Rules for living

What are your rules for living? Do you play it by ear? Perhaps you’ve written them down. Maybe yours are drawn from sacred texts.

If you haven’t codified them, it could be useful. It could be helpful, too, to browse others’ rules.

Take clinical psychologist Jordan B. Peterson’s list. The table of contents from his book 12 Rules for Life is compelling, even without further explanation.

Rule 1 / Stand up straight with your shoulders back
Rule 2 / Treat yourself like someone you are responsible for helping
Rule 3 / Make friends with people who want the best for you
Rule 4 / Compare yourself to who you were yesterday, not to who someone else is today
Rule 5 / Do not let your children do anything that makes you dislike them
Rule 6 / Set your house in perfect order before you criticize the world
Rule 7 / Pursue what is meaningful (not what is expedient)
Rule 8 / Tell the truth—or, at least, don’t lie
Rule 9 / Assume that the person you are listening to might know something you don’t
Rule 10 / Be precise in your speech
Rule 11 / Do not bother children when they are skateboarding
Rule 12 / Pet a cat when you encounter one on the street

What are some of your own guiding principles? (I’d love to hear them.)