Joe Rogan Experience #1208 - Jordan Peterson

Three, two, one. Here we are again.

Hey, Joe.

Hello, Jordan. (laughs)

(laughs) How are you doing, man?

Good to see you, man. I'm doing great. You have, uh, the, the schedule that you have and the amount of energy and enthusiasm you maintain with the schedule i- is very remarkable. 'Cause you're not stopping. You're not slowing down. I mean, you've, you've had your foot on the gas for like two solid years now.

Make hay while the sun shines.

I guess so.

Yeah.

Is that what it is? Is that how you feel about it?

Well, you know, when you have an opportunity that's completely preposterous-

(laughs)

... you're a fool to take it for granted.

Yeah.

You know?

I guess that's it, right?

So, and s- yeah, so Tammy and I have been to 100 cities since January. So everywhere, you know? And part of what keeps us going... Well, first of all, I have a really good crew, you know? Like the CAA guys, they're really good. Live Nation's been really good. They make sure the theaters are smooth and, and we've had no problems at all. Um, and then I have lots of people who are helping me with my scheduling, and Tammy travels with me. And then the, the lectures themselves, well, I really like doing them, partly because I do a different lecture every night and so that keeps me sharp and it makes sure that I'm thinking about new things all the time and trying to formulate my thoughts more precisely. And they're also unbelievably positive, so that's also, that al- that's also something that makes it a lot easier to, to do.

Mm-hmm.

Because, you know, I, I go to a city and there's 1,500 to 2,000 people waiting for me there, which is like staggering in and of itself wherever I go. And they're all there listening intently and, and it's, it's a sophisticated discussion, or at least as sophisticated as I can make it. And I'm communicating directly with the audience, and all the people are there to try to get their lives together. And so the, the, the feeling in the, in the hall is really, really positive. And then I usually talk to about 150 people afterwards and, you know, they're, they... All of them, all of them, well, many of them, you know, they just say hi and they're polite and we have a photograph and all that. But lots of them have stories about how they've been putting their lives together and they're thrilled to death about it, you know? That they're out of the hole they were in or they've started a new business or they've sold a new business or they just decided to get married or they're gonna have some kids or they've fixed up their relationship with their parents or they quit drinking or, and they're, they're not addicted. I talked to one guy in Europe. He'd stopped, he was, he was addicted, I don't remember what to, but it wasn't, it was something that wasn't good. He s- he'd stopped for nine months and got nine of his friends to quit too. So he comes up, he's just like bouncing, you know? He's so damn happy that his life is better. And not only that, that he had this additional positive effect on other people. So... And it's so fun because I have these conversations with people, they're brief, but they're very personal and they're very intense, you know, because they, they... You think, people have to trust you to tell you that their lives weren't going so well, and then they have to trust you even more to tell you that they're going better now because, of course, what you want when you tell someone that things are going better is you want real encouragement and real sense from the person you're talking to that they're happy for you. And I'm absolutely thrilled to hear these things. Like, I was in Whole Foods this morning. I w- I went down near where I'm staying, and two of the guys that work behind the meat counter came out to talk to me and... independently. And they'd both been reading my books and watching my lectures, and one of them said he had a seven-year-old son, he really wanted to do right by him. He was looking for ethical and moral guidance and, you know, he found the books really helpful and that it was helping him put his life together and... And so, c- our guy at the car rental place last night told me the same thing and, and so it's so exciting. It's so ridiculously exciting to go everywhere around the world and to go into airports or to walk down the street and have people come up and say, um, "I've been watching you on YouTube." They often mention you. "Uh, I've been listening to what you say. I've been developing a vision for my life. It's really helped me out a lot. Thanks a lot." And Jesus, like, to be able to have that happen, you know, time after time, day after day, all over the place, that's just absolutely... It makes going to 100 cities, like, c- continually, uh, energizing 'cause it's so positive. And so... And then there's all this weird crap in the press, you know, about my dangerous followers and all this alt-right nonsense. And it's so ridiculous, you know? I've talked to 250,000 people in, in, in seven months. We haven't had one incident that was negative in that entire time. Not one. Nothing. No misbehavior on anyone's part. We had one heckler who was obviously not a fan of mine, given that he was a heckler. That was it. Other than that, the audiences behave perfectly. They all dress up, they come in suits, which is really cool.