113 Jordan Peterson Quotes to Help You Gain Control Over Your Life

Jordan Peterson is a psychologist from Canada who is very well known for his knowledge as well as for the various meaningful quotes that he has shared with the world.

The quotes that he has come up with often have so much depth in the meaning that people from all of the world have come to admire him which is one of the many reasons he is so well-known.

He is also a college professor who is very well respected by many of his students for his psychological teachings and advice that people are able to apply to their lives in order to live better, happier lives. To many he is known as somewhat of a genius because he has touched the lives of many.

Here are 113 Jordan Peterson Quotes to Help You Gain Control Over Your Life

1. “The successful among us delay gratification. The successful among us bargain with the future.” – Jordan Peterson

2. “If you don’t stand your ground, then all that happens is people push you backwards.” – Jordan Peterson

3. “Face the demands of life voluntarily. Respond to a challenge, instead of bracing for catastrophe.” – Jordan Peterson

4. “It’s very hard to find your own words – and you don’t actually exist until you have your own words.” – Jordan Peterson

5. “If you fulfill your obligations everyday you don’t need to worry about the future.” – Jordan Peterson

6. “Consciousness is a mystery that faces the mystery of potential and transforms it into actuality. We do that with every choice we make. Our choices determine the destiny of the world. By making a choice, you alter the structure of reality.” – Jordan Peterson

7. “There are some games you don’t get to play unless you are all in.” – Jordan Peterson

8. “If you don’t say what you think then you kill your unborn self.” – Jordan Peterson

9. “If you can’t understand why someone is doing something, look at the consequences of their actions, whatever they might be, and then infer the motivations from their consequences.” – Jordan Peterson

10. “If you learn a martial art, you learn to be dangerous, but simultaneously, you learn to control it.” – Jordan Peterson

11. “It is more difficult to rule yourself than to rule a city.” – Jordan Peterson

12. “Compare yourself to who you were yesterday, not to who someone else is today.” – Jordan Peterson

13. “You’re going to pay a price for every bloody thing you do and everything you don’t do. You don’t get to choose to not pay a price. You get to choose which poison you’re going to take. That’s it.” – Jordan Peterson

14. “No one gets away with anything, ever, so take responsibility for your own life.” – Jordan Peterson

15. “It’s very difficult to regulate yourself, and if you learn to do that, well, it starts to spill over.” – Jordan Peterson

16. “I don’t think that you have any insight whatsoever into your capacity for good until you have some well-developed insight into your capacity for evil.” – Jordan Peterson

17. “Women select men. That makes them nature, because nature is what selects. And you can say “Well it’s only symbolic that women are nature”, it’s like no, it’s not just symbolic. The woman is the gatekeeper to reproductive success. And you can’t get more like nature than that, in fact it’s the very definition of nature.” – Jordan Peterson

18. “Work as hard as you possibly can on at least one thing and see what happens.” – Jordan Peterson

19. “What you aim at determines what you see.” – Jordan Peterson

20. “You don’t get to choose not to pay a price, you only get to choose which price you pay” – Jordan Peterson

21. “It took untold generations to get you where you are. A little gratitude might be in order. If you’re going to insist on bending the world to your way, you better have your reasons.” – Jordan Peterson

22. “If you have a comprehensive explanation for everything then it decreases uncertainty and anxiety and reduces your cognitive load. And if you can use that simplifying algorithm to put yourself on the side of moral virtue then you’re constantly a good person with a minimum of effort.” – Jordan Peterson

23. “If you’re going to be successful you need to be smart, conscientious, and tough.” – Jordan Peterson

24. “We believe that in reducing the scope and importance of our errors, we are properly humble; in truth, we are merely unwilling to bear the weight of our true responsibility.” – Jordan Peterson

25. “You can only find out what you actually believe (rather than what you think you believe) by watching how you act. You simply don’t know what you believe, before that. You are too complex to understand yourself.” – Jordan Peterson

26. “By changing what you cling to in the present, you can alter the future.” – Jordan Peterson

27. “It’s a small percentage of people who do the 80-hour-a-week high-powered career thing, and they’re almost all men. Why? Well, men are driven by socio-economic status more than women.” – Jordan Peterson

28. “We deserve some respect. You deserve some respect. You are important to other people, as much as to yourself. You have some vital role to play in the unfolding destiny of the world.” – Jordan Peterson

29. “Don’t underestimate the power of vision and direction. These are irresistible forces, able to motivate you over what might appear to be unconquerable obstacles.” – Jordan Peterson

30. “Strengthen the individual. Start with yourself. Take care of yourself. Define who you are. Refine your personality. Choose your destination” – Jordan Peterson

31. “You might be winning but you’re not growing, and growing might be the most important form of winning.” – Jordan Peterson

