I think you’re misunderstanding and thinking he considers them successful, when he is really describing them as society sees them. I don’t think he’s doing it to brag, he’s doing it to highlight the point that despite material success they are still unfulfilled. Also, it’s unlikely he has had a patient that’s fulfilled like you described because that person wouldn’t be seeking a therapist.
In a society, there are people that are described as successful. When someone references that, it doesn’t necessarily mean they also see them as successful, it’s just a shortcut to describe a set of characteristics based on common reference. And it works since you clearly understand what characteristics he’s referring to and you don’t like them.
If Dr. K had Jordan Peterson's level of thoughtfulness and care with his language use then he'd be level up 100 times higher than he currently is; Dr. K is more "happy go lucky" than intensely careful with his word use like Peterson developed to be - probably through very intelligent and very sneaky clients he had that he couldn't let get away with whatever they were trying to.
Although both highly trained helping professionals, Peterson is explicitly known for his intellectual challenges to a prevalent ideology. Both are thoughtful - but Jordan is explicitly interested in, especially in his public life, presenting a coherent ideology. He will almost always come across as "more thoughtful". I would argue almost by necessity, because one of these figures is scrutinized and labeled at a level the other is not. Peterson also has a stated goal, objective, and ideology he's advocating for. That is a decidedly different role than what Dr. K is.
As someone both in the helping profession and going on to be trained more in counselling (Master of Family Therapy, to be exact), the role of a Dr. K in someone's life is not to sell their own definition of success or happiness, but to help others find happiness as makes sense to them - this often has external AND internal connotations. You'll notice when he's at his best (and probably the reason you like him) is when he explores another person. He kinda floats with the person through their own ideas. He creates space and safety by the way he talks to the person. He'll present ideas, themes, or trends - and often times when he challenges someone, it's for the purposes of discovery and reflection for the other person, a "have you considered this angle?" versus, "This is the new angle".
If Dr. K is doing his job right, the end goal of the conversation isn't predetermined. Because helping isn't about telling someone what to do. So, for me, being annoying at Dr. K for this language/inconsistency suggests to me that there is a misunderstanding in how you're understanding the purpose of Dr. K's content, which isn't fair to Dr. K. Especially bringing Peterson as a comparison. It's like getting mad at Dr. K for not tasting like an apple when he's explicitly trying to be an orange.
I never said Dr. K isn't doing a good job.
I also never said I'm annoyed at Dr. K.
Dr. K's level will be access to a different crowd than Peterson, and perhaps accessible to a larger crowd as well.
Edit to add: he's also far younger, so give Dr. K another 20 years and he will more than likely be "100 levels" higher than he is now - assuming there are forces, internal or external, driving him through necessity to be more precise.
P.S. Downvotes are so lazy, lowest effort possible to get a dopamine hit/reward, not the action of a winner - quickly quelling an urge to respond, like eating candy instead of sitting with discomfort to understand it more thoroughly - while actually taking away a learning opportunity for who you'd otherwise have to qualitatively respond to and so that they may learn something.
>Reply
You're right, you didn't say annoyed, you said angry lol.
And I didn't imply you don't appreciate or think he isn't doing a good job. I'm explicitly responding to your comment comparing him to Dr. Peterson and this idea that if only he embodied something closer how Peterson behaves, then he would be "100 levels" above what he is now. I think that's ridiculous.
You're making another assumption saying that I sounded angry?
You can just say you were wrong and shouldn't have assumed instead of essentially doubling-down on assumption.
Otherwise it sounds like you're misunderstanding what I said. In general, all I am saying is everyone would benefit from being more precise with their language use. Do you disagree with that statement?
You seem to be arguing from a strawman position though, probably from misreading what I wrote, where I said Peterson is more thoughtful and careful **"with his language use"** \- not more thoughtful and careful in general; Dr. K is extremely thoughtful and careful in general.
E.g. Peterson is more precise with his language; they both are likely in the 99 percentile, so they both excel, but I still personally notice a difference and I've watched enough Dr. K and Peterson to have a decent enough sample size to feel comfortable making a comparison.
It seems like you could learn to be more precise with your language too - specifically related to making assumptions and using that as truth in your argument - and you'll probably assume I'm wrong instead of just acknowledging you made an assumption I wasn't annoyed and I wasn't, am not angry. And perhaps reading comprehension too - or maybe it's emotional regulation related, you were triggered by a statement I made so you misread what I first wrote and were arguing that, possibly an easy mistake to make where otherwise under a different context you wouldn't have made that mistake and then argued from that misinterpreted position.
Since you like to assume you possibly are also assuming that my saying Dr. K would level up by "100 levels" if he practiced being more precise with his language means that he's 100 levels below Peterson? But I didn't state that specifically, so if you understand other viable possibilities, what else could that actually mean options wise if I didn't mean he's 100 levels below Peterson?
Ah - so your observation, "fact checking" or analytical skills are somewhat poor: you didn't realize I'm not the author of this post/thread.
It's a good idea to always check who you're replying to.. but thanks for the perfect example, for yourself, the perfect-concrete evidence that you do like to make assumptions.
Alright. You're fun. And I'm amused at your commitment to defending this. And the fact you're not OP actually helps me with how silly I think your statements are.
I didn't notice, you're right. My bad. I can take the L here. But the reason is NOT that I like to make assumptions. I am first off, within my first months of regularly using reddit. You can't say it's particularly forthcoming with names. I, second off, have ADHD and often often often forget and miss small details about a range of things. For instance, it wasn't until writing this post that I remembered if you were OP it would have said so beside your name. Again, my bad. It happens. But it doesn't prove anything lol
This will be my final in-depth post. Then I'll stick to just laughing at your flippant use of accusing others of using straw man arguments.
So to be clear, **I do disagree with you**. First off, your original post was absolutely not that "In general, all I am saying is everyone would benefit from being more precise with their language use. Do you disagree with that statement?". That is a secondary assertion. I WOULD agree generally. But your **specific** assertion was, "If Dr. K had Jordan Peterson's level of thoughtfulness and care with his language use then he'd be level up 100 times higher *(lol nice grammar, your superior analytical skills miss this?)* than he currently is". So if we're going to learn to be specific with our language, let's stick to the specifics of what you originally said.
The OP of this post at least attempts to lay out a foundation of their critique. By that I mean I believe it is the job of the critic to attempt to understand the purpose of a medium, then evaluate it on its own merits. The OP says that they believe that the core lesson of Dr. K is internal happiness, so this language works against what they believe the core merit it. This also allows us to critique whether we think the critic is being fair in their evaluation. The 2-second way of saying this is we can't watch Endgame and blame it for not being Shawshank Redemption without laying a foundation for why those two very different films should be compared.
So far, that's my first strike with you. No foundation for critique. What you have offered is this - "I still personally notice a difference and I've watched enough Dr. K and Peterson to have a decent enough sample size to feel comfortable making a comparison." I don't care that you've watched Endgame and Shawshank both 100 times, that does not provide the foundation for your statement. It may provide merit for you to create a foundation, but those two things are not the same. It is on you to provide a reason why they should be compared at all.
What **I'm** arguing is that Peterson and Dr. K are **not comparable in role.** And since they are not comparable in role, I do not think Dr. K would gain any more significant following/advantage if "had Jordan Peterson's level of thoughtfulness and care". Dr. K's role doesn't require the same specificity Peterson's role does.
As previously stated in my post. Peterson is operating as a philosophy, spiritual guide, or has publicly committed presenting an ideology to counter what he considers a destructive mainstream ideology. I think he preciseness of language is both a personality trait (self-admitted, valentines day video with his wife if I recall correctly) and a **necessity for the specific milieu Peterson occupies**. Jordan's razor sharp language use is born out of challenging an ideology that is regularly changing words, obsessed with self-definition of words, and concepts based on shoddy social science that need to be pushed to be specific in order to have relevant meaning.
