it’s not okay for you to be weak loser
it’s not okay life is as harsh as you
think it might even be worse but you are
way tougher than you think many times in
life people don’t get what they want and
the motivation whattcha top 10 would
believe nation what’s that believe
nation it’s Evan I believe in you and
this channel is designed to be a part of
your daily success routine so let’s get
your motivation to attend and get you
believing in you grab a snack and chew
in today’s lessons from a man who went
from growing up in a small town in
Canada to a librarian mother and school
teacher father to becoming a Harvard and
University of Toronto professor and
having a YouTube channel with over 1.4
million subscribers he’s Jordan Peterson
and he was my take on his top ten rules
of success volume 6 also if you want to
know what Jordan Peterson and other
successful entrepreneurs have to say
about building unstoppable confidence
check out my 250 for confidence series
where every day for the next 254 days I
will send you a morning video for free
to help you build your confidence the
link to join is in the description below
if you’re gonna speak effectively you
have to know way more than you’re
okay let’s get off with rule number one
don’t waste your life I was outside
the Orpheum Theater it’s kind of rough
in downtown LA and I was walking down
the street with my wife and this car
pulled up beside us this kid hopped out
Latino kid about 19 or so and he said
are you dr. Petersen I said yes he said
oh I’m really happy to meet you and and
he shook my hand he said and I’ve been
watching your lectures and just wait a
minute wait a minute 10 and I said okay
okay and then he ran back to his car and
he got his dad out and they came over
and they had he had his own they had
their arms around each other and they’re
just smiling away you know like with a
real Duchenne smile a real smile and he
said I’ve been watching your lectures
I’ve really been working on putting my
relationship with my father together and
it’s really worked and so I thought well
that’s a lovely thing to have happened
when you’re walking through rough
neighborhood is that some kid jumps out
of his car and comes rushing over and
tells you how much better his life is
because he’s been working hard on the
basis of your recommendation to fix his
relationship with his father and people
are telling me stories like this all the
time and then and the thing that’s sad
about it I think and this is what makes
me emotional it’s not only that this is
so good and and and said good at a level
that transcends politics absolutely but
that people require so little
encouragement you know there’s so many
people I see in my ed my lectures and I
have a very diverse range of people who
come to my lectures they’re starving for
encouragement and they don’t need much I
said I had this kid talked to me at a
barbecue I was at this weekend and he’s
working with delinquent kids 13 and 14
years old and he said they were pulled
out of other delinquent camps and
brought to his camp which was for the
worst delinquents and he started talking
to them about my lectures and so they’ve
been watching him and now they have a
little fan club that’s based around my
lectures and they’re doing things like
talking to each other about making their
beds and cleaning up their rooms it’s
like it’s it’s unbelievable how little
genuine encouragement many people need
and how and how they have none no one
ever said to the men meant it it’s not
okay for you to be weak loser it’s not
okay
and the reason it’s not okay is because
you could be way more than that and it’s
a crime an ethical crime for you to
allow all that necessary potential to go
to waste it hurts you it hurts your
family it hurts the world really really
it does and people think oh okay
I give it and they do get it because
they know at some level
rule number two take responsibility you
know the idea that in some sense you’re
an eternal victim well there’s a truth
in that given that nature is conspiring
to destroy you and will be successful in
the end that you’re undermined by your
own Society at the same time you’re
buttressed by it and that you’re a
target of your own malevolence and that
of others I mean so there’s plenty
there’s there’s a triad of tragic and
malevolent forces that are aimed
directly at your heart and that’s always
the case but but to not take
responsibility for that and to attribute
a tribute to that to to a cosmic
injustice or a social sociological
injustice in some sense that’s aimed
particularly you that’s somehow the
fault of others is to miss the great
adventure of your life in that adoption
of that adventurous mode of being
there’s a deep meaning to be found and a
meaning maybe that transcends just you
that involves your family and that
involves your community and maybe even
the destiny of humanity itself but
there’s nothing about that that’s secure
easy and very little it has to do with
happiness the the idea that your problem
should be solved for you let’s say and
that it’s unfair that you have them well
it it it’s attractive in that there’s
nothing for you to do except complain
but but it’s horrifying in that there’s
nothing for you to do except complain
the difficulty is actually the funny
thing is is the difficulty is actually
the destiny and it is insanely difficult
but maybe you’re insane lay up to the
task
rule number three confront suffering
I’ve watched people do very difficult
things like people who work in
palliative care wards so all they’re
ever dealing with is pain and death
right and they can do it get up in the
morning they go to work and they take
care of those people they lose people on
a weekly basis and yet they can do it
and what that shows is that if you turn
around and you confront the suffering
voluntarily you find out that you are
way tougher than you think it’s not that
life is better than you think life is as
harsh as you think it might even be
worse but you are way tougher than you
think if you turn around and confront it
and so then what you discover is that
there’s a spirit within you that pursues
something that can pursue something
meaningful that has the resilience and
