we were in, laughing a good way

UM with everybody. And if they laughed, we knew that they would come back the next day. If they didn't laugh once throughout the day, we would never see them again. And you know was at that point that I realized that when you're dealing with you know, tough issues, especially involved with mental health, that if you don't laugh, you're

never gonna make it through. And you know, for me, um, I tell stories that are often you know, tragic and difficult, and I try to shine a light on on things that you know, society doesn't always necessarily want to look at. And so I think the humor is a really great tool for letting people know that it's okay to to have human feelings, to feel as though, um, you know, things are absurd at times, but it's still okay, like we can still laugh when we can get through this.

And so when I'm reading, when I'm writing, um, I know when I start to laugh, uh, you know, through the writing of the manuscript, laugh with my characters, laugh at the absurdity of their situations that I'm going to finish the manuscript. What were some of your favorite without giving any any plot away, what were some of your favorite funny moments in the Good Luck of Right now. It's it's hard to uh to to talk about the

jokes without spoiling them from for people. Um, you know, I can think of very specific moments in the book. But again I don't want to give spoilers x. I will say that the character of Max was a lot of fun to write, and again I'm trying to speak without spoilers, but he was just so so much fun to inhabit because it was just so uninhibited, and he was so honest and um and in so many ways

he was just so beautifully absurd. But through all of that, he was just really kind and like he really cared about people, and he really cared about um animals, and you know, it's a very beautiful soul within him. But hilarious at the same time, you know, because he spoke his mind and he would say the things that he wanted to say. UM. So again I'm talking in a vague way just to not to give spoilers. Yeah, I

actually didn't read the book. I listened to it a version of it on book, a book on tape, and the guy who did Max did a great Max. I mean, it's just I was laughing the whole time. I'd agree to I think he was. He was definitely the one that I got the most laughs out of. But there's a lot of humor, you know, it's it's funny because UM,

people have wildly different reactions to my books. I remember with Silver Linings, one of the first big public moments was that received an honorable mention for the Pen Hemmingway Award. You know, I got to meet Hemingway Son. It was is very shanky affair in Boston. I remember speaking with a very famous author um and who had read the book in He said to me, your book is hilarious. You know, the Silver Linings play book was so funny. I laughed all the way through and I just couldn't

stop laughing. And then I turned around and there was another person associated with the Penn Hemmingway and they said to me, you know, I love Silver Linings, but it was just so sad, like I cried all the way through it. And it was literally I just you know, within thirty seconds, you know, complete opposite reaction to the book from two people who claimed to love it. And I often think that our response to to life, but particularly issues about mental health, UM really are telling you

know about our attitudes about it as well. And you know they say that, you know, somebody's response to books is a lot more about them than the author, And I think that that's generally true. But I love it when I hear from people like yourself who who laugh at my jokes, because it makes me feel less alone and makes you feel a little bit more normal. So

thank you. Well, I got both, right, I got I got both the laughter and and the sadness, which I think you said, if you're not both laughing and crying while you're writing it at points, you don't feel like you have it. And I think that's the that's the gift of certain authors of the ability to combine those two things, because a funny book is one thing and a sad book is another thing, but one that hits both those things. One of my favorite writers is John Irving,

and he does a really good job of that. Well, thank you for that, embarrassing, I appreciate that. Yeah, I think you know, like comedy is in some ways, it's very close to tragedy. Um. You know, if if we if we think about the things that that we laugh at, you know, um, you know, for example, why do we laugh when you know, somebody's in the movie and they trip and fall down? You know, if there's funny music behind it, why do we laugh when somebody falls? Uh?

And I think it's because in many ways it's unexpected. We laugh at what we don't we don't really understand, or what we might be a little bit afraid of. And and so I think it's interesting to see how those two, you know, comedy and tragedy are, you know, kind of ying and yang speaking of fine lines, that line between sort of laughing at somebody and laughing with somebody. You know, if somebody falls down, it's it's funny. I always find the the test to be if I fall down,

do I still think it's funny? Which I usually do. I usually think it's pretty funny. So can we laugh at ourselves? That's that's it, you know. Um, you know, and I think that that's that's really important. My wife is always saying to me, we should we should laugh more, and we laugh all the time, but I do think we should laugh more. You know. It's it's good medicine.

