Why you're probably Lying to Yourself | Jordan Peterson

Transcript:

If you want to change the world, you start from yourself and work outward because you build your competence that way. It's like, I don't know how you can go out and protest the structure of the entire economic system, if you can't keep your room organized. People try to change the outside world for lots of ways, but many of those ways aren't just pure good. So what I've thought about is that what you start to do is you start to tell and act out the truth locally, like within the domain of your actual competence 'cause the world presents itself as a series of puzzles, some of which you're capable of solving and some of which you're not. You have many puzzles in front of you that you could solve, but you choose not to. Those are the things that weigh on your conscience. You know I should really do this, but you don't. It's like so I had this idea a long time ago, because the world is a pretty dreadful place. I thought, "Well, what would the world be like if people stopped avoiding the things they knew they should do?" 'Cause the question is how much are we contributing to the fact that life is an existential catastrophe and a tragedy? How much is our own corruption contributing to that? That's a really worthwhile question. Things you leave undone because you're angry, you're resentful, you're lazy, you have inertia. Well, you consult your conscience, and it says "Well, that place over there could use a little work." It's the same as working on yourself, and so you clean that up because you can and then things are a little clear around you and you're a little better off because you've practiced a bit and so you're a little stronger and then something else manifests itself and says, "Well, maybe you could take a crack at fixing me up too." So you decide to do that and that gets a little bit more pristine, and soon... And it's humble, because you're not exceeding your domain of competence. It's like don't be fixing up the economy, 18-year-olds. So, can you even clean up your own room? No. Well, you should think about that. You should think about that. 'Cause if you can't even clean up your own room, who the hell are you to give advice to the world.