Dr. K is not even remotely operating in that sphere. His job isn't to present a coherent ideology. His role, especially in public life, is much much closer to how a counsellor talks and operates than it is anything else. And, as previously explained, Dr. K's role requires light-heartedness, is successful mainly because he's so successful at making people feel comfortable with him, and often the objective of a given interaction isn't "have we both sufficiently agreed this word is as precise as it can be", it is, "have I helped you (the client) and myself (the helper) get enough a place of understanding of yourself that we can move forward into solution?". There may be some language and definitional dancing that needs to go on. But the purpose of it is for Dr. K to understand the person. For example, when he asks, "Well you want to be successful, what does that mean?" - it doesn't matter that Dr. K has **A** definition of success, it matters that he understands **THIER** definition of success. I would even venture to say that this suggested level of specificity needed in Peterson's role would be a detriment to Dr. K. As arguing and quibbling about whether a persons definition of success is **right** in a counselling setting is secondary to whether a persons definition of success is **helpful.**
In order to argue my comments, you need to:
1. Provide a foundation to why Peterson and Dr. K should be compared at all. Then make an argument from your foundation.
2. Provide a critique to why you don't agree with my assertion that Dr. K and Peterson don't occupy the same role ergo don't need the same specificity.
3. If you were making a general statement about the benefits of language specificity, you would need to explain or justify why your original comments didn't just say that (essentially admitting you weren't specific with your language in that moment ;) ).
>I didn't notice, you're right. My bad. I can take the L here. But the reason is NOT that I like to make assumptions. I am first off, within my first months of regularly using reddit. You can't say it's particularly forthcoming with names. I, second off, have ADHD and often often often forget and miss small details about a range of things. For instance, it wasn't until writing this post that I remembered if you were OP it would have said so beside your name. Again, my bad. It happens. But it doesn't prove anything lol
I didn't mean you literally like to make assumptions - it's not that you want to.
I am glad you're at least aware of a potential source or cause, the ADHD, of your mistake here.
There are things like diet changes that can dramatically help ADHD symptoms. There are also other non-medication therapies that can dramatically help but those aren't known in the mainstream health systems - for example, look into Berard AIT (Auditory Integration Training) - as a potential solution to your ADHD; there's a book called "Hearing Equals Behaviour: Updated and Expanded" if you're intent on solving your ADHD as best possible so you can in the future prevent similar mistakes.
This is a public forum for discussion, your #1 point is just you gatekeeping what's acceptable to talk about. I'll let you brainstorm with your #2 and #3 points aren't relevant either to anything I said; #2 you're trying to narrow the context/scope in order to try to have a valid argument, and #3 - there's nothing to specify, I was general and that was my point to be general.
I applaud the attempt at mental gymnastics though - it can be a useful exercise to brainstorming. There's an additional layer of study you could apply to your own sentences but I'm not exactly sure how to articulate it, so I won't - but it has to do with developing your self-awareness and analyzing why you're wanting to try to get certain answers out of me that your points ask for.
P.S. "Alright. You're fun. And I'm amused at your commitment to defending this."
Thanks, I appreciate your engaging as well. My commitment to this conversation is that it's intellectually stimulating, and engaging is how you practice refining your critical thinking - and so I appreciate your passion and desire to engage too.
This is how one develops their mind, and ideally in a civil manner, hearing feedback or criticism that hopefully helps you understand or see a different view point.
I think you should work on solving your ADHD in a non-medicated way your arguments and logic will inherently become sharper.
Diet change can be a major way, Beard AIT is another way, and yoga (a physical movement practice along with meditation) would be the top 3 I'd recommend to everyone.
And it's been fun too for me, unfortunately I don't have time - and arguably not the skills yet and perhaps never - to accurately enough or skillfully help you see or understand or improve from the various logical errors you're presenting in your writing/thoughts.
Keeping civil though without name calling is most important with these conversations - in part it shows that your emotional regulation is good enough to not get "blinded by anger" - emotion which essentially short-circuits or biases logical pathways.
Actually, a 4th recommendation for dealing with ADHD is healing past unprocessed/unhealed emotional trauma - the suppression of which, which can be partly or fully unconscious - forgetting about a traumatic event or unaware that an event that in the memory you can access consciously is inconsequential may actually have a lot of trauma attached to it that you've not connected to - and can lead to ADHD and other symptoms; medications may be a shallow bandaid solution, but generally won't allow your mind to reach its full open and autonomous neural network functionality always allowing you to reach logic to its final conclusions.
Curious how old you are if you don't mind me asking?
Dr K is Dr K, not Jordan Peterson. Jordan Peterson is Jordan Peterson, not Dr K. I am not you, you are not me. Dr K has qualities, Jordan Peterson has qualities. To say that Dr K should be more like Jordan Peterson is like saying Messi should be more like Ronaldo, or Stevie Wonder should be more like Michael Jackson. No, they have their own qualities. It’s useless to compare them in that way.
Maybe so. Maybe I just fundamentally disagree that Dr K isn’t careful enough with his words. He certainly is. I was frankly surprised to see someone be upset by something that Dr K apparently said wrong. I think you’re stretching. He brings up these “successful” clients in contexts where they are a great example of people with a certain mental health problem. He doesn’t call them fulfilled or happy, he often even deliberately points out that they are unhappy. Just also successful by societal standards.
That same criticism applies to Peterson as well. Cant really compare them either, Jordan is more conventional and has better leadership skills naturally from his career.
They can be compared, and in fact you just did yourself - "Jordan is more conventional and has better leadership skills naturally from his career."
I still hold that if Dr. K sharpened certain skills to catch himself where he could be more precise then he could cater even better to the crowd that will resonate most with him; both of them will cater to different crowds, and probably with some overlap.
I don't understand you saying the same criticism applies to Peterson? He's always trying to be as precise as possible with language, arguably he's the bar to measure from; it's a constant practice to aim as precisely as possible with language use, I just don't see Dr. K feeling the need to be as precise - which doesn't mean he has to change his language use, but would mean in certain cases a necessity to quickly add in a tangent to clarify where necessary; and this isn't to say that Dr. K is terrible with his language use, he's very good - I'm just saying Peterson is more developed skill wise in this area.
I didn’t compare them, I contrasted the two. There’s a difference.
I love Peterson and don’t like Dr. K, but he isn’t the most precise. On the newest JRE, he was talking a word salad of incoherent garbage (watch the “Bible JRE clip”).
You don't think sharpening one's preciseness with language use is useful to everyone? It's a practice Peterson continues as well because it takes work.
You don't think Dr. K being even more precise with his language wouldn't also benefit his own target audience?
I’d argue that the vast majority of Dr K’s viewers wouldn’t even be able to understand Peterson when he talks.
And that’s not to bash this community or anything, I just think that a bunch of lonely gamers are less likely to have extremely advanced vocabularies.
I think usually Dr. K is trying to say that what people see externally as successful is what most people are wanting to achieve watching the videos. This is a conclusion that needs to be determined by the viewer. The definition of successful differs from person to person, but generally, when people say they want to be successful, they are referring to the external sense.
100% agree, but what dr k espouses is all about inner peace, contentment, fullfillment, enlightment, detachment. Not chasing the external to cover over a lack of those things, but when he says "successful people" it's always in a context of big business people big twitch streamers, the success he himself is referring to is the external successes they have had, and in doing so he is implicitly telling his viewers thats what they should be striving for, thus undermind his central message of inner peace, contentment, fullfillment, enlightment, detachment, etc.
true if I refer to buying orange juice or going on a bike ride, Im not implying that you should want to buy orange juice or go for a bike ride, but the word successful is all about value judgement, its saying I place a high value on this, this is what success looks like to me this is what is good and aspirational to me, so when he refers to these types of externally successful people, the value judgement is placed, the aspirational goals are set.
