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Lewis Howes"THIS IS Why Most People Are LAZY & UNMOTIVATED IN LIFE!" | Jordan Peterson & Lewis Howes
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EVERY SPOKEN WORD
115 min read · 23,268 words- 0:00 – 10:05
Skills He Wishes He'd Built: Low-Intensity Leisure and Casual Contempt
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
If I saw something was difficult, I wanted to master it.
- SPSpeaker
Mm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
I was driven to do that just to see how far I could go in these multiple directions.
- SPSpeaker
Right.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
And that left me vulnerable to one thing. When there's no elephants under the rug and everyone's playing, if you ever have that-
- SPSpeaker
Mm ... you should consider yourself- I think you gotta have a dream. The school of greatness.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Really?
- SPSpeaker
[laughs] Yeah. Please welcome Lewis Howes. Is there anything you... any skills you wish you would've developed in your 20s-
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Mm
- SPSpeaker
... that you didn't develop sooner? Maybe you-
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Yeah
- SPSpeaker
... have, maybe you have them now, maybe you don't-
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
I've really thought about that. I've really thought about that recently. Well-
- SPSpeaker
What would those few skills be that you wish you would've developed and you wish everyone would develop?
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Well, when I, when my health fell apart-
- SPSpeaker
Mm-hmm
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
... and I was in the hospital for, or mult- multiple hospitals for long periods of time, you know, I stopped doing everything I was doing, and everything I was doing was difficult. My clinical practice was difficult. The professorial job was difficult. The company I was running was difficult. The writing was difficult. The, the, um-
- SPSpeaker
Getting out of bed
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
... podcasting and interviewing was difficult
- SPSpeaker
[laughs] Yeah.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Yeah, the lecturing was difficult. It was all difficult, and I'm not complaining about the difficulty. I actually loved that.
- SPSpeaker
Mm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
That was, that was fine. I'm not complaining about it at all, but because it was difficult, I have to be in really good shape to do it, and so then I wasn't in really good shape.
- SPSpeaker
Mm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
And so because I was in really good shape and everything I had done was difficult, I didn't know what to do, and I couldn't get back on top of things because it was like trying to jump into a car going 200 miles an hour. You know, it's like-
- SPSpeaker
Mm
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
... well, what I did, what I started doing back in December really is when I started working again, although I had been writing to some degree over the last two years. Um, I started doing podcasts like this, and they're not easy.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
You have to be... [sighs] Again, I'm not complaining. I love doing them. They're really interesting, but you have to be engaging, and you have to be sharp, and you have to not say anything stupid, and you can't be too emotional, and you can't be angry and, um, or that has to be very controlled, and you have to pay attention and focus, and you have to line people up, and it's technically difficult. You have to advertise it. You have to get the social media right.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- 10:05 – 22:58
What to Build in Your 20s: Fitness, Reliability and Connections
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Well, it certainly doesn't hurt to be in physical, good physical condition-
- SPSpeaker
Mm-hmm
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
... so we can walk through it. Stop drinking too much. How do you know if you're drinking too much? Um, you regret what you do when you're drinking.
- SPSpeaker
[laughs]
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
It's, it's interfering with other important goals.
- SPSpeaker
Mm-hmm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
It's, it's causing you financial distress. It's getting you in trouble with your friends or your family. It's getting you in trouble with the police. Okay? So stop abusing substances if you can, right? If you see that they're, um, hurting you. Um, and alcohol is particularly pernicious in that regard. So physical health. D- are you in decent shape? Are you strong and coordinated? And if you're not, well, you'd be better if you were.
- SPSpeaker
Right. [laughs]
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
You'd feel better. You'd be more effective. You'd live longer. You'd be less sick. And you really see that mount up. Like, if someone's been in shape once in their life, they age way better.
- SPSpeaker
Hmm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
And it's also a really good way of maintaining your cognitive ability. Like, you know, you, you hear about those exercises that you can do online to make you smarter and keep your cognitive ability intact.
- SPSpeaker
Yep.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Those don't work. There's no evidence that they work. People keep saying that they make you smarter, they maintain your cognitive function. Psychologists have studied that for 50 years hoping that one of those things will work.
- SPSpeaker
Hmm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Trying all sorts of creative tacks. They don't work. Exercise works. Cardiovascular and weightlifting. You start to decline in your fluid intelligence at about the age of 25, and it's a linear trend downhill, and it can accelerate as you get older.
- SPSpeaker
Hmm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
It's just like this, quite ugly.
- SPSpeaker
Hmm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
If you exercise, you stave that off.
- SPSpeaker
Wow.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
So that's really useful. Um, maintain your relationships and, and foster them. They're un... So when I look at successful people, they're really good at something. They're reliable. Right? You can count on their word. They're generous-
- SPSpeaker
Mm-hmm
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
... and they have a wide, wide connection network, which becomes more and more valuable as you get older.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
So it's one advantage that older people really have over younger people. They have a connection network, and a connection network is-
- SPSpeaker
Huge
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
... well, you could be connected to a thousand well-connected people. Okay, that means you are connected to the entire world.
- SPSpeaker
[laughs]
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Right?
- SPSpeaker
Right.
- 22:58 – 36:58
Loving Your Wife: Honesty, Trust and the Marriage Vow
- SPSpeaker
I know how important your wife is to you, and it's actually the first thing you write about, is the importance of the 50 years you've been in love with your wife. I'm curious, uh, what is the thing you love most about your wife? Uh, that's my first question.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
I think it's very difficult to say exactly why you're attracted to someone. It's, there's lots of factors, and many of them aren't known to you really. Um, she's very, she's provocative. She's witty and, uh, sharp, and so there's always an element of game playing. Like, it's not dishonest game playing, but there's a teasy, flirtatious provocativeness that characterizes her quite deeply. Uh, she's no pushover by any stretch of the imagination, and, um, I find that constantly interesting and intriguing. Um, it's partic- It's, it's, can be somewhat hard on me when I'm not feeling well.
- SPSpeaker
Mm-hmm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
But when I'm up and functioning properly, then that works out extremely well. And so-
- SPSpeaker
It will, yeah. What would you say would be the, the keys to your success of 50 years of loving each other and being in a, what seems to be a healthy, functional relationship, when in society today, there doesn't seem like many of those?
