These are my notes from the great book "The 12 Rules For Life" by Jordan Peterson
· The
Rules
13. Extras
1. Stand up straight with your shoulders back.
The first rule in The 12 Rules for Life is “Stand up straight with your shoulders back.” The author means this both literally and symbolically. Dr. Peterson uses neuroscience and evolutionary biology to explain the physical benefits of standing up straight. Your nervous system responds in an entirely different matter when you face the demands of life voluntarily.
Symbolically, to stand up straight is to take responsibility for your life. Embrace Being, and move forth right into the world. Strive for what’s better. You do not hit a target you don’t aim for. Make goals and a map for your life. Find out the price to be paid to achieve your goals. Decide to embark on the journey to make the necessary changes to improve your life.
The first rule in The 12 Rules for Life is “Stand up straight with your shoulders back.” The author means this both literally and symbolically. Dr. Peterson uses neuroscience and evolutionary biology to explain the physical benefits of standing up straight. Your nervous system responds in an entirely different matter when you face the demands of life voluntarily.
Symbolically, to stand up straight is to take responsibility for your life. Embrace Being, and move forth right into the world. Strive for what’s better. You do not hit a target you don’t aim for. Make goals and a map for your life. Find out the price to be paid to achieve your goals. Decide to embark on the journey to make the necessary changes to improve your life.
2.
Treat yourself like
someone you are responsible for helping.
Responsible parents are supportive and treat their children with care. Dr. Peterson suggests we should treat ourselves in the same manner. You should take care of yourself with attention. Consider what would be truly good for you. Do not underestimate the power of vision and direction.
Dr. Peterson cited a study that people are more likely to give prescribed medications to their pets than take their own medications. Humans are self-conscious and don’t care for themselves as well as they should. Listen to your self-talk. Talk to yourself everyday like your supportive best friend.
Responsible parents are supportive and treat their children with care. Dr. Peterson suggests we should treat ourselves in the same manner. You should take care of yourself with attention. Consider what would be truly good for you. Do not underestimate the power of vision and direction.
Dr. Peterson cited a study that people are more likely to give prescribed medications to their pets than take their own medications. Humans are self-conscious and don’t care for themselves as well as they should. Listen to your self-talk. Talk to yourself everyday like your supportive best friend.
3.
Make friends with people who want
what’s best for you.
The third rule is about your friends. People we call ‘friends’ aren’t always the best for us. If you tell a true friend bad news, they will listen. They will show grief and be supportive. They won’t be secretly happy that you lost your job or got a divorce. If you tell a real friend good news, they will be genuinely happy for you and want to celebrate.
If you have a friend whose friendship you wouldn’t recommend to your sister, your father, or your son, why would you have such a friend for yourself?
Surround yourself with people who support your upward aim.
The third rule is about your friends. People we call ‘friends’ aren’t always the best for us. If you tell a true friend bad news, they will listen. They will show grief and be supportive. They won’t be secretly happy that you lost your job or got a divorce. If you tell a real friend good news, they will be genuinely happy for you and want to celebrate.
If you have a friend whose friendship you wouldn’t recommend to your sister, your father, or your son, why would you have such a friend for yourself?
Surround yourself with people who support your upward aim.
4.
Compare yourself to who you were
yesterday, not to who someone else is today.
Rule 4 reminded me of a wise old phrase “Comparison is the Thief of Joy.”
It is human nature for us to compare ourselves to others. That’s not the right comparison though. Humans are multidimensional and just because an individual appears to be doing well in one domain(professionally), that doesn’t mean they’re doing well in other areas of life.
The proper comparison is to who you were yesterday. Are you better than who you were yesterday? Think about your trajectory. Is it going in the right direction?
You can do something today, likely just a small thing, to improve where you’ll be tomorrow. Doing this every day for years will reshape you.
Dr. Peterson used an analogy of purchasing a home to highlight introspection. “Every home needs an inspection prior to purchase. You need an inspector for you. The internal critic could get you on track. Perhaps happiness is always to be found in the journey uphill and not in the fleeting sense of satisfaction or waiting at the next peek.”
Rule 4 reminded me of a wise old phrase “Comparison is the Thief of Joy.”
It is human nature for us to compare ourselves to others. That’s not the right comparison though. Humans are multidimensional and just because an individual appears to be doing well in one domain(professionally), that doesn’t mean they’re doing well in other areas of life.
The proper comparison is to who you were yesterday. Are you better than who you were yesterday? Think about your trajectory. Is it going in the right direction?
You can do something today, likely just a small thing, to improve where you’ll be tomorrow. Doing this every day for years will reshape you.
Dr. Peterson used an analogy of purchasing a home to highlight introspection. “Every home needs an inspection prior to purchase. You need an inspector for you. The internal critic could get you on track. Perhaps happiness is always to be found in the journey uphill and not in the fleeting sense of satisfaction or waiting at the next peek.”
