[Jordan Peterson]: We're gonna go back to Boston
Okay
[Jordan Peterson]: Okay. So you said that's really where things started for you. So you moved there when you were 13. First of all, like what kind of kid were you in school?
If ADD is real, I certainly had it
And I was very, very interested in what I was interested in
I was very uninterested in people telling me what to do
Essentially couldn't wait to get out of school
But I would excel at things that I had interest in
Initially, it was art. I wanted to be a comic book illustrator, until I really got into martial arts
Then martial arts became the focus of my life
Around 14, 15 years old, that's when I really became massively obsessed
And it was really the first thing that I ever did where I really didn't feel like a loser
Like I really felt like, “Oh, I actually have some talent. I actually can be exceptional.” It's like something
Because you know I grew up constantly moving, didn't really have a lot of friends, I would be new in this town, I'd get picked on, I wasn't a big kid
And there was a lot of issues with that psychologically
I didn't like being afraid of other kids. I didn't like not knowing what to do if I ran into a kid, and they were gonna bully me and pick on me
You know, martial arts changed that 180 degrees
[Chorus]
And then I became someone
Who I would be afraid of
You know, I became the opposite of what I was
And then I became someone
Who I would be afraid of
You know, I became the opposite of what I was
So what I was, was someone who was terrified of conflict, didn't know what to do
And what I became was a Taekwondo champion
I became a martial arts champion
I knew how to fight
[Jordan Peterson]: How did it come about?
It was very fortunate
I'd done a little bit of martial arts training
Then one day I was in Boston for a Red Sox game, and as I was walking home to the train station, I decided to go check out the Jae Hun Kim Taekwondo Institute
It was right there
So I went up the stairs and as I was walking up the stairs a guy named John Lee was training
I heard this crazy sound, what it turned out to be this man kicking this bag and slamming his heel into this bag and having the chain snap and rattle and the thud of his heel slamming into this leather bag
I got up there and I watched this guy workout
I couldn't believe a person could do that
I'd never seen anybody kick something so hard in real life
Anybody that had such incredible martial arts skill like this guy did, John Lee, who became a mentor of mine
That changed everything
I was there the next day
I talked to them, they gave me a brochure and a pamphlet
I was probably there every day of my life until I was 22 years old
Just completely by luck, wandered into one of the best schools in the world for taekwondo
I just got lucky
I got really, really, really lucky
[Chorus]
I became someone
Who I would be afraid of
You know, I became the opposite of what I was
And then I became someone
Who I would be afraid of
You know, I became the opposite of what I was
I had keys pretty quickly
Right away, my instructor recognized that I was pretty obsessed and I was physically pretty talented
So he had me teaching classes instead of paying
One of the best ways for someone to get good at martial arts is actually to teach
It actually refines your technique
You think about it more. I was 14 or 15 by the time I got to that school
I had my black belt by the time I was 17, and I was competing in the adult division by then
I won the state championship when I was 18, and I won it every year from then until I stopped
Luckily with high school, kids heard about it right away
One of the kids you go to school with is flying all over the country, kicking people in the head
They just avoided me
People avoided me, junior and senior year
I'd already become this weird kid that was obsessed with martial arts
I spent most of my life from the time I was 15, till I was 21 training and competing
I've probably fought over a hundred times, a 100% singular, uniquely singular, but I avoided most of the pitfalls, high school partying and all that stuff
I didn't do that because I was scared of getting hurt
I was scared if I showed up for training hungover that I'd get beat up
I was scared of anything that would take even a tiny bit away from my performance as a fighter
'Cause I was obsessed with it
[Chorus]
I became someone
Who I would be afraid of
You know, I became the opposite of what I was
And then I became someone
Who I would be afraid of
You know, I became the opposite of what I was
Okay
[Jordan Peterson]: Okay. So you said that's really where things started for you. So you moved there when you were 13. First of all, like what kind of kid were you in school?