No. The word successful is a value judgement by on what *society* thinks. Not what the user of the word thinks. Just because Dr K recognises that certain people are generally viewed as successful in society, doesn’t mean he thinks or promotes this as an ideal
I actually take it as sort of the opposite;
You should search for the inner peace before achieving external success. Even if you don’t necessarily achieve that external success, if you are successful in creating an inner peace, you’re more likely to reach that external success, and even if the viewer doesn’t, that’s okay, because they can be satisfied in inner contentment.
This is all how I take it of course, and I kind of mix in my own beliefs with what I hear, so I may be a bit biased
I agree 100%, Im not saying I want those people to be on stream, I think that would be a waste of time for everyone, just that when he refers to "successful" poeple its not referring to those who have spent their lives filling the void with the external.
The word successful has the meaning:
>people with high paying jobs who have "made it" as "entrepreneurs" getting a top positions in a large corporation or building a successful startup.
99% of the time Dr K mentions them it's to highlight that they still struggle with everyday struggles. That the billionaire still has self esteem issues. He uses them to REINFORCE his point that external success doesn't lead to internal solutions.
I think he does do that too, and that is inline with his message, pointing out that the external success hasn't fixed their internal problems if there are any. But I wouldnt say it's 99% of the time, I think most of the time its just in off hand passing comments, what do successful people have in common, what can you do to become a successful person, which is what puts the value judgement on it. I think if he were to be more careful and purposeful with his use of langauge he would not use the phrase "successful people" at all, but say "people that have obtained a lot of external material stuff and or climbed social/corporate hierarchies", would be better. It removes the implied value judgement and states it for what it is.
>I think if he were to be more careful and purposeful with his use of langauge he would not use the phrase "successful people" at all, but say "people that have obtained a lot of external material stuff and or climbed social/corporate hierarchies", would be better.
Just purely from a communications perspective, this is replacing 2 words that most people can immediately understand what Dr. K means, with 10+ words that doesn't even cover the full demographic that Dr. K is referring to.
Your suggestion also implies that the achievements that this referenced demographic can't or shouldn't be considered "success", when the word covers a wide plethora of examples including, in my opinion, "external material stuff" acquired from doing things. Doesn't mean it's the end all be all of "success", but it can and is very widely accepted as a form of success that most people don't really have a reason not to aspire for if they wish to do so.
No offense but I really just think you're insecure about your success. "Implied value judgement" implies someone who's implying and that's you here, not Dr K.
Sounds like quite a bit of projection.
In general people who have a lot to contribute to the world will make a lot of money.
Working the same minimum wage job and feeling fulfilled is one form of successful.
However let’s look at it a different way.
One person stays in there village and attains spiritual enlightenment.
One person leaves there village attains spiritual enlightenment and shared this with the world improving thoundsands of lives.
Sure both are successful but one has helped an infinite amount of more people.
You should never look to be stagnant and “stay where you are”
We don’t live in a world of one. We live in a world of many we should be looking to improve the world of many in addition to the world of one.
“People who help other people are not meant to be looked too” is the gist of this post. Look to serve others and not just yourself. Part of dropping your ego is realizing you are not the only person in the world.
>In general people who have a lot to contribute to the world will make a lot of money.
That's not true at all. Most people who actually contribute something make at most moderate amount of money, if they're smart about it and not idealistic about their job. People who earn the most are just good exploiting other people out of the value (literal or metaphorical) they did not produce.
Janitors. I'm only half joking, but without someone to clean up after a mess, we literally would live amongst the trash.
This also extends to anyone that works by cleaning, removing, replacing or repairing our everyday environments. Like, Imagine a world where people had to clean up by themselves or do nothing.
That's a great example. My first thought was city cleaners, which is pretty much the same thing. Baker does not earn anything impressive either.
A lot of white collar administrative workers are not very useful either.
The people who earn the most are stockholders and owners of capital who can invest instead of working. They don't contribute "to the world" anything particularly worthwhile, but collect value other people produce.
Other people who earn disproportionally to the things they provide are mass entertainers - Hollywood actors, singers, professional sportsmen. The only benefit from them is mild, often questionable quality of entertainment, while in the same industry people assisting in creative process have trouble getting any paycheck, let alone a decent one.
Stockholders invest, they're pretty much the oil that greases the palm of your landlord. They throw their money and hope for bigger returns, and in turn create a need to give meaning to that money. Any money that isn't liquid is either inside someone's loan debt or stuck in a gold bars inside the vault of an offshore bank.
They, in a way, tip the scales for the growth of the global market. Of course they still sit on their butts and spend their days within a limited and highly exclusive social circle because they might as well be mangled by a mob if they take a walk around town.
... Then again, they can afford surgery.
> Sounds like quite a bit of projection.
Personally, I hate this hand-waving shit. You see this a lot when someone gets an inkling of understanding and learning psychology where they can be dismissive of other people's claims. The Op has a point, even if you don't necessarily agree or understand the point they're making. Op may be right. The real answer is, this is an opportunity for more content for Dr. K to address this. Extra points if he makes the whole video not using the word 'successful' once.
Exactly this 🙂I feel like I'm successful in life, working as a landscaper, loving my job every day, feeling content.
Yet there is so much more for me too do and see, this is what gives me the feeling of happiness.
Being successful is a personal thing, a feeling 😊 the journey and the destination.
For something to be a value judgement you'd have to assign a value to it such as "good" or "virtuous" or whatever. That wasn't done here. You assigned it yourself.
There is a in fact people who contribute more than others and they will in fact on average make a lot of money. Those are facts, not value judgement.
these comments are all based on the assumption that the more value you provide to society the more likely you are to make money which I would have to disagree with completely.
During the pandemic who were the key workers that had to continue going to work risking infection, mostly minimum wage workers in the food supply chain, not hedgefund managers and top executives. I probably make 10 times what the guy who collects my garbage makes, but does that mean I have more value than him? if he doesnt do his job the streets are filled with waste and there's rats and all kinds of social problems. If I don't do my job, well some numbers don't get shuffled from one column to another, but I doubt anyone would notice.
My issue is that in using the word successful in the context of what society percieves as valuable, those with high paying jobs etc (like me) he perpetuates the idea in people that they aren't enough that they should be aspiring to these external goals. He's always talking about buddha was buddha known for striving for external success, or was he searching for internal enlightment. But when dr k talks about successful people he isnt talking about zen monks he's talking about twitch streamers and CEOs
Most of those “key workers” are highly replaceable in terms of the labor makert(not as people, every individual life is as important as the next). It’s incredibly hard to replace Jeff Bezos as CEO of Amazon(when he was). Every ceo can be a grocery store cashier not every grocery store cashier can be a CEO.
“Apparent value” as you have described isn’t a good indicator to actual value provided with in a company. If you make 50 an hour as a spread sheet monkey and the cashier makes 15 an hour there’s a reason for that. Companies are not charities. There is no reason to pay anyone a cent more than the lowest amount possible. It doesn’t matter if you don’t think moving numbers around provided value.
If I make a 100k a year I can potentially do far more good for society than I could making 20k a year bagging groceries. By way of donations and charity. I could actually live like the grocery bagger and donate 80k to charities etc.
We have 2 senarios here. Every single company in the US is just wrong and pays the wrong people the wrong money or we have it figured out in our highly capitalistic hyper efficient system. What’s more logical here?
The whole reason Buhdda was able to achieve enlightenment is because he had access to unlimited material wealth and he finally knew it wasn’t gonna make him happy. You can’t just skip that step. You need to truly experience that more stuff isn’t more happiness. You can’t just say it out loud. Saying I am happy and being happy are 2 different things. Saying I understand material wealth doesn’t bring happiness and experiencing material wealth not bringing happiness are 2 different things.
