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Foreword
This book was very interesting. It had a lot of stories and deep knowledge of different things in depth along with the explanation and application of the rules. Even though the book was a little long in appearance (It was 350 pages long, your call if you want to call it long or not. 😝) It was an easy to read. The stories were intriguing and sometimes it was hard to put the book down. The book was very detailed so I have included only the most important parts in the newsletter. Take my word for it, if you want to read a non-fiction book that will amaze you, read this book, high chances, that you will love it. There are some rules which are metaphors and I will explain them too. As the summary is detailed, it might be a little lengthy, but trust me it is worth it. Dr. Peterson in the whole book focuses on how life is full of suffering and how you can’t avoid it. But with these rules, you can learn how to handle it.
1. STAND UP STRAIGHT WITH YOUR SHOULDERS BACK
Scientists have been using lobsters to understand human behaviour. Like other animals (and humans too), lobsters like to maintain a hierarchy. Territorial rights and social status go hand in hand for them. It is often a matter of life and death. The most dominant bird and animal occupy the best territory and have better chances of mating with higher quality mates. Contrary to popular belief, lobsters learn this on their own, not by watching others. If you would take a lobster who was born and brought up in an aquarium, and leave it out in the wild, it will automatically compete among other lobsters for a higher place in hierarchy.
Fun Fact: When the dominant lobster loses, it affects its brain. It affects so much that it will dissolve and grow a new brain that is more appropriate according to its social status.
Price’s Law (1963): An empirical rule which states that the majority of scientific publications in any field of study would likely come from a comparatively small number of authors.
Matthew Principle (Matthew 25:29): To those who have everything, more will be given; from those who have nothing, everything will be taken.
Now humans also stay in hierarchy naturally. To improve their ranking in the hierarchy instead of fist fighting, they compete in other things like skills, money, power, etc. Like lobsters, the better social status of a person, the better options they get for mating, they live a better life, have better neighbourhoods, etc. And the better ranking, the better confidence you will have. When you are confident you have better posture, you stand straight, you don’t slouch. You can induce confidence in yourself by having a better posture and this confidence will make you rise the status ladder.
2. TREAT YOURSELF LIKE SOMEONE YOU ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR HELPING
Generally people tend to have a slackish attitude when it comes to taking care of their own health. They won’t take proper medication or rest to get better. They will not do things that are good for them. They will give in to cheat days even when they know it is bad for them. But when they need to do the same for someone they care for like their partner, parents, kids or even pets. They will make sure they take proper medications and proper rest, they will do things that are good for them.
Author also talks about order and chaos in this rule. He tells how traditionally order is symbolically associated with masculinity. This is perhaps because hierarchy in nature is generally formed by males. Order is explored territory. It’s where you know everything and nothing new comes to disturb you. Similarly, traditionally chaos is symbolically with femininity as all the things we know were born of the unknown, just like everything we know were born of mothers.
When you look after yourself like you look after someone whom you care for or are responsible to look after, you will look after yourself much more seriously. You will not do things for short term gain. You will do things that are actually good for you instead of doing things that feel good. When you look after others with such care, why shouldn’t you look after yourself the same way. Afterall, you are the most important person to yourself.
3. MAKE FRIENDS WITH PEOPLE WHO WANT THE BEST FOR YOU
Sometimes, when people have a low opinion of their own worth or perhaps when they refuse responsibilities for their lives - they choose a new acquaintance, of precisely the type who proved troublesome in the past. Such people don’t believe that they can deserve any better. Sigmund Freud called this a “repetition compulsion.” When people choose people who are not better than them they get a false sense of security that whatever they are doing is quite good as no one in their circle is doing better than them in their circle. These friends will neither stop you from doing stupid things nor they will punish you for doing mistakes which you could have avoided. They will look away from your bad behaviour letting you be as you are or even let you get worse.
When you make friends with people who want the best for you, you have an inner hope for improving. Because if you don’t want to improve yourself, no one else can. These good friends will help you in making you better. They will put in efforts from their side in an attempt to make you better. They will appreciate you when you do good things and punish you when you do stupid bad things.They will not over look your bad behaviour. And when you are in a good company, you will want to improve too. These friends will motivate you to be better.