You've addressed the mental health and depression a lot. Are there any things you're willing to share in more detail about what that was like for you and how you've gotten through that? Yeah? You know, Um, it's funny. In super Lightnings playbook the movie, Um David wrote a line it's not my line. It wasn't in the book, But Bradley Cooper talks about white knuckling it like he says, I feel like I've been white knuckling it for a

long time. And Um, when I was teaching in my twenties, Um, I'm I'm a very functional um person who deals with depression anxiety. I'm very good at putting on a mask. Um when I when I talk about my depression now, from those days, my students will say, there's no way you like, you were so upbeat at school like you were. You were the guy giving us the big speech before you know, the soccer match of the basketball game. You're so positive in school, and you know that was definitely

one one part of it. But I would come home exhausted and completely depleted, and um, you know I was privately dealing with a lot of anxiety. And you know, of course, when you're hiding it all the time, it only makes it worse. And when you're not talking about it it makes it worse as well. And I had somewhat of a breakdown in my late twenties. Um, you know I was probably drinking too much at night. Um,

I was definitely drinking too much at night. It was an alcoholic, but I was self medicating, um, you know, more than I probably should have been. And uh again, I grew up in a blue collar neighborhood. People didn't talk about mental health, you know. Um, people weren't open about at it. And what was worse was, uh, you know, the model hood for man the model for manhood that I, you know, received was, you know, you just keep your mouth shut and tough it out. You know, you you

bully your way through. And and I try to do that for a long time. But you know, I realized that I had breaking points. And I also realized that, um, I'm somebody who can appear to be an extrovert when I need to be, but my true nature is that of an introvert. And I need time alone. Um, I need time to think. I need time to recharge my batteries. UM.

I don't like to make decisions quickly. And so, you know, picking the career choice abou high school English teacher, where I love doing that work and I felt as though I was very good at it was was probably the worst career choice I could have made. From my my own mental health. Now, writing fiction full time Um. You know when when I had that mental breakdown, you know, in my late thirties, my wife kind of sat me down and said, you know, we can't go on like this.

You've you've got to change, and you know I can't. I can't have you coming home, you know, depressed and anxious all the time. You've got to do something to help your mental health. And you know, she gave me that talk, like, if you could do anything in the world, what would you do, you know, if you could get up tomorrow and do anything, and what would make you happy?

And I said I would write fiction, and she said we should and I said, well, I can't because we have a mortgage and I have tenure, and you know, we have health insurance, and you know, I give a talk about this now, and I talked about how I used to polish the bars of my prison. Um. You know, tenure was a bar. You know, it's a good thing to have tenure, but it was also you know, it

kept me trapped in the cage. And you know, health insurance and a pension and you know, having a house and you know, all of these things that you're supposed to want, Um made me feel incredibly trapped. And my wife and I got to this point where, um, we just realized that we weren't living the life, the lives that we had imagined. You know. We met when she was seventeen, that was nineteen, and we wanted to make art, we wanted to write, you know, that's what we wanted

to do. And somehow we woke up ten years later, um, you know, being these people that we really did not want to be, UM, lives that we had not imagined for ourselves. And and so my wife, you know, it's the credit goes to her, you know, she said, we can do this, we can change and we we took a road trip in Ireland where um, I was reading a lot of books on Buddhism, and you know, for me at the time, that was that was a step

out of my comfort zone. Um again being raised like very Protestant, you know, exploring other views of the world, and we were drinking in Irish clubs and you know, we're walking through this gorgeous countryside during the day and my wife said to me, she's like, you're happy, Like you're so happy on this trip, Like wouldn't you like to be happy all the time? You know? And I really thought that that was an impossibility, that I couldn't do the things that I wanted to do. That you know,

that was for other people. Um, but my wife, she just kept saying, you know, if you want to do this, you should do it. And and she she really kind of gave me the ultimatum of you know, either we're gonna change our lives or you know, we can't go on like this anymore. And and so I didn't. It wasn't easy. Um, when I quit my tenure teaching position,

