The Matt Birk Interview with Matthew Kelly
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Matthew Kelly:
Hi, I'm Matthew Kelly. Thanks for joining us. I'm here with super bowl champion, Matt Birk. Matt, it's great to have you with us.
Matt Birk:
Great to be here, Matthew.
Matthew Kelly:
I got some very serious questions to get started. Are you a coffee lover?
Matt Birk:
I live on coffee.
Matthew Kelly:
You live on coffee?
Matt Birk:
I have to.
Matthew Kelly:
How much coffee? I've got a thing going, I'm asking all my guests how much coffee they drink to see who is most enamored, or addicted to coffee. How much coffee do you drink a day?
Matt Birk:
I'd say only, three or four cups. But then, the natural question is how big are the cups? Right? It doesn't matter how many cups you have. My cups are generally the 24 ounce.
Matthew Kelly:
24 ounces-
Matt Birk:
Variety, yes.
Matthew Kelly:
Three, or four?
Matt Birk:
Yeah, three or four of those.
Matthew Kelly:
At what point of the day, do you stop drinking coffee?
Matt Birk:
Oh, eight, nine o'clock at night. I could drink coffee while laying in bed and fall asleep right then and there, it's-
Matthew Kelly:
Wow.
Matt Birk:
That doesn't speak to my character at all. I mean, I don't think it should be lauded for that.
Matthew Kelly:
I don't think so. It's a superpower, isn't it?
Matt Birk:
Well, just means I've drank a lot of coffee over the years and it pretty much has almost zero effect on me, but I'm addicted. I have eight kids. I mean, how do you parent without-
Matthew Kelly:
We're going to get to that. And I hear that.
Matt Birk:
I got all excuses-
Matthew Kelly:
I hear that big time and I'm sure coffee isn't the only thing that you need in order to father eight children. What about, favorite movie?
Matt Birk:
Favorite movie is Braveheart.
Matthew Kelly:
Braveheart, why is it your favorite movie?
Matt Birk:
I think, it's got that thing, right? That thing that speaks to something in us, men. The courage, the fight, the cause, the woman, I mean, it's got it all, right? And it's got bagpipes, bagpipes are sweet.
Matthew Kelly:
Kilts, I thought you're going to mention the kilts.
Matt Birk:
I'm not big into the kilts, but the bagpipes I can get behind.
Matthew Kelly:
All right. The great line in the movie, "All men die, but not all men really live."
Matt Birk:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Matthew Kelly:
You've had incredible life, lots of different chapters and seasons of that life. But, it started, you grew up in Minnesota. What was life like as a child growing up in Minnesota?
Matt Birk:
I was very fortunate to have just that idyllic childhood. I mean, grew up in a part of town where there was just a bunch of families, a bunch of kids, blue collar middle-class, good values, million kids in the neighborhood. We were just outside playing all the time, walked up the hill to school, walked up the hill, to church. I mean, it was just perfect. I look back and I think how lucky I was to grow up in a time and a place like that. And yeah, long for that for my kids, right? Life's different these days.
Matthew Kelly:
Life is different these days. I read somewhere that, as a kid, you didn't win stuff. You weren't particularly athletic. You didn't get picked first in sports.
Matt Birk:
It's all true.
Matthew Kelly:
How does someone go from that, to being on a winning super bowl team?
Matt Birk:
Yeah, so I loved sports. I wasn't really any good at them. I was the fat, slow kid, which I was all right with. I mean, it didn't really matter. I remember, I knew I wasn't that good at sports, but it didn't matter. It didn't diminish my love for them. I mean, you play in the neighborhood and there's guys that are really good and guys that aren't. I was one of the guys that wasn't, and that was okay. And I tried every single sport, and then I got to high school and I said, "Well, the only sport I haven't tried is football. So, I might as well try that." Right? And that's when I discovered two gifts that God gave me. He gave me the gift of getting in people's way and the gift of grabbing onto them.
Matt Birk:
And those are two really important gifts, if you're an offensive lineman, that's it, that's it in a nutshell. And I started playing football and I was like, "Wow. I mean, I'm actually good at this. And I'd just play in high school, I'd get a letter jacket and probably had a girlfriend that was a little better looking than she should have been, because I was on the football team. I liked it and never thought I'd play in college and ended up playing in college. Never thought I'd end up playing in the NFL and playing the NFL for 15 years." But, I mean, sports was such a huge part of my childhood. And I mean, I can remember for years, people would ask me, "What do you want to be when you grow up?"