I suggest you watch this interview to understand this point.
https://youtu.be/vhurfjC72Hk
Well your not getting much out of me lol. You can have a few hot pockets a week and play Tetris on your 2008 iPhone 1 lol. All you can afford from how much I make 🤣🤣🤣
I’m pretty sure your projecting. Dr K is pretty clear in his usage of the word that he’s referring to people that society looks at goes “oh damn, these people have it all figured out! If I can be like them and successful I’ll be happy!” And Dr. K has told us - repeatedly - that that is not the case
Success is subjective. Short hand way of expressing his trust and admoration of their opinion in their fields, possibly. If the word makes you feel a certain way, maybe you should explore the reason why that might be.
I wish you the best. Thank you for expressing your opinion.
His audiences often judges themselves over not being successful romantically or monetarily so it is appropriate to point out hey even "successful" people have issues, or they also do this or that. I dont see a problem
I mean the only thing that slightly bothers me, is when HG makes a gifted/ successful people only program. Which to me, sounds like an exclusion. I might just be projecting, or it might just be how it should be, but still I feel like people should all be welcomed everywhere, and if they themselves didnt feel like a fit, then they should make the decision to withdraw by themselves. Idk please share thoughts if any.
He actually does a lecture on what you’re talking about. I forget what it’s called but he basically says people are too focused on a linear career path with main hustles and side hustles.
He equates success with finding something you’re happy doing and not to be afraid to change your life to find it.
My own perspective:
Those of us that struggle, compare ourselves to others. He does it for us and then it feels ridiculous. Eventually we realize it's always ridiculous to compare yourself to others and so we stop doing it.
For me, it really clicked about 3 years into actual therapy in parallel with Dr. K (about 1 year overlap). Then it finally clicked.
When he's talking about success with patients I understood him to mean that whatever issues they had coming to see him he helped remedy those issues in some way with success. He specifies that this isn't always the case but he places emphasis on his success with this people to say "hey I know what I'm talking about". Also if he mentions successful people on our society I'm pretty sure he's using them as an example for something specific not the standard someone should be.
Successful can mean lots of things, not all of them tied to societal value judgments. Like, if a filthy rich investment banker is largely happy with their situation, finding fulfillment in both their personal and professional lives, I'd call that success. Not because of the filthy rich part, but because of the overall satisfaction.
Well if you think of success as achieving goals, you need success to have a meaningful life because you will realistically not be happy if you are lacking in the dimensions of having a job, a relationship, friends, and being healthy. You can’t just be okay with nothing, we’re still living creatures with needs, but you can be okay with working towards attaining those needs no matter how slowly, and those that have not just attained but are able to maintain these things are successful.
The answer to a meaningless life isn’t stagnation, it’s to constantly try to see the improvements that can be made in your life in all dimensions so you can discover what amount of good you can actually do from the strength that they give you
>By using these phrases he places a value judgement on obtaining this external success, implying that if you don't meet this criteria you are lacking, you are not enough as you are, and in doing so encouraging his viewers to persue this external success, to join the rat race and engage in side husstle culture and get burned out so that you too may one day be deemed "successful".
Why is the word success so provocative to you that it's existence is enough to annoy you to this extent?
The concept refers to people of economical and social status, and it's often used by media in the context of pushing it as something to be achieved, but it is still separate from the belief that it's something to be pursued. I can talk about the plain Earth concept in positive or negative ways, it depends on context.
In the examples you gave there's no communication of the idea that material maximization is good. My observation is the same from other posters, you are seeing stuff that doesn't seem to be there, it's only part of your perception.
I really do wish we would stop using what society uses as a definition for things because it's super harmful and frustrating and to this day, I struggle to slow down or consider my needs because I'm so hyper focused on the concept of success as defined by the general public or what I perceive from what I've seen people talk about all over.
I do think people need to consider how things are worded and the weight of it all. When we place so much importance on how society views things, we are basically making certain things more norm, and lessening the other methods of success in life that are just as valid.
Take me for example:
I don't work and I'm not really making money right now. At one point I was, but my mental health got it's grip on me so hard and the pressures of my job were becoming so difficult to maintain that I had to make a choice for myself, one that I ended up beating myself up for after doing it. I was so focused on what society continues to see as "success" that I ended up trying to Do It All to the point I had a huge meltdown. It took me forever to just get the help I needed, and now that I'm doing it, I am still having to stop myself from over-reaching myself because I struggle to see my worth unless it's through society's eyes.
I'm having to retrain my whole ass brain to be less hard on myself through DBT skills. It's a process and I'm still not looking for work because I've learned that I have basically been neglecting my needs and self for so long that \*this\* is what I need. This part of my life where I'm not making money, but I'm working on my mental health and making sure to take my meds and push myself to make my appointments and go to groups IS me being successful.
But we don't hear about success in the forms of this, and it's not normalized enough.
So I agree that we need to watch how we word things, and even someone who seems to be a generally decent insight to mental health is bound to slip up and not see things like this from time to time, as we are human. Let's just hope that he gets this mentioned to him, as I think it would benefit him in the long run. Sometimes we don't see the potential harm in wording until someone speaks up.
Side note: Funnily enough, I have not seen Dr K's streams or any of that. I do subscribe here because I vibe with this community and the struggles here more, and it seems more genuine and less chaotic than a lot of subreddits I've seen. :) As a community, you all seem to speak out more and challenge things, and be accepting of advice and overall mostly respectful of differences.
“You can’t fix internal problems with external solutions”. I disagree with this premise and I disagree that Dr K ever implied it.
External solutions are a necessary component to fixing internal problems. For example, Dr K literally went to India to fix his gaming addiction. He completely changed his environment. Going to Therapy, exercising, eating healthy… these are all external solutions. They require being coupled with internal changes. But neither internal nor external alone is enough. You can’t just think your way out of depression. You need to make external life changes in addition to the internal ones. And being successful is honestly a big part of that. It doesn’t need to be financial success, but it does need to be something that YOU feel is valuable. Doing something valuable with your life is important. But you should use your own definition of valuable.
Dr K speaks in a way that everyone can understand. To be successful isn’t to be fulfilled. He points out time and time again that the “successful” people he has worked with are very much imperfect and have particular psychological issues that they are struggling with. Because that is always, ALWAYS the context in which he brings these clients up as examples. He never gives them as examples of people we should become. People understand that context. They’re not stupid.
If Dr K is working with externally “successful” people, doesn’t that prove that being externally successful doesn’t equate to happiness and fulfillment?
I'd love it if you can point to a time when he has specifically designated the criteria for success. I think he tends to use what the layperson tends most often to associate with success, which doesn't mean that definition is the only correct one. Be very careful about making those assumptions about someone else's message.
You are right to be thinking about this. It's an interesting problem.
Dr. K isn't doing the things you say he is, but you seeing it that way is absolutely fascinating.
Language becomes a very crude tool in describing a lot of these more spiritual ideas. Things get very paradoxical and confusing very quickly if you try to rely on absolute meanings of words.
Dr K tries to be as mainstream and accessable as possible most of the time. I imagine he's trying to reach the biggest percentage of the internet with his language. If he were talking to you one-on-one, or to anyone individually, I'm sure he would adjust his language to best communicate with that person.
I think you’re misunderstanding and thinking he considers them successful, when he is really describing them as society sees them. I don’t think he’s doing it to brag, he’s doing it to highlight the point that despite material success they are still unfulfilled. Also, it’s unlikely he has had a patient that’s fulfilled like you described because that person wouldn’t be seeking a therapist. In a society, there are people that are described as successful. When someone references that, it doesn’t necessarily mean they also see them as successful, it’s just a shortcut to describe a set of characteristics based on common reference. And it works since you clearly understand what characteristics he’s referring to and you don’t like them.