the strength to contend properly with
the catastrophe of existence without
becoming bitter that’s actually the
central so and then I would say that’s
one of the central themes of the twelve
rules for life is that make no mistake
about it like the first noble truth of
Buddhism life is suffering this is true
and it’s worse than that because it’s
suffering contaminated by malevolence
that’s the baseline but and so that’s
very pessimistic but the optimistic part
is that you are so damn tough you can
actually not only deal with that you can
improve it it’s like oh well that’s a
horrible situation but it turns out that
I’m armed for the task
well that’s that’s a great thing for
people to know and I do believe I think
the fact that we’re armed for the task
is even more true than the fact that
life is catastrophe contaminated by
malevolence we’re stronger than things
are terrible
so how things are pretty terrible so
that means we’re pretty damn strong Wow
yes it’s a very good thing to know and
it’s not naive optimism it’s a very
different thing it’s like no things are
terrible they’re brutal and you are so
damn tough you can’t believe it
rule number four pursue meaning not
happiness we’ve had a long conversation
in our culture about the necessity for
self esteem and happiness and that’s not
what I’m talking about I tell my
audiences and my readers very
straightforwardly that life is difficult
and that there’s a lot of suffering in
it and that you have to learn how to
conduct yourself in the face of that the
problem with the pursuit of happiness is
that when life’s storms come along
happiness disappears and then you’re
left with nothing and so you need to
pursue something that’s deeper than
happiness and if happiness comes along
well then hooray for you you don’t want
to despise it because it’s fleeting but
it’s much better to pursue things that
are meaningful than things that make you
happy it’s deeper and and it Orient’s
you more appropriately in it and it
keeps you centered in your own life and
makes you more useful for your family
and your community so a lot of what
people find in life that provides them
with a sustaining meaning is a
consequence of not the pursuit of Rights
or the pursuit of happiness or or the or
the or the development of self-esteem
but the adoption of responsibilities and
the more responsibility in some sense
the better responsibility for yourself
from making sure that your life lays
itself out like it should
responsibility for your family
responsibility for the community it’s
people who take responsibility that are
the ones that you admire and that’s the
right pathway through life that’s where
meaning is to be found and I think
that’s probably the crucial issue is
that identification of a profound
relationship between responsibility and
meaning and for many of the people that
I’m talking with it seems like that’s
the first time that that’s been
articulated for them rule number five
find your why you love to quote this
line this Nietzsche line that anyone who
has a why to live for can endure almost
any how
what’s your why what is driving you you
see when people read history they either
read it as a detached observer or they
tend to read it as well maybe the heroic
the heroic protagonist people like do it
imagine that they would be Schindler in
Schindler’s List but that’s wrong so
because the probability that you’ll be
the perpetrator is much higher
especially merely the perpetrator who’s
ensconced in silence when silence is not
the appropriate thing so I wanted to
having figured out what constituted Hell
in the pathway to that which would be I
suppose the cowardice that produces the
cowardice and resentment that produces
either complicitous in those events or
failure to oppose them when they emerge
I wanted to understand what the opposite
of that was because I think that’s what
needs to be learned from what happened
in the 20th century and so that’s why I
wrote maps of meaning was to understand
that and to lay out what the opposite
was and then that turned out to be
extremely helpful to me and then to the
people I started to teach about that
because it’s useful to know what the
opposite of hell is and I’ve been
teaching those things to people since
1993 that’s 25 years and the response
from the students has always been the
same sort of response that I’m getting
now absent some of the negative
characterizations let’s say which which
have emerged that for particular reasons
but the students have always said one of
two things and and this is the vast
majority of them this isn’t
cherry-picked responses it’s been the
same everywhere they tell me and this is
the same response I get from my
audiences now too is they say you’ve
given me words to explain things to
explain and understand things that I
always knew to be true or I was in a
very dark place for one of the seven
reasons that people might be in a dark
place alcohol or drugs or failure of
relationships or lack of vision or
nihilism or or hopelessness or
depression or anxiety if you know all
the pitfalls that people can encounter
and I’ve been developing a vision for my
life and trying to adopt responsibility
trying to be careful with what I say and
things are way better and that’s what
drives me rule number six live your
truth what’s your definition of
well greatness is what reveals itself
when you when you attempt to formulate
when you attempt to carefully articulate
and live out what you believe to be true
it just happens because there isn’t
anything more powerful than truth right
that’s the antidote to suffering truth
right so it’s a strange thing because
you think well yeah produces a lot of
suffering too it’s like yeah in the
short term rule number seven get better
every day what’s the goal of life
according to some of the more recent
pieces you’ve been writing I would say
that the goal in life is to conduct
yourself so that life improves at least
so that undo suffering is for stalled
but more than that so that’s its to
constrain malevolence and suffering to
the degree that that’s possible but then
also to work for a positive improvement
in things at every level and that’s
