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Week 5 [05-11.11.18] Dr. Jordan B. Peterson

In the past months, I started to follow Dr. Jordan B. Peterson. He is a clinical psychologist and professor at the University of Toronto. As a clinical psychologist, he has met a big number of people with problems in their life which helped him to understand deeper and summarise all kind of problems that people stumble. Moreover, his ability to select the right words and manner of speaking made him one of the best speaker who currently lives today.


Questions:
1. Have you heard about this person?
2. Do you agree with his point of view?
3. Have you already decided which goal to pursue in your life?

Comments

Unknown said…
1. No I've never heard of him.
2. Yes I can partly agree with his point of view. It reminded me of the imposter syndrom. Doubting about your own achievement, thinking you do not deserve what you have already achieved. Being a good loser is a also great point. Because if we choose always competitions in which we are good at, we will not get reasonably better. We won't feel the struggle, because how? Failing leads to improvement. It's like building a house. Every block stands for a failure. But in the end there will be roof imaging our sucess. For some of us the path is long and hard for others less difficult, but it leads to the same result.
3. Enjoying every minute of life. It doesn't matter if it is work or holidays. There is always something enjoyable in our actions. Lower your expectations, because it will never be as perfect as we imagine. Staying humble, there are many people which had a different start point then you. Being thankfull for what we have instead of complaining what we don't.
I heard of him and I actually watched quite a few of his videos on Youtube. He's is actually considered a controversial person, especially by liberals. But regardless of that, I found a lot of interesting ideas in his lectures, some of which are definitely worth considering.
I like this video very much. Especially the part with imagining your ideal future and your worst hell. I think every few years people should do this exercise to reorient themselves in life. Our priorities change, we achieve our goals and we need some new to strive. Our brains function in a certain way. We make dozens of small choices each day - what we eat, how we move, what we learn, how we spend our free time, how we talk to others, what we buy etc. We don't really think much about those choices, but they compound, they create our life and they push us in a certain direction. What we eat changes how we look, influences our health. How we talk to people, with whom we spend our time influences our careers, love life and general happiness. So if we set our priorities straight, if we realize what's important once every some time, it will help us pick the choices which will push us in the right direction. And living just day to day will not bring us any closer to a good life. At some point, you will stop and just ask yourself "how did I get here?". And the answer will always be "by making small choices that mattered".
I'm trying to remember about those choices I make and about the future I want to create. Right now my focus in life is to change my career - that's why I'll finish my engineering degree soon and hopefully find a new, satisfying job. And then I'll have to think what kind of future I want to create next.
I have never heard of Dr. Jordan B. Peterson.

I did not notice anything cynical in this video in particular. However, there is something that I would like to point out -- the thing, that many religions implement as a tool for guiding people. Hell and Heaven -- they can be encountered in one way or another in any religion. They serve as a reward/punishment for people's actions. While atheists are robbing themselves out of this kind of moralism, and thus, opt to seek the guidance in logic and own judjments, I can argue that the religious concept does not present the optimal solution for this. Amongst all options that I have swept through, surprisingly Satanism concept seems the most logical for me. According to the moralism of that religion, nothing happens after one's death. You just simply stop your existence and cannot experience anything since your senses are disabled as well as any kind of procedural thinking with your brain. What really matters is your life at this very moment and the existence in this world can be represented by Heaven as well as complete Hell. The life itself could be your cloud nine or worst nightmare. One is in a full control of his destiny. Sounds completely logical for me. And ironically, that pretty much sums up what all that psychologists are seeking to convey in all those motivational videos. I am not telling anything about other aspects of this particular religion, I am just sharing my impression about this concept of life itself being Hell or Heaven. Faber est suae quisque fortunae.
Unknown said…
Never heard about him, but there is a reason in his words. I hate those wannabe life-guru guys that say "Live today" or "Live this day like this is the last one". These statements are destructive, they make you feel like there will be no responsibility in the future for what you have done in one particular day. On a contrary, Dr. Peterson's position is based on taking the responsibility for your actions, and in my opinion, this is the right direction. Nobody will make you happy except yourself, nobody will build your life for you.
I already have my goals, but I still need more planning and I have to put more efforts than now. And if it is hard now, I am frightened about how harder it will become than. At some point you realize that you is your most dangerous enemy. Each day is the fight between internal hell and heaven, isn't it?
Unknown said…
No, I’ve never heard about him.

