Overcoming the Complexities of Parenting | Jordan Peterson EP 520

0:00Hi, my name is Lewis Howes and welcome to the Daily Motivation Show.

0:13I've seen many, many women protect their children from the father. They don't trust him. And so every time he interacts with the child, they'll do something disapproving. A look, they'll put him down. Now, it's not like men don't do that to their wives. There's all sorts of tricks that men have for their wives. But if you don't trust men, you won't let them have a hand in the discipline of the children. You know, when you think of discipline, you think of punishment and threat and dad saying no. That isn't discipline. Discipline is, if you discipline someone properly, they become disciplined. That means they're competent.

0:50They can control themselves. So I'll give you an example. My son is quite a disagreeable person by nature. He's very masculine. He's very high in emotional stability. So he doesn't have much negative emotion. and he's relatively low in agreeableness. And that's typical masculine pattern. The two big personality differences between men and women are agreeableness, women are higher, and neuroticism, tendency to feel negative emotion, women are higher. So what that meant was that when he was a kid, he was a stubborn little pup. It was hard to get him to do what he didn't want to do. And, you know, that's the mark of a character that is hard to stop.

1:27So there's real advantages to it. But kids who are disagreeable are a handful because they think I'm not doing that and you can't make me. The rule for him was he'd push the limits in a variety of ways and he was really good at that and he was quite persistent at it. And I'd talk to my wife and say, look, Julian's getting a little too pushy here. We have to crack down on him and stop him. And this is what I see. And she'd say, this is what I see. And we'd think, well, this is what we're going for a week. He isn't going to get away with anything. Like the line, man. it's like kid he'd be three or three and a half at this time sit on the steps sit on the steps and if he wouldn't because he was stubborn well I'd bring him over and put him on the steps like it was you're gonna if I say you're going to sit on the steps you are absolutely going to sit on the steps it was so interesting to watch him because he'd be angry you know because he got interfered with he didn't get to do what he wanted to do and and he would go and sit on the steps but he'd be like mad as hell on the way there, arms pumping up and down and just, you go sit on the steps like, you know, like this, just overcome with anger.

2:35And the rule was, as soon as you get yourself under control, and you can act like a civilized human being, and you want to have a good day, then you come and tell me and all, that's it, you're done. But it had to be real. And look, my criteria for accepting his statement was whether or not I liked him when he said it. if he was still misbehaving and bending the rules, he wouldn't be genuine when he talked to me. But if he came and said, okay, dad, like I've had enough. I've got myself under control. I'd rather have a good day. And as soon as he said that I liked him, it was like, hey, man, you're back in the party.

3:12Do what you want to do, yeah. Well, I didn't want him to sit on the steps anymore. I liked having him around. So we were on board with that. See, what was the discipline aspect, which is what I was talking about, is he learned how to integrate it into his personality. And I could see him doing that sitting on the steps. It was just this aggression circuit, which is unbelievably powerful, was just dominating him. And he'd just force it. Get it under control. Get it under control. Calm down. Bring yourself back into the social world. And it was a victory for his developing ego, you see, because he wasn't defeated by his own impulses.

3:48And that's discipline, you see. Then you're not defeated by your own impulses. So discipline has the wrong connotation. I was encouraging him. You can master this, man. And it worked. And it was so useful to us later because when Michaela got so sick, he was together. We could rely on him. So it was necessary. And he's a very reliable person who does what he wants. It's a great combination.

4:26Thank you so much for listening to today's episode of The Daily Motivation. And I hope you have an amazing rest of your day. If you enjoyed this episode, make sure to click the link in the description. That will take you to the full episode of our main podcast on The School of Greatness. And if you are loving The Daily Motivation, please follow us over on Apple Podcasts and Spotify and leave us a review over on Apple Podcasts right now. And if you want more exclusive content and ad-free listening experience, make sure to subscribe to our Greatness Plus channel on Apple Podcast right now. And if you want to get even more inspiration from our world-class guests and learn how to improve your life and take it to the next level, then make sure to sign up for the Greatness newsletter and get it delivered right to your inbox over at greatness.com slash newsletter.

5:16Again, have an amazing day and I'll see you tomorrow with another episode of the Daily Motivation Show.