that’s how you should orient yourself if
I just try to be a little bit better
today than I was yesterday along the
lines that you’re speaking to try to
create that Symphony but you do better
at it today yesterday and like everybody
watching right now not compare myself to
somebody else yeah but rather to compare
myself to the future version of me yeah
is that a rational way compare yourself
to who you were yesterday not to someone
else is today
well that’s it’s not only appropriate
but I think it’s also practical and one
of the things about what I do including
my book is that I’m always trying to
take high-level abstract truths you know
fundamental truths and to make them
concrete and practical so that you can
implement them in your day to day life
because it’s the connection between
those abstractions and practical action
that really cements their meaning and
makes them comprehensible and this idea
of incremental improvement is a great
one now if there are things about your
life that are bothering you or things
about the world that are bothering you
then you want to decompose them into
solvable
problems and you do this if you have a
child this is the sort of thing that you
do naturally right because you want to
set your child a challenge that’s
sufficiently challenging to push them
forward in their development so that
makes it meaningful for the child that
puts them in the zone of proximal
development which is where where proper
maturation takes place they’ll find that
intrinsically meaningful you want to
make it challenging but also with a
reasonable probability of success and
that and there’s an art to that so you
want to set yourself a task that’s
difficult but not so difficult you can’t
attain it and then what happens is that
you step up improvement across time
incremental II and there’s also a
certain element of humility to it right
which is don’t bite off more than you
can chew right don’t set grandiose goals
but incremental improvement will get you
a tremendous distance rule number eight
have adventurous goals many times in
life people don’t get what they want and
they need because they don’t aim at it
and it’s a hard lesson for people to
learn because they’re cynical to begin
with and they presume that there’s no
possible way of moving forward but it’s
not so unreasonable to assume that
you’re not going to hit what you don’t
aim at or you’re not going to hit what
you aim at and don’t shoot at and I’ve
seen time and time again that if people
do put forward a vision for what they
regard as worthy of pursuit which is
something you have to determine in
dialogue with yourself it’s like given
the difficult preconditions of existence
is there anything that you could
conceive of that you would regard as
sufficiently worthwhile so that you
would be motivated to pursue it it’s a
it’s a it’s a profound philosophical
question and it’s not an unreasonable
one it’s it’s a good place to start it’s
like well life is difficult and enough
to make you cynical and bitter and
perhaps enough to make you cynical and
bitter and suicidal and homicidal and
even genocide ‘el and it’s not
surprising in some sense and then the
question is well is there something that
edible or perhaps even desirable which
is something to do that justifies the
suffering and it’s hard to say what that
would be for each of you it’s something
that you can discover this is partly why
Nietzsche was wrong
Nietzsche thought that after God had
died that human beings would have to
invent their own values but the
psychoanalysts I would say Jung foremost
among them put forward a very powerful
counter claim which was that
well you can’t invent values they’re
already built into you you have to
discover them and I think that’s true
for each person it’s like well what
would justify you and in the abandonment
of your resentment and hostility what
would be a sufficiently adventurous goal
rule number nine struggle up the hill
they say do you believe in God let’s say
and my response to that always is well I
don’t know what you mean when you ask me
that question so I don’t know how to
answer it I don’t know what you mean by
belief but I can tell you something that
I believe and I would say this is a way
of speaking symbolically I do believe so
I was thinking the other day a week ago
I was thinking about this little fantasy
that entered my mind I was thinking
about st. Joseph’s oratorio in Montreal
and st. Joseph’s oratory o is a very
large religious building it’s one of the
biggest cathedral like structures in the
world and it said on the hill and won’t
royal and it’s set up where it can catch
the Sun you know so it’s an image of the
heavenly city on the hill right it’s an
image of the structures that we strive
to create that’s what it is an
independent of its specifically
Christian or religious function that’s
what it stands for symbolically okay so
it’s the city on the hill it’s it’s what
we’re striving towards when we walk
uphill in life
okay now the way the the oratorio is
structured there’s hundreds of steps
leading to it up the front and in the
early part of the 20th century a lot of
people who had physical disabilities
came there and they struggled up the
step on their crutches and many of them
left their crutches in the oratorio you
can see hundreds of them if you go there
it’s quite an interesting sight and I
was thinking about that and I was
thinking about what that man
this is what it means it means that you
know everyone has their disabilities
let’s say and I know that some people
are far more terribly affected than
other people I’m perfectly aware of that
but the question is what do you do about
that and what you do is you you set
yourself up on your damn crutches and
you struggle up the bloody hill that’s
what you do and you struggle up the hill
towards the kingdom of God that’s what
you do because the alternative is to
descend into the abyss that’s the
alternative and then so to say well do
you believe it’s like I believe that you
should struggle uphill towards the City
of God on your crutches that’s what you
should do that’s the opposite of the
descent into the abyss and so that’s
that’s at the foundation of our