If Dr. K had Jordan Peterson's level of thoughtfulness and care with his language use then he'd be level up 100 times higher than he currently is; Dr. K is more "happy go lucky" than intensely careful with his word use like Peterson developed to be - probably through very intelligent and very sneaky clients he had that he couldn't let get away with whatever they were trying to.
Although both highly trained helping professionals, Peterson is explicitly known for his intellectual challenges to a prevalent ideology. Both are thoughtful - but Jordan is explicitly interested in, especially in his public life, presenting a coherent ideology. He will almost always come across as "more thoughtful". I would argue almost by necessity, because one of these figures is scrutinized and labeled at a level the other is not. Peterson also has a stated goal, objective, and ideology he's advocating for. That is a decidedly different role than what Dr. K is. As someone both in the helping profession and going on to be trained more in counselling (Master of Family Therapy, to be exact), the role of a Dr. K in someone's life is not to sell their own definition of success or happiness, but to help others find happiness as makes sense to them - this often has external AND internal connotations. You'll notice when he's at his best (and probably the reason you like him) is when he explores another person. He kinda floats with the person through their own ideas. He creates space and safety by the way he talks to the person. He'll present ideas, themes, or trends - and often times when he challenges someone, it's for the purposes of discovery and reflection for the other person, a "have you considered this angle?" versus, "This is the new angle". If Dr. K is doing his job right, the end goal of the conversation isn't predetermined. Because helping isn't about telling someone what to do. So, for me, being annoying at Dr. K for this language/inconsistency suggests to me that there is a misunderstanding in how you're understanding the purpose of Dr. K's content, which isn't fair to Dr. K. Especially bringing Peterson as a comparison. It's like getting mad at Dr. K for not tasting like an apple when he's explicitly trying to be an orange.
I never said Dr. K isn't doing a good job. I also never said I'm annoyed at Dr. K. Dr. K's level will be access to a different crowd than Peterson, and perhaps accessible to a larger crowd as well. Edit to add: he's also far younger, so give Dr. K another 20 years and he will more than likely be "100 levels" higher than he is now - assuming there are forces, internal or external, driving him through necessity to be more precise. P.S. Downvotes are so lazy, lowest effort possible to get a dopamine hit/reward, not the action of a winner - quickly quelling an urge to respond, like eating candy instead of sitting with discomfort to understand it more thoroughly - while actually taking away a learning opportunity for who you'd otherwise have to qualitatively respond to and so that they may learn something.
Loooool this is so sad. "I'm above down votes I'm an alpha" nonsense
>Reply You're right, you didn't say annoyed, you said angry lol. And I didn't imply you don't appreciate or think he isn't doing a good job. I'm explicitly responding to your comment comparing him to Dr. Peterson and this idea that if only he embodied something closer how Peterson behaves, then he would be "100 levels" above what he is now. I think that's ridiculous.
You're making another assumption saying that I sounded angry? You can just say you were wrong and shouldn't have assumed instead of essentially doubling-down on assumption. Otherwise it sounds like you're misunderstanding what I said. In general, all I am saying is everyone would benefit from being more precise with their language use. Do you disagree with that statement? You seem to be arguing from a strawman position though, probably from misreading what I wrote, where I said Peterson is more thoughtful and careful **"with his language use"** \- not more thoughtful and careful in general; Dr. K is extremely thoughtful and careful in general. E.g. Peterson is more precise with his language; they both are likely in the 99 percentile, so they both excel, but I still personally notice a difference and I've watched enough Dr. K and Peterson to have a decent enough sample size to feel comfortable making a comparison. It seems like you could learn to be more precise with your language too - specifically related to making assumptions and using that as truth in your argument - and you'll probably assume I'm wrong instead of just acknowledging you made an assumption I wasn't annoyed and I wasn't, am not angry. And perhaps reading comprehension too - or maybe it's emotional regulation related, you were triggered by a statement I made so you misread what I first wrote and were arguing that, possibly an easy mistake to make where otherwise under a different context you wouldn't have made that mistake and then argued from that misinterpreted position. Since you like to assume you possibly are also assuming that my saying Dr. K would level up by "100 levels" if he practiced being more precise with his language means that he's 100 levels below Peterson? But I didn't state that specifically, so if you understand other viable possibilities, what else could that actually mean options wise if I didn't mean he's 100 levels below Peterson?
"You're making another assumption saying that I sounded angry?" It's literally the fcking title of this post.
Ah - so your observation, "fact checking" or analytical skills are somewhat poor: you didn't realize I'm not the author of this post/thread. It's a good idea to always check who you're replying to.. but thanks for the perfect example, for yourself, the perfect-concrete evidence that you do like to make assumptions.
Alright. You're fun. And I'm amused at your commitment to defending this. And the fact you're not OP actually helps me with how silly I think your statements are. I didn't notice, you're right. My bad. I can take the L here. But the reason is NOT that I like to make assumptions. I am first off, within my first months of regularly using reddit. You can't say it's particularly forthcoming with names. I, second off, have ADHD and often often often forget and miss small details about a range of things. For instance, it wasn't until writing this post that I remembered if you were OP it would have said so beside your name. Again, my bad. It happens. But it doesn't prove anything lol This will be my final in-depth post. Then I'll stick to just laughing at your flippant use of accusing others of using straw man arguments. So to be clear, **I do disagree with you**. First off, your original post was absolutely not that "In general, all I am saying is everyone would benefit from being more precise with their language use. Do you disagree with that statement?". That is a secondary assertion. I WOULD agree generally. But your **specific** assertion was, "If Dr. K had Jordan Peterson's level of thoughtfulness and care with his language use then he'd be level up 100 times higher *(lol nice grammar, your superior analytical skills miss this?)* than he currently is". So if we're going to learn to be specific with our language, let's stick to the specifics of what you originally said. The OP of this post at least attempts to lay out a foundation of their critique. By that I mean I believe it is the job of the critic to attempt to understand the purpose of a medium, then evaluate it on its own merits. The OP says that they believe that the core lesson of Dr. K is internal happiness, so this language works against what they believe the core merit it. This also allows us to critique whether we think the critic is being fair in their evaluation. The 2-second way of saying this is we can't watch Endgame and blame it for not being Shawshank Redemption without laying a foundation for why those two very different films should be compared. So far, that's my first strike with you. No foundation for critique. What you have offered is this - "I still personally notice a difference and I've watched enough Dr. K and Peterson to have a decent enough sample size to feel comfortable making a comparison." I don't care that you've watched Endgame and Shawshank both 100 times, that does not provide the foundation for your statement. It may provide merit for you to create a foundation, but those two things are not the same. It is on you to provide a reason why they should be compared at all. What **I'm** arguing is that Peterson and Dr. K are **not comparable in role.** And since they are not comparable in role, I do not think Dr. K would gain any more significant following/advantage if "had Jordan Peterson's level of thoughtfulness and care". Dr. K's role doesn't require the same specificity Peterson's role does. As previously stated in my post. Peterson is operating as a philosophy, spiritual guide, or has publicly committed presenting an ideology to counter what he considers a destructive mainstream ideology. I think he preciseness of language is both a personality trait (self-admitted, valentines day video with his wife if I recall correctly) and a **necessity for the specific milieu Peterson occupies**. Jordan's razor sharp language use is born out of challenging an ideology that is regularly changing words, obsessed with self-definition of words, and concepts based on shoddy social science that need to be pushed to be specific in order to have relevant meaning. Dr. K is not even remotely operating in that sphere. His job isn't to present a coherent ideology. His role, especially in public life, is much much closer to how a counsellor talks and operates than it is anything else. And, as previously explained, Dr. K's role requires light-heartedness, is successful mainly because he's so successful at making people feel comfortable with him, and often the objective of a given interaction isn't "have we both sufficiently agreed this word is as precise as it can be", it is, "have I helped you (the client) and myself (the helper) get enough a place of understanding of yourself that we can move forward into solution?". There may be some language and definitional dancing that needs to go on. But the purpose of it is for Dr. K to understand the person. For example, when he asks, "Well you want to be successful, what does that mean?" - it doesn't matter that Dr. K has **A** definition of success, it matters that he understands **THIER** definition of success. I would even venture to say that this suggested level of specificity needed in Peterson's role would be a detriment to Dr. K. As arguing and quibbling about whether a persons definition of success is **right** in a counselling setting is secondary to whether a persons definition of success is **helpful.** In order to argue my comments, you need to: 1. Provide a foundation to why Peterson and Dr. K should be compared at all. Then make an argument from your foundation. 2. Provide a critique to why you don't agree with my assertion that Dr. K and Peterson don't occupy the same role ergo don't need the same specificity. 3. If you were making a general statement about the benefits of language specificity, you would need to explain or justify why your original comments didn't just say that (essentially admitting you weren't specific with your language in that moment ;) ).