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Well, we, we really do our best not to lie to each other about anything. And we also have fights when they're necessary. We don't let things... We don't hide things in the fog. That's the title of chapter three of my new book, Don't Hide Things in the Fog. And we work through our issues. Our, if we're, if we have a dispute, we do our level best to get to the bottom of it, to find out what in the world's causing it, whose needs to change and why and how and when. And then how we can progress forward into the future without having that issue dog us or drag behind us or interfere with us at all. And that means a fair bit of confrontation, I would say. But in less so over the years as we've settled more and more things, but everything's out in the open. Everything that we can get is out of, out in the open. You, you can't have a relationship without trust.
- SPSpeaker
Mm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
And you, you trust your partner courageously if you're not naive, knowing that you can be hurt and that you can be deceived and that you can also do both of those things. So you offer your partner your trust as an invitation to them to be honest and forthcoming and, and well, and then issues come up and you delve into them and straighten them out. And we also attend to the relationship, um, in... I'm not going to refer back to this new book continually, but it's relevant in this context. Um, it's chapter 10, Plan and Work Diligently to Maintain the Romance in Your Relationship. And we do that as well. And it is effortful.
- SPSpeaker
Mm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
I mean, we t- we try to have, throughout our relationship, we try to have romantic dates one to three times a week. And they require preparation and cooperation and the will to do it, and the will to put yourself on the line, and the, the desire to make that a priority even when other things are more pressing. Um, w- we both want it to work. That's another thing. We're committed to it.
- SPSpeaker
Mm-hmm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Um, and not interested in finding another relationship. S- and so far we've been fortunate and that's worked. Um, we have fun together. We love our kids. We have had joint projects of all sorts together, renovating houses, traveling, raising our children, now our grandchildren. Um, but of all of that is, the, the most important thing as far as I'm concerned is to not to lie to your partner.
- SPSpeaker
You mentioned you don't have a relationship if you don't have trust or if there's not trust in the relationship. How does someone, um, if someone is not trusting the other partner, how do you cultivate trust? If you're 100% honest with that person, if you are transparent about every action you make in your life, if you're, you know, they have access to whatever they wanna see, and you're, you're constantly creating trust, but for whatever reason, they still might be jealous or insecure or not believing you. How does someone get someone to trust them? Or is it not about them at that stage and it's about the other person and their insecurities?
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Well, it, it depends very much on the particulars of the situation. Um, you know, so I don't know if there's a generic answer to that. I think that you can establish the ground rules explicitly, you know, and have a discussion about it. Are we gonna lie to each other or not? Are we gonna tell each other the truth to the degree that we can to make that an actual goal and to talk through the consequences of doing that and not doing it? And then I would also say, whenever a hiccup occurs in the relationship, maybe don't call it out at each hiccup, you know, because you have to have a certain amount of silent tolerance in any relationship to let small infractions go. But if they repeat, my rule is three times.
- SPSpeaker
Mm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
And it's the rule that we, I share with my wife. I- if something happens three times that is causing emotional u- upset, anger, jealousy, disappointment, resentment, frustration, any of those things, anything that you don't want to experience and that you especially don't want to experience repeatedly, then you can call it out. And, and if you, if you have three examples, your case is much better made than if you just have one. And I would also say that when you call it out, you know, you could say, "Look, uh, we were at a party the other night, and you were... It looked to me, I felt as if you were paying too much intense intent- attention to, um, Dave."
- SPSpeaker
Mm-hmm. [laughs]
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
"There was flirting going on there. That's what it looked like to me. There was some flirting going on there. And you know, I, that made me uncomfortable." Well, y- you don't say, "Well, you were flirting. Stop doing it." You say, "Well, this is how it looked, this is what it looked like to me, and here was my response." And then you wanna think, "And maybe I'm a damn fool and blind and jealous and stupid, and I'm misinterpreting, or maybe it was a harmless flirtation of the sort that people engage in because it adds a little bit of spice to a social interaction." You wanna find out. Like, it- it's really convenient if it's the other person's fault, except then you're laden with living with that person.
- SPSpeaker
[laughs]
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
So it really doesn't help you anyways. But it's convenient because then they have to change. But-
- SPSpeaker
Mm-hmm
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
... you've got to think about this over the long run. You're gonna be interacting with this person On a minute-by-minute basis for decades. Um, if you're the idiot and that's causing trouble, then you should find out. So you wanna say, "Well, look, this is what I saw. What's your explanation of what's going on?"
- SPSpeaker
Mm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
And then they'll offer you their viewpoint, and hopefully they'll do the same thing. They'll think, "Well, this is my intent," and maybe they have to go think about it, but, "This is my intent, and this is what I saw, and I think you're being oversensitive," um, in that situation. And you peel back the explanations layer by layer until you both agree on what happened and more importantly, on what you're going to do about it in the future. And that's really hard, and especially if there is something going on that's not straight.
- SPSpeaker
Mm-hmm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Because that will require quite a bit of digging. It'll probably result in anger and tears and a fight, and that's very unpleasant. It's, it's easier in the short term to avoid that, but hopefully the consequence of that is you don't have to have that fight again.
- SPSpeaker
Right.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
You have to come to a negotiated agreement about, about that situation, and you have to pay attention to your own uncomfortable negative emotions in order to manage that and not, and not pretend that everything's all right or that you're nicer than you are or that you're less jealous than you are or, or, or less blind or... See, one of the things I learned from Carl Jung, the psychoanalyst, about marriage was that there is a reason marriage was a vow. Like, the vow is that you stick together. Okay, so now imagine that's a vow, okay? You do not get to leave, period.
- SPSpeaker
[laughs] Right.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Okay, so what does that mean? Well, on the upside, it means that you don't have to be alone. It means that your family will have continuity over decades. It means that the narrative of your life won't be fragmented and broken by divorce or sequential divorce. It means that your children can grow up and maybe have their children within a continuing family. Um, it means that your children will be able to maintain relationships with the grandparents on both sides and the cousins. Like, it's a big deal to maintain that. There's huge advantages in it. It means that you'll have someone there when you're not well, and so will your partner. Um, and it'll means that you have someone to share all of the positive things of life with. So there's huge advantages to it. Okay, so why does it have to be a vow? Well, I don't think you can tell the truth to someone who can run away.