civilization that idea well argue with
it if you will see if you can figure out
why that’s not an acceptable idea maybe
you should help someone struggle up the
hill perhaps you should you know you can
lend a hand to someone although you
don’t want to take the burden away from
them entirely because there’s something
noble about struggling up the damn Hill
right there’s something that’s adventure
that’s the call to proper being it’s
like well we don’t need to forget this
you know we don’t need to forget it the
universities have been there since time
immemorial to try to push that idea
forward through the generations and
everyone needs to know that idea that’s
what gives your life not happiness
forget about that if it comes well great
accept it dignity nobility character
truth responsibility beauty those are
the things to aim for and rule number 10
the last one before a very special bonus
clip is fight for your beliefs I don’t
I’ve had journalists say well what makes
you think that your right to free speech
Trump’s the right of someone to not be
offended and I think that’s really the
level of our political discourse okay so
we’ll run a little thought experiment so
I’m talking to one person I’m talking to
you and the rule is I don’t get to
offend you okay maybe we can still have
a discussion about something difficult
but let’s say I’m talking to ten people
and about an important thing now I have
to make sure that I don’t say anything
to fight despite the
this is an important and contentious
issue that I don’t say anything that
offends even one of those ten people
okay maybe I can even manage that what
if I’m talking to a thousand people
there’s going to be someone in that
thousand people there’s gonna be someone
who’s offended at the mere fact that I
exist
so it’s an impossible standard it’s like
well you can’t say anything offensive
okay fine
then you can’t say anything okay so what
you don’t get to say anything because no
one should be offended well then you
don’t get to think well what happens if
you don’t think well then you can’t
negotiate your way through the future
and you fall into a pit and so does
everyone else so that’s where that all
ends up you can’t say offensive things
equals you cannot negotiate your way
properly through the future equals
everyone suffers well that’s a bad
that’s a bad strategy so and it’s and
it’s all covered up with well you know
it’d be better if no one was ever
offended it’s like well who thinks that
you know how naive you have to be to
think that how you have to be
pathologically naive which is the kind
of naive that you could have grown out
of
but you willfully refused to because you
weren’t willing to see what was in front
of your face and then you impose that
blind naivety on everyone else because
you don’t want to allow them to upset
your like
rosy view your rosy view of yourself in
the world there’s it’s just there’s no
now I’ve got a really special bonus clip
from Jordan Peterson on how to have an
aim that I think you’re really gonna
enjoy but before that it’s time for the
three-point landing question it’s time
to move from just watching another video
to actually taking action and if you’re
feeling bold leave your answers in the
comments below here we go question
number one what beliefs are you fighting
for number two what is your most
adventurous goal and number three how
are you pursuing meaning not happiness
while the suffering is pain and the
suffering is anxiety and uncertainty and
the suffering is hopelessness but the
consequence of all that is that you get
bitter and when you get bitter you get
mean and you get cruel and you start to
hurt yourself and other people so it’s
not only that if you don’t have a goal
you suffer it’s that you if you don’t
have a goal you suffer and then you get
cruel and bitter and resentful and then
you start to actively try to make the
world a worse place mm-hmm and so so
because you can’t suffer pointlessly
without becoming bitter and you can’t
become bitter without becoming cruel so
you need a name the question is then the
question of course is what you should
name yeah that’s for sure
so then the question is what should your
aim be but it’s not easy to ask people
to say well it’s easy to ask them what
do you want your life it’s a very hard
question to answer because it’s too
vague and grande so we help in the
future authoring program we help people
break that down it’s okay so here’s the
situation so you put yourself in the
right frame of mind so what’s the right
frame of mind
it’s like rule 2 in this book treat
yourself like you’re someone responsible
for helping you’re someone that you are
responsible for helping so what that
means is you have to start from the
presupposition that despite all your
flaws and insufficiencies that it’s
worth having you around and that it
would be ok if things are better for you
so you need to take care of yourself
like you’re taking care of someone you
care for so there’s a bit of a
detachment in that and then the next
thing is ok so now look 3 to 5 years
down the road okay you get to have what
you need and want
assuming you’re being reasonable and
that you actually want it which means
you’re willing to make the sacrifices
that would that would make it possible
what do you mean by reasonable well that
does that’s the next thing well within
your grasp that would be something what
if something is out of your grasp but
you still push hard enough well then you
need an incremental plant right you need
to break that goal down into step out
some crazy goal within a year that’s
like you haven’t even done the
to master a skill yet yeah yeah well
that’s it and you can have a high end
goal and more power to you if you do
need it well you need a pathway to it
you know if you if it’s ten stories up
above you you need a staircase to get
there right and so you have to build the
if you want more Jordan Peterson check
out the top 50 rules video I made on him
the link is right there next to me I
think you’ll enjoy it continue to
believe and I’ll see you there stop
doing the things that you know are wrong
that you could stop do it’s like we’re built for struggle as human beings