Matt Birk:
And I was conflicted. I didn't know if I wanted to be a professional baseball player, professional basketball, this was the big decisions that were weighing on me as a child. And I guess, it's a way of saying that, God answers prayers. Because, more than anything, I wanted to be a professional athlete, but I think that you need to be specific in your prayers to God. Because, yes, he made me a professional athlete, but he made me an offensive lineman. There's no kids on their knees, praying at night and saying, "God, please make me an offensive lineman." Right? Nobody wants to be an offensive lineman, but the world needs linemen too. And that's what I was.
Matthew Kelly:
So, you almost never left Minnesota as a kid.
Matt Birk:
Right.
Matthew Kelly:
What's it like stepping on the campus at Harvard?
Matt Birk:
Woo, man.
Matthew Kelly:
18 years old.
Matt Birk:
Yeah, 18 years old. So, I joke around, but it's true. I never won a trophy as a kid, never. Was never on a all-star team, or anything and had the success in high school with football. And so, it was average in many ways until high school. I started getting recognized and school would always come fairly easy to me. So, I was a good student, good athlete, going to Harvard to play football. My parents, I remember they woke my brothers up early, I had two younger brothers. Woke them up, made them drive me to the airport, all of us. And they just dropped me at the curb. I had two duffel bags, which was pretty much everything I had. And they said, "Good luck. We love you. We'll come visit you when we can." And jumped on a plane and went to Harvard. And I got there and it was just like, "Oh my gosh, the world is so much bigger than I knew." I mean, I grew up in St. Paul, Minnesota never really went anywhere. I thought everybody was white, Irish and Catholic, that was my whole world.
Matt Birk:
But, then just got exposed to people from all over the world and all these different ideas. But, the thing that happened to me in college early on, was where I'd been coasting for a few years. It just seemed like I just had the Midas touch. I was having all this success and everybody was telling me how great I was doing, how proud they were. And I was believing the hype. "Yeah, I'm pretty good. I'm working hard." And I got to Harvard and all just came crashing down. I mean, I'm on the football field, I'm an 18 year old boy, I'm playing against 22 year old men. That's not going well. And then, in school, you're sitting here in class with some of the best and the brightest in the world. And you're competing for grades against them and have these unbelievable world famous professors. Football wasn't going well, school wasn't going well. And it was probably the first I'm going to say real crisis I had in my life where it was like, "Oh my gosh, I don't know if I can do this."
Matthew Kelly:
So, you're into your first semester. You wanted to leave. Your dad wrote you a letter. What did the letter say?
Matt Birk:
Well, so here's how it went. I was like, "Yeah, this isn't going well." I was way beyond my comfort zone and I was scared. And so, when I went home for Christmas break, I had two duffel bags with me. That was everything I had. And my plan was I wasn't going to go back. So, waiting for the right time to spring this on my parents and I bring it up and I say, "I don't think I'm going to go back." And my dad, he's a pretty old school guy. He listened, he said, "No, you're going back." And that was it, I went back. Didn't want to, but that was it. Your dad told you, I don't know, he just did it.
Matt Birk:
So, I'd been back for a few weeks and I get a letter in my mailbox, which back then we wrote letters. We didn't have email. And it was a letter from my dad. And he told me that, when he was 18 years old, he got a trip to Vietnam. He didn't want to go. He was told to go twice-
Matthew Kelly:
Hmm.
Matt Birk:
Serve two tours in the Vietnam war. And he said, "You're at a great school. You get to play football, nobody's shooting at you. Grow up." Essentially, it was grow up. And I remember, obviously, it was unbelievable perspective. And I mean, at 18 years old and you're selfish. And I'd gotten to a point in my life where it was just, everything was about me. And so, I didn't have that perspective and the way that he told it to me, it's those times when a father needs to tell his son something like, "Hey, this is important." Changed my life, and I stopped feeling sorry for myself. I don't know if it got any easier. School was still pretty hard, football got better. I got bigger and stronger. School, was still a struggle. But, that was an important day in my life.
Matthew Kelly:
Powerful. Is there another lesson that your father taught you that it's important for you to teach your children?
