Chaos: Jordan Peterson on being cheated on
If you’ve ever been cheated on or betrayed, this might resonate. It’s not just about the person who lied to you, it’s about your view of yourself in the world:
Insight can help turn chaos into order. I have experienced that on occasion. But insight doesn’t always make the emotions engendered by a betrayal better, because your history is still your history, and your orientation towards the world and towards other people may have changed irrevocably as a result of your experience.
I get the feeling that Peterson’s passion in this area arises from personal experience and his assertion that such a betrayal engenders profound chaos is the result of defining oneself by one’s relationship to a partner, rather than defining oneself by one’s own sense of self.
Romantic song lyrics often indicate this with assertions that, “I would be NOTHING without you” and, “if I lost you, I’d have nothing to live for”…
If one has been attentive and caring toward one’s partner, then betrayal is not a reflection upon the betrayed but upon the character of the betrayer. The ability to trust it is an indication of mental and emotional health. Until proven otherwise, extending trust to a partner who has expressed commitment and devotion is the only rightful action, so the betrayal of trust is not a failure upon the part of the betrayed. The betrayer is to be pitied for they have thrown away a precious pearl… trust, to wallow in a brief moment of self-gratification. Holding on to that truth is how one retains order in the midst of the resulting chaos.
And there is where trust in God provides surcease in even the most trying of circumstances because God will never abandon us and, however dire the circumstances, trust in God is our shield against life’s vicissitudes.
We are all of course human and even Jesus had a brief moment when he asked why his Father had abandoned him… but then he accepted his awful reality by reaffirming his trust in God by saying, ‘father, thy will be done’ and from that point forward he was at peace with his fate. As in so many ways, his life is a demonstration of his ministry.
It’s getting to the point that if GB posts a comment, I do not need to.
I will say though, that as a small point of difference, Jesus was quoting David in PS 22 as a remez, the sign He promised the Pharisees, and was not abandoned by His Father, or feeling so.
Being cheated on must be a terrible experience. I can’t imagine the heartache of having the one you love, the one you trusted, betray that love and trust. Very, very sad.
I can understand why Peterson focuses on cheating in marriage, but I wish he had said something about interpersonal betrayal that does not involve a sexual or marital relationship. Parents can betray children with devastating consequences. In my case, the betrayer was my mother– who lied to me over and over again from my childhood onward, so many times that I suspect there are lies she told that I have yet to uncover. It’s easy to say that she was a narcissistic brat who never grew up, and that her lies were a child’s way of evading the responsibilities of parenthood, along with giving her a sense of superiority in “putting one over” on someone else.
And I came to the same conclusion as GB above, that “The betrayer is to be pitied for they have thrown away a precious pearl… trust, to wallow in a brief moment of self-gratification.” I have always known that a child’s trust is one of the most precious gifts offered to a parent, and in my case, my mother threw my trust in the toilet, so to speak, and flushed it. My dad died when I was 15; I was an only child, and I had to trust her; I had no siblings to compare notes with, so to speak. But finding that she betrayed me repeatedly was shattering, as several of her lies affected some major life decisions that I would have made differently had she been truthful with me. I went through a very dark period when I blamed myself for ever trusting her and wondering whether I even have enough sense to come in out of the rain.
What saved me were two things: 1) growing up in the Church and coming to faith in God; and 2) meeting good people through the Church who proved trustworthy. In fact it was coming to know them that I began to discern not only that my mother was a habitual liar, but just how damaging her lies had been. One of these good people was my doctoral advisor in graduate school; he helped me not only to identify the lies, but also to stop blaming myself for trusting a betrayer.
His own trust in God strengthened me when my faith wavered; if I could add one thing to GB’s comment that “trust in God is our shield against life’s vicissitudes,” it would be that even the strongest Christian needs the companionship of brothers and sisters in the faith. I am very grateful to those who have walked beside me on the way.
That’s not a healthy attitude.
