The Art of Manliness - #377： 12 Rules for Life With Jordan Peterson

00:00:00.000 brett mckay here and welcome to another edition of the art of manliness podcast have you been

00:00:18.400 stuck in a rut for a while have you been there for so long you feel like there's no use in trying

00:00:21.840 to get out of that slump maybe you even start telling yourself things can never get better

00:00:25.440 this is just the way things are is there even a point to all of this and as you ruminate over

00:00:29.740 these questions over and over you feel more and more depressed and maybe even start to feel a bit

00:00:34.080 resentful resentful towards others resentful towards life itself well my guest today says that perhaps

00:00:38.720 the way you start to get out of that rut is to clean your room bucko his name is jordan b peterson i've

00:00:43.020 had him on the show before check out episode number 335 you haven't heard it yet peterson is a

00:00:47.100 psychoanalyst and a lecturer he's got a new book out called 12 rules of life an antidote to chaos

00:00:51.700 today on the show dr peterson and i discuss why men have been disengaging from work and family and

00:00:56.220 why his youtube lectures resonate with so many modern men we then unpack why it's so easy to

00:01:00.600 get resentful about life before spending the rest of the conversation discussing rules and guidelines

00:01:05.060 that can help you navigate away from resentment and towards a life of meaning dr peterson explains

00:01:09.560 why he thinks a meaningful life isn't possible without religion or myths what lobsters can teach

00:01:14.260 us about assertiveness and why a simple act like cleaning your room can be the stepping stone towards

00:01:18.700 a better life after the show's over check out the show notes at aom.is slash rules of life

00:01:23.520 and dr peterson joins me now via skype jordan peterson welcome to the show thanks very much

00:01:38.740 for the invitation so we had you on the show about five months ago kind of talk about your work in

00:01:43.980 general and your ideas and what you're trying to do and i'd encourage people to listen to that episode

00:01:49.120 to get a big picture view of what what jordan's doing you've got a new book out 12 rules of life

00:01:54.020 antidote to chaos so i'd like to get into some specifics this time kind of build off what we

00:01:58.640 talked about last time into more specifics and talk about what you do in the book this podcast

00:02:03.280 the art of manliness so i want to start off with this your primary audience tends to be men i think

00:02:07.900 you've mentioned in interviews that about 80 of your youtube viewers are male what do you think is

00:02:13.220 going on there why do you think men are so drawn to your message well i'm not sure it could be just a

00:02:19.840 side effect of the fact that the most of the youtube users are actually men so there's that's playing a

00:02:27.480 role although and so it's hard to separate out that basic baseline fact from whatever more specifically

00:02:35.860 might be going on but i think that assuming that there is something specific that is attracting

00:02:42.640 men i think that what it is is a call to responsibility essentially i think that people

00:02:48.540 are especially young men are sick and tired of being fed a constant diet of you're good enough

00:02:54.360 you should feel happy with who you are um an endless diet of rights and freedoms will give you a

00:03:03.520 meaningful life and that's on that that's on the sort of pat you on the back even though you don't

00:03:09.000 deserve a side of reality and then there's the lack of call to adventure i would say and the accusation

00:03:16.960 that men face increasingly that their active presence in the world does nothing but contribute 0.87

00:03:22.660 to tyranny and oppression which i think is absolute it's not only nonsense it's it's pernicious and

00:03:29.520 destructive nonsense of the worst kind and so you know i've been telling men instead or suggesting to

00:03:35.780 them explaining it more than telling that it's necessary for them to grow up and get their act

00:03:42.900 together and to adopt some responsibility and to bear a burden and to speak truthfully and to take

00:03:49.560 responsibility because there's important things to do in the world and that the world will be a lesser

00:03:55.580 place if they don't allow what's within them to come forward and i think that that's true and so

00:04:01.420 i think that that's a message that reasonable young men who are somewhat lost are desperate for

00:04:08.660 so if men aren't getting this message why so we've had people on the podcast discuss how

00:04:14.140 you know different economists psychologists sociologists discussing how men are dropping out

00:04:19.980 of public life dropping out of school the workforce etc not getting married and you know doing all that

00:04:25.400 stuff why do you think that message that you think is getting passed on to men through the culture is

00:04:30.980 causing men to basically withdraw from society well if you're not going to be rewarded for your virtues

00:04:38.280 and instead you're going to be punished for them then what's your motivation to continue especially when

00:04:45.160 it takes a fair bit of effort to say truthful things and to shoulder responsibility and if the

00:04:51.080 consequence of that so there's there's reason to avoid it to begin with just as a consequence of the

00:04:55.940 difficulty but if the net effect of doing that is that you're accused before you even do anything

00:05:02.580 wrong of being a an upholder of rape culture and the patriarchal tyranny and the oppressive west then

00:05:09.420 why in the world would you want to contribute to that especially if you start to believe it you know

00:05:14.200 some of it's just a matter of accepting excuses and and taking the easy way out but some of it's a

00:05:19.560 matter of becoming guilty enough to actually believe it withdrawing from active engagement in the world

00:05:24.400 the people who are going after masculinity let's say as toxic can't distinguish between tyrannical power 0.99

00:05:31.520 and competence in fact for them there is no distinction between the those two things which

00:05:36.060 shows you just how addled they really are because it's extraordinarily important to discriminate

00:05:40.700 between competence and power you know in the post-modern types especially the neo-marxists

00:05:46.160 think oh well competence that's just how you justify your claim to your position it's really just power 0.99

00:05:52.840 you're just defining competence in a way that benefits you but that's idiotic so it doesn't really 0.99

00:05:59.460 require much of an argument it's certainly no one ever acts like that if you have a car and it doesn't 0.98

00:06:04.720 work you take it to a competent mechanic if you if your father's heart is failing you take him to a

00:06:10.520 competent surgeon and you don't think oh well that person is just there because of the you know the 0.96

00:06:16.080 western patriarchy and the privilege of of the oppressor so it's nonsense it's resentful cowardly 0.97

00:06:24.940 ideologically possessed pathological nonsense and it's extremely dangerous and so i've been saying that 0.73