If ADD is real, I certainly had it
And I was very, very interested in what I was interested in
I was very uninterested in people telling me what to do
Essentially couldn't wait to get out of school
But I would excel at things that I had interest in
Initially, it was art. I wanted to be a comic book illustrator, until I really got into martial arts
Then martial arts became the focus of my life
Around 14, 15 years old, that's when I really became massively obsessed
And it was really the first thing that I ever did where I really didn't feel like a loser
Like I really felt like, “Oh, I actually have some talent. I actually can be exceptional.” It's like something
Because you know I grew up constantly moving, didn't really have a lot of friends, I would be new in this town, I'd get picked on, I wasn't a big kid
And there was a lot of issues with that psychologically
I didn't like being afraid of other kids. I didn't like not knowing what to do if I ran into a kid, and they were gonna bully me and pick on me
You know, martial arts changed that 180 degrees
[Chorus]
And then I became someone
Who I would be afraid of
You know, I became the opposite of what I was
And then I became someone
Who I would be afraid of
You know, I became the opposite of what I was
So what I was, was someone who was terrified of conflict, didn't know what to do
And what I became was a Taekwondo champion
I became a martial arts champion
I knew how to fight
[Jordan Peterson]: How did it come about?
It was very fortunate
I'd done a little bit of martial arts training
Then one day I was in Boston for a Red Sox game, and as I was walking home to the train station, I decided to go check out the Jae Hun Kim Taekwondo Institute
It was right there
So I went up the stairs and as I was walking up the stairs a guy named John Lee was training
I heard this crazy sound, what it turned out to be this man kicking this bag and slamming his heel into this bag and having the chain snap and rattle and the thud of his heel slamming into this leather bag
I got up there and I watched this guy workout
I couldn't believe a person could do that
I'd never seen anybody kick something so hard in real life
Anybody that had such incredible martial arts skill like this guy did, John Lee, who became a mentor of mine
That changed everything
I was there the next day
I talked to them, they gave me a brochure and a pamphlet
I was probably there every day of my life until I was 22 years old
Just completely by luck, wandered into one of the best schools in the world for taekwondo
I just got lucky
I got really, really, really lucky
[Chorus]
I became someone
Who I would be afraid of
You know, I became the opposite of what I was
And then I became someone
Who I would be afraid of
You know, I became the opposite of what I was
I had keys pretty quickly
Right away, my instructor recognized that I was pretty obsessed and I was physically pretty talented
So he had me teaching classes instead of paying
One of the best ways for someone to get good at martial arts is actually to teach
It actually refines your technique
You think about it more. I was 14 or 15 by the time I got to that school
I had my black belt by the time I was 17, and I was competing in the adult division by then
I won the state championship when I was 18, and I won it every year from then until I stopped
Luckily with high school, kids heard about it right away
One of the kids you go to school with is flying all over the country, kicking people in the head
They just avoided me
People avoided me, junior and senior year
I'd already become this weird kid that was obsessed with martial arts
I spent most of my life from the time I was 15, till I was 21 training and competing
I've probably fought over a hundred times, a 100% singular, uniquely singular, but I avoided most of the pitfalls, high school partying and all that stuff
I didn't do that because I was scared of getting hurt
I was scared if I showed up for training hungover that I'd get beat up
I was scared of anything that would take even a tiny bit away from my performance as a fighter
'Cause I was obsessed with it
[Chorus]
I became someone
Who I would be afraid of
You know, I became the opposite of what I was
And then I became someone
Who I would be afraid of
You know, I became the opposite of what I was
I don’t know about that
Some of ‘em maybe
But I think some of ‘em just don’t have discipline
There's also an issue of momentum
You're not used to doing it, it's not a part of your life
It's not something that you're accustomed to pushing yourself
There's been many, many, many, many, many, many, many days where I didn't wanna work out
I just didn't feel like I had the energy and I just forced myself
And I think there's very few people out there that know how to force themselves That's a learned skill
You have to have real rigid requirements of yourself
Where you don't allow yourself to back out of things
[Chorus]
Do something
Do something
Do something
Do something
Do something
Do something
Do something
Do something
Excuses are a giant part of the problem
It's not simply a physical health issue
There's also mental aspects of it and discipline's a big one
I just know way too many people who are weak mentally
I can't just chalk it off to only the way they physically feel