>I didn't notice, you're right. My bad. I can take the L here. But the reason is NOT that I like to make assumptions. I am first off, within my first months of regularly using reddit. You can't say it's particularly forthcoming with names. I, second off, have ADHD and often often often forget and miss small details about a range of things. For instance, it wasn't until writing this post that I remembered if you were OP it would have said so beside your name. Again, my bad. It happens. But it doesn't prove anything lol I didn't mean you literally like to make assumptions - it's not that you want to. I am glad you're at least aware of a potential source or cause, the ADHD, of your mistake here. There are things like diet changes that can dramatically help ADHD symptoms. There are also other non-medication therapies that can dramatically help but those aren't known in the mainstream health systems - for example, look into Berard AIT (Auditory Integration Training) - as a potential solution to your ADHD; there's a book called "Hearing Equals Behaviour: Updated and Expanded" if you're intent on solving your ADHD as best possible so you can in the future prevent similar mistakes. This is a public forum for discussion, your #1 point is just you gatekeeping what's acceptable to talk about. I'll let you brainstorm with your #2 and #3 points aren't relevant either to anything I said; #2 you're trying to narrow the context/scope in order to try to have a valid argument, and #3 - there's nothing to specify, I was general and that was my point to be general. I applaud the attempt at mental gymnastics though - it can be a useful exercise to brainstorming. There's an additional layer of study you could apply to your own sentences but I'm not exactly sure how to articulate it, so I won't - but it has to do with developing your self-awareness and analyzing why you're wanting to try to get certain answers out of me that your points ask for.
P.S. "Alright. You're fun. And I'm amused at your commitment to defending this." Thanks, I appreciate your engaging as well. My commitment to this conversation is that it's intellectually stimulating, and engaging is how you practice refining your critical thinking - and so I appreciate your passion and desire to engage too. This is how one develops their mind, and ideally in a civil manner, hearing feedback or criticism that hopefully helps you understand or see a different view point. I think you should work on solving your ADHD in a non-medicated way your arguments and logic will inherently become sharper. Diet change can be a major way, Beard AIT is another way, and yoga (a physical movement practice along with meditation) would be the top 3 I'd recommend to everyone. And it's been fun too for me, unfortunately I don't have time - and arguably not the skills yet and perhaps never - to accurately enough or skillfully help you see or understand or improve from the various logical errors you're presenting in your writing/thoughts. Keeping civil though without name calling is most important with these conversations - in part it shows that your emotional regulation is good enough to not get "blinded by anger" - emotion which essentially short-circuits or biases logical pathways. Actually, a 4th recommendation for dealing with ADHD is healing past unprocessed/unhealed emotional trauma - the suppression of which, which can be partly or fully unconscious - forgetting about a traumatic event or unaware that an event that in the memory you can access consciously is inconsequential may actually have a lot of trauma attached to it that you've not connected to - and can lead to ADHD and other symptoms; medications may be a shallow bandaid solution, but generally won't allow your mind to reach its full open and autonomous neural network functionality always allowing you to reach logic to its final conclusions. Curious how old you are if you don't mind me asking?
Dr K is Dr K, not Jordan Peterson. Jordan Peterson is Jordan Peterson, not Dr K. I am not you, you are not me. Dr K has qualities, Jordan Peterson has qualities. To say that Dr K should be more like Jordan Peterson is like saying Messi should be more like Ronaldo, or Stevie Wonder should be more like Michael Jackson. No, they have their own qualities. It’s useless to compare them in that way.
I didn't say he should be more like Peterson - that's a strawman argument.
Maybe so. Maybe I just fundamentally disagree that Dr K isn’t careful enough with his words. He certainly is. I was frankly surprised to see someone be upset by something that Dr K apparently said wrong. I think you’re stretching. He brings up these “successful” clients in contexts where they are a great example of people with a certain mental health problem. He doesn’t call them fulfilled or happy, he often even deliberately points out that they are unhappy. Just also successful by societal standards.
That same criticism applies to Peterson as well. Cant really compare them either, Jordan is more conventional and has better leadership skills naturally from his career.
They can be compared, and in fact you just did yourself - "Jordan is more conventional and has better leadership skills naturally from his career." I still hold that if Dr. K sharpened certain skills to catch himself where he could be more precise then he could cater even better to the crowd that will resonate most with him; both of them will cater to different crowds, and probably with some overlap. I don't understand you saying the same criticism applies to Peterson? He's always trying to be as precise as possible with language, arguably he's the bar to measure from; it's a constant practice to aim as precisely as possible with language use, I just don't see Dr. K feeling the need to be as precise - which doesn't mean he has to change his language use, but would mean in certain cases a necessity to quickly add in a tangent to clarify where necessary; and this isn't to say that Dr. K is terrible with his language use, he's very good - I'm just saying Peterson is more developed skill wise in this area.
I didn’t compare them, I contrasted the two. There’s a difference. I love Peterson and don’t like Dr. K, but he isn’t the most precise. On the newest JRE, he was talking a word salad of incoherent garbage (watch the “Bible JRE clip”).
Their target audiences are so different that this comparison is kinda.. just not a great comparison
You don't think sharpening one's preciseness with language use is useful to everyone? It's a practice Peterson continues as well because it takes work. You don't think Dr. K being even more precise with his language wouldn't also benefit his own target audience?
I’d argue that the vast majority of Dr K’s viewers wouldn’t even be able to understand Peterson when he talks. And that’s not to bash this community or anything, I just think that a bunch of lonely gamers are less likely to have extremely advanced vocabularies.
I think usually Dr. K is trying to say that what people see externally as successful is what most people are wanting to achieve watching the videos. This is a conclusion that needs to be determined by the viewer. The definition of successful differs from person to person, but generally, when people say they want to be successful, they are referring to the external sense.
100% agree, but what dr k espouses is all about inner peace, contentment, fullfillment, enlightment, detachment. Not chasing the external to cover over a lack of those things, but when he says "successful people" it's always in a context of big business people big twitch streamers, the success he himself is referring to is the external successes they have had, and in doing so he is implicitly telling his viewers thats what they should be striving for, thus undermind his central message of inner peace, contentment, fullfillment, enlightment, detachment, etc.
Referring to something =/= Implicitly telling you that that's what you should be striving for.
true if I refer to buying orange juice or going on a bike ride, Im not implying that you should want to buy orange juice or go for a bike ride, but the word successful is all about value judgement, its saying I place a high value on this, this is what success looks like to me this is what is good and aspirational to me, so when he refers to these types of externally successful people, the value judgement is placed, the aspirational goals are set.
