Clean Up Your Room: 4 Jewish Lessons from Jordan Peterson

Dr. Jordan Peterson is a well-known author and psychologist who has spoken up against antisemitism before October 7th and dozens of times afterwards.

Dr. Peterson’s books resonate with Jewish lessons that you can use to fuel your personal growth. Here are four lessons you can learn from his work.

1. Clean Up Your Own Room

Jewish wisdom teaches that when you want to make a change, you begin first with yourself. You clean up your own room. Take responsibility for your own life before trying to change the world.

Dr. Peterson writes: “Clean up your bedroom. Take care of your family. Follow your conscience. Straighten up your life. Find something productive and interesting to do and commit to it. When you can do all that, find a bigger problem and try to solve that if you dare.”

His words echo the timeless words of Rabbi Yisrael Salanter, the 19^th century founder of the Mussar movement that focuses on personal growth, who famously said:

“When I was a young man, I wanted to change the world. I found it difficult to change the world, so I tried to change my nation. When I found I couldn’t change the nation, I began to focus on my town. I couldn’t change the town, so, as an older man, I tried to change my family. Now, as an old man, I realize that the only thing I can change is myself. And suddenly I realize that if, long ago, I had changed myself, I could have made an impact on my family. My family could have made an impact on our town. The town’s impact could have changed the nation, and I could indeed have changed the world.”

2. Your Actions Show You Who You Are

If you want to understand what you truly believe and value, look at your daily schedule. What are your priorities? How are you spending your time?

As Peterson writes: “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.”

The Mishna teaches, “Study is not the primary goal but action is (Ethics of the Fathers, 1:17).

Peterson encourages you to not only take action according to your beliefs but to speak up when you know that your voice is needed in the world: “When you have something to say, silence is a lie.”

3. Focus on Who You Can Become

Your growth matters. Are you moving forward? Do you have direction? Are you staying in your own lane and focusing on your own improvement?

As Peterson writes: “Compare yourself to who you were yesterday, not to who someone else is today. Always place your becoming above your current being.”

This echoes the words of Rabbi Jonathan Sacks who said: “Every day in which we do not do some good deed, take some step toward God, is a day wasted and our days on earth are too few to waste even one.”

4. Your character determines what you see

What you prioritize as your goal and direction in life determines what you notice around you and how you see the world. As Peterson writes: “The better ambitions have to do with the 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. What you aim at determines what you see.”

Your character not only shapes your perspective of the world, it is also the only thing you truly always have. In the words of Rabbi Yisrael Salanter: “Character is a person’s only real possession.”

Keep learning and growing. Often what you need to do now is right in front of you as Dr. Peterson writes: “The secret to your existence is right in front of you. It manifests itself as all those things you know you should do, but are avoiding.”

But it all starts with making your bed and cleaning up your room.

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