00:06:31.640 about as bluntly as i just said it and i think that more and more people are realizing that

00:06:37.840 it's gone far enough i'm sure hoping they are so one of the other dangers too of this sort of

00:06:43.680 resentful attitude that you're talking about is that the the men who do withdraw or even just people

00:06:47.960 who withdraw could be a woman too they tend to it tends to lead to nihilism and resentment themselves 0.87

00:06:54.100 right they withdraw and it starts to fester i mean what's going on yeah well the thing is the thing about

00:06:59.920 life is very difficult life there's an old one of the most ancient of religious ideas that it emerges

00:07:07.700 everywhere i would say is that life is essentially suffering and what that means is that well people

00:07:14.920 are fragile and vulnerable and mortal and prone to physical decay and mental illness and to a fair

00:07:22.900 share of malevolence as well we're fragile creatures and that means that life is hard and painful and

00:07:29.400 anxiety provoking and you need something to set against that that's worthwhile and that's that's your

00:07:36.620 destiny in the world say your positive destiny in the world and if you don't have something positive to set

00:07:42.440 against that and your life is nothing but struggle and pain and with with the occasional foray into 0.96

00:07:51.060 malevolence or victimization by malevolence then all you do is suffer stupidly and that makes you bitter

00:07:57.420 and resentful and resentful and then you know that's just the beginning of your trouble because 0.96

00:08:02.240 bitter and resentful that's just where you start the descent into hell you know you go from bitter and

00:08:07.960 resentful to vengeful and to and to cruel and and and and way past that if you really want to pursue it

00:08:15.360 and and people pursue that all the time it's not like it doesn't happen it's not like this is some

00:08:20.600 abstract dream all those high school shootings all these mass shootings they're all carried out by

00:08:26.980 people who've walked down that road a very long distance i wrote about that in chapter six it's

00:08:32.800 rule six is called set your house in perfect order before you criticize the world and it's about the

00:08:39.740 motivations of people like the columbine high school shooters and the mass rapist the serial rapist

00:08:46.080 carl pansram who features very heavily in that chapter and it's a meditation on people's motivation

00:08:52.440 for for evil which is which exists in all of us and and no wonder like it's understandable that doesn't

00:08:59.940 make it right so the book 12 rules for life is a very serious book there's there's elements of humor

00:09:05.880 in it but you know i'm trying to struggle with things at the deepest possible level and to

00:09:11.320 explain to people why it's necessary to live a upstanding and noble and moral and truthful

00:09:17.940 and responsible life and and why there's hell to pay if you don't do that so that seems to be

00:09:25.400 bizarrely enough an attractive message tell people life is hard and here's how to handle it well that's

00:09:32.300 it well everyone knows life is hard and it's not just hard it can be unbearably hard and and it's it's

00:09:38.260 worse than hard because sometimes the hardship is inflicted upon you by yourself or by someone close

00:09:44.640 to you or or sometimes by an enemy or but sometimes by a friend you know you get betrayed and it's not

00:09:51.060 just that it's hard you're you're also subject to evil you're subject to malevolence and that makes it

00:09:56.060 even worse and and everyone knows this and so you need something to set against that you need a noble way

00:10:02.720 of being to set against that and the thing is you know all of everything i've said so far in this

00:10:09.340 program i would say in some sense is very dark and pessimistic you know but what's optimistic is that

00:10:15.900 having established the truth of the matter the suffering of life and the malevolence that's part

00:10:21.800 of it you can also discover that living a meaningful life in the face of that a responsible meaningful

00:10:28.320 truthful life is actually possible and it actually works that's the thing that's the optimistic thing

00:10:35.460 you know it's not so bad to say to people look we've got a real problem here it's no joke it's a dead

00:10:41.200 serious problem it's the fragility of your life and hell all balled up into one thing but that's okay

00:10:47.760 because there's an antidote to it there's something you can do about it and you could start today

00:10:53.060 and well that's what i try to detail out in 12 rules for life and in my lectures online as well

00:10:59.380 and i believe it to be the case as pessimistic as i am about the nature of human beings and our

00:11:05.440 capacity for atrocity and malevolence and betrayal and and laziness and inertia and all those things

00:11:11.440 i think we can transcend all that and set things straight and i think that people can literally start

00:11:16.680 today so and you know i've had thousands of people write me now and and and thousands of people

00:11:23.000 talk to me as well because it's up in those numbers now and they're saying well look i've been

00:11:28.440 watching your youtube videos and listening to to the information that you're providing and i

00:11:34.300 decided to start putting my life together so i i tried i've been trying really hard for the last

00:11:39.680 three or four months and it's really working you know i'm getting along better with my girlfriend and

00:11:43.620 maybe we're getting married and i have a job now and i'm pursuing it and i'm out of my nihilistic

00:11:49.360 pit of despair and you know thank god for that what a lovely thing to hear from people

00:11:54.840 so hooray hooray yeah well i mean in in your work in your work in your lectures and in this book

00:12:01.520 you you look to myths um and stories from around the world but all you know primarily from the bible

00:12:07.360 you did a whole lecture on the old testament to provide and you use these to provide a framework

00:12:12.520 for a meaningful life i'm curious you know we live in a sort of post a secular age as uh it's been

00:12:20.400 called do you think it's possible to chart a meaningful life without resorting to religious

00:12:24.580 or mythical stories and if not no why not no i don't believe so because the story of a meaningful

00:12:30.460 life is a religious story by definition so no it's not possible people have oriented themselves

00:12:38.260 with stories forever and the greatest stories are about the proper way to orient yourself in life

00:12:44.480 and the deeper they are the more accurate they are let's say and the deeper they are the more they

00:12:49.960 move into the territory that it is religious in nature what religious means essentially in the final

00:12:57.940 analysis is something like profound or deep or eternal and there are eternal truths that are necessary to

00:13:07.800 to to it's necessary to live by eternal truths it's an eternal truth that life is suffering

00:13:14.340 it will never go away that that truth and it's an eternal truth that living in truth and living