it’s not okay life is as harsh as you
think it might even be worse but you are
way tougher than you think many times in
life people don’t get what they want and
the motivation whattcha top 10 would
believe nation what’s that believe
nation it’s Evan I believe in you and
this channel is designed to be a part of
your daily success routine so let’s get
your motivation to attend and get you
believing in you grab a snack and chew
in today’s lessons from a man who went
from growing up in a small town in
Canada to a librarian mother and school
teacher father to becoming a Harvard and
University of Toronto professor and
having a YouTube channel with over 1.4
million subscribers he’s Jordan Peterson
and he was my take on his top ten rules
of success volume 6 also if you want to
know what Jordan Peterson and other
successful entrepreneurs have to say
about building unstoppable confidence
check out my 250 for confidence series
where every day for the next 254 days I
will send you a morning video for free
to help you build your confidence the
link to join is in the description below
if you’re gonna speak effectively you
have to know way more than you’re
okay let’s get off with rule number one
don’t waste your life I was outside
the Orpheum Theater it’s kind of rough
in downtown LA and I was walking down
the street with my wife and this car
pulled up beside us this kid hopped out
Latino kid about 19 or so and he said
are you dr. Petersen I said yes he said
oh I’m really happy to meet you and and
he shook my hand he said and I’ve been
watching your lectures and just wait a
minute wait a minute 10 and I said okay
okay and then he ran back to his car and
he got his dad out and they came over
and they had he had his own they had
their arms around each other and they’re
just smiling away you know like with a
real Duchenne smile a real smile and he
said I’ve been watching your lectures
I’ve really been working on putting my
relationship with my father together and
it’s really worked and so I thought well
that’s a lovely thing to have happened
when you’re walking through rough
neighborhood is that some kid jumps out
of his car and comes rushing over and
tells you how much better his life is
because he’s been working hard on the
basis of your recommendation to fix his
relationship with his father and people
are telling me stories like this all the
time and then and the thing that’s sad
about it I think and this is what makes
me emotional it’s not only that this is
so good and and and said good at a level
that transcends politics absolutely but
that people require so little
encouragement you know there’s so many
people I see in my ed my lectures and I
have a very diverse range of people who
come to my lectures they’re starving for
encouragement and they don’t need much I
said I had this kid talked to me at a
barbecue I was at this weekend and he’s
working with delinquent kids 13 and 14
years old and he said they were pulled
out of other delinquent camps and
brought to his camp which was for the
worst delinquents and he started talking
to them about my lectures and so they’ve
been watching him and now they have a
little fan club that’s based around my
lectures and they’re doing things like
talking to each other about making their
beds and cleaning up their rooms it’s
like it’s it’s unbelievable how little
genuine encouragement many people need
and how and how they have none no one
ever said to the men meant it it’s not
okay for you to be weak loser it’s not
okay
and the reason it’s not okay is because
you could be way more than that and it’s
a crime an ethical crime for you to
allow all that necessary potential to go
to waste it hurts you it hurts your
family it hurts the world really really
it does and people think oh okay
I give it and they do get it because
they know at some level
rule number two take responsibility you
know the idea that in some sense you’re
an eternal victim well there’s a truth
in that given that nature is conspiring
to destroy you and will be successful in
the end that you’re undermined by your
own Society at the same time you’re
buttressed by it and that you’re a
target of your own malevolence and that
of others I mean so there’s plenty
there’s there’s a triad of tragic and
malevolent forces that are aimed
directly at your heart and that’s always
the case but but to not take
responsibility for that and to attribute
a tribute to that to to a cosmic
injustice or a social sociological
injustice in some sense that’s aimed
particularly you that’s somehow the
fault of others is to miss the great
adventure of your life in that adoption
of that adventurous mode of being
there’s a deep meaning to be found and a
meaning maybe that transcends just you
that involves your family and that
involves your community and maybe even
the destiny of humanity itself but
there’s nothing about that that’s secure
easy and very little it has to do with
happiness the the idea that your problem
should be solved for you let’s say and
that it’s unfair that you have them well
it it it’s attractive in that there’s
nothing for you to do except complain
but but it’s horrifying in that there’s
nothing for you to do except complain
the difficulty is actually the funny
thing is is the difficulty is actually
the destiny and it is insanely difficult
but maybe you’re insane lay up to the
task
rule number three confront suffering
I’ve watched people do very difficult
things like people who work in
palliative care wards so all they’re
ever dealing with is pain and death
right and they can do it get up in the
morning they go to work and they take
care of those people they lose people on
a weekly basis and yet they can do it
and what that shows is that if you turn
around and you confront the suffering
voluntarily you find out that you are
way tougher than you think it’s not that
life is better than you think life is as
harsh as you think it might even be
worse but you are way tougher than you
think if you turn around and confront it
and so then what you discover is that
there’s a spirit within you that pursues
something that can pursue something
meaningful that has the resilience and
the strength to contend properly with