God is a being that depends entirely on your beliefs, but the same applies to any fictional being. You can choose to believe that some 2D anime waifu character will never abandon you, however dire the circumstances. Since the emotional relief depends on how strongly you believe he/she won’t abandon you, the being itself is not relevant.
Any case, placing your emotional relief upon some invisible character is NOT a healthy attitude. It’s OK to have a system of beliefs, but it must be a free personal choice, not a psychological co-dependence. You can freely choose to believe in God, Allah, Krishna, Zeus, The Force or whatever supernatural entity you freely choose. But the moment you psychologically DEPEND ON it, you lose you freedom of choice and you’re more likely to become delusional to protect that system of beliefs.
GB,
Isn’t Peterson happily (more or less!) married to a woman he’s been in love with since he was 9 years old?
PACat,
Auwe. Betrayal by a parent is worse than betrayal by a partner. Damaging in a more existential way. Good to hear that you have gotten beyond it.
Yann,
Uh, no. Notice how nobody ever gets up at an AA meeting and says; ‘I saved my soul. All By My Self.’
“God is a being that depends entirely on your beliefs”
That’s some pretty powerful faith there Yann…for someone who thinks faith unhealthy.
Ed,
When I read your comment I was all set to apologize for ‘sucking all the air out of the room’, a not infrequent failing of mine. But then some of the following comments proved that I had not, including your reference to Jesus “quoting David in PS 22 as a remez”. Forgive my obtuseness but could you further clarify that for me?
“GB,
Isn’t Peterson happily (more or less!) married to a woman he’s been in love with since he was 9 years old?” Molly Brown
I didn’t know that and am happy to learn of it. So perhaps it’s not personal but why then Peterson’s passionate assertion that it leaves the betrayed ‘rudderless’?
“God is a being that depends entirely on your beliefs” Yann
If God exists, then our beliefs about him/her/it are irrelevant to that divine nature.
If God does not exist, then those who do believe in God are projecting their own needs upon a fictional character.
Though I cannot prove that God exists, IMO only those most willfully in denial (out of their own soul’s needs) can imagine that God does not exist. Personal testimonials are of course non-persuasive to the non-believer.
But physical evidence is another matter; Why Some Scientists Embrace the ‘Multiverse’
To read and become aware of those physical parameters, scientifically verified and conclude that they are irrelevant to speculation as to God’s existence is to reveal the depth of one’s denial of reality. At the very least, they indicate a deist POV, i.e. God exists but is not involved with his creation.
Once awareness of that physical evidence is gained, to then imagine that the millions upon millions of personal testimony of a profound spiritual experience are somehow imagining it all violates credulity, as they cannot all be delusional or scammers. Did all who witnessed Jesus’ miracles lie? Conmen always reveal themselves, was Jesus the one exception?
To examine all of the evidence, circumstantial, physical and personal testimony for God’s existence and conclude that it reveals there to be no God is in fact to reveal intellectual dishonesty with oneself.
Geoffrey Britain on September 8, 2019 at 10:18 am said:
Ed,
When I read your comment I was all set to apologize for ‘sucking all the air out of the room’, a not infrequent failing of mine. But then some of the following comments proved that I had not,
* * *
The conversations at Neo’s place are often like this.
I appreciate all of the interesting and informative comments that so many people share, and especially the personal experiences that underlie them.
That appreciation also includes those comments that motivate us to examine and substantiate our own beliefs.
The others (including some of mine, I’m sure) are what scrolling is made for.
“…including your reference to Jesus “quoting David in PS 22 as a remez”. Forgive my obtuseness but could you further clarify that for me?” – GB
It’s a frequently asked and answered question, as a quick search for “jesus quotes psalms on the cross” revealed.