- 36:58 – 42:43
Jealousy, Negotiation and Why We Default to Slavery or Tyranny
- SPSpeaker
Is there room for jealousy and insecurity in a relationship? Sh- Is there a healthy amount of jealousy that people should have in a relationship, or does jealousy and insecurity only cause more suffering and pain in a relationship?
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Well, I think there's a reasonable amount of proprietary interest, let's say. I mean, in a, in a classic monogamous relationship, a marriage, there's sexual fidelity is a crucial element of that. Um, and maybe y- you'll make an arrangement that differs from that, but it's not easy to chart uncharted territory like that. I mean-
- SPSpeaker
Mm
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
... if you wanna have an adventure like that with a partner, a monogamous adventure that also includes sexual exploration, well, maybe you can pull it off, but I doubt it. It's really complicated.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah. Let's say you're not having sexual exploration with other people, sh- and you're telling each other the truth and you're being honest. Sh- is there room to be jealous or insecure, uh, in that relationship? Or it, does, does jealousy typically cause more harm than it does, you know, spice and good, I guess?
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
I think jealousy probably causes more trouble than good, but that doesn't mean that there's something wrong with the proprietary interest.
- SPSpeaker
Mm-hmm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Should you care if your partner pays undue attention to someone of the opposite sex they find attractive? Well, probably you should care. You might even say something about it. They might even be happy about that.
- SPSpeaker
Mm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Right? Because it indicates that you noticed and that it matters to you. Now, I think it shades into jealousy when it's harmless interactions, it's interactions that would be regarded as harmless by a third-party observer, let's say-
- SPSpeaker
Mm
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
... I know that's a very difficult line to draw, that are being magnified as a consequence of insecurity on the part of the observer. Or there's envy, where your partner is attracting attention-
- SPSpeaker
Mm
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
... status, success, any of those things, and you're jealous of that. That's not helpful. You should be pleased. The optimal situation is for you to be pleased when your partner's successful.
- SPSpeaker
Mm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Um, I, I don't think competitive couples... I don't think competition between people who are in a monogamous relationship is useful particularly. It's p- not zero sum competition.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Um, I mean, you can d- compete in a game-like sense.
- SPSpeaker
Right. Fun-
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
You know, like-
- SPSpeaker
... fun, playful competition, but not-
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Yeah, but not-
- SPSpeaker
... not competitive in life
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
... not existential competition.
- SPSpeaker
[laughs]
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
You're on the same team. That's the point.
- SPSpeaker
Right.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
You know, and if one of you is feeling left behind for one reason or another, it's, it's time to throw that out on the table and say, "Look, I'm, I'm playing second fiddle here far too often. What can we do about that?"
- SPSpeaker
Mm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
"Well, it looks like you need a... And like, I've got an adventure. It looks like you need one, too. Well, how can we rearrange the situation so I have my adventure?" And then it's up to that person, too, to figure out what obstacles they might be putting up in their own pathway-
- 42:43 – 52:23
Sex, Shame and Cultural Contradictions
- SPSpeaker
What happens when we feel like our partner is depriving us of what we want if it's not, you know, uh, infidelity or something of the, the likes of being with other people, but something else that we want in our life, uh, uh, a, a goal, a dream?
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Well, sexually that happens all the time.
- SPSpeaker
Right.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Because people... Generally speaking, men would like to have sex more frequently than women, so that's a, that's a sticking point in many relationships. Um, but f- forget that for the moment. We, we might just as well say that the probability that one partner and the other partner are going to have exactly the same level of sexual interest, say, with regards to frequency, is quite low.
- SPSpeaker
Mm-hmm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
So there's going to be friction there. So what do you do? Well, you, you, you negotiate about it. It's like, "Well, I'd like to have sex 15 times a week." "Well, I'd like to have sex once a week."
- SPSpeaker
Right.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Okay. Well, you know, the logical con- the logical, uh, m- meeting point there would be in the middle.
- SPSpeaker
Mm-hmm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
But then that has to be planned out, and you also have to say exactly what you mean. Well, exactly what do you mean by sex? Do you, do... Because there's all sorts of variations of sex, include, include, from ranging from just intimate closeness to-
- SPSpeaker
Mm-hmm
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
... full-fledged sexual activity of various sorts, and the various sorts matter, too. And these are painful discussions often. It's very funny in some sense that people will do and desire things that they won't talk about.
- SPSpeaker
Hmm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Right? They're, they're, they'll, they'll [laughs] engage in the act, but they won't engage in the negotiation, and they won't admit what they want.
- SPSpeaker
Why is it so hard for us to admit what we want?
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
We're ashamed of it.
- SPSpeaker
Mm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
That's easy with sex. Uh, sex and sh- sh- shame regulates sex.
- SPSpeaker
Hmm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
You know, people say, "Well, you shouldn't be ashamed of sex." It's like, well, really? Really? No. That's a stupid theory.
- SPSpeaker
Hmm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
We arrest people who expose themselves in public. Why? Well, because we don't want people masturbating in public. We assume they should be ashamed enough not to do that.
- SPSpeaker
Mm-hmm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Shame regulates sexual behavior, so we're embarrassed about our desires. And, you know, na- naively you'd think, well, you can just shed that. Well, first of all, no, you can't, and second of all, it isn't obvious at all that you should.
- SPSpeaker
Hmm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
What you might be able to do is to determine how to play out your sexual life in the confines of your relationship in a manner that neither of you do find shameful. But that's, that's... Just think how hard that is. Like, you know, you think, "Well, that's what I want." It's like, but then you think about how unlikely that is-
- SPSpeaker
Hmm
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
... and how difficult it would be to attain it. You know, you could say that if that ever happens to you in your life once, you're lucky.
- SPSpeaker
[laughs]
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
You know, that it's perfect. Uh, now I, I think that's pessimistic because I, I believe that solutions to that problem can be negotiated.
- 52:23 – 1:00:18
Raising Children with Discipline and Shared Parenting
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
I don't know if I'm proud about it, uh, proud of it. Um, like, the, the success at these things seem so unlikely and so dependent on, uh, good luck in some sense that, you know, mostly I'm gen... If things go well for me, I'm generally grateful that I escaped from the ax, you know, rather than being proud of it. Um, we did a good job of working through our, our attitude towards how we were going to treat our children.
