Quote Of The Day By Matthew McConaughey: 'We Cannot Fully Appreciate The Light Without The Shadows. We Have To Be Thrown...'

After delivering a breakthrough performance in 1993's "Dazed and Confused," Matthew McConaughey went on to make an indelible mark in film and television, finding mainstream success as a leading man in seminal movies like "A Time to Kill," "The Wedding Planner," and "Contact." The actor also gained widespread critical acclaim and awards buzz for playing Ron Woodroof in 2013's "Dallas Buyers Club," winning the Academy Award for Best Actor for the role.

On the television front, McConaughey's unforgettable turn as the nihilistic Rust Cohle in Season 1 of "True Detective" earned him a Primetime Emmy nomination for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Drama Series. Other accolades for the role include his wins at the Critics' Choice Awards (for Best Actor in a Drama Series) and the TCA Awards (Individual Achievement in Drama) in 2014. McConaughey is also set to reunite with "True Detective" co-star Woody Harrelson in the upcoming Apple TV comedy "Brothers."

McConaughey's ability to inhabit a wide variety of characters is a testament to his commitment and versatility as an actor, which is why he's the source of today's Quote of the Day.

"We cannot fully appreciate the light without the shadows. We have to be thrown off balance to find our footing. It's better to jump than fall. And here I am."

The above quote comes from McConaughey's 2020 memoir, "Greenlights." A collection of stories and insights from the actor's life in chronological order, "Greenlights" details some of McConaughey's everyday struggles on his path to superstardom. "Notes about successes and failures, joys and sorrows, things that made me marvel, and things that made me laugh out loud," the actor notes in the memoir's "About" section.

McConaughey's "Greenlights" is chock-full of life lessons and anecdotes that urge the reader to make difficult choices and commit to them, even if we're unsure what tomorrow holds.

Despite starring in a handful of dramatic roles in the late '90s, McConaughey's claim to superstardom was in the form of romantic comedies in the 2000s, including "Failure to Launch" and "How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days." Although these movies cemented the actor's knack for charming leading roles, they also ran the risk of McConaughey being typecast.

McConaughey's most prominent leap of faith was "Dallas Buyers Club," which marked a dramatic shift to roles that were grittier and more complex. Then came a slew of projects with meatier roles, including "The Wolf of Wall Street," "Interstellar," and "The Sea of Trees," among others. While it took some time for him to find his footing, these opportunities were only made possible after a courageous leap into the unknown.

• "So many of us today are out to prove that the truth is just an outdated nostalgic notion, that honesty, along with being correct and right, is now a deluded currency in our cultural economy... But I don't want to quit believing, and I don't want to stop believing in... humanity, you, myself, our potential." — from an interview with The Guardian in 2025
• "When you're growing up, you make choices not necessarily by what you want to do, but by eliminating what you don't want to do. And then you grow up, you mature, and you become aware of what you want." — from an interview with Garden&Gun in 2016
• "Persist, pivot, or concede. It's up to us, our choice every time." — from McConaughey's memoir, "Greenlights"