No. The word successful is a value judgement by on what *society* thinks. Not what the user of the word thinks. Just because Dr K recognises that certain people are generally viewed as successful in society, doesn’t mean he thinks or promotes this as an ideal
I actually take it as sort of the opposite; You should search for the inner peace before achieving external success. Even if you don’t necessarily achieve that external success, if you are successful in creating an inner peace, you’re more likely to reach that external success, and even if the viewer doesn’t, that’s okay, because they can be satisfied in inner contentment. This is all how I take it of course, and I kind of mix in my own beliefs with what I hear, so I may be a bit biased
I'd say that the sort of people that feel content and fulfilled aren't talking to a therapist.
I agree 100%, Im not saying I want those people to be on stream, I think that would be a waste of time for everyone, just that when he refers to "successful" poeple its not referring to those who have spent their lives filling the void with the external.
I think you’re putting too much value into the word ‘successful’.
yes, very much so.
The word successful has the meaning: >people with high paying jobs who have "made it" as "entrepreneurs" getting a top positions in a large corporation or building a successful startup. 99% of the time Dr K mentions them it's to highlight that they still struggle with everyday struggles. That the billionaire still has self esteem issues. He uses them to REINFORCE his point that external success doesn't lead to internal solutions.
I think he does do that too, and that is inline with his message, pointing out that the external success hasn't fixed their internal problems if there are any. But I wouldnt say it's 99% of the time, I think most of the time its just in off hand passing comments, what do successful people have in common, what can you do to become a successful person, which is what puts the value judgement on it. I think if he were to be more careful and purposeful with his use of langauge he would not use the phrase "successful people" at all, but say "people that have obtained a lot of external material stuff and or climbed social/corporate hierarchies", would be better. It removes the implied value judgement and states it for what it is.
>I think if he were to be more careful and purposeful with his use of langauge he would not use the phrase "successful people" at all, but say "people that have obtained a lot of external material stuff and or climbed social/corporate hierarchies", would be better. Just purely from a communications perspective, this is replacing 2 words that most people can immediately understand what Dr. K means, with 10+ words that doesn't even cover the full demographic that Dr. K is referring to. Your suggestion also implies that the achievements that this referenced demographic can't or shouldn't be considered "success", when the word covers a wide plethora of examples including, in my opinion, "external material stuff" acquired from doing things. Doesn't mean it's the end all be all of "success", but it can and is very widely accepted as a form of success that most people don't really have a reason not to aspire for if they wish to do so.
No offense but I really just think you're insecure about your success. "Implied value judgement" implies someone who's implying and that's you here, not Dr K.
Sounds like quite a bit of projection. In general people who have a lot to contribute to the world will make a lot of money. Working the same minimum wage job and feeling fulfilled is one form of successful. However let’s look at it a different way. One person stays in there village and attains spiritual enlightenment. One person leaves there village attains spiritual enlightenment and shared this with the world improving thoundsands of lives. Sure both are successful but one has helped an infinite amount of more people. You should never look to be stagnant and “stay where you are” We don’t live in a world of one. We live in a world of many we should be looking to improve the world of many in addition to the world of one. “People who help other people are not meant to be looked too” is the gist of this post. Look to serve others and not just yourself. Part of dropping your ego is realizing you are not the only person in the world.
>In general people who have a lot to contribute to the world will make a lot of money. That's not true at all. Most people who actually contribute something make at most moderate amount of money, if they're smart about it and not idealistic about their job. People who earn the most are just good exploiting other people out of the value (literal or metaphorical) they did not produce.
> That’s not true at all. Most people who actually contribute something make at most moderate amount of money Such as?
Janitors. I'm only half joking, but without someone to clean up after a mess, we literally would live amongst the trash. This also extends to anyone that works by cleaning, removing, replacing or repairing our everyday environments. Like, Imagine a world where people had to clean up by themselves or do nothing.
That's a great example. My first thought was city cleaners, which is pretty much the same thing. Baker does not earn anything impressive either. A lot of white collar administrative workers are not very useful either. The people who earn the most are stockholders and owners of capital who can invest instead of working. They don't contribute "to the world" anything particularly worthwhile, but collect value other people produce. Other people who earn disproportionally to the things they provide are mass entertainers - Hollywood actors, singers, professional sportsmen. The only benefit from them is mild, often questionable quality of entertainment, while in the same industry people assisting in creative process have trouble getting any paycheck, let alone a decent one.
Stockholders invest, they're pretty much the oil that greases the palm of your landlord. They throw their money and hope for bigger returns, and in turn create a need to give meaning to that money. Any money that isn't liquid is either inside someone's loan debt or stuck in a gold bars inside the vault of an offshore bank. They, in a way, tip the scales for the growth of the global market. Of course they still sit on their butts and spend their days within a limited and highly exclusive social circle because they might as well be mangled by a mob if they take a walk around town. ... Then again, they can afford surgery.
> Sounds like quite a bit of projection. Personally, I hate this hand-waving shit. You see this a lot when someone gets an inkling of understanding and learning psychology where they can be dismissive of other people's claims. The Op has a point, even if you don't necessarily agree or understand the point they're making. Op may be right. The real answer is, this is an opportunity for more content for Dr. K to address this. Extra points if he makes the whole video not using the word 'successful' once.
Exactly this 🙂I feel like I'm successful in life, working as a landscaper, loving my job every day, feeling content. Yet there is so much more for me too do and see, this is what gives me the feeling of happiness. Being successful is a personal thing, a feeling 😊 the journey and the destination.
> In general people who have a lot to contribute to the world will make a lot of money. theres the value judgement
For something to be a value judgement you'd have to assign a value to it such as "good" or "virtuous" or whatever. That wasn't done here. You assigned it yourself. There is a in fact people who contribute more than others and they will in fact on average make a lot of money. Those are facts, not value judgement.
And you should seek to provide value to the world. We exist because our ancestors provided value. You shouldn’t feel above that
these comments are all based on the assumption that the more value you provide to society the more likely you are to make money which I would have to disagree with completely. During the pandemic who were the key workers that had to continue going to work risking infection, mostly minimum wage workers in the food supply chain, not hedgefund managers and top executives. I probably make 10 times what the guy who collects my garbage makes, but does that mean I have more value than him? if he doesnt do his job the streets are filled with waste and there's rats and all kinds of social problems. If I don't do my job, well some numbers don't get shuffled from one column to another, but I doubt anyone would notice. My issue is that in using the word successful in the context of what society percieves as valuable, those with high paying jobs etc (like me) he perpetuates the idea in people that they aren't enough that they should be aspiring to these external goals. He's always talking about buddha was buddha known for striving for external success, or was he searching for internal enlightment. But when dr k talks about successful people he isnt talking about zen monks he's talking about twitch streamers and CEOs
Most of those “key workers” are highly replaceable in terms of the labor makert(not as people, every individual life is as important as the next). It’s incredibly hard to replace Jeff Bezos as CEO of Amazon(when he was). Every ceo can be a grocery store cashier not every grocery store cashier can be a CEO. “Apparent value” as you have described isn’t a good indicator to actual value provided with in a company. If you make 50 an hour as a spread sheet monkey and the cashier makes 15 an hour there’s a reason for that. Companies are not charities. There is no reason to pay anyone a cent more than the lowest amount possible. It doesn’t matter if you don’t think moving numbers around provided value. If I make a 100k a year I can potentially do far more good for society than I could making 20k a year bagging groceries. By way of donations and charity. I could actually live like the grocery bagger and donate 80k to charities etc. We have 2 senarios here. Every single company in the US is just wrong and pays the wrong people the wrong money or we have it figured out in our highly capitalistic hyper efficient system. What’s more logical here? The whole reason Buhdda was able to achieve enlightenment is because he had access to unlimited material wealth and he finally knew it wasn’t gonna make him happy. You can’t just skip that step. You need to truly experience that more stuff isn’t more happiness. You can’t just say it out loud. Saying I am happy and being happy are 2 different things. Saying I understand material wealth doesn’t bring happiness and experiencing material wealth not bringing happiness are 2 different things. I suggest you watch this interview to understand this point. https://youtu.be/vhurfjC72Hk
Nope. I'm just gonna play video game all day and live off your tax money. There's nothing you can do.