- SPSpeaker
Mm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
So we were on the same page all the time, pretty much all the time, and so the kids couldn't... We didn't let the kids appeal to one of us or the other. We really participated in their upbringing, and we talked all that through, and that, that's, that's good. We have good relationships with our kids, both of us, and, and that was really necessary, too, because my daughter got unbelievably sick for massive amounts of time. And, and my son, we had to ignore him a lot because he just wasn't dying. So it was like, "Kid, sorry, like, we got a problem here, and you..." And, and he was great, man. He, uh, he just rode through that like a, like a master.
- SPSpeaker
Mm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
But, um, if we hadn't sorted out our child-rearing philosophy, let's say, we would've s- it would've sunk us, for sure.
- SPSpeaker
Really?
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Be- well, because it was so close to the edge that, you know, few marriages survive the death of a child, and no wonder, you know? But the serious illness of a child is also an unbelievable stressor, and, um, you know, we sailed through that as well as could be hoped. You kinda know that 'cause you look back and you think, "Well, do we regret?" Right? N- th- and of course, there's the odd regret. You know, one thing of, when you have a sick child, you have this terrible conundrum all the time of, well, how hard do you push them?
- SPSpeaker
Mm-hmm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
When do you allow the illness to be a reason that they aren't doing something? Um, when do you allow them to use the illness as a reason that they're not doing something? Well, it's really, it's really, really hard to get that right, and sometimes we pushed harder than we should have and misunderstood, too.
- SPSpeaker
Mm-hmm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
And but- At least we did that together. And my, my wife, you know, she... I've seen many, many women protect their children from the father. They don't trust him, and so every time he interacts with the child, they'll do something disapproving. A look. They'll, uh, they'll put him down. Now, it's not like men don't do that to their wives. There's all sorts of tricks that men have for their wives.
- SPSpeaker
Mm-hmm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Men are very good at turning their wives into, uh, drudges, for example, for a variety of reasons which we can go into. But y- if you don't trust men, you won't let them have a hand in the children, uh, the discipline of the children. You know, and when you think of discipline, you think of punishment and threat and Dad saying, "No."
- SPSpeaker
Mm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
That isn't discipline. Discipline is... Discipline, if you discipline someone properly, they become disciplined.
- SPSpeaker
Mm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Right? They, that means they're competent. It means-
- SPSpeaker
They're organized, they have structure, they have... Yeah
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
... they can control themselves. So I'll give you an example. When my son is quite a disagreeable person by nature.
- SPSpeaker
Mm-hmm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
So he's very masculine. He's very high in emotional stability, so he doesn't have much negative emotion. And he's very, and he's relatively low in agreeableness. He's, um, he's... And that's, that's typical masculine pattern. Now, the two big personality differences between men and women are agreeableness, women are higher, and neuroticism, tendency to feel negative emotion, women are higher. So, so what that meant was that when he was a kid, he was a stubborn little pup. It was hard to get him to do what he didn't wanna do. And, you know, that's the mark of a character that is hard to stop, so there's real advantages to it. But it, kids who are disagreeable are a handful because they think, "I'm not doing that and you can't make me."
- SPSpeaker
Right. Is it, is it-
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
And he was really quite good at that
- SPSpeaker
... and isn't one of your rules from the first book, like, don't let your kids do anything that would make you not like them?
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Dislike them.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Yes, and the re- uh, we should talk about that because that's such a good rule, I think. But then, I used to, the rule for him was, you know, he, he'd push the limits in a variety of ways, and he was really good at that and quite persistent at it. And I'd talk to my wife and say, "Look, Julian's getting a little too pushy here. Um, we have to crack down on him and stop him. And, and this is what I see." And she'd say, "This is what I see." And we'd think, "Well, this is what we're going... For a week, he isn't gonna get away with anything." Like, the line, man. It's like, "Kid," he'd be three or three and a half at this time, "sit on the steps."
- SPSpeaker
[laughs]
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
"Sit on the steps." And if he wouldn't because he was stubborn, well, I'd bring him over and put him on the steps. Like, it was, "You're gon- if I say you're going to sit on the steps, you are absolutely going to sit on the steps." So it was so interesting to watch him because he'd be angry, you know, because he got interfered with. He didn't get to do what he wanted to do. And, um, he'd be s- and he would go and sit on the steps, but he'd be like mad as hell on the way there, arms pumping up and down and just, "Ar." He'd go sit on the steps like, you know, like this, just overcome with anger. And the rule was, as soon as you get yourself under control and you can act like a civilized human being and you want to have a good day, then you come and tell me and I'll, that's it. You're done. But it had to be real. And l- look, my, my, uh, r- my criteria for accepting his statement was whether or not I liked him when he said it. You know, if he was still being a s- uh, if he was still misbehaving and, and bending the rules-
- SPSpeaker
Mm
- 1:00:18 – 1:09:17
Feeling Loved, the Walled Garden of Play, and Conflict Delayed
- SPSpeaker
When do you feel the most loved, Jordan? When what's, when what's happening around you or when you're creating something or when you're with people, what, when do you feel personally the most loved?
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Uh, it's pr- when I'm with my family, when I'm with my kids. With, when I'm with my family. Friends, too, and, and that's even been more the case over the last couple of years because my family and friends have been so unbelievably loyal and helpful to me and my family as we've-
- SPSpeaker
Mm
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
... had our troubles.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Terrible, terrible troubles over the last couple of years.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
They've been so unbelievably reliable and-
- SPSpeaker
Mm
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
... helpful. Amazing. Certainly people have gone out of my way for me in a way that I, I don't believe I would have done for them.
- SPSpeaker
Really?
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Well, look, I saw my father-in-law when, when, when... And I ta- write about this in, in Beyond Order. No, I write about it in 12 Rules more, I think, but it doesn't matter. He's a, like, he's a really extroverted guy, disagreeable guy too, masculine guy, extroverted, assertive. Everybody in the little town I grew up in knew who he was. He was a performer, you know-
- SPSpeaker
Mm
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
... the life of the party. Um, and a good businessman, but a real character. And, uh, he, he did his own thing. But then his wife got, uh, prefrontal dementia when she was quite young, 55, and man, he took care of her for 15 years.
- SPSpeaker
Wow.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
It was unbelievable.
- SPSpeaker
Wow.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
And it was so interesting too, because if we offered to help him, he would accept it right away, and anything that we could do that would... Like I suggested one time, for example, that he buy a digital readout sign so that if he went out, he could type in where he was going on the sign and it would just repeat over and over.