I have long been aware that Christ quoted the first words of Psalm 22, but this article , and others, introduced me to a much more expansive understanding that he really did mean us to apply the entire Psalm to him.
https://byustudies.byu.edu/content/my-god-my-god-why-hast-thou-forsaken-me-psalm-22-and-mission-christ
https://blog.logos.com/2012/04/5-allusions-to-psalm-22-at-christs-crucifixion/
And to continue the discussion from another angle:
https://jewsforjudaism.org/knowledge/articles/why-did-jesus-quote-psalms-222-on-the-cross
Wikipedia actually has a fairly good, if brief, treatment of different viewpoints on the topic.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sayings_of_Jesus_on_the_cross
That’s a fact, which is a different thing. Since there’s no evidence of the existence of any god, and there’s no evidence that any information about them could be true, the concept you have about it is based entirely in your beliefs. It doesn’t matter if eventually it exists or it isn’t. The concept you have right now about something can not depend on information you don’t have right now.
“Any case, placing your emotional relief upon some invisible character is NOT a healthy attitude.”
This comment falls into the category of “proving how foolish you are by trying to prove how wise you are. Literally ALL of human history demonstrates that virtually everyone has a need to “place their emotional relief” on something other than themselves and most of those that don’t are prone to sociopathic narcissism.
Mike
“Since there’s no evidence of the existence of any god”
There’s plenty of evidence for the existence of God. Whether you find that evidence convincing or not is another matter.
Mike
Well, you have your community, your people, your nation, your family, your friends. That’s way healthier than using invisible beings.
For example?
It’s too bad the conversation here has devolved into a back and forth about the existence of God rather than looking at the original topic, what Jordan Peterson has to say about what it does to one to discover that you’ve been lied to and betrayed. I found what Peterson said original and worthy of review.
This other matter, concerning religion, ought be reserved for another day. Thank you, Mohammed, for hijacking the thread.
miklos:
I found it surprising, also, the turn the thread took, and that the original idea that Peterson is presenting was more or less ignored or glossed over.
It has been my experience—and I’ve had quite a bit of experience with people who are betrayed either in love or in other realms of human existence—that although religion can sometimes be a help, it doesn’t usually negate what Peterson is saying here, and the profound quality of the dislocation experienced.
neo on September 8, 2019 at 4:08 pm said:
miklos:
I found it surprising, also, the turn the thread took, and that the original idea that Peterson is presenting was more or less ignored or glossed over.
* * *
Peterson talked about the yin-yang symbol, which has a black dot in the middle of the white side, signifying that order can suddenly turn to chaos at any moment; and a white dot in the middle of the black side, signifying how an insight, such as an alcoholic hitting bottom, can bring order out of chaos.
So, some of us just turned from the chaos of betrayal to the order of spiritual peace.
Other people see reliance on invisible beings as chaotic, and prefer the orderly realm of pure reason.
Symbols are like that.
GB: You did not suck the oxygen out nor was I complaining that you did.
I was just pointing out that I find myself in agreement with you so often that I find it spooky.
AesopFan did a fine job answering your question to me, thank you.
My answer is at https://ed-bonderenka.blogspot.com/2018/03/its-good-friday-why.html
I apologize if it seems I am promoting my blog, but a link is more compact than a lengthy comment.
As to the Jordan video, I was cheated on. I finally figured it out.
I was, and am, a committed Christian, firm in my faith towards my “invisible friend” (H/T to Yann).
I thought my wife was. I offered to try and work out the marriage with my wife, but she decided to leave for, and eventually marry, her lover.
It hurt, but the marriage had been a struggle and now was not.
I have no rancor, she is the mother of my boys (who remained with me) and it would be counter-productive to alienate them from her (she managed to do that all by herself).
I paid for her divorce lawyer and set up a scheme where her child support was derived from her interest in our home.
God sent me a wonderful wife not long after.
My invisible friend saw me through this and I am grateful to Him.
Geoffrey Britain on September 8, 2019 at 10:18 am said:
..Personal testimonials [that God (of some kind) exists] are of course non-persuasive to the non-believer.
But physical evidence is another matter; Why Some Scientists Embrace the ‘Multiverse’
* * *
To take the second point first, Prager’s apologetics are always worth reading.
He does a good job of pointng out some of the multiple horns of the dilemma (multi-lemma?) because there are more than two; or rather, picking one horn of a dilemma can lead you to another binary choice, and so on ad infinitum in some cases.
