https://youtubetranscript.com/?v=d57fpzzTOmU
I have very little emotional resilience and I’m worried for that reason about the release of this book I mean, I just did a times interview london times interview that was really Yeah, we followed that let’s say it’s that frustrating it’s it’s it’s I mean it’s funny because just you know again It was like the same stories are playing out again this person goes after you and then it just turns against that person and and it’s just she’s exposed for For the fraud that she was being and during that interview and so You know, I think in the end so strange that it keeps happening over and over. I mean, I really decided not to do mainstream interviews now for a good while because i’ve It seems to me that i’ve gone to the well of public sympathy so to speak Enough times and that if this happens to me two or three more times Let’s say people are going to rightly say, you know, how many times does it take for peterson to learn? And so I don’t want that to happen I mean i’ve been You know, I feel an obligation to my publishers obviously to talk about the book Um, although that interview had virtually nothing to do with the book We hoped that I would be able to discuss my health issues With someone who would treat them squarely and then I could ignore them from then on in but um Uh, that isn’t what happened. Um Well, it’s been it’s a sign of the politicized discourse like you you It’s a sign of the breakdown that we’re going through that we see this capacity to have so entrenched aside that People are can’t doesn’t doesn’t matter what they do. It doesn’t matter what they say They don’t feel like they’re responsible because in a way you’re the enemy and you know, and it’s not just you it’s other other It’s between different groups. But if you’re the enemy then Everything is justified And so well, I think a huge part of this is is driven by the desire to have an enemy Yeah You know, there’s it’s it’s very difficult to feel It’s an easy route to self-righteousness to have an enemy Exactly, and yeah, it’s a great place to put all evil Hmm. Yeah, and because you attract so much attention you’re an easy you’re definitely an easy target. Well, that’s the theory It seems not to turn out that way Yeah, but it’s also was the timing You know The way when you kind of came up in the public, uh sphere there was a massive shift happening In culture and I think that’s one of the things you could feel and that was happening around us And to some extent, you know donald trump had something to do with that as well in the sense that it was this malaise that was there and this kind of This jostling and this this uh, and this is what led to all that kind of discourse. And so I think that you you were identified you became identified almost mythologically, I guess As as a character and and people you know have Treat you that way and they act with you that way in many respects Yes, it becomes very difficult to to understand. It’s become very difficult for me to understand what character I am You know So much has changed in my life over the last five years i’m i’ve been on leave from the university so that’s very destabilizing I don’t have my clinical practice anymore. And so I was you know, seeing 20 people a week So that’s a huge transformation in my life. My my house has been completely renovated. It was renovated Well, my wife was ill and so we didn’t Uh, well it the renovation went on in our absence. And so i’m a foreigner in my own house, which is Which is although i’m starting to become accustomed to it and there’s some things I like about the new house But I don’t feel at home in it I wouldn’t say and i’ve only been here for two months in the last three years because I was on the road and then well all this And so that and everything that’s happened has been very disruptive for my family And of course tammy got so unbelievably sick and and with something that was supposed to be fatal and recovered more or less miraculously um And then i’ve been so unbelievably ill or still am and I I have just I just don’t know where to put any of this um, yeah, I I can’t think about the past at all because so much of it is Incomprehensible, especially over the last five years. I can’t think about the present because i’m in so much pain And I can’t think about the future because I don’t know what i’m going to do and I have no idea how long this pain is Going to last it’s been i’ve been in pain Really severe pain for two years now and yeah and that’s It’s it’s a strange thing because in this book one of the chapters The last chapter is called be grateful in spite of your suffering you know and um I went every through every sentence in that chapter a very large number of times because Much of the time while I was rewriting it particularly I was in a lot of pain and um Like it’s crypt it’s it’s it’s a pain level. That’s hard to Fathom in some sense because I would say every single day I have now is worse than any day I ever had in my life before I got ill So and then I know very well that um adding bitterness To your malaise is a very bad idea, you know It doesn’t help but that that I can certainly see the attraction in that I feel like shaking