I was terrified. Um My father is a very pragmatic banker, and um, you know, telling him I wanted to write fiction full time and leaving a steady paycheck just did not compute. And he's a huge fan now, like he gives my work to all of his customers, and he's always coming out to my events and he's been really supportive. But at first, UM, he called me an idiot. You know, he's he was furious. You know, he said he wasn't gonna pay for my health insurance, He would not pay

for my dental. What was I going to do in three years when I found out I wasn't a fiction writer and I was unemployable because I had this huge gap on my CV, you know, just really fear based logic, and it worked because it's scared the hell out of me. Um. You know, but I always say, you know people now that will say to me, you know, like you you were so brave, like leaving you know, your tenured position and doing what you did, like taking this giant leap

of faith, and I would say, I wasn't brave. You know. It was just a last ditch effort to save myself. You know, I don't know that I would be here if I if I didn't do the things that I needed to do to feel mentally well. And so you know there's a lot of sacrifices, you know, living with my in laws, and they were wonderful people, but it was it was very humbling to do that. In my early thirties. You know, my my best friend was in the process of you know, building a very well respected

spinal implant company and experiencing wild success. And you know, my friends were climbing the ladders of their jobs and buying bigger houses and having babies, and you know, I felt very small, you know, as I sat typing away in a basement. You know, believing that I was going to be a fiction writer sometime. But you know, again, like there was that that good wolf, and you know, I kept trying to feed it and kept trying to believe, um that I could do the things that I wanted

to do. And We're gonna provide me with a better life. And and now I write fiction full time, you know. So you know, part of the year, I travel and promote my books and I meet wonderful people, which is great, um. But for the other part of the year, I'm pretty much by myself with my wife and um. You know, we live by the water now, and you know, I get up when I want to and I write fiction, and I can be alone and I can take time

to do things that make me feel healthy. You know, today my wife and I took an hour walk on the beach at the dog. Um. You know, I worked hard to you know, I didn't interview, you know, for people in the Philippines, and you know, I worked on my fiction. But it's at my pace, and it's it's in an environment that makes me feel mentally well. I had to fight to get here, had to fight really hard,

um to get here. Both um, you know, in the arena of publishing, but also you know in my mind as well, UM, to stop believing that I couldn't do all these things that I wanted to do, and and really trusting that, um, you know, the feelings that I had, and the belief that I needed to do what would give me the best life and make me feel most mentally, Well, um was right, and then I should trust my instincts, um,

you know, which was which was really hard. Of course, after you go to the oscars, everybody's on board, you know, and people come around and it's it's nice to have that luxury now. But um, you know, for a long time, I didn't have too many cheerleaders, and you know, I think in some ways it's a write of passage for

every artist and maybe for every human being. Yeah, that's a really that's a really great story, and that that ended the way, didn't I think you may not have had a lot of cheerleaders, but it sounded like you had one of the most important ones, which is your wife. So that makes a big difference. Yeah, I do, you know, I feel, um, wildly blessed and very very lucky, um to have my wife. You know, these when people ask me and a lot of people say, like, how do

I become a fiction writer? You know, how to become a published novelist. And one of the first things I'll say is make sure you choose the right life partner, you know, And I think that's probably true of you know, whatever you want to do in life. But I often think about, you know, meeting Alicia when we're in our late teens, and just how how lucky, you know, we were to to come across each other. There's a long story about that that I'd sell on book tour, but uh,

you know, I feel very grateful for that. But we've done the work too, I should say, you know, we work really hard to to not only um be the best people that we can be, but also we work hard on our relationship too. Excellent. Well, I think that's a great way to to wrap up. Thanks very much for coming on the show. Like I said, I really enjoyed the good Luck of Right Now. I'm looking forward

to reading some of the other ones. Any idea. I know that the good luck of right now is in casting any idea when it might be a movie that people can see. Well, I met with um Dayton and Farris, who directed Little Miss Sunshine about a month ago in l A. And they're very excited about the project and there's all types of wonderful rumors and I'm not allowed to talk about right now, but we're hoping that they

start filming relatively soon. So Fingers Crossed also have another book coming out next year called Love May Fail Um, which is also being made into a film as well. Well. Congratulations on all your success and thanks for joining us on the show. Hey, it was my pleasure. Thanks so much for having us, and thanks for putting this good message out into the world. It's it's really important and it's a beautiful thing. Thank you, Bye bye, all right,

take care, matt Yeah. You can learn more about Matthew Quick and this podcast in our show notes at when You Feed dot Net slash q