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- The Only Book I've Read 5+ Times
The Only Book I've Read 5+ Times
Matt Karamazov
August 28, 2025 ā¢ Estimated Reading Time: 20 minutes
YOUTUBE š CREATOR LAUNCH ACADEMY š PATREON
12 Rules for Life, by Jordan Peterson, is the only book Iāve read more than five times (including listening to the audio version once, read by him), and itās one of those Before/After books for me.
My life was one way before I read it (good, not great, and certainly not filled with much meaning or purpose), and after I read it, my life looked completely different.
Before rising to global prominence following some viral videos on YouTube, Dr. Peterson was a brilliant but relatively unknown psychology professor in Toronto, Canada.
He had written a book before (Maps of Meaning, which is also excellent), and heād had some academic and public success, but nothing approaching the level of international stardom heād achieve over the course of just a few short years.
Iād say that he adjusted to the instant fame relatively well, but there were also someā¦controversies. He certainly gained a small army of haters to go along with all the hero-worshipers (I am neither).
I even had the chance to interview him privately before his inbox exploded.
We got on Zoom and spoke for more than forty-five minutes (I had contributed to his Patreon, and that was one of the perks - I jumped on it). And let me just tell you:
Heās one of the greatest listeners Iāve ever encountered. Which makes sense, given that Rule #9 is to āAssume That the Person You Are Listening to Might Know Something You Donāt.ā
I came prepared with a list of questions and topics I wanted to ask him about, and he patiently reviewed the entire list with me, even going over our allotted time so that he could answer a few more.
He may not remember the meeting, but Iāve never forgotten it.
My summary and book notes from 12 Rules for Life are below, and as youāll see, I came away with nearly twenty pages of excellent, extremely valuable takeaways.
Before we get into it though, I want to remind you:
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And with that, before our coffees get cold, letās hit the books!
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āDoing something you love on a schedule you canāt control can feel the same as doing something you hate.ā
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After achieving my (somewhat meaningless) goal of reading 1,000 books before I turned 30, I set a new (also meaningless but cool) goal of reading 10,000 books. As of today, Iāve read exactly 1,409 books, including 57 books so far this year, and if youāre interested, hereās my full Reading List.
āIt takes careful observation, and education, and reflection, and communication with others, just to scratch the surface of your beliefs. Everything you value is a product of unimaginably lengthy developmental processes, personal, cultural and biological.
You don't understand how what you want - and, therefore, what you see - is conditioned by the immense, abysmal, profound past.
You simply don't understand how every neural circuit through which you peer at the world has been shaped (and painfully) by the ethical aims of millions of years of human ancestors and all of the life that was lived for the billions of years before that.
You don't understand anything. You didn't even know that you were blind.ā
In this book - an international bestselling phenomenon - Jordan Peterson presents 12 rules for facing reality unafraid, rising to the challenges that life throws at each and every one of us, and building the strength to affirm the value, goodness, and infinite worth of Existence - despite the obvious pain, struggle, and hardship that has every single one of us in Its crosshairs.
Critics have said that his rules for life are obvious and banal, but I mostly disagree. Some of them are obvious, some of them are lacking in originality, but you know what?
That doesnāt make them any less powerful or transformative. That doesnāt mean you can just flip through them and say, āWell I knew that already.ā Itās not that simple. Because itās not enough to know what to do, you have to do what you know.
I have nearly twenty pages of notes: nearly twenty pages of excellent reminders, helpful advice, and yes, some truly profound realizations.
My favorite is probably Rule #2, which is that you should āTreat Yourself Like Someone You Are Responsible for Helping.ā Like a really good friend, someone who wanted the absolute best for you and wanted to see you happy and at peace.
One way to look at it is that you should almost be like a butler for your future self, anticipating your future needs and making life as simple and easy and meaningful as possible for the person youāre rapidly becoming. Is that a simple idea? Is it obvious and unoriginal? Sure, maybe. But is it life-changing? It was for me.
Some of Dr. Petersonās rules were more relevant to me than others, and I suspect that if I were to revisit the book twenty years from now and take notes all over again, without looking at the ones Iāve already taken, Iād wind up with takeaways that were completely different. Itās not that the book would be any different. Itās that I would be different.
Iām profoundly grateful for everything that Dr. Peterson has done for me - through his books, lectures, YouTube videos, and our personal correspondence.
My own father was (and is) a wonderful man who taught me a variety of incredible lessons, both by words and example, and so I wouldnāt say that I was looking for a āfather figureā in Jordan Peterson. But vast multitudes of people all over the world did find such a father figure in him, someone to teach them that they could be better than they are.