the catastrophe of existence without
becoming bitter that’s actually the
central so and then I would say that’s
one of the central themes of the twelve
rules for life is that make no mistake
about it like the first noble truth of
Buddhism life is suffering this is true
and it’s worse than that because it’s
suffering contaminated by malevolence
that’s the baseline but and so that’s
very pessimistic but the optimistic part
is that you are so damn tough you can
actually not only deal with that you can
improve it it’s like oh well that’s a
horrible situation but it turns out that
I’m armed for the task
well that’s that’s a great thing for
people to know and I do believe I think
the fact that we’re armed for the task
is even more true than the fact that
life is catastrophe contaminated by
malevolence we’re stronger than things
are terrible
so how things are pretty terrible so
that means we’re pretty damn strong Wow
yes it’s a very good thing to know and
it’s not naive optimism it’s a very
different thing it’s like no things are
terrible they’re brutal and you are so
damn tough you can’t believe it
rule number four pursue meaning not
happiness we’ve had a long conversation
in our culture about the necessity for
self esteem and happiness and that’s not
what I’m talking about I tell my
audiences and my readers very
straightforwardly that life is difficult
and that there’s a lot of suffering in
it and that you have to learn how to
conduct yourself in the face of that the
problem with the pursuit of happiness is
that when life’s storms come along
happiness disappears and then you’re
left with nothing and so you need to
pursue something that’s deeper than
happiness and if happiness comes along
well then hooray for you you don’t want
to despise it because it’s fleeting but
it’s much better to pursue things that
are meaningful than things that make you
happy it’s deeper and and it Orient’s
you more appropriately in it and it
keeps you centered in your own life and
makes you more useful for your family
and your community so a lot of what
people find in life that provides them
with a sustaining meaning is a
consequence of not the pursuit of Rights
or the pursuit of happiness or or the or
the or the development of self-esteem
but the adoption of responsibilities and
the more responsibility in some sense
the better responsibility for yourself
from making sure that your life lays
itself out like it should
responsibility for your family
responsibility for the community it’s
people who take responsibility that are
the ones that you admire and that’s the
right pathway through life that’s where
meaning is to be found and I think
that’s probably the crucial issue is
that identification of a profound
relationship between responsibility and
meaning and for many of the people that
I’m talking with it seems like that’s
the first time that that’s been
articulated for them rule number five
find your why you love to quote this
line this Nietzsche line that anyone who
has a why to live for can endure almost
any how
what’s your why what is driving you you
see when people read history they either
read it as a detached observer or they
tend to read it as well maybe the heroic
the heroic protagonist people like do it
imagine that they would be Schindler in
Schindler’s List but that’s wrong so
because the probability that you’ll be
the perpetrator is much higher
especially merely the perpetrator who’s
ensconced in silence when silence is not
the appropriate thing so I wanted to
having figured out what constituted Hell
in the pathway to that which would be I
suppose the cowardice that produces the
cowardice and resentment that produces
either complicitous in those events or
failure to oppose them when they emerge
I wanted to understand what the opposite
of that was because I think that’s what
needs to be learned from what happened
in the 20th century and so that’s why I
wrote maps of meaning was to understand
that and to lay out what the opposite
was and then that turned out to be
extremely helpful to me and then to the
people I started to teach about that
because it’s useful to know what the
opposite of hell is and I’ve been
teaching those things to people since
1993 that’s 25 years and the response
from the students has always been the
same sort of response that I’m getting
now absent some of the negative
characterizations let’s say which which
have emerged that for particular reasons
but the students have always said one of
two things and and this is the vast
majority of them this isn’t
cherry-picked responses it’s been the
same everywhere they tell me and this is
the same response I get from my
audiences now too is they say you’ve
given me words to explain things to
explain and understand things that I
always knew to be true or I was in a
very dark place for one of the seven
reasons that people might be in a dark
place alcohol or drugs or failure of
relationships or lack of vision or
nihilism or or hopelessness or
depression or anxiety if you know all
the pitfalls that people can encounter
and I’ve been developing a vision for my
life and trying to adopt responsibility
trying to be careful with what I say and
things are way better and that’s what
drives me rule number six live your
truth what’s your definition of
well greatness is what reveals itself
when you when you attempt to formulate
when you attempt to carefully articulate
and live out what you believe to be true
it just happens because there isn’t
anything more powerful than truth right
that’s the antidote to suffering truth
right so it’s a strange thing because
you think well yeah produces a lot of
suffering too it’s like yeah in the
short term rule number seven get better
every day what’s the goal of life
according to some of the more recent
pieces you’ve been writing I would say
that the goal in life is to conduct
yourself so that life improves at least
so that undo suffering is for stalled
but more than that so that’s its to
constrain malevolence and suffering to
the degree that that’s possible but then
also to work for a positive improvement
in things at every level and that’s
that’s how you should orient yourself if