my fist at the sky and complaining bitterly and But it doesn’t help but it but there doesn’t seem to be any relief either and so that’s It’s so it’s so perverse. It’s shaken my faith. I suppose um I I’m in this perverse position where My work has in principle helped so many people And yet I don’t seem to be able to dig myself out of my current circumstances so Well or even to make sense of them, yeah I think that I think that the role that you’ve you played is a is a kind of a transition role and that transition manifests itself to you as a as a Trying to have your feet on two sides of rifting of an eye two islands that are floating away from each other And you you you’re trying to hold on You’re trying to kind of help people focus on the middle and help people Avoid radicalization and avoid falling into camps in a manner that will lead to God knows what and so I think that I think that that’s the role that you played and it’s and it’s been like i’ve seen for example People transition through your work transition from worlds moving worlds. That’s really what i’ve seen happen It’s more than just changing the way changing your opinion or changing your mind about something It really is about changing the world you inhabit. And so that’s a That’s a crazy that’s a crazy role to play and especially because like I said you you have your foot It’s like you kind of have your one foot or one eye. Let’s say looking towards I would call religion or looking towards christianity or something like that And then you have another eye which is still very much immersed in a kind of secular humanism and You have one leg that is you know, you understand people that are more left-leaning You understand people that are more right-leaning you have this capacity to kind of understand everybody, but you’re Yeah, it’s it’s uh, that means that you make enemies on on all sides too Well, you know the overwhelming response that i’ve got publicly has been I would say traumatically positive Yeah, and you wouldn’t think that that would be possible really but I find it that way. I mean partly it’s overwhelming to have people constantly Tell me in person Their responses to what i’ve been doing It’s very emotional and I get caught up in that quite quickly And of course on youtube and the social media platforms YouTube particularly the bulk of the comments about me are very very positive It’s 99 to 1 often in terms of likes and dislikes it’s yeah and and It’s too much Well, I don’t know how I don’t know how to I don’t know how to I don’t know what category to put it in. I don’t know how to conceptualize it I mean part of part of me the practical part of course says well I just happened to adopt a new technology at a time when it started to boom And filled a kind of niche that was empty in that technology at that time But in some sense that that doesn’t really cut it, you know Because it doesn’t have anything to do with the content and then I think well I have been dealing with these Well borderline religious issues. Well, certainly not just borderline. There’s lots of religious people who seem to think that i’m dealing with religious issues and and Well, and that’s really what I wanted to talk to you about tonight so Because i’m not inside the church so to speak it’s hard to say what the utility of that is The utility of being inside the church Of being outside it of being because i’m an outsider talking about religious matters Yeah, but I think that I think that I think that it has played a great role like I i’ve often said something that i’ve often said that you’re something like king syrus If you know the story of king syrus in scripture king syrus was a persian king Who told the jews to go back to israel and build their temple? So he wasn’t jewish like he wasn’t he wasn’t an israelite. He wouldn’t believe in the god of the israelites But he was like hey, you know that temple of yours looks pretty nice Why don’t you just go back there and and rebuild your own own thing? And so that’s definitely an effect that i’ve seen you have, you know The number of people that have become christian because of you is hilarious. Sorry, it’s not hilarious It’s just kind of it’s just kind of this strange thing because you you you kind of stand outside and you look at you’re looking At the door and you’re looking at the church and you’re saying hey, this isn’t not so bad You know, look at this. What is what is going on here? Like what is this about? And and then because of that, oh, it’s also do you think you’ve got something better You know, I was talking to a friend of mine the other day when we were walking Because as I said, I walk about 10 miles a day right now Try to keep myself under control and you know, he he was raised a communist in poland and and his and then an atheist and He was complaining I think I think this is what he told me That he was complaining to his parents at one point about a religious wedding that they were going to Despite not believing and he said as he got older he realized he had nothing to replace that with It’s like okay, throw it out Fine. Okay. Now, where are you? Well, you’re just as bad off as you were before but you also don’t have that beautiful thing You