00:13:21.660 responsibly is the proper antidote to that and and when you talk about things at that level of generality

00:13:27.460 let's say and and applicability and depth and you're in the religious domain like it or not

00:13:33.240 now you might say well does that have anything to do with god that's a separate question i would say

00:13:39.520 and and well i think you can you can you can have a reasonable difference of opinion about that

00:13:46.700 but the religious is part of human experience it's part of everyone's experience it's it's what you

00:13:53.160 experience when you listen to a particularly moving piece of music or when you're deeply affected in a

00:14:00.300 in a play or at a movie or even by something that someone tells you or when you're deeply engrossed

00:14:05.960 in your life something engaging that you're that you're actively um something meaningful that you're

00:14:12.740 actively engaged in these are all religious experiences and and and they're part of the instinctual

00:14:19.120 landscape of human beings it isn't even a question we know this you can evoke mystical experiences in the lab

00:14:26.500 it's part parcel of the of the human condition now we don't know the metaphysical significance of that

00:14:33.600 but i would say it's a bit too early to say that it's that there's none you know i do believe that

00:14:38.880 the appropriate way to conceive of human beings is that we're part material and and mortal and finite

00:14:46.000 and part immaterial and and metaphysical and divine i believe that's the most accurate way to think

00:14:52.620 about human beings and i also know that the cultures that are predicated on that view of the human being

00:14:59.300 are the ones that work you know when you interact with yourself if you treat yourself in part as if you

00:15:06.780 were a transcendent being capable of much more than you are currently managing if you treat the people

00:15:14.880 around you like that and you act like that in the world you'll be radically successful in your

00:15:20.160 endeavors everyone loves to be treated like like that and perhaps it's because that's the way that

00:15:26.300 they really are so make sure and see if i'm getting you you think that or you're suggesting that we need

00:15:32.500 to tap into a meaning that's outside or external to us because like you know you talk about nietzsche

00:15:36.740 nietzsche you know said with the death of god we have to create our new values right our own meaning

00:15:41.840 right become the ubermensch is that possible no i don't i don't think so see you asked me at the

00:15:49.620 beginning of this conversational string whether it was possible for us to to live in a completely

00:15:57.360 secular manner without let's say returning to the religious depths and that was nietzsche's suggestion

00:16:03.900 that we do so that we discover our own values or create them but i mean he had just started to work

00:16:11.360 out that idea in the few short years before he died i think the psychoanalysts criticized that idea

00:16:18.320 to death by discovering that there were forces that operated within us that are not under our

00:16:24.840 control i don't think that you can create your own values i think you can co-create them but a huge part

00:16:32.200 of it is discovery you know if you you can't make something in your life meaningful if it isn't

00:16:40.900 meaningful you can't force that on yourself you have to discover it you know because i could say to you

00:16:46.240 well why don't you watch your life for the next month and notice when what you're involved in is

00:16:51.620 deeply meaningful just notice it as if you don't control it or understand it and then strive to start

00:16:59.720 doing more of that and what you'll find is that you have to discover it you can't make it happen

00:17:05.060 it sort of comes upon you rather than being something that you can command so what i guess

00:17:14.200 what you're we can get into the rules what the 12 rules do and of course this list isn't exhaustive

00:17:19.640 i guess it sets up the the parameters for you for you to discover that meaning right it doesn't force

00:17:25.740 it but it sets the the the groundwork for you to actually have those meaningful experiences well it

00:17:30.060 also it also helps explain that that's what's happening you know so we could look at it this way

00:17:36.100 so i believe that the experience of meaning is an instinct and you could think about it as the

00:17:43.320 ordering instinct it's more like the balancing instinct but we'll start with ordering there's a lot

00:17:51.080 inside of you that needs to be ordered and set straight like you're a collection of motivations and

00:17:58.100 emotions and thoughts and and proto-actions and desire desires well i suppose those are the same

00:18:05.260 as motivations you're a loose collection of all those things and something has to bring all of that

00:18:11.040 into a functioning order and the experience of deep engagement the experience of meaning i think

00:18:17.560 is the manifestation of the instinct that orders you and it orders you and it orders your family

00:18:23.400 and it orders the world the broader world as well and that instinct isn't some secondary consequence of

00:18:30.660 some more important biological function let's say it's it is that very function and i think we know

00:18:38.160 enough about neuroscience now i think we know enough about how the brain operates to just make that

00:18:43.300 statement categorically so my hypothesis has been and this is this is not a fully original hypothesis it's

00:18:51.140 based on the work of neuroscientists whose research i know well and respect greatly very hard-headed

00:18:57.540 people they believe for example that the left hemisphere is specialized for operation in explored

00:19:04.600 territory and that the right hemisphere is specialized for operation in unexplored territory

00:19:10.360 or or that the left hemisphere handles things that have been routinized and practiced and the right

00:19:16.540 hemisphere handles things that are novel well you need to practice things you need to know what you're doing

00:19:22.660 and you have to have a place where that works so that would be explored territory or or order or routine

00:19:29.840 and so part of your brain works well there but then that's surrounded always by things that you don't

00:19:36.400 understand and so there's another part of your brain that has to work with the things you don't understand

00:19:41.720 and the sense of meaning occurs when you get those two systems working properly together

00:19:47.340 so that you're partly stable and secure and operating where you know what's going to happen next and it's

00:19:55.900 going to be something that you want but also expanding your competence at the same time and pushing yourself

00:20:02.360 and stretching yourself so that if things shift on you then you're going to be ready and prepared

00:20:10.500 and that's a deep instinct that's the instinct of meaning as far as i can tell and it's it's an

00:20:16.760 unerring guide to proper action in the world and see we've lost faith in the idea of meaning

00:20:22.780 intrinsic meaning but i think that's a big mistake i think it's a big mistake i don't think it's warranted

00:20:28.280 by the facts so let's get into some of your specific rules the first rule you ask readers to consider

00:20:35.240 the lobster what can a giant sea bug teach us about living a meaningful life well it can teach us

