#37 RULE NUMBER 1: Stand Up Straight With Your Shoulders Back (Of Lobsters and Men VOL 1)

Siim Land (0:00)

What is the most fundamental rule of life that you should adopt? What's this overarching principle that can have a massive impact on everything else you do as well? I'm gonna give it to you. Are you ready? Here it is. Rule number one, stand up straight with your shoulders back.

It may sound comical and innocent, but it actually has a profound impact on your overall experience of reality. This is not some self-help positive thinking bullshit, but it's programmed into your physiology and psyche. Jordan Peterson, who is a Canadian clinical psychologist at the University of Toronto, talks about this in his latest book, The 12 Rules of Life, An Antidote to Chaos.

Rule number one, stand up straight with your shoulders back is a meditation on the habits and dominance hierarchies of lobsters that can apply to humans as well. And in this episode of the Body, Mind Empowerment Podcast, we're gonna be talking about exactly that. Welcome, my name is Siim, and I hope you're ready for this little small special episode that I'm gonna do about the first rule, rule number one.

SPEAKER_2 (1:15)

Do you want to know what it is?

Siim Land (1:19)

Body, mind empowerment.

SPEAKER_2 (1:21)

Get stronger, faster, smarter, quicker, friendlier, more helpful, more driven.

Siim Land (1:27)

Everything the body needs.

SPEAKER_2 (1:28)

Control your mind.

Siim Land (1:32)

So basically a while back, many years ago, Jordan Peterson read some papers on lobsters, and he made an insightful discovery.

Namely, he found that the way lobsters hold their body and what posture they're in had a predictive outcome on their position in the lobster dominance hierarchy and their neurochemical future, if we could call it as such. He looked at many studies done on lobsters and found that male lobsters engage in fights with each other, and it's a way of establishing themselves in the dominance hierarchy of the group.

Jordan Peterson (2:05)

So these creatures engage in dominance disputes, and I think dominance is the right way to think about it, because lobsters aren't very empathic and they're not very social, and so it really is the toughest lobster that wins.

Siim Land (2:16)

The lobster who wins the battle will experience this boost in confidence and audacity, namely because of a surge in a neurotransmitter called serotonin. Serotonin is the feel-good neurotransmitter that makes you feel fulfilled and pleased.

Jordan Peterson (2:32)

And what's so cool about the lobster is that when a lobster wins, he flexes and gets bigger, so he looks bigger, because he's a winner. It's like he's advertising that.

Siim Land (2:42)

This is going to increase the winning lobster's position in the dominance hierarchy, which gives them access to more food, better mating opportunities, better shelter, less stress, and an overall physiological performance-enhancing effect. The victorious lobster who's running high on elevated serotonin is going to feel better and more confident about itself. And this is going to make it hold a more dominant and upright posture. They're literally going to hold themselves and look more dominant because of that.

This in turn will have an additional neurochemical boost that can increase serotonin even more. And this is going to increase the chances of being victorious in the future again. The lobster who loses the battle will experience a decrease in serotonin levels, which make it feel more inferior, more pathetic, more stressed out, less eager and confident to engage with the world. And it's gonna basically go through this full blown depression almost. This is also going to reflect in the losing lobsters future success. They're not gonna get access to that much food, which makes them weaker. They're not going to get as many mating opportunities, which creates more stress.

They're not going to sleep well because of their low serotonin levels. And they're less likely to win the next fight because of this impeding feeling of apathy.

Jordan Peterson (4:00)

The biological, the neurochemical system that makes him flex is serotonergic.

And you think, well, who cares? What the hell does that mean? Well, I'll tell you what it means. It's the same chemical that's affected by antidepressants in human beings. And so like, if you're depressed, you're a defeated lobster. Like you're, you're like this, I'm small. I'm not, you know, things are dangerous. I don't want to fight. You give somebody an antidepressant, it's like up, they stretch and then they're ready to like take on the world again.

Well, if you give lobsters who just got defeated in a fight, serotonin, then they stretch out and they'll fight again.

Siim Land (4:32)

Serotonin deficiencies in general lead to irritability, aggression, pain, depression, suicide, alcohol and drug use, eating and binging behavior, obsessive compulsive disorder, chronic pain, seizures, hypoglycemia, insomnia, and a disruption in circadian rhythms. So it's this impeding doom of neurotransmitters. It just blows you away because it's so remarkable and significant. Your entire experience of reality is rooted in your physiological experience, which stems from the sensory stimuli and your perceptions of it. In lobsters particularly, serotonin governs status, emotional regulation and posture, just like it does in human beings.