Yes, I do agree with his point of view. Especially I like this one "you have to be a good loser". I understood it quite recently and this is definitely one of the best quotes from this video. Pushing yourself to the edge/limit is so extremely useful. I only regret I haven’t realized it before. Always trying something new and growing your experience along with the potential is incredible. It brings new colors, emotions and moments in your life. We won’t get so much from the things we are already good at. Maybe we will get better(but mostly stay on the same level) but the difference between what we would achieve in new sphere that we haven’t tried is huge.

As for me "be the best version of yourself" sounds good enough, doesn’t it? I don’t have a concrete goal right now but I constantly trying to get to know something new. I believe that right now I am on the stage of gathering the knowledge that’s why I can’t answer your question(right now!).
Unknown said…
First time saw him a little bit more than a year ago. The amount of power he radiate to the world is huge so I watch A LOT of his videos trying to identify what is that thing that give him that kind of self-confidence. In the end I figure out that it's amount of knowledge he have and all those different point of view he considered before he made his mind about something. His ability to use language as a tool is amazing. Waiting for his book to came out I was disappointed with amount of reference to god and bible and religion he make and couldn't finish it...
Unknown said…
No, I hadn’t.
Yes, it’s interesting point of view. I like his thought about choosing the level of life and good losing. I had situation when I was the best pupil in school, but because of it I can’t move forward, learn something new. That’s why I change school and it helps me become better and grow up.
Yes. My goal is became good programmer,thoroughly learn Java.

Unknown said…
Great points.
I suggest to check his lectures. He has same points which he uses to help people to understand how to live better.
Unknown said…
Yeah, he is mostly popular because of this controversy. But it made more people to listen his words which is not that bad.
As you said, it is important to stop and recap every step that has led to this point.

Wish you luck in your plans.
Unknown said…
Great point of view. I respect it.
I am not a religion person so this usually does not bother me.
However, from what you have written I have only one question:
If person is an atheist and does not believes that there is no afterlife, does it make him a satanist?
Unknown said…
I have never heard about Dr. Jordan Peterson

I strongly agree with his viewpoint, in his talk he mentions key aspects of living a conscious life. First keyword is “responsibility” that means that we and only we are responsible for how our life will look life. We have to think about our expectations, goals, people who are important to us and once we know what do we want to achieve we can start planning our activities accordingly. Another message from Dr, Peterson which I find very valuable is the simple truth known as “no pain, no gain”, that means we have to push ourselves to the limit and be on the edge of our skills and abilities, because it is the only way we can develop our skills and learn new things.

I am constantly setting new goals in my life as I think it is the perfect way to achieve more and more in my life. My goals are rather small and realistic so I can prepare exact plan and timeline for achieving them.
This is the first time I'm hearing about this person, but I already impressed by his speech.
It's indeed powerful what he says. I would like to say thanks to the author of this post for reviling Dr. Jordan B. for me and everyone else.
I'm absolutely agree with his view of life. Things like aim, persistence and planing your life will definitely take you where you what to be.
I'd been thinking that the aim of my life is simply to be happy, to achieve a success. But recently I started to think. What is success ? What is to be happy. Happiness is just a moment in your life. And success, as many people in the world as many opinions what is success. Of course I have some goals which I'm trying to reach. But I guess I need to use some of the advices given by Dr. Jordan B. Peterson to be sure what exactly I want.
Unknown said…
Yes. Yes, it is.

On some point of life, we will take responsibility for everything we have done.
In other words, was our time just wasted or efficiently wasted.
Unknown said…
Unfortunately, we must learn some lessons only by ourselves.
Right now, we need to find out how to loose as efficient as possible.

I will wait until you reach your final form.
Unknown said…
Totally agree with everything that you wrote.
The way he uses language and general knowledge about his topic makes him a great speaker.

About last sentence: By reference do you mean his last book?
Unknown said…
1. Yes, I've heard about Dr. Jordan Peterson.