00:20:42.480 something very profound about life itself you know one of the criticisms that's thrown forward

00:20:48.700 very commonly today by the post-modern neo-marxist social constructionist types who believe that human

00:20:56.880 beings don't have any real nature and that everything is only a construction of the social world

00:21:03.960 is that the observation that animals live in hierarchical structures and have for a third of a

00:21:12.180 billion years so the idea that the patriarchy let's say is somehow a cultural construction is

00:21:18.980 preposterous nonsense it's an idea that has no bearing no grounding whatsoever

00:21:25.960 in the facts of the matter now the particulars of a human hierarchy can be shaped by cultural forces

00:21:33.940 clearly but the fact of hierarchical organization is something unspeakably ancient and so ancient that

00:21:42.400 even these giant sea insects that you described the lobsters the crustaceans from whom we separated

00:21:50.800 about a third of a billion years ago in the evolutionary climb forward they live in hierarchies as well and

00:21:58.300 the same neurochemical systems mediate their behavior in the hierarchies that mediate our behavior in our

00:22:04.540 hierarchies so one of the amazing things this amazing demonstration of biological continuity is that

00:22:11.220 if a lobster is fighting with another lobster for a position in a hierarchy and he loses

00:22:16.220 then he'll make himself small and and and crouch down and collapse physically and run off and hide

00:22:24.860 and won't fight again but if you give him antidepressants to oversimplify slightly if you give him

00:22:32.360 antidepressants then he'll stand up straight and go out and fight again and the reason i wrote about that is

00:22:38.480 because it's it's definitive proof and and not the only source by the way that existence itself

00:22:46.820 social existence itself is deeply hierarchical and that your hierarchical position governs your posture

00:22:54.900 there's a reciprocal relationship between the two and your emotional well-being and so knowing how to

00:23:01.060 conduct yourself in a hierarchical relationship in hierarchical relationships is extremely important and one thing you

00:23:07.240 can do is improve your posture if things aren't going well for you if you if you feel put down and victimized

00:23:13.160 and if people are picking on you it might be that you're broadcasting the wrong signals and to stand up

00:23:18.900 straight well that starts to regulate your nervous system right then and there and to stand up straight

00:23:24.560 and face the world forthrightly means that people will treat you with more respect and you can get a virtuous

00:23:29.600 a spiral developing and so it's an injunction to paying attention to how you hold yourself in the

00:23:36.940 world and an explanation of why that's deeply deeply important and not merely a consequence of

00:23:43.520 some sociological process so that's rule one yeah but what do you do i mean because it suffering

00:23:50.520 these status defeats right over and over again it creates a vicious cycle it just it causes you to do

00:23:56.680 things that actually hurt you more in the long run how do you find it in you when you say you're someone's

00:24:01.780 listening to this and they've just i mean they're they feel like a loser right how do they find it in

00:24:07.380 to stand taller and kind of face the world and fight the world when they've they've suffered those status

00:24:11.160 defeats over and over again well i think i would say that much of the rest of the book is about that

00:24:16.220 about what you can do to put yourself together i mean the first thing i would say is that it's it's a

00:24:21.980 very dangerous thing to construe yourself as a particularized victim i mean people people

00:24:27.560 definitely encounter defeats over and over again i would say that's even part of life hopefully you

00:24:32.820 can learn from them and you can stop making the same mistake over and over i would say well like

00:24:38.280 rule i think it's rule eight is tell the truth or at least don't lie that's a really good place to

00:24:44.220 start if you're suffering continual defeats there's a high probability that you're not saying the things

00:24:50.880 that you need to say and you're not living your life in an integrated and and and what would you

00:24:56.700 say an integrated and forthright manner there's things that you're leaving undone now i know

00:25:02.900 sometimes people find themselves in terrible situations and everything that's happening

00:25:07.060 around them is arbitrary and unfair but that's very rare it's very rare that people are in a situation

00:25:13.260 that's so terrible that there isn't something they're doing that's making it worse and so you know

00:25:19.020 rule two is treat yourself like you're someone who's worth helping well that's a good attitude

00:25:24.260 to adopt yourself and to adopt with regards to yourself and you might start to think about what

00:25:28.420 it would mean to help yourself so we have this program online called the self-authoring suite and

00:25:33.720 there's one component of it helps you write an autobiography so that you can figure out where you

00:25:39.180 are and how you got there that's helpful another component helps you analyze your personality faults and

00:25:45.160 virtues so you can figure out who you are and a third component helps you write a plan for the future

00:25:50.020 you might say well if your life isn't going the way you want it to then start to think about what you

00:25:54.720 want what do you want from your friends what do you want from your family what do you want from your

00:26:00.180 intimate relationships how are you going to educate yourself what are your career goals how are you

00:26:05.520 going to handle the temptations of drugs and alcohol and other forms of temptations i mean if you were to take

00:26:10.680 care of yourself properly how would you put your life together across those dimensions what would

00:26:15.440 your vision for yourself look like three to five years down the road if you were taking care of

00:26:19.840 yourself and rule three is make friends with people who want the best for you well that's another thing

00:26:25.960 that you can put straight you know if you are surrounding yourself with people who are happy when

00:26:31.820 you're defeated and unhappy when you're successful even if they call themselves your friends perhaps even if

00:26:37.380 they call themselves your family is you should step away from people like that because they're not

00:26:41.800 looking out for what's best in you you have every right and even an ethical responsibility to surround

00:26:48.160 yourself with people who are going to be happy when good things happen to you for good reasons and there's

00:26:53.740 lots of things you can do i mean one of the things that i've suggested to people is that they clean up their

00:27:00.640 rooms instead of protesting in the street and that's become a bit of an internet meme and you know

00:27:07.320 if if if things aren't going well for you then i would say start fixing the little things that

00:27:14.380 are in front of you that you could fix and don't stop and see what happens try it for a year try it

00:27:20.800 for two years really dedicate yourself to it quit lying and saying things that make you weak and sort out

00:27:27.400 what you have right in front of you that you could fix and and that can remove the bitterness too you can

