Beyond Order: 12 More Rules for Life

Content Warning: This part of the guide contains descriptions of mental illness, addiction, and traumatic events relayed to the author from his patients. 

Peter describes his father-in-law as a strong and admirable person despite his many health issues. The family tells a story in which, after his wife had served him lunch on the same small plates for twenty years, he snapped one day and complained about their size. Peterson sees this as an example of the need to voice one’s displeasure, even over fairly minor issues, rather than allowing such grievances to linger and lead to misery. He then pairs this funny family anecdote with the story of a client, a woman profoundly unhappy in her marriage. In addition to her husband’s narcissism and alcohol addiction, she loathed all the furnishings in their house, and so never invited anyone to visit. However, she never did anything about it, “because she understood that a serious discussion, once initiated, risked expanding to include all the things that were troublesome about her marriage and that a real, no-holds-barred battle would therefore likely ensue” (93). Ultimately, they divorced. Peterson believes that even the most trivial problems ought to be addressed.