Matt Birk:
Hmm. My dad, he's just a doer. He's one of those, guess you could say, he evangelizes with his actions. It's his personal example. Yeah, we didn't have a lot growing up, but he was always volunteering to, whatever it was. Run the Christmas tree lot, be the commissioner of the little league, make meals at the soup kitchen, whatever it was, he just went and did it. Didn't try to make a spectacle out of it, just went and did it. Never said anything, just work, my mom and my dad. I feel, one of the great blessings of my life, is that I was born to two parents who have great work ethic. They just went to work every day. And that's a blessing. If you have that example where you're expected, it's just what we do. We show up and we work and we show up and we serve, that's powerful. That's big part of what shaped who I am today.
Matthew Kelly:
Is it hard to pass that on to your kids?
Matt Birk:
I think it's getting harder, kids these days. I mean, I had a full-time job when I was 11. Worked every day at the golf course for the Summer, every single day. And this is what we did, right? These days it's different, life is different, it's digital, it's a lot more comfortable, but it's just the culture, right? The motivation, the value that we just put on work as a society, as a whole. The dignity that we see in work, I don't think it's what it used to be. And so, it is hard to do. I was very fortunate to be able to play football for 15 years. I don't need to work, but I remember when I retired, it was like, "Well, what am I going to do? Am I going to go play golf every day and go catch fish?" I remember I made a conscious decision, "My kids need to see me working, doing something, getting up every single day and doing work, because that's important." Because, the example of my parents, the effect that it had on me. I think, that's the best way to try to pass something on.
Matthew Kelly:
Yeah. I'm struck by something you just said. You said, "I don't need to work." And financially, that's true, right? And I think our society looks at work that way.
Matt Birk:
Mm-hmm.
Matthew Kelly:
We say, "We need to work financially, or we don't need to work financially." But, then what you've expanded on, is the reality that you do actually need to work.
Matt Birk:
Yes.
Matthew Kelly:
And that we do have this need to exert ourselves in that way and to end up playing golf every day, isn't necessarily good for the soul. At dinner last night, you made a comment that really struck me also. You said, "I've always had the gift of faith." It is a gift. When did you become aware of that? Or, how did you experience that as a child?
Matt Birk:
Hmm. I just remember as a child, just always feeling like God was right beside me. Just, always on my shoulder. Like I said, I was the fat, slow, whatever, below average. I was never sad, I never had any angst, or stress. I always just felt like everything was just always going to work out. I've always had this feeling, that everything's always going to work out. And I can vividly remember times in my life where, I'm on my bike, biking to school and God's with me, I'm talking to God like a friend. I mean, those are just early memories I have. I guess I didn't realize that until probably a few years ago, that I was blessed with the gift of faith. Again, that says nothing about my character. It's just, something I was blessed with.
Matthew Kelly:
How did that manifest during your football career?
Matt Birk:
Wow. So, there's the other side of the story, right? So, first of all, I think prosperity derails more people than adversity does.
Matthew Kelly:
Hmm.
Matt Birk:
And so, I had enjoyed a lot of prosperity, high school, college. And then, I get drafted by my hometown team. The team that I grew up, we used to run home from church to get in front of the TV and watch the Vikings game on Sundays. And here I'm playing for the Vikings and everybody's slapping me on the back saying, "God, you're doing great. We're so proud of you. You're doing awesome." And I'm naive enough, I'm believing them. I'm like, "Yes, I am doing awesome." And I can remember I stopped going to church pretty much. I left high school and I remember the first Sunday, go out to school, we're practicing football.
Matt Birk:
We wake up Sunday morning, we've got the day off. There's seven other guys in the dorm room with me. And I'm waiting for somebody to say, "Hey, let's go to church." And nobody said, "Let's go to church." And so, I didn't go. And it was the first Sunday I ever missed.
Matthew Kelly:
Hmm.
Matt Birk:
You feel pretty guilty about that. It was hard. Second Sunday rolls around, don't go to church. Becomes a lot easier the second time and the third time. Habits, the habits that you talk about. So, I've justified not going to mass like, "Hey God, I'm really busy, doing all these great things." Everybody's telling me how great I'm doing, right? Of course, you play in the NFL. "Well, our games are on Sunday. How am I supposed to make it? How do you expect me to go to mass, when I got to go play the Bears?" And that's an excused absence, right?
