Key takeaways from the Jonah Hill movie “Stutz”
After enduring depression in his own life, Jonah Hill breaks down the barriers to create a meaningful conversation between himself and his therapist, recording moments that could change peoples’ mental well-being
Change your mindset and you can completely alter your life.
While this is a thought that isn’t uncommon among life coaches, counsellors and peers, it really is the top line view of how to deal with your emotions, pain, suffering — all to put yourself in a better position of acceptance.
Over the years I’ve been altering my perspective on life based on new information and the subconscious teachings of people I’ve met along the way. And I’m a true believer in the fact that the choices you make are what affect you as a person, but I never used to be.
Originally I portrayed the mindset that everything has its reason and that it will all work out good in the end, but this is a very passive way of looking at things. Was I just going to sit back and wait for life to turn itself around before I make a change or experience success or achieve happiness and contentment?
I understand today that this is a form of paralysis. One that can feed a depressed state and ultimately leave you behind as the world moves forward. It’s only when I stumbled across the latest Netflix film by Jonah Hill, which really stunned me into realising I had begun that journey to reaching acceptance with myself.
“I’m making this movie because I want to give therapy and the tools I’ve learned through therapy to as many people as possible through a film” — Jonah Hill
I’m no expert in this, nor have I completed this journey, because, like life itself, it follows you and is ever changing.
To be honest, I never imagined such a film as Stutz — a documentary conversation between the Hollywood actor and his therapist, Phil Stutz — could fill me with so much joy and hope that what I’m already trying to achieve is a workable solution to leading a much healthier life.
The film, as far as I know, follows a format that has never been done before — the patient questions the therapist about his life, his practices, and how they help people become enlightened to their own self-worth.
Especially on a platform like Medium, I could never truly express more how valuable the documentary is; beyond any form of motivational video or mental well-being insights that you could ever experience online or in person. The film has a profound effect that only the Superbad star and Stutz could evoke in the viewer.
Well, that viewer was also me, and I learned so many valuable things from just an hour and forty minutes of raw emotion.
Be healthier physically before you can be happy
I guess this is the stage that I’m working on right now. It took me until mid-23 years old before I began to see how my physical health could so easily affect my mind. Since then, a lot of my best days followed hard work in the morning through exercise in the gym or mindful behaviour before work or anything else I’ve desperately needed to get done in a day. Now I feel hyper conscious of my feelings and how they are affected by my physical state, which isn’t just reset daily, but can often be altered multiple times within twenty-four hours.
This relates to one of the concepts in the documentary, of which one prioritises your focus. Starting with your body, Stutz clarifies that how you feel physically can account for around 85% of your mental state. Then there are people. Connecting with those around you, particularly in difficult times can prevent you from slipping away from family, friends, or even your career if it requires human interaction to get a job done. This is one of Stutz’s tools that outlines the process as a pyramid.
Mental well-being comes from imperfection
Another point that is highlighted in the film is perfection. The Snapshot tool, which is a mechanism of addressing the illusion of perfection that I imagine many other people also strive for.
The tool itself is the active process of understanding how the end goal of your life will never provide you with an overwhelming influx of fulfilment. Many great minds in business have also referred to the opposite, which is the love of the process. Ultimately, striving for something to make you happy is null and void, but what really allows a person to achieve fulfilment is the ability to see that process for what it really is — a battle with pain, uncertainty, and constant work.
These are but a few of the tools presented by Stutz and some that I hope to adopt for myself, but the purpose of me writing about this new movie is to personally guarantee that anyone reading will watch, learn, and feel as a result of it.
The tools presented in the film can really change a life, and it’s immediately clear why Jonah Hill underwent such an uncertain, uncomfortable, yet freeing process to share his relationship with his therapist.
It’s fulfilling to see a programme that is filmed cinematically, yet strategically stripped back to focus on the truth behind the relationship and selflessly share their experiences to help inspire others in self help. In my humble opinion, the new movie ‘Stutz’ is a work of art in the 21st Century and couldn’t have been created at a better moment in history.
It’s also great to see that humour can be retained in such a production in a non-destructive way.
“I made this movie because I love Phil, because I love the life that these tools allowed for me to have, and it doesn’t matter what people think about the movie, it just matters that we finished it. Together” — Jonah Hill