00:27:33.080 at least run it as an experiment say well i'm not going to be bitter and nihilistic for a year

00:27:37.420 i'm really going to hit this hard i'm going to make a goal i'm going to develop a vision and i'm going

00:27:42.040 to play the game as hard as i can for a year and then i'll reevaluate it's like well that's a good

00:27:48.440 plan man yeah that'll help so yeah fixing those small things as a way to increase competency power

00:27:55.140 you know if we're making competency equal power i think there's a nietzsche quote like joy is the feeling

00:27:59.760 of power increasing right joy is the feeling of competency increasing so as you clean your room

00:28:05.900 and do others little small things you start to feel better about life well they're also not so small

00:28:11.500 you know like if you live in a house that's really chaotic you know your your parents are

00:28:16.720 alcoholics and you're you know an overgrown child and the place is a filthy hellhole and everybody's 0.50

00:28:23.340 aiming down and there's always carping and bitterness and resentment everywhere you try to

00:28:29.360 clean up your room in a place like that you'll find that there's nothing small about it at all

00:28:32.900 it's really hard it's really difficult it'll take a lot out of you you'll you'll face unbelievable

00:28:38.560 opposition from the people around you and you'll have to fight through that too so these things that

00:28:43.960 people think are small like sorting out their own household it's like that's not small man that's

00:28:48.960 really hard it's really hard and if you get good at that if you get so that you can put your room and

00:28:53.900 put yourself in order and then put your room in order and then put your household in order like

00:28:58.460 you're well on the way to being unstoppable i want to go back to that idea that rule of speaking the

00:29:03.780 truth right and you you did you said that in reference to you know figuring out where you are now

00:29:09.340 in life and using you know the self-authoring tools that you have helped you do that how do you

00:29:15.360 what's the advice you give to people to ensure they're actually depicting reality as it is because

00:29:20.620 we're story i don't think we're storytelling we're storytelling animals so we could say the story well

00:29:24.880 i'm here because of you know such and such thing and i'm a victim blah blah blah blah but yeah you

00:29:29.420 ignore the things that you contributed well okay so you've got two questions there is one is how do you

00:29:35.100 how do you know that what you're saying is the truth and the second is how do you test the stories

00:29:39.840 that you tell yourself right right and those are both really good questions so let's start with the

00:29:44.280 first one i don't think you can know if you're telling the truth but because who knows the truth

00:29:50.600 right the truth is is in some sense is an unreachable goal but one thing you can do and you can do this

00:29:59.460 right away is you can stop saying things you know to be false so the chapter is actually called tell the

00:30:06.300 truth or at least don't lie and i would say well it's very difficult to have your vision clear enough

00:30:11.980 so that you can see the truth but by the same token virtually everyone knows when they're lying

00:30:18.700 at least some of the time and could stop doing that and that's good enough if you stop saying

00:30:24.920 things that you know to be lies then you'll start clarifying your vision and you'll get better and

00:30:30.640 better at perceiving the truth even though you'll never get you'll never get to the point where you

00:30:34.780 where you have it in your grasp right it's an ever-receding goal and then with regards to the story

00:30:40.140 that you tell yourself well this is what's made me into a a pragmatist technically speaking of the

00:30:46.260 william james cs purse type what's the purpose of memory people ask well it's to remember the past 0.99

00:30:53.180 so that's the wrong answer the purpose of memory is to help you stop doing the stupid things you did

00:30:58.700 in the past that hurt you and so if you have an accurate representation of the past and its failures 0.78

00:31:04.840 then you won't repeat the failures into the future you know let's say you have a lot of resentment about

00:31:10.820 women just for the sake of argument you've had a lot of bad relationships and you have a lot of 1.00

00:31:15.220 resentment about how women are and how they've treated you and you have a theory about women and men and

00:31:20.960 about their relationship in the world and you keep telling yourself that theory and acting it out in

00:31:26.140 the world and all that happens is you have one bad relationship after another it's like well clue in

00:31:32.320 there's something wrong with your theory if you keep applying it and the and the same pathological

00:31:37.820 things keep happening then perhaps there's something wrong with you the way you formulated the story you

00:31:44.200 know and you can't complain about women you know what i mean women is not a category that you get to

00:31:50.360 complain about because women for men present a huge part of the challenge of life and it's up to you to 0.99

00:31:57.860 reconfigure yourself so that you can have a successful relationship with a woman and if you

00:32:02.880 don't then you're wrong it's as simple as that right it's like that saying if everyone you meets an a-hole 0.99

00:32:09.500 then you're probably the a-hole well you gotta ask yourself at some point how much of it and you maybe

00:32:14.960 you should hope that that's the case because if it's everyone else well good luck to you but if it's

00:32:20.020 just you well you might be able to change that you know you have you you you come out and make a

00:32:25.380 statement you say every woman i've ever known has betrayed me it's like well you know you might ask

00:32:31.000 yourself if there's a reason for that well it's just the way women are it's like well no actually 1.00

00:32:37.000 it's just the way you are it's either you or it's all women so pure occam's razor simplicity and 0.98

00:32:44.820 humility would all suggest that you're the one with the problem so and if the world keeps slapping you

00:32:51.160 in the face at some point you have to wonder if if it's trying to tell you something you ever see

00:32:56.880 the movie groundhog day oh it's it's one of my favorites classic yeah groundhog day is a great

00:33:01.380 movie and and that's that the groundhog day has the proper mythological structure it's a religious

00:33:07.300 movie about death and rebirth it's brilliant well if every if every one of your days is groundhog day

00:33:14.300 then it's time to wake the hell up okay so i guess you know when you tell your story you figure that

00:33:18.800 out maybe a heuristic to use would be question it like how could this not be true or why why would

00:33:25.760 i have this story what other explanation would it be well well it's it's if your life isn't what you

00:33:30.960 would like it to be then there's some possibility that the story you're telling yourself about it is

00:33:35.560 wrong you might as well just assume that why not assume that it's like well i don't have anything i

00:33:42.260 want okay well maybe what you want is wrong or maybe the way that your your theory about being