As for personal testimonials of the Benevolent Designer God (or, take your choice, the Malevolent Chaotic Force – the word “religion” covers both as well as neither):
I have experienced things that have bolstered my faith in the particular BDG known as Jesus; I can tell people what I experienced, and some will be persuaded to proceed in search of their own testimony, and some will not.
He already told us that would happen.
Luke 16:19-31 King James Version (KJV)
AesopFan:
As I said, I assume that for many religious people religion is a comfort at such a time.
But for many it’s not all that much of a comfort. And I’m surprised that so many people seem to think that the sort of reaction Peterson describes to a personal betrayal of the magnitude he describes is some sort of indication that a someone has “defined oneself by one’s relationship to a partner..” One doesn’t have to have utterly defined oneself that way to feel the deep deep pain—and the chaotic confusion—of a betrayal. This is certainly true of religious people as well, plenty of whom have wrestled with the depth of this pain.
I think that there are also betrayals and then there are betrayals. When a marriage has sort of run its course already, or when the connection between the husband and wife was never very deep in the first place, the betrayal isn’t necessarily the sort Peterson is describing, and it’s easier to pick up and move on, either with or without the help of religion. But if the connection was deep and the person thought the marriage was fine, the sort of response Peterson is describing can occur in religious or non-religious people.
It is somewhat like what happens when a person is the victim of a con artist—and particularly when a person has been married to a con artist.
Betrayal by a person and how one feels is what Peterson was talking about. Male womanizers often fail to understand how their cheating can be devastating to those they’re cheating on.
One of the righteous sources of anger in the male-hating feminist movement is how often the most attractive alpha males seduce their mates, get love & trust, and then betray the trust by sleeping around. Getting equality by women equally sleeping around is not the optimal equality. Reducing alpha male cheating should be the clear and honest goal, but that also requires some responsibility by Other Women who know they’re sleeping with somebody else’s husband.
Giving up womanizing because of the betrayals is the right thing to do, but not so easy. Especially for the rich and famous, even if older. See Hollywood…
I would propose that a sense of the chaos Dr, Peterson is speaking of, might come from going to work as on any other day, doing your job to the best of your ability , and then hear the announcement of the plant closure.
Do you have a plan?
Do you have something, someone, you can rely on on as a point of stability?
Or you are in a worship service and a gunman strikes.
Do you have a plan?
Do you have a gun in your pocket?
Chaos jumps at you, as is his point.
Your reaction is based on who you are and how you have prepared.
I believe it’s also during one of his Biblical series lectures that Peterson brings up the devastation of betrayal and specifically references this as something he has come across through his clients in therapy.
I highly recommend the series, it is superb, thought provoking and at times, hilarious. You don’t have to be a believer to understand the depth of insight into human nature and the ‘rules of life’ the Bible stories offer.
Betrayal is a form of loss. Whether the person we depended upon betrays us or dies suddenly, either way, our existence is profoundly altered and we must grieve and then move on accordingly.
“Reducing alpha male cheating should be the clear and honest goal, but that also requires some responsibility by Other Women who know they’re sleeping with somebody else’s husband.” – It wasn’t me (that’s…kind of funny…)
Absolutely true story:
I had a co-worker who was forever moaning about the difficult time she was having finding a good man, one she could settle down with, yada yada, and that the men she dated (ahem) never stuck around for very long.
We were very sympathetic, as a group, about her suffering from these betrayals
Then, after the course of several conversations, we found out that she was only dating married men.
Duh.
PS There are good reasons, civilizationally as well as interpersonally, to enforce “Thou shalt not commit adultery” legally and culturally, as well as religiously (same thing, at the time), although it has to apply to both parties equally.
Letting the ban s
(continued; power failure intervened)
Letting the ban slip around so that it only applied to the women, and no longer to the men, was an affront to deity and civility as well as to the individual women.
In a case allegedly about that law, in it’s male-privileged instantiation, the possibly-imaginary but not-at-that-time-invisible god-construct made his opinion of the situation quite plain.