2. I agree with his point of view shown in this video.

3. Three years ago I've decided that I will finish these studies and I am very close to reaching this goal. After that I will have to reevaluate everything and think what I want to do next. I have some vague ideas, but nothing yet written on paper. First and foremost I want to be happy. This is the only thing that I am sure of right now and that will never change.
Unknown said…
Yes, of course I've heard of Jordan Peterson, he is in my top 5 "people to look up to". I've been watching his video for over a year now. He has strong believes and knowlage based on facts. In my opinion he's one of the smartest guys on earth. I agree with most of his points, but not all of them, maybe I still have to live a couple years longer to understand it. The characteristic that I admire in him is talking to people in non-harmfull way, and showing them there is something beyond their thinking. He's not trying to convince anybody, he's simply showing another angle of the topic. I have couple goals in my life, right now I'm determinated to develop a lot of them simultaneously. And if You ask me what is my ultimate goal to pursue in life, I simply answear to you "to be happy".
Cezary Róg said…
I have never heard about Dr. Jordan Peterson. In my opinion, the video shows the truth and I agree with it. We have to think about our lives seriously. We never know when and how it may end. Some decisions can lead to very bad results. We can't always try to be perfect because it may even lead us to depression. My goal is to live life my way. I don't like when people give me advice that they should adopt in their lives first. I want to keep on working hard because I like it and that makes me happy, but also have time for my family and friends. Everyone wants to be happy in life but many people does nothing to make it work.
Peterson attacks the idea that happiness is our supreme goal and reintroduces the idea that meaning trumps happiness in the long term. There are some things worth waiting and suffering for. He offers an alternative to the instant gratification to me myself and I. And he does that in a humble, loving, respectful way so that the message does get lost. A Clinical Psychologist with common sense is almost an oxymoron, but Mr. Jordan Peterson ... just wow
I have heard many times about him, because i sometimes browse some western medias. It's funny how Peterson is being framed of being a fascist sexist and so on, while he literaly just preaches about how you should be achieving your goals and making sure you don't get distracted by nonsense. I partially agree with him, not on all the points, but he is a rather experienced person and definitely delivers some interesting point of view on things that trouble people all over the world. I know what is my goal in life, and i am pursuing it.
Marcin Zając said…
1. Have you heard about this person?
No, I haven't heard about this person.

2. Do you agree with his point of view?
Yes, It is interesting point of view and I fully gree with him.

3. Have you already decided which goal to pursue in your life?
My goal is to be happy and becoming the best version of myself.
He is a very interesting person. I think it is worth listening to him, in whole or in part. But it is worth remembering that you are a person - that you have your own opinion and you make a decision and only then you will have consequences from your decisions. I think that it is most important to achieve balance in your life, both psychological and material. Nothing should be in excess, everything should be in moderation. Similar to hormones - we can search on the internet and see what happens if some of our hormones are out of balance. Our entire system will break, the body will be difficult. Balance should be a goal for everyone, even if you are not aware of this yet.
1. I haven’t heard about him before.
2. It’s hard to tell about agreeing with his point. These are very complex topics that can be extended to whole lectures, squeezed into 4min video. But I really liked the one example about life is not being a game but series of it. From that short movie I can only deduce that he is very intelligent person and probably very experienced in his field. While I don’t like that kind of pretentious videos, I see the point of it and I believe they can help a lot of people in hard times or in everyday life.
3. Yeah. It is to try dudeism from The Big Lebowski
1. Have you heard about this person?
I think that I've seen a miniature of his video on Youtube, but that's all.

2. Do you agree with his point of view?
Mostly yes - living a life without any "purpose" and responsibilities might be a waste of time - Your time.

3. Have you already decided which goal to pursue in your life?
Not yet - maybe I have a short term goal for a next 10 years, but I don't have any plans for later :)
I have heard about him, he has very interesting lectures about psychology and he can easily explain some difficult issues.
I do agree with his point of view. You need responsibilites to grow and the responsibilities have to be at the right difficulty level.
I'm still looking for my goal. Right now I'm just following my life's flow and it works but I feel that it's time to decide, to find a goal for the next 5 years.
Wojtek Protasik said…
This is the first time I see this guy.

Can't really choose a side on this one as it's a pretty complicated matter. I, however, really liked the analogy with series of games. I agree you have to learn which competitions to choose and learn to fail as it happens when you develop.