'Cause I've felt like shit a hundred times, and then I worked out and then I felt way better
It's just a fact of life, that's real
[Chorus]
Do something
Do something
Do something
Do something
Do something
Do something
(People don't know how to do that)
Do something
And if you're used to doing this
Get in your car, sit down
Drive to the office, sit down
Go to lunch, sit down
Go to the board meeting, sit down
Get in your car, sit down
Get home, sit down
Then go to the gym? Fuck off
It's one thing if someone has good legit physical issues
But there's a lot of people who do not
They just have poor diet choices, they have a sedentary lifestyle, and they have the momentum of this sedentary lifestyle that's holding them back
They're accustomed to being lazy
You don't have to do a lot. You just have to do something
You walk up hills, you jump a little rope, you take a little tiny kettle bell, you do a couple cleans and presses, you do a few pushups, you do a few sit ups to get your blood pumping
You're moving, you're alive
To say you don't have enough energy to exercise, that is crazy to say
Can you walk to the fucking refrigerator? Yes
Well, you can exercise
[Chorus]
Do something
Do something
Do something
Do something
Do something
Do something
Do something
Do something
You don't have to do anything crazy
Just walk around the block
There's 80-year-old ladies who take yoga with me
They're fucking really old and they're in there
They're going after it. They could easily say, "I don't have the energy to do that."
But they don't. It's a mental attitude
They make a decision
Besides you don’t have to kill yourself, you don’t have to go to a CrossFit class and try to do the workout of the day
You don't have to go nuts
You don't have to do that
But you got to do something
Just get-get your blood moving
Your body has requirements
It wants to move
It wants to move
And when it does, you feel better
But people like to give themselves this excuse, "I do not have the energy to do this." Whatever
If you decide that, that's true
But if you watch a motivational video, there's a hundred of them on YouTube thousands even
You go watch one, you get fired up. You're like, "Fuck it, I'm gonna jump some rope." You jump some rope, you do something
Do some pushups, do something, you'll feel better
[Chorus]
Do something
Do something
Do something
Do something
Do something
Do something
Do something
(Pull that shit up, Jamie)
We have fucked up lifestyles
The human body is not designed to sit down all day
And certainly not designed to be stuck in traffic
And be in the office and just be in front of a fucking computer monitor watching your soul get sucked through the LCD screen
It's crazy. You gotta be really careful with just the way you describe things
Just like, say, "I don't have the energy to do something."
Fuck off, stop
Some of ‘em maybe
But I think some of ‘em just don’t have discipline
There's also an issue of momentum
You're not used to doing it, it's not a part of your life
It's not something that you're accustomed to pushing yourself
There's been many, many, many, many, many, many, many days where I didn't wanna work out
I just didn't feel like I had the energy and I just forced myself
And I think there's very few people out there that know how to force themselves That's a learned skill
You have to have real rigid requirements of yourself
Where you don't allow yourself to back out of things
[Chorus]
Do something
Do something
Do something
Do something
Do something
Do something
Do something
Do something
Excuses are a giant part of the problem
It's not simply a physical health issue
There's also mental aspects of it and discipline's a big one
I just know way too many people who are weak mentally
I can't just chalk it off to only the way they physically feel
'Cause I've felt like shit a hundred times, and then I worked out and then I felt way better
It's just a fact of life, that's real
[Chorus]
Do something
Do something
Do something
Do something
Do something
Do something
(People don't know how to do that)
Do something
And if you're used to doing this
Get in your car, sit down
Drive to the office, sit down
Go to lunch, sit down
Go to the board meeting, sit down
Get in your car, sit down
Get home, sit down
Then go to the gym? Fuck off
It's one thing if someone has good legit physical issues
But there's a lot of people who do not
They just have poor diet choices, they have a sedentary lifestyle, and they have the momentum of this sedentary lifestyle that's holding them back
They're accustomed to being lazy
You don't have to do a lot. You just have to do something
You walk up hills, you jump a little rope, you take a little tiny kettle bell, you do a couple cleans and presses, you do a few pushups, you do a few sit ups to get your blood pumping
You're moving, you're alive
To say you don't have enough energy to exercise, that is crazy to say
Can you walk to the fucking refrigerator? Yes
Well, you can exercise
[Chorus]
Do something
Do something
Do something
Do something
Do something
Do something
Do something
Do something
You don't have to do anything crazy
Just walk around the block
There's 80-year-old ladies who take yoga with me
They're fucking really old and they're in there
They're going after it. They could easily say, "I don't have the energy to do that."