I just try to be a little bit better
today than I was yesterday along the
lines that you’re speaking to try to
create that Symphony but you do better
at it today yesterday and like everybody
watching right now not compare myself to
somebody else yeah but rather to compare
myself to the future version of me yeah
is that a rational way compare yourself
to who you were yesterday not to someone
else is today
well that’s it’s not only appropriate
but I think it’s also practical and one
of the things about what I do including
my book is that I’m always trying to
take high-level abstract truths you know
fundamental truths and to make them
concrete and practical so that you can
implement them in your day to day life
because it’s the connection between
those abstractions and practical action
that really cements their meaning and
makes them comprehensible and this idea
of incremental improvement is a great
one now if there are things about your
life that are bothering you or things
about the world that are bothering you
then you want to decompose them into
solvable
problems and you do this if you have a
child this is the sort of thing that you
do naturally right because you want to
set your child a challenge that’s
sufficiently challenging to push them
forward in their development so that
makes it meaningful for the child that
puts them in the zone of proximal
development which is where where proper
maturation takes place they’ll find that
intrinsically meaningful you want to
make it challenging but also with a
reasonable probability of success and
that and there’s an art to that so you
want to set yourself a task that’s
difficult but not so difficult you can’t
attain it and then what happens is that
you step up improvement across time
incremental II and there’s also a
certain element of humility to it right
which is don’t bite off more than you
can chew right don’t set grandiose goals
but incremental improvement will get you
a tremendous distance rule number eight
have adventurous goals many times in
life people don’t get what they want and
they need because they don’t aim at it
and it’s a hard lesson for people to
learn because they’re cynical to begin
with and they presume that there’s no
possible way of moving forward but it’s
not so unreasonable to assume that
you’re not going to hit what you don’t
aim at or you’re not going to hit what
you aim at and don’t shoot at and I’ve
seen time and time again that if people
do put forward a vision for what they
regard as worthy of pursuit which is
something you have to determine in
dialogue with yourself it’s like given
the difficult preconditions of existence
is there anything that you could
conceive of that you would regard as
sufficiently worthwhile so that you
would be motivated to pursue it it’s a
it’s a it’s a profound philosophical
question and it’s not an unreasonable
one it’s it’s a good place to start it’s
like well life is difficult and enough
to make you cynical and bitter and
perhaps enough to make you cynical and
bitter and suicidal and homicidal and
even genocide ‘el and it’s not
surprising in some sense and then the
question is well is there something that
edible or perhaps even desirable which
is something to do that justifies the
suffering and it’s hard to say what that
would be for each of you it’s something
that you can discover this is partly why
Nietzsche was wrong
Nietzsche thought that after God had
died that human beings would have to
invent their own values but the
psychoanalysts I would say Jung foremost
among them put forward a very powerful
counter claim which was that
well you can’t invent values they’re
already built into you you have to
discover them and I think that’s true
for each person it’s like well what
would justify you and in the abandonment
of your resentment and hostility what
would be a sufficiently adventurous goal
rule number nine struggle up the hill
they say do you believe in God let’s say
and my response to that always is well I
don’t know what you mean when you ask me
that question so I don’t know how to
answer it I don’t know what you mean by
belief but I can tell you something that
I believe and I would say this is a way
of speaking symbolically I do believe so
I was thinking the other day a week ago
I was thinking about this little fantasy
that entered my mind I was thinking
about st. Joseph’s oratorio in Montreal
and st. Joseph’s oratory o is a very
large religious building it’s one of the
biggest cathedral like structures in the
world and it said on the hill and won’t
royal and it’s set up where it can catch
the Sun you know so it’s an image of the
heavenly city on the hill right it’s an
image of the structures that we strive
to create that’s what it is an
independent of its specifically
Christian or religious function that’s
what it stands for symbolically okay so
it’s the city on the hill it’s it’s what
we’re striving towards when we walk
uphill in life
okay now the way the the oratorio is
structured there’s hundreds of steps
leading to it up the front and in the
early part of the 20th century a lot of
people who had physical disabilities
came there and they struggled up the
step on their crutches and many of them
left their crutches in the oratorio you
can see hundreds of them if you go there
it’s quite an interesting sight and I
was thinking about that and I was
thinking about what that man
this is what it means it means that you
know everyone has their disabilities
let’s say and I know that some people
are far more terribly affected than
other people I’m perfectly aware of that
but the question is what do you do about
that and what you do is you you set
yourself up on your damn crutches and
you struggle up the bloody hill that’s
what you do and you struggle up the hill
towards the kingdom of God that’s what
you do because the alternative is to
descend into the abyss that’s the
alternative and then so to say well do
you believe it’s like I believe that you
should struggle uphill towards the City
of God on your crutches that’s what you
should do that’s the opposite of the
descent into the abyss and so that’s
that’s at the foundation of our
civilization that idea well argue with