00:33:49.360 in the world is incorrect your theory about yourself is incorrect your ideas about other

00:33:53.460 people are incorrect and that's why things aren't working out for you there's a little section in the

00:33:58.920 book i took a piece from a t.s elliott play called the cocktail hour and in that play a woman approaches

00:34:06.760 a psychiatrist at a at a cocktail party and says i need to talk to you for a minute i'm having real

00:34:12.740 serious problems my life is not going well i'm i'm suffering far too much and i have this idea

00:34:18.340 i i really hope there's something wrong with me and that you can help me figure out what it is and

00:34:23.320 the psychiatrist is sort of taken aback and he says well why do you hope that there's something wrong

00:34:27.140 with you and she says well i'm having a terrible time of it and if it's if there's something wrong with

00:34:33.480 me then maybe i can fix it but if there's something wrong with the world and that's just how it is well

00:34:37.560 then i don't see that i have any hope at all and so that's it's such an optimistic idea it's echoed

00:34:42.760 in the new testament statement uh you should take the log out of your own eye before you worry about

00:34:47.700 the dust moat in your neighbor's eye and that's also right it's like if if your life isn't what it

00:34:52.780 should be then assume that it's your fault now i know that's harsh because i know that people

00:34:57.580 the terrible things happen to people and and they're often arbitrary but it doesn't matter

00:35:03.100 it doesn't matter it's still the right way to face the world face the world as if the excess

00:35:08.860 suffering that you're undergoing is your fault and you could do something about it and you'll find

00:35:13.960 that there's more that you can do about it than you think well and this kind of ties into my next

00:35:17.960 question this idea of sacrifice that you've lectured a lot about and you write you know a great deal

00:35:24.260 about i think in one of your lectures you said that sacrifice is like the greatest human invention

00:35:28.760 ever yeah it's the discovery of the future if you only live in the present like an animal then you

00:35:34.520 have to do the next thing that's necessary whatever that happens to be but if you're a human being

00:35:40.560 things are more complex because you have to do whatever needs to be done next in a way that doesn't

00:35:46.180 interfere with the future or maybe even makes the future better and what that often means is that you

00:35:52.260 don't get you don't get to do exactly what you want right now you don't get to pursue your impulses

00:35:59.600 because you're going to pay a price for that tomorrow or next week or next month or next year instead you

00:36:06.300 often have to give up something of value now to obtain something of higher value later and that's

00:36:12.540 basically the sacrificial motif these archaic people who were sacrificing something of value to to god 0.99

00:36:19.360 were acting out the idea that you had to give up something of value in the present so that you

00:36:25.060 could establish a better future and that that's really the motif of work right because work is the

00:36:31.400 sacrifice of the moment for the benefit of the future and the funny thing is the strange thing is

00:36:38.220 that sacrifice actually works it actually pays off you can you actually can bargain with the future

00:36:44.500 which is well i describe why that is in in great detail in in 12 rules for life but one of then you

00:36:53.000 might ask yourself and i also write about this i believe it's in rule seven which is do what is

00:36:58.340 meaningful not what is expedient you have to sacrifice to get ahead well what's what does getting

00:37:05.180 ahead mean what would be the best possible ahead well that's sort of conceptualized religiously in

00:37:11.180 ideas like paradise or heaven and then you might say well what is the ultimate sacrifice that you

00:37:17.180 have to make in order to get ahead to reach paradise or heaven well you have to sacrifice yourself to

00:37:25.040 what's good essentially something like that you sacrifice everything weak that's everything about

00:37:31.540 yourself that's weak to the good it's something like that and that's just accurate that's painful

00:37:37.660 because you know people are generally not very well constituted they're not very mature they're

00:37:44.420 they're not they're not very articulate they're not aiming very high and so when they start sacrificing

00:37:51.020 parts of themselves they may find that there's a lot to burn off maybe almost everything but the

00:37:57.000 end goal the end consequence of that hopefully the aim that's being pursued is of sufficient grandeur to

00:38:05.820 justify that self-immolation that's the that's the phoenix right the phoenix bursts into flame burns

00:38:13.880 off everything that's old and is then reborn that's an that's a symbol of the savior the phoenix and it's

00:38:20.380 something you do to yourself it's like everything old and dead about you you want to let go of let it burn

00:38:25.620 off it's painful but because it's alive but it's just dead wood you don't need it that's part of the

00:38:32.700 sacrifice of yourself right and it sounds like sacrifice is a skill it's like something you have

00:38:37.840 to learn and practice at it is a skill there's no doubt about it part of the skill is setting your

00:38:43.220 goal think well what so what would i say what's a good goal well let's start from the initial

00:38:50.000 premises that life is dreadful suffering tainted with malevolence all right so everyone can agree on

00:38:56.560 that that's a little harsh but it seems accurate okay fine that's the baseline all right now now how

00:39:02.840 do you solve that problem well you have to embark upon an adventure that's so remarkable that it

00:39:10.400 justifies that so you can say to yourself jesus this is rough man there's a lot of misery along with

00:39:16.820 this a lot of betrayal a lot of malevolence it's like doesn't matter it's worth it you know and you

00:39:23.060 watch yourself in a week or a month and you'll see that there are times when you feel that way

00:39:28.360 about your life you think man this is tough life is hard but boy it's really worth it so that's what

00:39:34.000 you want you want a goal that makes your life worth it that's not the same as being happy that's a that

00:39:38.900 hap the idea that you should pursue happiness that's for that's that's for children for naive

00:39:44.740 children it's a foolish idea you want to instead live your life in a manner that justifies

00:39:50.860 it's suffering and and that's possible you think that's worth it man i'm going to play this game

00:39:55.980 it's it's worthwhile game and i would say i've been trying to conceptualize that in a very precise

00:40:01.280 manner most recently i would say well you're looking for meaning in your life well it's simple

00:40:06.580 there's chaos to confront there's order to establish and revivify and there's evil to constrain

00:40:14.420 and that's enough meaning you do those things that'll that'll justify the pain and suffering