4. COMPARE YOURSELF TO WHO YOU WERE YESTERDAY, NOT WHO SOMEONE ELSE IS TODAY
When people are young and live in small towns and small schools, they are good at one thing or another. So good, they are known for that by people around them. But when they move to cities with bigger populations, they feel discarded as they are not special anymore. Similarly, when people start with something new, they will look at someone and see that the other person is so much better than them. They start feeling bad about themselves. This method of comparison is absolutely wrong and you are ruining things for yourself when you do this.
Someone else is not your competition. Your competition is you. Everyone has their own pace. When you compare your day 1 to someone else’s day 1000, you just demoralise yourself. What you should instead do is, you look at yourself. Look who you were yesterday and compare it with today. Observe how you have grown today, what new things did you learn today (For example, yesterday you didn’t know the summary of the book, but today you have already learnt four out of twelve rules.) Once you compare yourself to yourself, you will be focused on yourself more than you would on others, you will see your small flaws and then you will know how to correct them.
5. DO NOT LET YOUR CHILDREN DO ANYTHING THAT MAKES YOU DISLIKE THEM
Children are hungry for attention. This attention comes from parents, peers or even other people. This attention is necessary for their growth too. When they fail to grab attention, they will do something a little more attention seeking. And they will do a little worse every time they fail to get attention. This same thing applies to when kids do a bad thing. If they are not stopped, they will continue doing that and will even grow worse. For example if you don’t stop your child when they snatch away someone else’s toy, they will do it again and they will snatch other kids’ toys too. And with time, this habit will become worse. When the kids are all grown up and they will show this kind of behaviour, you will resent them. This includes not finishing their food, sleeping late, fighting with other kids, etc. So, instead of letting that phase ever come into your life, you stop them from doing things that make you resent them.
6. SET YOUR HOUSE IN PERFECT ORDER BEFORE YOU CRITICISE THE WORLD
When we look at the world, we see it is full of flaws and we imagine how good it would be if it was in perfect order. Many of us are ambitious enough to fix it too. But what we forget is that, we too, are full of flaws. We focus more on the outside world rather than ourselves. We try to fix the world when we should be fixing ourself.
If you cannot bring peace to your household, how dare you try to rule a city?
When you are good yourself, only then you can ask others to correct themselves and become better others. And once you become better, the world becomes a little better too.
7. PURSUE WHAT IS MEANINGFUL (NOT WHAT IS EXPEDIENT)
Expedient means to help with ulterior motives or for personal benefits. To share doesn’t mean to give away something you value, get nothing back. That is instead only what every child who refuses to share fear it means. To share properly is to initiate trade. A child who can’t share - who can’t trade - can’t have friends, because having friends is a form of trade. If you are disciplined and privilege the future over the present you can change the structure in your favour.
Expedience is the following of the bond impulse, it’s short-term gain. It’s narrow and selfish. It is to get its way. It takes nothing into account. It is immature and irresponsible. Meaning is its mature replacement. Meaning emerges when impulses are regulated, organised and unified. Meaning emerges from the interplay between possibilities of the world.
When you do things for the sake of doing good or for the meaning, you get a different satisfaction. You add a little goodness to the world. Meaning signifies that you are in the right place, at the right time, properly balanced between order and chaos, where everything is as best as it can be at that moment.
8. TELL THE TRUTH - OR ATLEAST, DON’T LIE
Taking the easy way out or telling the truth - they are not merely two different choices. They are different pathways through life. They are two utterly different ways of existing. We tell small lies to justify our bad behaviour and lying. We sometimes tell these lies even to not hurt others feelings. These lies include saying yes when you wanted to say no to your boss, your partner or anyone else. These lies make you resent something everytime you lie. And over time the resentment grows so big that it inflicts a conflict.
It is better to have small conflicts by telling the truth to have a good and healthy relationship in future rather than lying now and possibly ruining your relationship.
If you betray yourself, if you say untrue things, if you act out a lie, you weaken your character. If you have a weak character, then adversity will mow you down when it appears, as it will, inevitable. You will hide, but there will be no place left to hide. And you will find yourself doing terrible things. An inauthentic person continues to perceive and act in ways that his own experience has demonstrated false. He does not speak with his own voice.If your life is not what it could be, try telling the truth. If you cling desperately to an ideology, or wallow in nihilism, try telling the truth. In paradise everyone speaks the truth, that’s what makes it paradise.