But they don't. It's a mental attitude
They make a decision
Besides you don’t have to kill yourself, you don’t have to go to a CrossFit class and try to do the workout of the day
You don't have to go nuts
You don't have to do that
But you got to do something
Just get-get your blood moving
Your body has requirements
It wants to move
It wants to move
And when it does, you feel better
But people like to give themselves this excuse, "I do not have the energy to do this." Whatever
If you decide that, that's true
But if you watch a motivational video, there's a hundred of them on YouTube thousands even
You go watch one, you get fired up. You're like, "Fuck it, I'm gonna jump some rope." You jump some rope, you do something
Do some pushups, do something, you'll feel better
[Chorus]
Do something
Do something
Do something
Do something
Do something
Do something
Do something
(Pull that shit up, Jamie)
We have fucked up lifestyles
The human body is not designed to sit down all day
And certainly not designed to be stuck in traffic
And be in the office and just be in front of a fucking computer monitor watching your soul get sucked through the LCD screen
It's crazy. You gotta be really careful with just the way you describe things
Just like, say, "I don't have the energy to do something."
Fuck off, stop
You have to be the hero of your own story
And you can do that
You have to be the hero of your own story
And you can do that
90% of it is just showing up
Get there and start working, like you're not gonna feel perfect every day
Gotta be those days you push through
This is what I want you to do
Write down what you would like to fix about your life
If you're 30 pounds overweight, you wanna lose 30 pounds, do it the right way
Write down what you eat
Exercise every day
Force yourself to do it
The brain is the general, the troops are the body, and you get up, and you do it
And then you get to write it down
You know you're doing what you gotta do to get by, but ultimately you're not respecting yourself
I think we all have a certain amount of appreciation and respect for hero figures
We all look at the guy who never lies, always does the right thing, and fucking helps everybody out and that's the John Wayne character, that's the ultimate hero
The ultimate hero
[Chorus]
You have to be the hero of your own story
And you can do that
You have to be the hero of your own story
And you can do that
And when you look at your own life and you don't stack up, you're a thief, you stole money from your wife's purse, and you don't wanna smoke cigarettes, but you fucking have to, you can't deal with the stress, so you smoke
You devalue yourself, you slowly start devaluing yourself
You look at yourself and you realize that if you were judging yourself, you would judge yourself on faith
You can't pretend you're the hero of your story
Hero of your story
Most people get stuck in these patterns, find themselves in the person who doesn't follow through on their ideas
Well, I start things and I quit
No, you don't
No, you have started things and you quit and it gives you a horrible sense of regret
It's made you define yourself by that
You're not who you were a year ago
You're not who you were five minutes ago
You're not who you were last week
So you gotta regulate how much you dwell on regrets of the past. You really gotta be careful
You have to be the hero of your own story
And you can do that
You have to be the hero of your own story
You can be the hero of your own story that woke up today
You can be the hero of your own story that at 40 years of age stopped, got out of bed and said, "I'm not doing this anymore
I'm not doing this anymore
And I'm gonna get myself in shape and I'm gonna eat healthy
And I'm gonna do this, 'cause this is me now
This is me now
I decided this is me
And people have to realize that you are not your past
You are not all the times you fucked up
You're not all the times you were drunk
That's not you
That's not you
You are the person who's learned from a great deal of experience
This is a battle that you will fight for the rest of your life, but the key is to fight it, not to give in
Don't give in to that resistance. Fight that resistance. And in doing so, every day you do so, you have won the battle for that day
And you will continue to fight that battle
[Chorus]
You have to be the hero of your own story
And you can do that
You have to be the hero of your own story