00:40:19.780 of your life and it'll it'll turn you away from bitterness and resentment this kind of leads nice

00:40:25.200 into my next question is this like how do you deal manage the fact that sometimes your sacrifices

00:40:30.900 don't turn out the way you hoped right use the story of cain and abel kind of to highlight this

00:40:35.240 cain offered a sacrifice too for whatever reason it didn't get accepted and he got super resentful

00:40:40.420 about it and i think that happens to in people's lives too they they have a goal they make what

00:40:45.480 they think are the resilient sacrifices for it and then it doesn't turn out the way they had hoped

00:40:50.580 so how do you avoid that reason that resentfulness that when things don't work out the way you want

00:40:56.060 it well generally if you're moving forward in some manner that's worthwhile and things don't work

00:41:02.020 out precisely the way that you expected you'll have generally gained something as a consequence

00:41:07.920 of the experience you should be wiser and what that means is that you might think well i didn't get

00:41:12.740 my goal quite right i wasn't aiming at exactly the right place and i didn't make precisely the right

00:41:18.260 sacrifices so then you try again you you forgive yourself you think well i gave it a good shot it

00:41:24.200 didn't work out but i didn't get it quite right and then you meditate and you talk to people you trust

00:41:29.860 and you try to reconfigure your goal and you think i must have got it wrong didn't work out i must

00:41:34.080 have got it wrong i'll reconfigure my goal and i'll reconsider my sacrifices and i'll repeat the

00:41:40.640 endeavor and if you do that diligently then your vision will become clearer and what you're aiming

00:41:46.980 at will become better and the sacrifices you make will become more effective so you think i'm going to

00:41:52.560 try this i'm probably wrong and i'm going to have a lot to learn but i can learn and then it's a

00:41:58.740 self-correcting process across time and to become bitter about it the failure to become bitter about

00:42:04.440 it is another form of failure it's it's a form of meta failure i would say because it it it undermines

00:42:10.840 your faith in the process itself and then you've really failed if you've just failed well that's not

00:42:16.180 such a big deal man people people aim at something and miss quite frequently although they generally

00:42:22.700 learn something by doing it it's like aim again if that doesn't work aim again if that doesn't work

00:42:29.260 aim again maybe you have to aim a little lower you know aim at something you're more likely to hit

00:42:35.060 and maybe your goal was grandiose or maybe your discipline was insufficient so you have to reconfigure

00:42:41.760 and and re-implement and and try again so and this is the long term and that's a good that's another

00:42:48.120 question i have is you've kind of hit on this a bit is how do let's say someone's listening to this

00:42:53.860 and they're like i want to start doing this i want to start cleaning my room yeah but they don't see

00:42:58.300 the benefit right away you know a week month and things just feel like how do you keep going when

00:43:04.660 you don't see that immediate right you think do you think they will they will see the benefit they

00:43:08.940 will see the benefit if they're if they're in the game properly if they open themselves up to

00:43:14.140 to the possibility of transformation and they and they make the sacrifices properly let's say

00:43:21.540 if they don't because you can't go in your room and say well look i'm going to clean this up and

00:43:26.560 if my life isn't 100 better in a month then to hell with it like that's not the right attitude the

00:43:31.900 right attitude is look everything around me is quite a mess and i'm going to work diligently to

00:43:38.480 improve it in the ways that i can improve it and i'm going to stick this out and i'm going to watch

00:43:42.520 very carefully and i'm going to be grateful for small benefits that come my way and i'm going to

00:43:48.300 be attentive and i'm going to see them it's not you you can't there's a there's a statement in the

00:43:54.280 new testament that i wrote about a fair bit in 12 rules for life it says you cannot test god it's

00:44:00.480 something that christ tells satan when he's being tempted you cannot put god to the test it's like you

00:44:05.620 can't clean up your room and then sit there with your hands crossed with your arms crossed and say

00:44:09.840 okay you know tap tap tap when is the reward coming that's not how it works you have to you

00:44:16.520 have to deeply assume that if things are not working out for you that you're at fault and then you have

00:44:23.680 to work to improve those things you know you could improve and then you have to be i would say humbly

00:44:30.300 grateful when things start slowly to go your way and that'll work but it's not you can't have the

00:44:36.280 attitude well now i'm finally going to get what i deserve you know it's about time things came

00:44:40.680 around my way right that's not going to work and i guess another attitude to have is sort of

00:44:46.300 understand that you know metaphorically things are going to tend towards chaos or entropy and so your

00:44:53.600 job is just to constantly keep things in order constantly keep cleaning your room it's never it's never

00:45:00.140 going to stop no and well but i you can you if you're lucky if you're fortunate i mean sometimes

00:45:06.300 you can be in a situation where there's so much chaos that that your boat is sinking and you can

00:45:11.060 barely bail fast enough to stay afloat you know that happens to people from time to time in their life but

00:45:16.620 often you're in a situation where if you put in a decent effort then you can get ahead of the chaos

00:45:23.840 and start to make not only to keep it at bay but to start to establish habitable order look i went to

00:45:31.860 a restaurant like when i was a kid you know i worked as a dishwasher when i was about 14 and it was a

00:45:38.320 hard job i mean the first three weeks i was doing this i was going to school and i was up till like

00:45:44.360 three in the morning at this restaurant because i'd get so far behind in the dishes that i took me hours

00:45:49.860 after my shift ended to to get them all done and i remember talking to my dad about two weeks into

00:45:56.020 the job and i said look i'm i'm like busting myself in half here and i can't keep up i don't know if i

00:46:01.600 can do this job and and my dad wasn't someone who was ever happy in the least if i quit if i quit you

00:46:08.620 know and he said well look you know maybe maybe it's just maybe no one could keep up and i thought well

00:46:14.620 maybe and anyways i stuck with it for about another week and then the german chef who was kind of

00:46:19.440 rough old guy finally came over i guess he thought i passed my initiation test or something and he

00:46:24.920 showed me how to do it he showed me how to organize the dishes and stack them and and and organize my

00:46:30.680 workplace so i could keep up and then i could really keep up you know and then i actually got good at the