9. ASSUME THE PERSON YOU ARE LISTENING TO MIGHT KNOW SOMETHING YOU DON’T
A lot of people have conversations just for the sake of speaking, you don’t learn anything new. You close all the doors for learning new things. This holds true for talking to yourself. People think that they think when they don’t. It’s mostly self criticism. Thinking is listening to yourself. It’s difficult. To think you need to be atleast two people at the same time. Then you have to let these people disagree. Thinking is an internal dialogue between two or more different views of the world. True thinking is complex and demanding. It requires you to be an articulate speaker and a careful, judicious listener, at the same time. It involves conflict. So, you have to tolerate conflict.So, you have to learn to give and take and modify your premises and adjust your thoughts - even your perceptions of the world. Sometimes it results in the defeat and elimination of one or more internal avatars.
To improve your listening ability, Carl Rogers suggested that ‘Each person can speak up for himself only after he has first restated the ideas and feelings of the previous speaker accurately, and to the speaker’s satisfaction.’
10. BE PRECISE IN YOUR SPEECH
People refuse to specify, be it problems, their feelings, etc. Why refuse to specify, when specifying the problem would enable its solution? Because to specify the problem, is to admit that it exists. To specify the problem is to allow yourself to know what you want, say from friend or family, then you will know, precisely and cleanly, when you don’t get it, and that will hurt, sharply and specifically. But you will learn something from that, and use what you learn in the future. The alternative to that single sharp pain is the dull ache of continued hopelessness and vague failure and the sense that time, precious time, is slipping by. When you speak clearly, the other person will understand more clearly. This removes the fog of uncertainty and leaves nothing to assumptions.
Say what you mean, so that you can find out what you mean. Act out what you say, so you can find out what happens. Then pay full attention. Note your errors. Articulate them. Strive to correct them. That is how you discover the meaning of your life. That will protect you from the tragedy in your life. Admit what you want. Tell those around who you are, precisely.
11. DO NOT BOTHER CHILDREN WHEN THEY ARE SKATEBOARDING
People including children don’t seek to minimise risk. They seek to optimise it. When playgrounds are made too safe, kids either stop playing in them or start playing in unintended ways. Overprotected we will fail when something dangerous, unexpected and full of opportunity suddenly makes its appearance, as it inevitably will. Skateboarding, here, signifies the risky things people, specially children, do. If you stop them from doing dangerous things (like skateboarding), they will not fall and will not learn to get up on their own. Which is very necessary for their growth. People learn when they face hardships. People who never faced hardships are too fragile and vulnerable in the real world. Protect your children, but let them hurt themselves a little. Let them fall while walking, scrape their knees on slides, get scratches while petting a cat, etc.
12. PET A CAT WHEN YOU ENCOUNTER ONE ON STREET
This is very helpful, if you are someone who finds themselves dwelling upon their misery all the time.
Set aside some time to talk and to think about the illness or other crisis and how it should be managed everyday. Do not talk or think about it otherwise. If you do not limit its effect, you will become exhausted, and everything will spiral into the ground. This is not helpful. Conserve your strength. You're in a war, not a battle, and a war is composed of many battles. You must stay functional through all of them. When worries associated with the crisis arise at other times, remind yourself that you will think them through, during the scheduled period. This usually works. The part of your brain that generates anxiety is more interested in the fact that there is a plan rather than details of the plan. Don't schedule your time to think in the evening or night. Then you won't be able to sleep. If you can't sleep then everything will go rapidly downhill.
And Dr. Peterson doesn’t mind if you pet dogs too 😇 . Dogs are loving creatures, they are our allies, they like getting petted and domesticated. Cats however are not very fond of getting petted unless they want you to. They will only come to pet you if they feel like other times, they will just ignore your whole existence. But when you pet a cat (or a dog) for a brief moment, you forget all your problems and crises. You live in the moment. The moment of happiness and satisfaction of satisfying a cat. And that is important.
This is all for this month’s book. I hope you liked it.