- SPSpeaker
Oh, that's cool.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
And some recordings in the bathroom to help his wife remember what to do, and he would just implement those, accept and implement them right away. But he, this guy who was, who lived his own life, who, who was a, a, a, a very extroverted social person, not someone who you would have regarded as soft and caring. And, and I don't mean that in a negative way, it's just that that wasn't him. He wasn't Mother Teresa, you know?
- SPSpeaker
Mm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Um, he just, he cared for her in a way that was absolutely astonishing, and I saw that also in my friends and my family, in the care that they've offered to Tammy and I over the last two years. Mind-boggling. Uh, mind-boggling.
- SPSpeaker
Wow.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
But I would say the, like, the, the place I like to be the be- most is in a family situation when everyone's, when there's no elephants under the rug-
- SPSpeaker
Mm
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
... and everyone's playing. If you ever have that-
- SPSpeaker
Mm
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
... you should consider yourself fortunate-
- SPSpeaker
Wow
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
... beyond belief, because it's unlikely, and you can lose it at any moment.
- 1:09:17 – 1:24:58
Healing Trauma and Shame: Memory, Updating and a Philosophy of Evil
- SPSpeaker
And what, what... You mentioned, uh, paradise being a, a safe space where we can play and have fun and feel protected. Uh, but a lot of times, at least in the last year, I'm seeing more and more in the world that the anxiety, stress, depression, challenges of the mind or the heart and the body have seemed to come to the, the surface for a lot of people even more. And it, it sounds to me, and it looks to me like when I'm connecting with people, that a lot of things from the past, past memories, past pains, hurts, traumas, are being brought to the forefront for a lot of people with the chaos of the now. How do we start to heal the, the memories of the past, the traumas of the past, uh, so that they don't keep hurting us in the present?
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Well, the first thing I would say is, you know, sometimes there's a crisis and well-meaning mental health professionals rush in to discuss the trauma while it's still happening.
- SPSpeaker
Mm-hmm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
That's a really bad idea.
- SPSpeaker
Mm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
People are generally traumatized because something actually horrible happened, and dwelling on it in the moment just makes it worse. It's not like anybody has a solution. "Here's how you should understand this." You know, someone's just shot up your kid's school. "Here's how you should understand this. That'll make it all better." It's like, "No, it won't."
- SPSpeaker
Mm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
If you have old baggage, that often comes up if you're having an argument with someone, doesn't it? You know how it, you know how it is. This is partly why people don't like to have a dispute within a relationship, because it's a thread, and you pull on that thread and just, God.
- SPSpeaker
[laughs]
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
For that, we had another rule. Do not agree with something you don't agree with.
- SPSpeaker
Ooh.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Like, if we're gonna, if we decide, you and me, that we're doing this, we don't go back and say, "Well, I didn't really mean it."
- SPSpeaker
Mm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
We don't get to play revisionist with our history. So if you, if you don't agree, don't agree. Fight, object, or hold your peace.
- SPSpeaker
Mm-hmm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Because you see what happens with couples is there's a little fight, and then one says to the other, "Yeah, but you did this." And then that person says, "Yeah, I know I did that, but then that was because you did this."
- SPSpeaker
Right.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
And each this gets bigger until what's on the table is why the hell should we stay together at all?
- SPSpeaker
Right.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
And so every fight becomes why the hell should we stay together at all? So that's another thing you wanna do, is you wanna have the fight about this thing.
- SPSpeaker
Not about everything.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Not about the past. Not everything. It's like, "Okay, you were flirting. I think you were flirting more than you should have been." Okay, so I go away and I think, "Well, okay, maybe I was. Okay, um, well, then we have to have a discussion about why, and maybe we can solve that, but mostly what we have to do is figure out how to not have that happen again." Okay, so we're gonna go see the same couple again. "What is it that you want me to do?" So I'm the flirtatious one, let's say. "What do you want me to do?" "Well, you have to figure that out." It's like, "No, I'm stupid, like you. We're equally stupid."
- SPSpeaker
Right.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
"I need to know what would satisfy you, and you need to figure out what would satisfy you so I know." And that, like, that's also extremely useful, is let your con- Establish your conditions of satisfaction. Make them explicit. Let the other person know.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah, you can't read someone's mind. Yeah.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
We're very bad at that. [laughs] We're bad at reading our own minds, for that matter.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
So if we, if I have a fight with, with Tammy, let's say, sometimes I remember to say, "Okay, what, what do you want me to do right now? What can I do? What, what should I say and mean?" You know, and you think, "Well, you shouldn't let the other person put words in your mouth." Well, fair enough, you know, I'm not act- I'm not asking for something false. I'm saying, "I'd like to not have this happen. Can you see a way out? Is there something I could do to increase the probability that that's the route we could take?" And, you know, sometimes that works. But the other person has to let you know what they would find satisfying.
- SPSpeaker
You mention, you mentioned sexual shame. Um, and it triggered something in me about just the shames of the past that people tend to hold onto. I think I, I might have mentioned this to you the last time we talked, I'm not sure if you know, but I was, I was sexually abused when I was five by a man that I didn't know, and for 25 years, I held onto the secret, the shame. Uh, and if anyone ever knew about this, then I would never be loved. I, you know, I would-
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Right, 'cause you feel contaminated, permanently.
- 1:24:58 – 1:37:03
Inner Peace, Fame and Reputation in the Age of Shredding
- SPSpeaker
How do, how do you f- how do you f- cultivate your own personal inner peace amongst the different, uh, changes that have come up, whether, you know, the fame, the health challenges, uh, uh, personally, maybe challenges with family or friends? How do you personally keep a level of inner peace amongst the chaos?
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
I walk a lot. I exercise a lot. A lot.
- SPSpeaker
[laughs]
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Like, I'm walking about seven miles a day now, and working out as well, and so... And that's necessary. Um, I take solace-
- SPSpeaker
If you didn't, if you didn't walk and work out, where do you think you would be-
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Dead
- SPSpeaker
... on a level? Really.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Definitely. Yes. Yes, definitely.
- SPSpeaker
You, is that physically because you wouldn't be physically taking care of your body, or because mentally and emotionally your peace would be chaotic and it would drive you to die?
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
That.
- SPSpeaker
Wow.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Yeah.
- SPSpeaker
So that, you s- you were saying s- sorry, I was interrupting you. Solace, you said?