it if you will see if you can figure out
why that’s not an acceptable idea maybe
you should help someone struggle up the
hill perhaps you should you know you can
lend a hand to someone although you
don’t want to take the burden away from
them entirely because there’s something
noble about struggling up the damn Hill
right there’s something that’s adventure
that’s the call to proper being it’s
like well we don’t need to forget this
you know we don’t need to forget it the
universities have been there since time
immemorial to try to push that idea
forward through the generations and
everyone needs to know that idea that’s
what gives your life not happiness
forget about that if it comes well great
accept it dignity nobility character
truth responsibility beauty those are
the things to aim for and rule number 10
the last one before a very special bonus
clip is fight for your beliefs I don’t
I’ve had journalists say well what makes
you think that your right to free speech
Trump’s the right of someone to not be
offended and I think that’s really the
level of our political discourse okay so
we’ll run a little thought experiment so
I’m talking to one person I’m talking to
you and the rule is I don’t get to
offend you okay maybe we can still have
a discussion about something difficult
but let’s say I’m talking to ten people
and about an important thing now I have
to make sure that I don’t say anything
to fight despite the
this is an important and contentious
issue that I don’t say anything that
offends even one of those ten people
okay maybe I can even manage that what
if I’m talking to a thousand people
there’s going to be someone in that
thousand people there’s gonna be someone
who’s offended at the mere fact that I
exist
so it’s an impossible standard it’s like
well you can’t say anything offensive
okay fine
then you can’t say anything okay so what
you don’t get to say anything because no
one should be offended well then you
don’t get to think well what happens if
you don’t think well then you can’t
negotiate your way through the future
and you fall into a pit and so does
everyone else so that’s where that all
ends up you can’t say offensive things
equals you cannot negotiate your way
properly through the future equals
everyone suffers well that’s a bad
that’s a bad strategy so and it’s and
it’s all covered up with well you know
it’d be better if no one was ever
offended it’s like well who thinks that
you know how naive you have to be to
think that how you have to be
pathologically naive which is the kind
of naive that you could have grown out
of
but you willfully refused to because you
weren’t willing to see what was in front
of your face and then you impose that
blind naivety on everyone else because
you don’t want to allow them to upset
your like
rosy view your rosy view of yourself in
the world there’s it’s just there’s no
now I’ve got a really special bonus clip
from Jordan Peterson on how to have an
aim that I think you’re really gonna
enjoy but before that it’s time for the
three-point landing question it’s time
to move from just watching another video
to actually taking action and if you’re
feeling bold leave your answers in the
comments below here we go question
number one what beliefs are you fighting
for number two what is your most
adventurous goal and number three how
are you pursuing meaning not happiness
while the suffering is pain and the
suffering is anxiety and uncertainty and
the suffering is hopelessness but the
consequence of all that is that you get
bitter and when you get bitter you get
mean and you get cruel and you start to
hurt yourself and other people so it’s
not only that if you don’t have a goal
you suffer it’s that you if you don’t
have a goal you suffer and then you get
cruel and bitter and resentful and then
you start to actively try to make the
world a worse place mm-hmm and so so
because you can’t suffer pointlessly
without becoming bitter and you can’t
become bitter without becoming cruel so
you need a name the question is then the
question of course is what you should
name yeah that’s for sure
so then the question is what should your
aim be but it’s not easy to ask people
to say well it’s easy to ask them what
do you want your life it’s a very hard
question to answer because it’s too
vague and grande so we help in the
future authoring program we help people
break that down it’s okay so here’s the
situation so you put yourself in the
right frame of mind so what’s the right
frame of mind
it’s like rule 2 in this book treat
yourself like you’re someone responsible
for helping you’re someone that you are
responsible for helping so what that
means is you have to start from the
presupposition that despite all your
flaws and insufficiencies that it’s
worth having you around and that it
would be ok if things are better for you
so you need to take care of yourself
like you’re taking care of someone you
care for so there’s a bit of a
detachment in that and then the next
thing is ok so now look 3 to 5 years
down the road okay you get to have what
you need and want
assuming you’re being reasonable and
that you actually want it which means
you’re willing to make the sacrifices
that would that would make it possible
what do you mean by reasonable well that
does that’s the next thing well within
your grasp that would be something what
if something is out of your grasp but
you still push hard enough well then you
need an incremental plant right you need
to break that goal down into step out
some crazy goal within a year that’s
like you haven’t even done the
to master a skill yet yeah yeah well
that’s it and you can have a high end
goal and more power to you if you do
need it well you need a pathway to it
you know if you if it’s ten stories up
above you you need a staircase to get
there right and so you have to build the
if you want more Jordan Peterson check
out the top 50 rules video I made on him
the link is right there next to me I
think you’ll enjoy it continue to
believe and I’ll see you there stop
doing the things that you know are wrong
that you could stop do it’s like we’re built for struggle as human beings
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