That they didnāt have to become great overnight, but that they could become great if they simply started where they are, and started with what they could do. And then kept going.
He taught millions of people that striving for the best - striving for the highest and most worthwhile achievements - was both possible and desirable.
That life was fundamentally good, and worth living, despite all its inevitable pains and frustrations. That the world could become so much better if we became better.
He showed us the way, even if he couldnāt always follow it himself.
Perhaps most importantly, he taught people that they could be brave. That they could confront the (very real) darkness and horror of Existence, that they could find their way through it as long as they knew what they were aiming at, and that no matter what, they could still find Existence to be fundamentallyā¦Good.
āPerhaps, if we lived properly, we wouldn't have to turn to totalitarian certainty to shield ourselves from the knowledge of our own insufficiency and ignorance.
Perhaps we could come to avoid those pathways to Hell - and we have seen in the terrible twentieth century just how real Hell can be.
I hope that these rules and their accompanying essays will help people understand what they already know: that the soul of the individual eternally hungers for the heroism of genuine Being, and that the willingness to take on that responsibility is identical to the decision to live a meaningful life.
If we each live properly, we will collectively flourish. Best wishes to you all, as you proceed through these pages.ā
āYou need to place one foot in what you have mastered and understood and the other in what you are currently exploring and mastering. Then you have positioned yourself where the terror of existence is under control and you are secure, but where you are also alert and engaged.ā
āPerhaps heaven is something you must build, and immortality something you must earn.ā
āWe 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. You are, therefore, morally obliged to take care of yourself.ā
āYou must keep the promises you make to yourself, and reward yourself, so that you can trust and motivate yourself. You need to determine how to act toward yourself so that you are most likely to become and to stay a good person.ā
āYou could help direct the world, on its careening trajectory, a bit more toward Heaven and a bit more away from Hell. Once having understood Hell, researched it, so to speak - particularly your own individual Hell - you could decide against going there or creating that. You could aim elsewhere. You could, in fact, devote your life to this.ā
āWe only see what we aim at. The rest of the world (and that's most of it) is hidden. If we start aiming at something different - something like āI want my life to be betterā - our minds will start presenting us with new information, derived from the previously hidden world, to aid us in that pursuit.ā
āThe tragic irrationalities of life must be counterbalanced by an equally irrational commitment to the essential goodness of Being. It is simultaneously the will to dare set your sights at the unachievable, and to sacrifice everything, including (and most importantly) your life. You realize that you have, literally, nothing better to do.ā
āTo tell the truth is to bring the most habitable reality into Being. Truth builds edifices that can stand a thousand years. Truth feeds and clothes the poor, and makes nations wealthy and safe.
Truth reduces the terrible complexity of a man to the simplicity of his word, so that he can become a partner, rather than an enemy. Truth makes the past truly the past, and makes the best use of the future's possibilities. Truth is the ultimate, inexhaustible natural resource. It's the light in the darkness.ā
āIf your life is not what it could be, try telling the truth. If you cling desperately to an ideology, or wallow in nihilism, try telling the truth. 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.ā
āPeople are very tough. People can survive through much pain and loss. But to persevere they must see the good in Being. If they lose that, they are truly lost.ā
āHow could the world be freed from the terrible dilemma of conflict, on the one hand, and psychological and social dissolution, on the other?
The answer was this: through the elevation and development of the individual, and through the willingness of everyone to shoulder the burden of Being and to take the heroic path.
We must each adopt as much responsibility as possible for individual life, society and the world. We must each tell the truth and repair what is in disrepair and break down and recreate what is old and outdated. It is in this manner that we can and must reduce the suffering that poisons the world.
It's asking a lot. It's asking for everything. But the alternative - the horror of authoritarian belief, the chaos of the collapsed state, the tragic catastrophe of the unbridled natural world, the existential angst and weakness of the purposeless individual - is clearly worse.ā
āNothing is going so badly that it cannot be made worse.ā
āI wish you all the best, and hope that you can wish the best for others.ā
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OK, thatās it for nowā¦
Iāve got plenty more excellent book recommendations coming your way soon though!
Thereās also my YouTube channel, where I publish book reviews, reading updates, and more each week.
And if you want to learn how Iāve built an audience of 160,000+ followers across social media, became a full-time creator, and how Iām rapidly growing my audience and my profits in 2025, join us inside Creator Launch Academy and thatās exactly what Iāll teach you ā weād love to have you in the community!
With that said, I hope you enjoyed this edition of The Reading Life, and enjoy the rest of your day!
Until next timeā¦happy reading!
All the best,
Matt Karamazov
P.S. Whenever you're ready, here are two more ways I can help you:
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