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Well, and, but peace. That comes to you, if you're fortunate, and sometimes it doesn't come. Um, I try to do things that I f- think are worthwhile, that, that seem worthwhile, and that gives me solace, I suppose.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Um, uh, so I'm writing, I'm talking to people who I find interesting about things that I think are crucially important. I'm trying to learn and to communicate as a consequence of talking to these people. Um, I'm trying to do what I can for my family and my friends.
- SPSpeaker
Mm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
And to do what I can beyond that as well, in a variety of different ways. Um, those are all useful endeavors, and they keep me going.
- SPSpeaker
What have you found to be the best practices of managing, uh, mass attention? Whether you wanna call it fame, mass attention, mass audience, uh, people being fanatical about your message, your work, you as an individual, uh, you know-
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Luckily that, that hasn't happened too much, the fanatical side of things. You know, I've had the odd ru- the odd brush with people who were a little more persistent than was probably good. And you know, I could see lurking signs of mental health issues behind that and-
- SPSpeaker
Mm-hmm
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
... but fortunately, very little of that has happened, and, um, that's certainly all for the good. Um-
- SPSpeaker
It's 'cause you're not, you're not living in LA, that's probably why. [laughs]
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Well, could be. Could be. But it, well, for whatever reason, I've been pretty fortunate about that.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Um, I talk over what I'm doing with the people around me all the time, and try to keep it on the proper pathway to the degree that I'm able to do that. And, and to see if what I'm doing is justifiable and ethical. And we're all terrified of this, you know, to a degree that is very difficult to communicate. You know, we, we live in a time where if you make a mistake, you can be shredded. And the, I would say to some degree, the more visible you are, the more thorough the shredding.
- SPSpeaker
Oh, right. Yeah.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
And so the cost of an error, an ethical error, is unbelievably high. The cost of the appearance of an ethical error is e- extremely high, much less the cost of an actual ethical error. And so we're very careful-
- SPSpeaker
Mm
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
... to tr- to act ethically in every manner possible, appearance and reality.
- 1:37:03 – 1:43:41
A Sense of Destiny and the Story of Meeting Tammy
- SPSpeaker
Did you ever have a, a, a goal to impact this many people? Was that part of your life's mission, that, "I wanna reach more people than outside of the classroom, and, you know, sell five million copies of my books, and be so well-known," that you are? Was that ever a mission, or was it always just, "I wanna learn and teach, and if 10 people watch, great. If 10 million people watch, great"?
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
I probably knew- I, I knew when I was working on my Maps of Meaning book that I was... Look, I, I tried to, I tried to write about the most serious problem I could find in the most serious way I could manage- manage. And I thought, "Well, if this is a serious problem and I'm addressing it seriously-
- SPSpeaker
Mm-hmm
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
... it's probably a serious endeavor and will have the consequences of that, that, whatever those might be. And when I started to lecture about what I had been thinking about and learning about, the impact was obvious.
- SPSpeaker
Okay.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
And, and, and unique in some sense. I mean, there are... My lectures, the most typical response I got from students in my classes was, especially in the class on my first book, Maps of Meaning, was, "This course changed how I looked at everything." And I would say-
- SPSpeaker
My, my life, the world, the universe, God, everything
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
... yeah. Or they'd say, "Well, I've learned all these things and I don't know how to talk about them with anyone else."
- SPSpeaker
Hmm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Which was the same sort of thing. And, and a lot of the public commentary on my work is s- similar to that. But, you know, in some sense, that wasn't a surprise because what I learned changed the way I looked at things completely too, absolute, completely, 100... Like, completely, in a revolutionary way. And so, and, and I, I, I had a sense of that from I don't know how old, very young.
- SPSpeaker
You had a sense that-
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Four, five
- SPSpeaker
... you had a sense-
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Young
- SPSpeaker
... you had a sense that your, uh, life would impact millions of people?
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Yes.
- SPSpeaker
Oh. Was it kind of like an inner dialogue or an inner calling or something that was-
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
It was like a dream.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Sort of. Or the remem- memory of a dream.
- SPSpeaker
That's crazy.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Look, I talked to Jocko Willink the other day.
- SPSpeaker
Oh.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
I'm, I'm looking forward to releasing that.
- SPSpeaker
That's great.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
It was such a good conversation.
- SPSpeaker
That's great.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
I had such a good conversation with him. He made such, this immensely tough person, tough guy.
- SPSpeaker
Very.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
He kn- he knew he wanted to be a soldier from the time he was, like, three.
- 1:43:41 – 1:57:15
Building Confidence, Fixing Inadequacies and Finding Motivation
- SPSpeaker
So I'm curious, when's, what is the, what are the keys to building confidence when you feel insecure or afraid or, or scared of being embarrassed? Whether it be dating someone or a career or anything, what's the keys to building confidence so that you're attracting what you want?
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Well, look, look, you... I read some of your biographical history before we talked today, and you tell a story about being picked last.
- SPSpeaker
Mm-hmm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
And then you compensated for that.
- SPSpeaker
Yes.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Now, there... Alfred Adler, by the way, the psychoanalyst, uh, associate of Freud, built his whole theory around compensation of that sort, inferiority complex plus compensation. But it's adaptive, right? Like, you got picked last, it embarrassed the hell out of you.
- SPSpeaker
Yep.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
So what did you do? You decided, "That is not going to be me anymore."
- SPSpeaker
Never again.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Right.
- SPSpeaker
Never again. Yes.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Okay. Now, you did say, you know, that you adopted a maybe too, what, inflexible model of what it meant to be masculine as a consequence.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
But when I read that, I thought, "Yeah, but still, you... Fair enough, it wasn't... The, the new you that you adopted wasn't optimal in all possible manners, but it was definitely improvement over the previous you."
- SPSpeaker
[laughs] Exa- I wasn't picked last again, that's for sure. [laughs]
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Right. Well, exactly. Okay. So, so, so the first thing I would say is that if you feel insecure and less and ashamed and all of that, that you have to take stock.
