The first thing that Dr. Peterson does is called pacing your reality. So even when he doesn’t share your beliefs, he shows that he can understand why you might think the things that you do. For instance, Jordan is religious, but listen to how he speaks about atheism:
There’s a good case to be made for atheism. I mean, let’s, you know, make no bones about it, because you could say, in some sense, there’s three, four hundred years of brilliant scientists who’ve been doing nothing but laying the foundation for an objective, empirical atheism.
Jordan grants that the side he does not agree with has really strong points in its favor. And this might sound counter-productive if you’re trying to persuade someone, but it actually makes people more open to changing their mind. Because in any discussion the absolute hardest thing to do is to admit that you might be wrong and risk appearing dumb. That’s why saying things like “Hey, you make a great point” and “I totally see why you see things that way” is so important in a heated argument. It lets the other person not feel dumb if they end up changing their mind. This is how Dr. Peterson can get other people to open up to his views without having to push them around.
That’s partially why so many people have had their minds changed by Dr. Peterson. He’s not trying to make them feel dumb, he’s trying to help them, to educate them. Contrast that with the quote-unquote own-compilations on YouTube, where one person tries to make the opposing side or the opposing argument look as stupid as possible.
It can be tempting to laugh when your side gets one-up on someone from the other side, but when you make people feel stupid, no one actually changes their mind, and while it might feel like you’re a winner, you’re actually completely ineffective at changing behavior.
So if your goal is to make the world a better place, be like Dr. Peterson. Do your best to understand people’s perspectives and give them credit for doing their best to figure things out, even if you disagree.