00:46:35.920 job and i had quite a bit of spare time and i learned to be a short order cook and i got along

00:46:39.820 really well with the the cooks and the bartenders and all the people that were in the restaurant i really

00:46:44.160 loved that because i i got to work in an adult world even though i was only 14 it was really good 0.90

00:46:49.260 but part of that was i took the damn job seriously it was just a dishwasher's job you know but i took 0.97

00:46:55.340 it seriously and then then all of a sudden it wasn't just a dishwasher's job it was my bloody 0.98

00:46:59.840 entry into the adult world and i learned to cook and now i can you know and then i could cook i could

00:47:04.220 take care of myself i got to be a good cook and you know i had this kid walked into a restaurant about

00:47:09.140 a month ago and the kid that was seating me said hey i've been watching your videos and i wanted to

00:47:13.820 thank you and i said well why what's been going on he said well here i'm working at this restaurant

00:47:17.880 and in the last like six months i decided to really work hard at it to work as hard as i could

00:47:22.660 and he said i got three promotions he said i can't believe it it's like you have there's lots right in

00:47:28.420 front of you the whole world is right in front of you you might think well other people have more in

00:47:33.440 front of them it's like well maybe they do but you've got more than you can manage right in front

00:47:37.800 of you if you took full advantage of it it might be the gift that never stops giving and you know you

00:47:43.700 think well that's naive you know there's horrible places to work it doesn't matter how hard you work

00:47:48.040 and you really won't get rewarded and people will take advantage of you it's like well if you're in

00:47:52.060 a job like that then you should find another job but in most places and i've i've had a lot of jobs

00:47:57.640 like i've probably had 50 jobs and and they've ranged from well from dishwasher to harvard professor which

00:48:03.780 is a pretty good range and my experience has been in 90 of those places if you were honest and you

00:48:11.020 worked hard and you were reliable and you weren't above the job then gate doors would open to you

00:48:18.820 and a lot faster than you think and i truly believe that that's the case it's especially the case in our

00:48:24.260 culture because our culture is actually based on confidence and if you're if you're reliable and honest

00:48:29.720 and a hard worker and your eyes are open and you're grateful for what you've got you can advance very

00:48:35.080 rapidly and i've seen that over and over and over in my in my clinical practice you know i've had lots

00:48:40.180 of clients they come to me and they're doing okay they've got a decent job but they're not happy with

00:48:45.160 it maybe they're not making enough money and they can't buy a house and so we put together a plan

00:48:49.640 three-year plan it's like okay we're gonna triple your damn salary in three years but you're you know 0.54

00:48:54.820 it's gonna take work get your resume together get some more education figure out what you want 0.91

00:49:00.620 start applying for other jobs figure out how to do an interview and push and like people move fast

00:49:08.180 it's amazing so and it's not like it's not hard it's hard but if you don't waste time being well

00:49:14.040 if you don't waste time wasting time and being bitter you can put a tremendous amount of effort

00:49:19.120 into what you're doing and then there'll be people around who are really interested in finding someone

00:49:23.760 who wants to put effort into what they're doing and they will open the door for you they will provide

00:49:29.360 you with opportunities more than you know what to do with yeah human beings value competency

00:49:33.700 across the board well sensible human beings right value competence and if and there are lots of

00:49:40.680 people like that around and they're looking around to see to find other competent people because it's

00:49:45.420 kind of rare and like the people i know that have been hyper competent you know people who've

00:49:50.240 established multiple businesses and sometimes multiple spectacularly successful businesses one of the

00:49:55.620 things they absolutely love and this is a place where i think capitalism entrepreneurial capitalism

00:50:01.440 gets a bad rap they love finding young people who have who are motivated and giving them opportunities

00:50:08.120 and helping them develop their careers it's it's one of the primary sources of gratification

00:50:13.080 for people who've developed successful careers you think well they're greedy and they want everything

00:50:18.780 for themselves it's like that's a psychopath that person like a solid competent reliable

00:50:26.100 entrepreneurial creator is so happy when he or she stumbles across someone who wants to be

00:50:33.360 competent that you can hardly believe it and they'll do everything they can to help them build their

00:50:38.620 careers that's the real world it's not the cynical world of the of the radical leftist resentful

00:50:45.740 imagination well jordan there's a lot more we could talk about but where can people go to learn more

00:50:49.940 about the book well they can go to my website jordanbpeterson.com they can go to my youtube

00:50:56.420 channel there's lots of lectures there including some that are directly about the book there's an

00:51:01.660 audio version because people are accustomed to listening to me lecture and so there was a fair

00:51:07.080 demand for the audio version so i recorded that they could try the self-authoring program it's it's

00:51:13.020 very inexpensive it works even if you do a really bad job of it so that's what i encourage people to do is

00:51:19.540 like pick up the program write your autobiography write like lay out your faults and your virtues

00:51:26.720 make a plan for the future and do it badly it'll be way better than not doing it at all so those are

00:51:33.520 all possibilities fantastic well jordan peterson thank you so much for your time it's been a pleasure

00:51:37.860 thanks very much for the opportunity it was a pleasure talking to you again good luck with your

00:51:42.300 podcast and with what you're doing my guest today was jordan b peterson he is the author of the book

00:51:46.680 12 rules of life it's available on amazon.com and bookstores everywhere you can find more

00:51:50.900 information about his work at jordanbpeterson.com also check out our show notes at aom.is slash rules

00:51:55.720 of life where you can find links to resources where you delve deeper into this topic

00:51:58.880 well that wraps up another edition of the art of manliness podcast for more manly tips and advice

00:52:12.140 make sure to check out the art of manliness website at artofmanliness.com if you enjoy the podcast

00:52:16.100 i've got something out of it appreciate if you take one minute to give us a review on itunes or

00:52:19.320 stitcher it helps out a lot as always thank you for your continued support and until next time

00:52:23.060 this is brett mckay telling you to stay manly

00:52:25.220 you

The Art of Manliness - February 06, 2018

#377： 12 Rules for Life With Jordan Peterson

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