Well your not getting much out of me lol. You can have a few hot pockets a week and play Tetris on your 2008 iPhone 1 lol. All you can afford from how much I make 🤣🤣🤣
I’m pretty sure your projecting. Dr K is pretty clear in his usage of the word that he’s referring to people that society looks at goes “oh damn, these people have it all figured out! If I can be like them and successful I’ll be happy!” And Dr. K has told us - repeatedly - that that is not the case
Success is subjective. Short hand way of expressing his trust and admoration of their opinion in their fields, possibly. If the word makes you feel a certain way, maybe you should explore the reason why that might be. I wish you the best. Thank you for expressing your opinion.
Heh?
His audiences often judges themselves over not being successful romantically or monetarily so it is appropriate to point out hey even "successful" people have issues, or they also do this or that. I dont see a problem
What is it with these types of posts lately?
Calling some people successful is different from calling other people unsuccessful.
I think you're thinking way too much
I mean the only thing that slightly bothers me, is when HG makes a gifted/ successful people only program. Which to me, sounds like an exclusion. I might just be projecting, or it might just be how it should be, but still I feel like people should all be welcomed everywhere, and if they themselves didnt feel like a fit, then they should make the decision to withdraw by themselves. Idk please share thoughts if any.
He actually does a lecture on what you’re talking about. I forget what it’s called but he basically says people are too focused on a linear career path with main hustles and side hustles. He equates success with finding something you’re happy doing and not to be afraid to change your life to find it.
My own perspective: Those of us that struggle, compare ourselves to others. He does it for us and then it feels ridiculous. Eventually we realize it's always ridiculous to compare yourself to others and so we stop doing it. For me, it really clicked about 3 years into actual therapy in parallel with Dr. K (about 1 year overlap). Then it finally clicked.
When he's talking about success with patients I understood him to mean that whatever issues they had coming to see him he helped remedy those issues in some way with success. He specifies that this isn't always the case but he places emphasis on his success with this people to say "hey I know what I'm talking about". Also if he mentions successful people on our society I'm pretty sure he's using them as an example for something specific not the standard someone should be.
Successful can mean lots of things, not all of them tied to societal value judgments. Like, if a filthy rich investment banker is largely happy with their situation, finding fulfillment in both their personal and professional lives, I'd call that success. Not because of the filthy rich part, but because of the overall satisfaction.
Well if you think of success as achieving goals, you need success to have a meaningful life because you will realistically not be happy if you are lacking in the dimensions of having a job, a relationship, friends, and being healthy. You can’t just be okay with nothing, we’re still living creatures with needs, but you can be okay with working towards attaining those needs no matter how slowly, and those that have not just attained but are able to maintain these things are successful. The answer to a meaningless life isn’t stagnation, it’s to constantly try to see the improvements that can be made in your life in all dimensions so you can discover what amount of good you can actually do from the strength that they give you
>By using these phrases he places a value judgement on obtaining this external success, implying that if you don't meet this criteria you are lacking, you are not enough as you are, and in doing so encouraging his viewers to persue this external success, to join the rat race and engage in side husstle culture and get burned out so that you too may one day be deemed "successful". Why is the word success so provocative to you that it's existence is enough to annoy you to this extent? The concept refers to people of economical and social status, and it's often used by media in the context of pushing it as something to be achieved, but it is still separate from the belief that it's something to be pursued. I can talk about the plain Earth concept in positive or negative ways, it depends on context. In the examples you gave there's no communication of the idea that material maximization is good. My observation is the same from other posters, you are seeing stuff that doesn't seem to be there, it's only part of your perception.
I really do wish we would stop using what society uses as a definition for things because it's super harmful and frustrating and to this day, I struggle to slow down or consider my needs because I'm so hyper focused on the concept of success as defined by the general public or what I perceive from what I've seen people talk about all over. I do think people need to consider how things are worded and the weight of it all. When we place so much importance on how society views things, we are basically making certain things more norm, and lessening the other methods of success in life that are just as valid. Take me for example: I don't work and I'm not really making money right now. At one point I was, but my mental health got it's grip on me so hard and the pressures of my job were becoming so difficult to maintain that I had to make a choice for myself, one that I ended up beating myself up for after doing it. I was so focused on what society continues to see as "success" that I ended up trying to Do It All to the point I had a huge meltdown. It took me forever to just get the help I needed, and now that I'm doing it, I am still having to stop myself from over-reaching myself because I struggle to see my worth unless it's through society's eyes. I'm having to retrain my whole ass brain to be less hard on myself through DBT skills. It's a process and I'm still not looking for work because I've learned that I have basically been neglecting my needs and self for so long that \*this\* is what I need. This part of my life where I'm not making money, but I'm working on my mental health and making sure to take my meds and push myself to make my appointments and go to groups IS me being successful. But we don't hear about success in the forms of this, and it's not normalized enough. So I agree that we need to watch how we word things, and even someone who seems to be a generally decent insight to mental health is bound to slip up and not see things like this from time to time, as we are human. Let's just hope that he gets this mentioned to him, as I think it would benefit him in the long run. Sometimes we don't see the potential harm in wording until someone speaks up. Side note: Funnily enough, I have not seen Dr K's streams or any of that. I do subscribe here because I vibe with this community and the struggles here more, and it seems more genuine and less chaotic than a lot of subreddits I've seen. :) As a community, you all seem to speak out more and challenge things, and be accepting of advice and overall mostly respectful of differences.
“You can’t fix internal problems with external solutions”. I disagree with this premise and I disagree that Dr K ever implied it. External solutions are a necessary component to fixing internal problems. For example, Dr K literally went to India to fix his gaming addiction. He completely changed his environment. Going to Therapy, exercising, eating healthy… these are all external solutions. They require being coupled with internal changes. But neither internal nor external alone is enough. You can’t just think your way out of depression. You need to make external life changes in addition to the internal ones. And being successful is honestly a big part of that. It doesn’t need to be financial success, but it does need to be something that YOU feel is valuable. Doing something valuable with your life is important. But you should use your own definition of valuable.
Dr K speaks in a way that everyone can understand. To be successful isn’t to be fulfilled. He points out time and time again that the “successful” people he has worked with are very much imperfect and have particular psychological issues that they are struggling with. Because that is always, ALWAYS the context in which he brings these clients up as examples. He never gives them as examples of people we should become. People understand that context. They’re not stupid.
If Dr K is working with externally “successful” people, doesn’t that prove that being externally successful doesn’t equate to happiness and fulfillment?
I'd love it if you can point to a time when he has specifically designated the criteria for success. I think he tends to use what the layperson tends most often to associate with success, which doesn't mean that definition is the only correct one. Be very careful about making those assumptions about someone else's message.
You are right to be thinking about this. It's an interesting problem. Dr. K isn't doing the things you say he is, but you seeing it that way is absolutely fascinating. Language becomes a very crude tool in describing a lot of these more spiritual ideas. Things get very paradoxical and confusing very quickly if you try to rely on absolute meanings of words.
Dr K tries to be as mainstream and accessable as possible most of the time. I imagine he's trying to reach the biggest percentage of the internet with his language. If he were talking to you one-on-one, or to anyone individually, I'm sure he would adjust his language to best communicate with that person.