32. “He whose life has a why can bear almost any how.” – Jordan Peterson

33. “A harmless man is not a good man. A good man is a very dangerous man who has that under voluntary control.”  – Jordan Peterson

34. “Don’t avoid something frightening if it stands in your way.” – Jordan Peterson

35. “Maintain your connections with people in your life.” – Jordan Peterson

36. “If you dare to do the most difficult thing you can conceptualize your life will work out better than if you do anything else.” – Jordan Peterson

37. “Walk tall and gaze forthrightly ahead. Dare to be dangerous.” – Jordan Peterson

38. “Get your life together and when that happens, you’ll be more productive.” – Jordan Peterson

39. “The purpose of life is finding the largest burden that you can bear and bearing it.” – Jordan Peterson

40. “To journey happily may well be better than to arrive successfully.” – Jordan Peterson

41. “Women deeply want men who are competent and powerful. And I don’t mean power in that they can exert tyrannical control over others. That’s not power. That’s just corruption.” – Jordan Peterson

42. “There are two major reasons for resentment: being taken advantage of (or allowing yourself to be taken advantage of), or whiny refusal to adopt responsibility and grow up.” – Jordan Peterson

43. “Sometimes taking a risk really pays off. And not taking a risk is also a risk. So there’s no way out of risk. It’s a gamble one way or another.” – Jordan Peterson

44. “The way that you make people resilient is by voluntarily exposing them to things that they are afraid of and that make them uncomfortable.” – Jordan Peterson

45. “You have to be a monster to stay alive.” – Jordan Peterson

46. “If you over-coddle people, if you protect them from everything that’s sharp, you make them dull and narcissistic.” – Jordan Peterson

47. “Read something written by someone great.” – Jordan Peterson

48. “Be grateful in spite of your suffering.” – Jordan Peterson

49. “You should never sacrifice what you could be for what you are.” – Jordan Peterson

50. “Expedience is the following of blind impulse. It’s short-term gain. It’s narrow, and selfish.” – Jordan Peterson

51. “When things break down, what has been ignored rushes in.” – Jordan Peterson

52. “You cannot aim yourself at anything if you are completely undisciplined and untutored.” – Jordan Peterson

53. “Can you imagine yourself in 10 years if instead of avoiding the things you know you should do, you actually did them every single day – That’s powerful.” – Jordan Peterson

54. “What worked yesterday will not necessarily work today.” – Jordan Peterson

55. “Do not hide unwanted things in the fog.” – Jordan Peterson

56. “Start to stop doing what you know to be wrong.”  – Jordan Peterson

57. “Do not try to rescue someone who does not want to be rescued, and be very careful about rescuing someone who does.” – Jordan Peterson

58. “Sometimes, when things are not going well, it’s not the world that’s the cause.” – Jordan Peterson

59. “Treat yourself as if you were someone that you are responsible for helping.” – Jordan Peterson

60. “If you cannot bring peace to your household, how dare you try to rule a city.” – Jordan Peterson

61. “Make friends with people who want the best for you.” – Jordan Peterson

62. “Remember that what you do not know is more important than what you already know.” – Jordan Peterson

63. “Anything that you let win grows. Don’t practice what you don’t want to become” – Jordan Peterson

64. “Put the things you can control in order. Repair what is in disorder, and make what is already good better.” – Jordan Peterson

65. “No learning environment is safe, by the way. I don’t know about you, but every important thing in my life I’ve ever learned was painful.” – Jordan Peterson

66. “Watch people like a hawk, and when they do something good, tell them.” – Jordan Peterson

67. “Be the hero your mom wanted you to be” – Jordan Peterson

68. “A major part of life and its meaning is the challenge that comes with confronting difficulties.” – Jordan Peterson

69. “The things that pose the greatest threats to your survival are the most real things.” – Jordan Peterson

70. “A question to ask is ‘What do you do when you encounter a lion?’, or ‘What do you do when you encounter someone angry?’ – Explore. That can make you the master of a situation, so you can be the master of something like fire without being terrified of it.” – Jordan Peterson

71. “There’s lots of times in your life that you’re not going to be happy… You want to have something meaningful – that’s the boat that will take you through the storm” – Jordan Peterson

72. “Do not allow yourself to become arrogant or resentful.” – Jordan Peterson

73. “There’s nothing more powerful than paying attention” – Jordan Peterson

74. “Do the things which make you strong. Stop doing the things which make you weak (unless you want to be weak).” – Jordan Peterson

75. “You cannot be protected from the things that frighten you and hurt you, but if you identify with the part of your being that is responsible for transformation, then you are always the equal, or more than the equal of the things that frighten you.” – Jordan Peterson

76. “To stand up straight with your shoulders back is to accept the terrible responsibility of life, with eyes wide open.” – Jordan Peterson

77. “You have all of these miserable people with problems you can’t imagine to believe…and look, the lights are on.” – Jordan Peterson