Ask
yourself: Is there
one thing that exists in disarray in my life where I could, and would set
straight?
What
you aim at determines what you see. Aim in whatever direction that will make
your life better. You cannot aim yourself at anything if you are completely
undisciplined and untutored.
5.
Do not let your
children do anything that makes you dislike them
As a new parent, this chapter struck a chord. I found myself taking many notes.
Parents must reward attitudes and actions that will bring their child success in the world outside the family. Parents must use threats and punishment when necessary to eliminate behaviors that will lead to misery and failure. If a child has not been taught to behave properly by the age of four, it will forever be difficult for him or her to make friends.
Good rules for children:
·
Do
not torture or bully other children
·
Do
not bite kick or hit except in self-defense. .
·
Learn
to share
·
Pay
attention when spoken to by adults
·
Go
to sleep properly so that your parents can have a private life and not resent
your existence.
·
Take
care of your belongings, because you need to learn how and because you’re lucky
to have them.
·
Be
good company when something fun is happening, so you’re invited. Act so that
other people want to have you around.
“No” is a very important word in
parenting (and in life). What “no” means in the Final analysis is always:
“If you continue to do it, something you do
not like will happen to you. “
Otherwise it means nothing.
Don’t protect your child, encourage your child.
Don’t protect your child, encourage your child.
Timeout can be an extremely effective
form of punishment. Particularly if the misbehaving child is welcome as soon as
he controls his temper. An angry child should sit by himself until he calms
down. Then he should be allowed to return to normal life. The rule is “come be
with us as soon as you can behave properly”.
Disciplinary
principles:
·
Limits
the rules
·
Use
minimum necessary force
·
Parents
should come in pairs
·
Parents
have a duty to act as proxies for the real world
·
Parents
should understand their own capacity to be harsh, vengeful, arrogant,
resentful, angry, and deceitful
Do
not do anything for your child that they can do themselves. Make your children behave. Take
responsibility for their discipline. Take responsibility for the mistakes you
will inevitably make while disciplining. Apologize when you’re wrong and learn
to do better.
Clear
rules make for secure children and calm, rational parents. Do not let your
children do anything that makes you dislike them.
6.
Set your house in
perfect order before you criticize the world.
“If you cannot bring peace to your household, how dare you try to rule the city?” There are plenty of things wrong with the world. There’s much to complain about. Dr. Peterson speaks of the ‘anti-human’ strains growing in our world. He draws from the old biblical story of Cain & Abel. Cain had resentment towards God about his difficult existence. Rather than look inward, Cain blamed the creator, and took vengeance on God’s favorite, Abel. Negativity, nihilism, and resentment are powerful forces to contend with.
Stop doing what you know to be wrong.
Sort yourself out. Don’t waste time. You will begin to discover new, more
subtle things that you were doing wrong. Stop doing those too. After months and
years of diligent effort, your life will become simpler and less complicated.
Let
your own soul guide you. Watch what happens over the days and weeks. When you
are at work, you will begin to see what you really think. You will start to
tell your wife your children your parents what you really want and need.
7.
Pursue what is meaningful,
not what is expedient.
Life is suffering. There is great malevolence in our existence. Meaning is the antidote to those things.
Decide
what a meaningful life looks like to you. This will take much thought and
reflection. Consider your funeral. What’s going to be said about you? What do
you want to be said about you?
Aim
Up towards your meaningful life. Pay attention. Fix what you can fix. Don’t be
arrogant in your knowledge. Strive for humility.
You
may have to give up something of value today to get something better in the
future. Sacrifice now, gain later. It might be time to sacrifice what you love
best, so that you can become who you might become, instead of staying with who
you are.
8.
Tell the truth, or at
least don’t lie.
Many
times in life we have two options. Take the easy way out, or tell the truth.
Set
your ambitions, even if you were uncertain of what they should be. The better
ambitions have more to do with character and ability than status and power.
Status you can lose. Character and skills travel with you and allow you to
prevail against adversity.
If
you bend everything totally, blindly and willfully towards the attainment of a
goal, and only that goal, you will be blind to other goals that could better serve
you. That is one sacrifice if you do not tell the truth.
Everyone
needs a concrete, specific goal. An ambition and a purpose. But, all such goals
should be subordinated to what might be considered a meta-goal. This is a way
of approaching in formulating goals themselves. The Meta goal could be, “live
in truth. “This means, “act diligently towards some well-articulated, defined
and temporary end. Make your criteria for failure and success timely and clear,
at least for yourself (and even better if some else can understand what you are
doing and evaluate it with you)
9.
Assume that the
person you were listening to might know something you don’t.
You want to end a conversation wiser
than when you started. Truly listen to them actively. “What you don’t know is
more important than what you know”. If you really listen to people, you can
learn amazing things.
