Beyond Order: 12 More Rules For Life

by Jordan B. Peterson

So, there exists a hero and an adversary; a wise king and a tyrant; a positive and negative maternal figure; and chaos itself. That is the structure of the world in six characters (with the strange seventh of chaos in some sense the ultimate birthplace of all the others). It is necessary to understand that all seven exist, and that they are all existential permanents—elements of experience with which every soul, rich, poor, blessed, cursed, talented, dull, male, and female must inevitably contend. That is life—they are life. Partial knowledge of the cast, conscious or unconscious, leaves you undefended; leaves you naive, unprepared, and likely to become possessed by deceit, resentment, and arrogance. If you do not know that the treasure is guarded by a dragon, or that nature, beautiful nature, can turn its teeth on you in an instant, or that the peaceful society you take for granted is threatened constantly by authoritarianism and tyranny, or that you contain within yourself the adversary who might wish that all those negative transformations occur, then you are, first, a needy acolyte for an ideology that will provide you with a partial and insufficient representation of reality; and, second, someone blind in a manner dangerous to themselves and others alike. If you are wise, your political philosophy encompasses a representation of all seven, even if you could not articulate it in those terms.