78. “You are morally obliged to take care of yourself. You should take care of, help and be good to yourself the same way you would take care of, help and be good to someone you loved and valued.” – Jordan Peterson

79. “You must determine where you are going, so that you can bargain for yourself, so that you don’t end up resentful, vengeful, and cruel.” – Jordan Peterson

80. “People think they think, but it’s not true. It’s mostly self-criticism that passes for thinking.” – Jordan Peterson

81. “It is much better for any relationship when both partners are strong.” – Jordan Peterson

82. “Instead of protesting and trying to change the world, first win the war of evil within yourself. To make the world a better place first do the things you have to do everyday. And do them- actually do them everyday.” – Jordan Peterson

83. “Confront the chaos of Being. Take aim against a sea of troubles. Specify your destination, and chart your course.” – Jordan Peterson

84. “Blaming others for your problems is a complete waste of time. When you do that, you don’t learn anything. You can’t grow and you can’t mature. Thus you can’t make your life better.” – Jordan Peterson

85. “Find something in your life that’s so worthwhile doing that the fact that you’re going to suffer is justifiable.” – Jordan Peterson

86. “The better ambitions have to do with development of character and ability, rather than status and power. Status you can lose. You carry character with you wherever you go, and it allows you to prevail against adversity. – Jordan Peterson

87. “The proper way to fix the world isn’t to fix the world. There’s no reason to assume that you’re even up to such a task…but you can fix yourself. You’ll do no one any harm by doing so. And in that manner at least, you will make the world a better place.” – Jordan Peterson

88. “Stop saying those things that make you weak and ashamed. Say only those things that make you strong. Do only those things that you could speak of with honour. – Jordan Peterson

89. “If you have a friend whose friendship you wouldn’t recommend to your sister, or your father, or your son, why would you have such a friend for yourself?” – Jordan Peterson

90. “Specify your damn goals because how are you going to hit something if you don’t know what it is?” – Jordan Peterson

91. “If you feel weak and rejected, and desperate, and confused, try telling the truth. In Paradise, everyone speaks the truth. That is what makes it Paradise.” – Jordan Peterson

92. “We experience most positive emotion in relationship to a goal and what that means is if you don’t have a goal then you don’t have any motivation.” – Jordan Peterson

93. “One definition of a winner is someone who never let losing stop them.” – Jordan Peterson

94. “I would say you should surround yourself with people who are aiming up and who want the best for what’s best in you. Unless you want people that will excuse your pathologies and make way for your weakness and lead you down the path of perdition.” – Jordan Peterson

95. “Humility is the precondition for learning and why it’s one of the highest moral virtues.” – Jordan Peterson

96. “If you’re going to fix complicated problems, you have to learn how to fix simple problems first.” – Jordan Peterson

97. “You want to take on responsibility. You want to take on the heaviest load that you can conceive of that you might be able to move because it gives your life nobility and purpose. And that offsets the tragedy.” – Jordan Peterson

98. “Happiness is a fleeting emotion. It occurs most appropriately along the journey to somewhere genuinely worth going.” – Jordan Peterson

99. “If you don’t have anything to look up to, you don’t have anything to do. A lot of the meaning that people find in their lives is purpose driven.” – Jordan Peterson

100. “It’s better to be adult than to be a child, it’s better. It’s better to be in control of you own destiny. There’s a place for you in the world. The world would be lesser if you don’t take your place in it.” – Jordan Peterson

101. “You must determine where you are going in your life, because you cannot get there unless you move in that direction. Random wandering will not move you forward. It will instead disappoint and frustrate you and make you anxious and unhappy and hard to get along with (and then resentful, and then vengeful, and then worse).” – Jordan Peterson

102. “Set your house in perfect order before you criticize the world.” – Jordan Peterson

103. “You must shepherd your limited resources carefully. Seeing is very difficult, so you must choose what to see, and let the rest go.” – Jordan Peterson

104. “treat yourself like someone you are responsible for helping” – Jordan Peterson

105. “Only man will inflict suffering for the sake of suffering.” – Jordan Peterson

106. “We live in a framework that defines the present as eternally lacking and the future as eternally better.” – Jordan Peterson

107. “Perhaps happiness is always to be found in the journey uphill, and not the fleeting sense of satisfaction awaiting at the next peak.” – Jordan Peterson

108. “We only see what we aim at. The rest of the world (and that’s most of it) is hidden” – Jordan Peterson

109. “pursue what is meaningful (not what is expedient)” – Jordan Peterson

110. “Meaning emerges when impulses are regulated, organized, and unified.” – Jordan Peterson

111. “tell the truth or at least don’t lie” – Jordan Peterson

112. “If only power exists, then the use of power becomes fully justifiable.” – Jordan Peterson

113. “Memory is not a description of the objective past. Memory is a tool. Memory is the past’s guide to the future.” – Jordan Peterson