Ed, I am glad you were okay with my jumping in to answer GB in your place (the first shall be last ??).
Thanks for your blogspot post and your own explanation of the Ps 22 reference at the crucifixion.
I also learned a new word, which always makes my day brighter.
From one of the links in Ed’s post:
https://www.thattheworldmayknow.com/remez
Without diligent use of foot-notes and some scholarly apparatus, it’s easy to miss a lot of those, so I’m glad to know it’s a recognized rhetorical tool, and will look more closely in the future.
I recently finished a book you might add to your reading list, which improved my understanding of Christ in his contemporary context (although the author never mentioned remez by name, he did make some of the scriptural allusions plain).
Jesus Through Middle Eastern Eyes: Cultural Studies in the Gospels, by Kenneth E. Bailey
Edward R Bonderenka on September 8, 2019 at 7:51 pm said:
I would propose that a sense of the chaos Dr, Peterson is speaking of, might come from going to work as on any other day, doing your job to the best of your ability , and then hear the announcement of the plant closure.
* * *
With all due respect to the action plan you presented, to me a betrayal is more like being in a job where you’ve never had a bad evaluation, the boss tells you frequently that he likes you, and you leave one afternoon with a full agenda for the next day…
then showing up for work in the morning and finding you’ve been fired over-night, the doors are locked, and your personal effects are in a box in the foyer.
Been there, done that, as have friends and family.
(In my case, there was a power shift at the top, my manager lost his position and our entire group was closed down; one of my sons never did find out what happened.)
Okay, I’m going to shoe-horn this story in, just because it is a funny follow-on to Neo’s ruminations on the well-shod, or un-shod, guest.
I think I can justify it as an example of order-in-the-midst-of-chaos, and also something of a betrayal, since the intruder did transgress the home-owner’s expectations of privacy, although in a very civil fashion.
https://www.nme.com/news/music/man-breaks-taylor-swift-home-takes-off-shoes-polite-2545013?utm_source=hootsuite&utm_medium=&utm_term=&utm_content=&utm_campaign=
Hey, speaking about human relationships (and apropos of J. Peterson’s sisyphean(?) struggles)…
https://twitter.com/i/status/1170814692316463104
(H/T Blazing Cat Fur)
I was betrayed by my mother on behalf of my Lefty, daddy issues lesbian sister so she could keep going to my sisters home on a mountain.
I spent my life stupidly being the Good Son and doing what I thought I was suppose to do while they treated her like a rented mule until they discovered she was going to have a lot of money when she died. That’s when my sister weaponized my mother against.
There are things that can never be undone and I’ll never forgive her(and my siblings)for what she did…
Aesop, at least the guy’s mom’s teaching about shoes in somebody else’s house took. Good for her!
Although I do think the lad needs to work a bit on his understanding of priorities….
However, what I really wanted to say was, thanks for the link. I’ve never seen Miss Swift before, very attractive, but the point is, I LOVE her jacket!
It’s great to see a popular singer with taste.
Thanks! :>)))
Sorry, 100% off topic.
The apple in this music vid reminded me, irresistibly, of Neo.
https://youtu.be/UVcumIJdvNU
Faith is a logical domain. We cannot reach conclusions about articles of faith through observation, replication, and deduction. The scientific logical domain is notoriously limited in time and space. There are historical myths to believe in the existence of an extra-universal entity. There are scientific myths (e.g. circumstantial evidence, often liberal assumptions/assertions, inference) to believe in past reconstructions (e.g. evolutionary creation, “Big Bang”), future prophecies (e.g. CAGW), and anything beyond the edge of our solar system. The difference is that we cannot expect to access the faith logical domain without trust (e.g. external aid). Similarly, we cannot observe, replicate, and deduce the past, or anything outside of the near-domain, but there may be cause that we will eventually venture beyond the edge of our solar system, and reduce the uncertainty of the intermediate space. In the meantime, there is faith, a separation of logical domains, and a post-normal science that threatens scientific integrity and productivity, and to force an extraordinary developmental misalignment (e.g. “great leap”, selective-child, diversity).