- SPSpeaker
Mm-hmm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
And look, I have an exercise online at selfauthoring.com. It's, there's three exercises there. One helps you write about the past, one about the present, and one about the future. The present authoring program helps you assess your faults and your virtues. Okay, well, if you have some faults and you feel insecure and inferior because of that, well, you should. Now, it shouldn't be so much that you're crippled by it and unable to take action. You shouldn't be beating yourself into the ground because you're not everything you could be, because no one is, and if you beat yourself into the ground, then you can't get up and improve. But you, you, you f- you have to differentiate. It's like, okay, to what degree am I being hard on myself, counterproductively critical, hearing the voice of my too-harsh and angry father in my head-
- SPSpeaker
Right
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
... um, adopting inappropriate stereotypical representations of masculine competence. How much of my self-criticism is ill-advised? Fair enough. And you wanna deal with yourself with a certain amount of care, but then along with that, there's the, well, fix your weaknesses.
- SPSpeaker
Mm-hmm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
You know, if you're ashamed of being ignorant, you're showing up at a party because, you know, you claim to knowledge that you don't have and someone exposes you. Well, you can be angry at them, and you probably will, but they've actually done you a favor. They pointed out an inadequacy is a pathway that you can travel down.
- SPSpeaker
Ooh.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Right? A recognized inadequacy is, assumed it's such a gift in some sense if, if it's accurate. I'm in... 'Cause you think, "Well, what should I do? What should I do with my life?" That's a real complicated question.
- SPSpeaker
Right.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Oh, here's an inadequacy. Excellent, you have a pl- you have a, a goal now. Rectify it. Now, you still have to think strategically and figure out how to rectify it and do it step by step and, but Carl Rogers, the psychotherapist, um, pointed out that the per- person, for s- for therapy to be successful, the person has to wanna change. So they have to have recognized that they have a problem.
- SPSpeaker
Mm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
If the, if someone is mandated by the court to attend therapy, it's very difficult for the therapist to convince them that they have a problem. Once you're convinced you have a problem, it's like away you go. You know? I know it's still technically difficult. It requires discipline and all of that. There's no magic solution. But if you're plagued by feelings of inferiority, you should rectify the most obvious inferiorities.
- SPSpeaker
Right. Focus on those first over s- optimizing strengths, would you say?
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
No, not necessarily. Not, not necessarily. I'm... And you don't have to redress every... Like, I can't, I'm a terrible jazz musician.
- 1:57:15 – 2:04:11
Others' Opinions, Self-Doubt and Living Ethically
- SPSpeaker
When, you know, I hear a lot of people say, "Don't let the opinions of other people hold you back from taking action on your goals," because I think a lot of people will listen to other people's opinions, and they feel scared to do something based on someone saying, "I told you so," or, "You couldn't do this," or, "You're not good enough." How do we overcome that, those opinions that h- keep us playing small, that hold us from putting our creation into the world or going after what we want?
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Well, generally, someone else's comment is unlikely to bring you to a halt unless you value that comment. It... So imagine you're going to pursue a goal, but you're full of doubts.
- SPSpeaker
Mm-hmm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
And so 40% of you is doubts, and 60% of you is pursuing the goal, and then five or six people object, and they object using the doubts.
- SPSpeaker
Mm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Well, you're, you're... It's... That's gonna be really hard on you.
- SPSpeaker
So how do we overcome self-doubt?
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
But partly, well, partly what that means is you, you probably haven't thought it through completely. Like, what are you doing, and why?
- SPSpeaker
Mm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
And if you have a bunch of doubts and they haven't been addressed, then you're vulnerable at that point. And y- it may be that your goal is not everything it could be, and it may be that your strategy isn't fully fleshed out.
- SPSpeaker
Mm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
And so you have to have a conversation with your doubts and take them seriously and see if you can construct a goal that's, that you're on board with.
- SPSpeaker
Right.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
And then, then a doubt pops up because someone criticizes you and triggers a doubt, and you look at the doubt and you think, "Okay, here's the doubt, and this is why what I'm doing, you know, maybe won't work." But then you think, "But I... But this, I've thought this through, and I've thought this through, and I've thought this through, and that all works. And so, no, that, uh, that isn't going to stop me." You know, so I look and I think, "Well, I'm, I'm, I'm writing something. Why? Well, I wanna figure out this problem. I wanna think about this problem. Why? Well, it's an engaging problem, but it's a problem that many people seem to have, so that discussing it and figuring it out seems to be useful. Why? Well, because the more of us who take problems seriously and try to address them and communicate about them, the fewer problems we might have, and the less suffering there'll be. And suffering doesn't seem to be a good thing, unnecessary suffering. Maybe we could work towards it, and maybe that's what I should be doing, and that seems to be what's ethical," and, and that's it. Like-
- SPSpeaker
Right
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
... and you might say, you might say, "Well, what if you doubt that doing what's ethical is right?" Um, well, it's not that easy to construct an argument that supports the idea that having more unnecessary suffering in the world is good.
- SPSpeaker
Mm-hmm. Right. [laughs] Right.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
So I would say, you know, you wanna put yourself on firm moral foundations. And people talk about morality all the time, "This is what you should do, or you're a bad person." It's arbitrary.
- SPSpeaker
Mm-hmm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
You know, it's, it's got this ring of patriarchal tyranny. But that, that's n- based on a misapprehension of what morality is. It's like, do you wanna be tortured by your conscience? Like, how, I mean, how pleasant do you find it to be tortured by your conscience?
- SPSpeaker
It's horrible.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
How horrible? Like, is there anything worse?
- SPSpeaker
It's excruciating, yeah. I don't, I don't know if there's anything worse. I mean-
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
It's up there
- SPSpeaker
... you gotta live with it, yeah, for as long as you have it.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Yeah. Well, I think that's a universal experience, a near universal experience. So you, you live ethically when you're not violating your conscience.
- SPSpeaker
Right.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Well, there isn't anything better than that. That might not be good enough. It, it might not even be good. Like, let's say you manage it.
- SPSpeaker
Mm-hmm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Things can still come along and, and take you out sideways. But, but the purpose of living ethically is so that, so that you have some peace.
- 2:04:11 – 2:16:16
Money, Sales and Not Despising What Success Requires
- SPSpeaker
I haven't heard a lot of people talk to you about money. Maybe I've just missed it. Uh, uh, and maybe you've talked about it a bunch, but I haven't seen it.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
That's a good, that's a good, that's a good question. Yeah, definitely.
- SPSpeaker
I, I don't wanna make assumptions, but, uh, if I was making assumptions, [laughs] uh, college professors aren't typically multimillionaires. Uh, am I fair to say that's semi-accurate?
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Hmm.