Making strict plans for years ahead is not what I usually do. I can see an outline of my plan but from my own experience things change so often and so fast I know this image wouldn't be reliable.
Mykhailo Reznyk said…
I’ve heard about Dr. Peterson. I’ve seen a few interviews with him, where he was explaining his attitude to the new law passed by the Canadian Parliament, which adds gender expression and gender identity to the list of Human Rights, meaning that refusing to refer to someone using their own made-up pronouns like Hir or Zir will be a violation of human rights. This is so unbelievably stupid. I have no problem if someone thinks that he or she is C, D, E, Z gender or doesn’t have gender at all. It’s these people’s right to do with their life whatever they want, and they can live in illusions as mush as they like. I just don’t understand why others are forced to live in their illusions too. Basically, that was the whole point of Dr. Peterson and I couldn’t agree more. As we discussed few weeks ago, unfortunately, we observe the rise of generation of snowflakes, who put their feelings over common sense and logic.
I haven’t read his book and I haven’t seen his motivational videos. But after this one I’ll surely take a look. Regarding this video, I agree with his point. I think clear vision of your own nearest future can be very helpful. I think that lack of motivation in a lot of people is caused by absence of a goal. Of course, we cannot predict the future and plan our whole life. But at least we can define what we want to achieve in 2-3 years. In that case you will finally gain some motivation.
Kristina Moroz said…
I've heard about many people but this one is new for me.
Well, he's point of view is interesting.
Enjoying every minute, trying to do what makes me happy. Have people around me who makes me feel better, who pushes me to better version of myself. Making changes every day and growing as person.
It is interesting moment. Being better than everyone around sometimes kind bite you.
When it is easy to win, it means that you do not progress in your skills.
That why I am glad that you have this opportunity. Wish you luck.
It is nice that his words has given something in your mind.
His words have special meaning in my soul.
So I suggest to listen to his lectures.
When we meet again in the university, I will give you more suggestions to his lectures.
I am glad that you already thinking about topics that he has provided.
Thank you.
I am happy that you have already known him before.
Wish that your thoughts be the same to think about for later years.
I agree with you.
Reason that motivation videos are so popular is because people search for a way to become happier in their life.
Having this kind of person to listen is a present.
I agree.
To have this person in our time is golden opportunity to learn about the life.
I am glad to hear that.

Peterson is one of the remain people that cares about freedom of words that were spoken.
Wish you best in your way to become the best version of yourself.
But in the end. We are all people.
Every choice that we have made has already been decided for us. (not 100%)
That is why person that can summarize for us to become better version of ourselves is he.
It is great to hear.

It is a way to become greater person. When you listen what great people have to say about their lives.
Wish you to find your way in your life.
Listen to his lectures as a background.
His speeches have ability to change/navigate your life.
Ahmed Elsawi said…
1. Have you heard about this person?

I have never heard of Dr. Jordan B. Peterson.
.....................................................................
2. Do you agree with his point of view?

In general, I agree with him.
I think the main point " Believe in yourself and in your life ".
.....................................................................
3. Have you already decided which goal to pursue in your life?

Actually not yet but in general, I'll try to do it.
This can be your great way to understand how your life is working.
If you create a plan, there is possibility to learn new side of your life.
We will continue this conversation when we meet each other in the university. :)
I have chosen video that can be understanded from people that have never heard about this person.
I had those kind of people in my life. Appreciate this kind of people. They will make your life greater.
He is the person whose words can become a motivation video.
However, the way he is thinking is the way to live our life.
I suggest to listen to his lectures.
They will help to understand how to manage your future. :)
Aleksander Wiza said…
I've never heard of the man before, although he seems to be making a few valid points that could prove useful. Prioritising on which opportunities to pursue and which to leave out is an important concept that should be present in everyone's life.

When it comes to choosing the general meaning of my existence, I tend to sail wherever the wind blows rather than fixating on a singular path to follow, however while sailing through this ocean of opportunities, I try to keep an open eye and plenty of flexibility to adapt to yet unknown currents.
Ahmed Elsawi said…
thank you, I'll try.
No, it doesn't. Actually saying "I manifest Satanism" does.

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