I am always amazed by the number of words. On this topic and most others, why so many commentors feel a need for so many of words?.
Simply, when 2 people enter in a relationship they have, in most cases, agreed to remain faithful to each other. Period. Failure to adhere is simply betrayal. Period.
Lowtech,
Forgiving someone does not necessarily mean trusting them, loving them, or even liking them again. Forgiving is simply understanding them sufficiently to not hate any longer. Harbouring anger and hate within us damages ourselves, not the target of those feelings.
Failure to adhere is simply betrayal. Period.
True. It’s also true that every once in a while you encounter someone formally betrayed who was, er, asking for it. Some people are quite adept at inducing compassion fatigue.
Art Deco:
Can you cite any statistics on that profound wisdom? /s
GB wrote, “why then Peterson’s passionate assertion that it leaves the betrayed ‘rudderless’?”
1. I’m sure he’s seen it many times in the course of his psychology practice.
2. He’s a very empathetic person. Witness him almost weeping at what society is doing to men.
When I discovered that my stepmother was a pathological liar and sociopath, that she was mistreating my dad in his decline, that she was scheming to take his money without his consent, and when I had to hire a lawyer to defend Daddy and several other relatives from her lies, my life was in chaos. It was so hard to accept that someone could be doing these things deliberately. All respect to those who have endured even more devastating betrayals.
As to Jesus quoting Psalm 22, there was a huge controversy early in Christianity, in which Marcion and others said that the Hebrew scriptures were entirely superseded by the message of Christ. That’s not what Jesus himself said, and the Church rejected the argument. Since Jesus taught that he was the fulfillment of the Scriptures, i.e., the Hebrew Scriptures, non-heretical Christians have always understood the many references Jesus made to the scriptures as meaning the message to the Hebrews was integral to his own ministry. (Naturally, Jewish rabbis don’t see this the same way. Christian readers see Christ where Jewish readers do not.)
Art Deco on September 9, 2019 at 10:31 am said:
…every once in a while you encounter someone formally betrayed who was, er, asking for it. Some people are quite adept at inducing compassion fatigue.
* * *
These two statements are positively correlated, but separable.
“Asking for it” does not justify tit-for-tat behavior (betrayal for betrayal), as there are other ways to get out of the situation without compromising one’s own moral values.
to om: Stats are not needed to confirm anecdotal data.
If anyone can produce a study of the incidence of compassion fatigue, I would love to see it, but “every once in a while” is the operative condition.
Most of us, most of the time, don’t have to deal with people like that; that’s why it is so easy not to recognize what is happening, and get sucked into the lies and betrayals.
“Compassion fatigue” is a real thing, and can occur in contexts other than adultery and interpersonal betrayal (entire groups have lost my sympathy over the last decade, because of their aggressive ingratitude and incessant demands).
People (groups) with toxic personalities (demands) who harp on only the negative aspects of their lives, the chronically-needy who don’t take responsibility for their own lives, and the in-your-face transgressors are debilitating, and a source of burn-out for anyone in a friendship, family, or profession who has to deal with them constantly.
I have personal anecdotes galore, but no stats. The solution is disengagement where at all possible. For those feeling guilty about maybe not being compassionate enough with this kind of person, some words of advice out of LDS tradition:
Mosiah 4:27 – And see that all these things are done in wisdom and order; for it is not requisite that a man should run faster than he has strength. And again, it is expedient that he should be diligent, that thereby he might win the prize; therefore, all things must be done in order.
https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/ensign/1994/06/wisdom-and-order?lang=eng
Lots of secular literature on the subject as well; this is a good start.
https://greatist.com/live/dealing-with-a-toxic-person#3
GB asks “So perhaps it’s not personal but why then Peterson’s passionate assertion that it leaves the betrayed ‘rudderless’?”
Remember that Peterson is has practiced clinical psychology for years. No doubt many of his views are informed by this.