Sean's Notes

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Better Question: Why should you even bother improving yourself?

Before you can learn how to improve yourself, you need to examine why...

Principle: Suffering may be unavoidable, but suffering more than what's necessary is avoidable.

If you don't "organize yourself" you'll find that you negatively affect yourself and those around you.

You may say "I don't care about that"; but that's not true. You do care... because if you're experiencing pain, you care about that pain - even if it's just in a negative way. claim

Why? Practical Answer:

(1.) you don't suffer "any more stupidly" than you have to. claim

and (2.) those around you don't have to suffer as much either. claim

Pain (and the desire to remove it) are always connected. claim

It's very rare to find someone in pain who would say "it wouldn't be any different if I was out of this situation"... so you care. evidence

So, if you do care about improvement in your life (removal of pain), or "getting your act together" - how do you go about doing that? conclusion

You may argue that "you don't care", but the nature of pain is that, by definition, you care about it or it wouldn't be a pain.

So, you do care, even if you don't want to admit it.

There's a desire to improve ones situation (one's self). claim

Summary of 'why should you bother improving yourself?' question.

So, you (a.) get get your act together...

... so there (b.) isn't more stupid pain than necessary.

Referenced in

Video/Jordan Peterson Video Notes - Index

Before you ask yourself "what could I do to improve myself" you first need to consider why you should even bother. Two main reasons: First: while suffering may be unavoidable, suffering more than what's necessary is avoidable... so improving your life helps you avoid "avoidable suffering". Second: Your improvement also affects those around you, improving yourself reduces their suffering as well.