Matthew Kelly:
Just because it's the Bears?
Matt Birk:
Well, any NFL franchise. Most of them, most of them. So, I'd reached this point where I was very focused on worldly success, had all the fame and money and, there's a hamburger named after me in St. Paul, that's how famous I was.
Matthew Kelly:
Hamburger.
Matt Birk:
If you're a lineman and you have a hamburger named after you, that's pretty big time.
Matthew Kelly:
That is big time. That's usually a quarterback thing.
Matt Birk:
Yeah, it's still there. You come to Minnesota, we'll get a Matt Birk burger. I'd just signed to the biggest contract in the history of the NFL for a center. I mean, beyond my wildest dreams. But, I knew on the inside, there was a huge hole. I knew that I was actually dying.
Matthew Kelly:
Hmm.
Matt Birk:
All these things were supposed to bring me happiness, this was everything I ever wanted. Why am I not? Why don't I have that joy that I thought I would have? So, I meet girl, become rather smitten with her. And she becomes my wife. And she was Catholic too, but fallen away a little bit. But, she was like, "Hey, we got to go to church." I was like, "Yeah." I went back to church and this was really the first time as an adult. I wasn't going, because my parents told me to go, or "Hey, it's Christmas, meet us at mass." I went and I was like, "Wow, yeah. Maybe, there's something here."
Matt Birk:
And I guess the point I'm trying to make is, I was raised catholic, given the gift of the faith as a child. But, at some point, all of us cradle Catholics, we have to claim the faith as our own. We have to say, "Yes, I am a Catholic." And so, it's through my marriage that I came back to the faith and really became intentional about being a Catholic, living out my identity as a child of God and taking my faith seriously.
Matthew Kelly:
You mentioned your wife, Adrianna. How much ice tea did you drink, in an effort to win your wife's affection?
Matt Birk:
Okay. So, I was a lineman. I was about 315 pounds, single, never cooking for myself, right? So, you got to find your places where you can go and get those high calorie meals. So, there is a diner, it was a greasy spoon diner, famous, been there forever, good food, good rib-sticking food, great breakfast, meatloaf, that stuff. So, I went in there and there was this waitress who I liked particularly, and everything at this place is big. All the portions are big and even the drinks, they're 32 ounce classes. So, I would always sit in this girl's section and I'd get an ice tea, well it was 32 ounces ice tea. Well, I wanted her to come back and refill my drink, so I could continue hitting on her. And so, I would suck down, three or four ice teas at a breakfast. So, Adriana would come back and fill up my glass and I could make small talk. So, it was some work, I walked out of there with a few bellyaches, but it was well worth it, because she did become my wife, so...
Matthew Kelly:
Talking about the gift of faith, talking about falling away from the church, coming back to the church. How is God manifesting in your life different today than at any other time in your life?
Matt Birk:
Well, that's a great question. I feel like right now I have eight children, couple business opportunities, the school that I'm involved in, a lot of stuff going on. It's a lot. And I think God's got me in that place right now where I know that I have no choice, but to submit to his will. And I remember that place, I know I can't do this. There are times where I still say, "Oh, I'm on top of it. I got this." And then, it's just disaster. I mean, I'm really in that place where, I say almost because I'm still human, but it's almost total dependency on God, that we can just keep this whole thing together. I mean, with kids, there's all this stuff with kids. Marriage, it's a lot. And I can't even begin to try to really wrap my head all around it, or even feel like I have any semblance of control.
Matthew Kelly:
Hmm.
Matt Birk:
And so, it's almost like, "Okay, well, show up. Here I am, God. Help me figure this out, give me the wisdom and the endurance to do these things according to your will." And I think it's a pretty good place to be. I'm not trying to make it sound like, "Everything's easy and great, it's not." Which is I think, the point. But, I'm at that point where I almost have no choice, but to submit to the will of God.
Matthew Kelly:
It's sounds like there's been this journey from the arrogance of youth, "I got it all going on. Everyone's telling me I'm the man." To, this position of humility and dependence on God. We see a lot of people trying to maintain the arrogance-
Matt Birk:
Hmm.
Matthew Kelly:
Even through the things you're describing and I think the collateral damage that comes with that, you've made this journey yourself, but you've seen a lot of other people make the journey.
Matt Birk:
Oh yeah.