Dawn Allcot
·4 min read
Canadian psychologist and author Jordan Peterson recently shared his views on poverty in North America with personal finance expert Dave Ramsey. Peterson admitted that poverty has many causes. But many people in the U.S., specifically, remain poor because they don’t have a plan that can help them make better financial decisions and resist the temptation of instant gratification.
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“You need to develop a plan for your life,” Peterson said on The Ramsey Show. “That makes delaying gratification and not engaging in impulsive, momentary pleasure worthwhile because you’re building toward something that you actually want to attain.”
Peterson pointed out that schools fail to teach people how to create a vision or plan for the future. “We’re very bad in our society, appallingly and miraculously bad, at helping people develop a vision,” he said. “It’s the number one thing we should be teaching people and we don’t do it at all.”
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Peterson’s Tips for Crafting a Vision (Future Authoring)
Peterson provided a solution for those who have no vision for the future — he called it “future authoring.”
While the exercise can take as long as 90 minutes or even longer, he suggested that people take just 15 minutes, to start, and begin writing down a vision of what their life could look like in five years.
“Who do you want to be? Why? What do you want your life to look like in five years? What are you building towards? Why are you saving — or working? What’s your vision? What makes it worthwhile?” he asked.
If you have problems conceptualizing this, you might want to think about what it would be like to take care of yourself the way you would take care of someone you love, such as a child or friend.
Often, people can picture better circ*mstances for other people than they can for themselves.
“I think a huge part is to get them to start conceptualizing themselves as people who could be pursuing a goal that they found compelling rather than people who are driven by circ*mstances,” Peterson told Ramsey.
Another tactic to get your creative juices flowing might be to look at other people’s lives and consider the positive elements you might want for yourself. “What do other people have that’s working for them?” Peterson said.
If it helps, you can even break your vision into various areas, such as:
Relationships (romantic, family, friends).
Career or job.
Educational goals.
Hobbies and personal development.
Giving back your community / civic responsibilities.
Strategies to resist temptation.
“Now,” Peterson said, “imagine five years down the road you can have what you want or need. What is it? Don’t worry about being right — just get it down.”
Proof of Concept
Ramsey and Peterson agreed that, when you are working toward a future vision, feelings like burnout tend to vanish.
“When you see yourself moving towards a goal, you’re inspired,” Peterson said. “You have enthusiasm. You have hope. You have energy. You can communicate effectively and enthusiastically!”
When Peterson practiced the Future Authoring exercise with students prior to attending college, it helped reduce the dropout rate by 50%, he said. It also increased those students’ grade point averages by 35%.
“Before, students went to university with no vision. Of course, half of them didn’t succeed because they had no idea why they were doing anything,” he told Ramsey. “You have to entice people into the hypothesis of a vision.”
It helps, at first, to craft a vision that you can believe in — or, at least, one that feels attainable from where you’re starting out. “You want to develop your vision within the realm of possibility,” Peterson said.
Also, make sure it’s your dream for the future you are following, and not someone else’s definition of success (or what society expects of you). “You should be honest enough with yourself so that it’s actually something that’s compelling to you,” Peterson said.
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This article originally appeared on GOBankingRates.com: Jordan Peterson Tells Dave Ramsey ‘Absence of a Plan’ Causes Poverty — How So?