- SPSpeaker
That if you're a professor, you're not making millions, you're not this financially abundant, uh, human. You have a, maybe a good salary, but you're not bringing in financial abundance at the next level. Uh, and I'm not gonna try to assume where you're at financially before you became more famous in the YouTube and the media sensation and the books, but I'm assuming that you've accumulated a lot more money than what you had, let's say, five years ago. How have you learned to manage the mindset around the, the wealth that has come to you? Uh, the level of wealth that has come to you. How have you managed it? How do you deal with it now as it keeps coming in? I'm assuming more comes in with every book and success. Um, and what were your thoughts about money before this level of money came to you?
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
I'd never made any bones about being an evil capitalist. But... Well, I'll give you an example. So I, I built this, I told you about this software that, that online program that helps people-
- SPSpeaker
Hmm
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
... write out their past and their present and the goals, goals for their future. We tested the, the future part of that to see if it worked, and it worked quite well. Um, it was effective. Um, and I sell it. Why don't I give it away? Well, because that's not the right price.
- SPSpeaker
Hmm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Like pricing decisions, money is very, very complicated, and pricing is very complicated. Pricing is value.
- SPSpeaker
Hmm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
It's like, well, is the right price for something zero? Well, probably not, first of all, because it doesn't take zero to make it-
- SPSpeaker
Right
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
... or sustain it. Like, there's an infrastructure, customer service infrastructure. There are people working on it constantly who could be making new things. If you can't sell it, what makes you think it's worth anything? If you can't sell it, what makes you think you've got your communication right? Like, you can use price as an indication of whether what you're doing works. If no one'll pay for it, maybe it's no good, or maybe you're not talking about it properly. So I wanted to make things that would work, that would work in the marketplace.
- SPSpeaker
Hmm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
It was a challenge. There's the challenge aspect of it, too. So I never had contempt for money. Um, and money for me was always, well, it was a challenge, that's one thing. And for many people who are motivated by money, money actually serves as a challenge.
- SPSpeaker
Mm-hmm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
It's like, "Can I, can I make more of this?" It's, it's a competition in some sense-
- SPSpeaker
Right
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
... like a game. Um, 'cause you might think, "Well, they want all the things." It's like, yeah, sort of no. You kinda, if you're sensible, you sort of max out on things pretty rapidly.
- SPSpeaker
Right, [laughs] right. Can only buy so much and use it so much.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Well, and it, it... Yes, and I'm not hedonistic in a manner that money would aid in, in some sense.
- SPSpeaker
Of course.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Um, partly 'cause I'm not 16.
- SPSpeaker
Mm-hmm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
You know, I'm 60, so what am I gonna do with it? Um, and I've also learned be careful what you buy, because it's not clear who owns who when you buy something. Like, I knew this very rich couple, and they had like six houses.
- SPSpeaker
Hmm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Well, the poor woman, the, the female member of the couple, all she did was worry about the houses. [laughs] Like, one house is bad enough, 'cause it's always falling apart.
- SPSpeaker
[laughs]
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Six big houses fall apart all the time.
- 2:16:16 – 2:22:04
Gratitude, Three Truths and the Definition of Greatness
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Well, whatever I might be doing for other people, they're certainly doing that for me. So I'm-
- SPSpeaker
Yeah
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
... grateful to have the privilege-
- SPSpeaker
Yeah
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
... the immense and staggering privilege of being attended to.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
It's amazing. You know, um, it's... So, so I, I, I don't... Whatever I might be g- uh, what would you say, sacrificing for it, I'm gaining-
- SPSpeaker
Yeah
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
... equivalently. I've had so much support from people. It's just absolutely staggering. And so-
- SPSpeaker
Well, we appreciate you, and you're making an impact on our lives, and we hope you're balancing and taking care of your health as well. That's the most important. Um, I asked you two questions in the last interview that I'd love to ask you again. I'm not sure if you're gonna remember them, but I wanna see if you have the same or different response. Uh, the one question's hypothetical. It's called my three truths question. I would like you to imagine that many, many years away, you get to choose the last day on Earth for yourself, but you eventually gotta go, and you accomplish everything you wanna create into the world. You see your work come to life, the impact, the family. Everything happens, and it's magical, right? But, uh, for whatever reason, you gotta take all your work with you. So, you gotta take Beyond Order, all your content, your videos, podcasts. It's all gotta go with you to the next place, but you get to leave behind three truths, the three lessons, the biggest lessons you've learned in your life that you'd wanna share with the world, and this is all we would have of your content left behind. What would you see would... What would you say would be your three truths?
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
I would say have the faith. Strive to manifest the faith necessary to make things better rather than worse.
- SPSpeaker
Mm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Pray that you have enough terror to be frightened out of your own deceit, and strive to be grateful regardless of... Regardless. That would be... That's good enough.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah. Yeah, I think one of, one of your rules is be grateful in the suffering, right? So, uh-
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
In spite of-
- SPSpeaker
In spite of. Yeah
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
... that's the last rule, and the one that I've wrestled with most, I would say, over the last, especially the last two years.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah. That's probably gotta be the hardest to find the gratitude.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Yeah. Well, you know, people have their reasons. I, I outline them in chapter 11. Why are you bitter? Well, here are the reasons. Oh, [laughs] well, those are real reasons. No wonder. You know, you listen to someone tell you about their life. It's so f- typical, so frequent. Catastrophic occurrences.
- SPSpeaker
Mm-hmm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
You know? And yet people stumble forward positively, and it's a miracle. And a lot of that is... It's... See, that chapter, be grateful in spite of your suffering, it's really a chapter about, in, in some sense, about faith and courage.
- SPSpeaker
Mm-hmm.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
And it, it's, it's an act of faith and courage to be grateful because there's reasons not to be, and so it's like a, it's a decision. And, and it's not like you make the decision and then you've got it. You've done it right, and then you have it. It's, it's a constant ongoing decision. And the temptation to not... To, to be ungrateful, to be bitter, it's always there-
- SPSpeaker
Yeah
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
... and compelling, rationally compelling.
- SPSpeaker
It's easy.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
Emotionally compelling.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah.
- JPDr. Jordan Peterson
But it makes everything worse.
- SPSpeaker
Oh, it's so true. It's so true. It's like eating candy, you know? It tastes good for a moment, and then you feel sick for hours. My-
Episode duration: 2:22:05
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