And you can do that
[Chorus
You have to be the hero of your own story
And you can do that
You have to be the hero of your own story
And you can do that
A system will set out the honeypots for people to get trapped in
The ideas of retirement, the ideas of the golden years, providing you benefits, providing you a healthy work environment
Why? Well, because they want people to work for them
They don't want people to realize their own dreams and escape
They want to set it up so that you stick around, stick around some sort of an unsatisfying world
It's up to you to see that video game problem, to see that issue as it comes up on the map and calculate your future
And you can do that
You have to be the hero of your own story
And you can do that
90% of it is just showing up
Get there and start working, like you're not gonna feel perfect every day
Gotta be those days you push through
This is what I want you to do
Write down what you would like to fix about your life
If you're 30 pounds overweight, you wanna lose 30 pounds, do it the right way
Write down what you eat
Exercise every day
Force yourself to do it
The brain is the general, the troops are the body, and you get up, and you do it
And then you get to write it down
You know you're doing what you gotta do to get by, but ultimately you're not respecting yourself
I think we all have a certain amount of appreciation and respect for hero figures
We all look at the guy who never lies, always does the right thing, and fucking helps everybody out and that's the John Wayne character, that's the ultimate hero
The ultimate hero
[Chorus]
You have to be the hero of your own story
And you can do that
You have to be the hero of your own story
And you can do that
And when you look at your own life and you don't stack up, you're a thief, you stole money from your wife's purse, and you don't wanna smoke cigarettes, but you fucking have to, you can't deal with the stress, so you smoke
You devalue yourself, you slowly start devaluing yourself
You look at yourself and you realize that if you were judging yourself, you would judge yourself on faith
You can't pretend you're the hero of your story
Hero of your story
Most people get stuck in these patterns, find themselves in the person who doesn't follow through on their ideas
Well, I start things and I quit
No, you don't
No, you have started things and you quit and it gives you a horrible sense of regret
It's made you define yourself by that
You're not who you were a year ago
You're not who you were five minutes ago
You're not who you were last week
So you gotta regulate how much you dwell on regrets of the past. You really gotta be careful
You have to be the hero of your own story
And you can do that
You have to be the hero of your own story
You can be the hero of your own story that woke up today
You can be the hero of your own story that at 40 years of age stopped, got out of bed and said, "I'm not doing this anymore
I'm not doing this anymore
And I'm gonna get myself in shape and I'm gonna eat healthy
And I'm gonna do this, 'cause this is me now
This is me now
I decided this is me
And people have to realize that you are not your past
You are not all the times you fucked up
You're not all the times you were drunk
That's not you
That's not you
You are the person who's learned from a great deal of experience
This is a battle that you will fight for the rest of your life, but the key is to fight it, not to give in
Don't give in to that resistance. Fight that resistance. And in doing so, every day you do so, you have won the battle for that day
And you will continue to fight that battle
[Chorus]
You have to be the hero of your own story
And you can do that
You have to be the hero of your own story
And you can do that
[Chorus
You have to be the hero of your own story
And you can do that
You have to be the hero of your own story
And you can do that
A system will set out the honeypots for people to get trapped in
The ideas of retirement, the ideas of the golden years, providing you benefits, providing you a healthy work environment
Why? Well, because they want people to work for them
They don't want people to realize their own dreams and escape
They want to set it up so that you stick around, stick around some sort of an unsatisfying world
It's up to you to see that video game problem, to see that issue as it comes up on the map and calculate your future