Dr. Peterson frames the following question, “Do you want to be the all-knowing tyrannical King, or do you want to be the continually transforming “fool” changing and learning all the time?”
He provides a great tip when having a deep conversation. After your conversation partner makes an argument, you reply with “What I hear you saying is….”, and then summarize their argument. This is useful to make sure both participants are on the same page.
Dr. Peterson frames the following question, “Do you want to be the all-knowing tyrannical King, or do you want to be the continually transforming “fool” changing and learning all the time?”
He provides a great tip when having a deep conversation. After your conversation partner makes an argument, you reply with “What I hear you saying is….”, and then summarize their argument. This is useful to make sure both participants are on the same page.
10. Be Precise in
your speech
Speech
is how we bring problems out of chaos to solve. If there are underlying issues
at work or in your relationships, it is through speech that the problems are
raised. Unaddressed, these conflicts can grow, become murkier, and usually get
worse. Careful, precise, and direct communication is how to remedy many of your
problems.
Communication
is key in moving forward in the world. The world is a complex place which is
why you must be Precise with your aim. Note your errors. Articulate
them. Strive to correct them.
11. Do not
bother children when they are skateboarding.
Children on playgrounds will push themselves.
It’s good for their development. Leave them alone, and let them fail. We need
to encourage our boys to be brave and courageous. Peterson claims that parents
who interfere with children while they are embracing risk are being “cowardice”.
Life is a call to adventure, not a riskless, bubble wrapped trip. Dr. Peterson
goes into further detail about positive masculinity and how we should be
fostering it in our young men.
The chapter goes into further detail about properly developed men and women. Peterson claims healthy women don’t want boys for partners, they want men. A tough woman usually wants someone tougher in a partner. Smart women want someone smarter.
The chapter goes into further detail about properly developed men and women. Peterson claims healthy women don’t want boys for partners, they want men. A tough woman usually wants someone tougher in a partner. Smart women want someone smarter.
12. Pet a Cat
When You Encounter One In the Street
This chapter is about finding hope
when life has taken a difficult turn. Life is hard. Tragic things will happen
to you. When you’re in a place and time that you’d rather not be, appreciate
and notice the small moments of joy that present themselves.
Dr. Peterson shares the hard challenges his family faced with his daughter’s health issues. His daughter suffered from several auto-immune conditions and needed dozens of surgeries before she was 12. She had to take massive amounts of opioids and several doctors said there was no cure for her conditions. The family wasn’t sure if she’d see her 20th birthday.
He shares that during this troubling time, a neighbor cat named Ginger, occasionally approached him on the street. The cat was friendly and wanted a bit of attention. This was an example of a brief moment of beauty worth cherishing.
Dr. Peterson shares the hard challenges his family faced with his daughter’s health issues. His daughter suffered from several auto-immune conditions and needed dozens of surgeries before she was 12. She had to take massive amounts of opioids and several doctors said there was no cure for her conditions. The family wasn’t sure if she’d see her 20th birthday.
He shares that during this troubling time, a neighbor cat named Ginger, occasionally approached him on the street. The cat was friendly and wanted a bit of attention. This was an example of a brief moment of beauty worth cherishing.
When things are going to
hell, shrink your time horizon down.
Perhaps when your life is going well, you can map out the next three
months or year. However, when you’re in a darker place, one may have to just
plan for the next week, the next day, or the next hour. He encourages people to
narrow their focus down to a time horizon that is manageable.
13.
Extras:
There’s
a final chapter where Dr. Peterson asks himself some challenging questions. He
reveals these answers to readers, as the questions can apply to everyone.
What should I do tomorrow?
·
The
most good possible in the shortest period of time.
What shall I do next year?
·
Try
to ensure that the good I do then will be exceeded only by the good I do the
year after that.
What shall I do with my life?
·
Aim
for paradise, and concentrate on today.
What shall I do with my wife?
·
Treat
her as if she is the holy mother so that she may give birth to a world
redeeming hero.
What shall I do with my daughter?
·
Stand
by her, listen to her, care for her, train her mind, and let her know it’s OK
if she wants to be a mother. Encourage her in everything she wants to courageously
do. Also include a genuine appreciation for the fact of her femininity calling
to include and recognize the importance of having a family and children.
What shall I do with my parents?
·
Act
such that your actions justified the suffering they endured. Remember all the
sacrifices, love your parents and your grandparents. Be grateful for all the
progress that has been made.
What shall I do with my son?
·
Encourage
him to be true, set his sights at the good, the beautiful, and then focus
carefully on the concerns of each moment. Encourage your son to do what is
right, and to strive to have his back while he is doing so.
Sources:
·
Book
12 Rules For Life – An Antidote to Chaos By Jordan Peterson
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