A new venture.

Back to school with our man Peterson, Dr Jordan Peterson that is

Blog time : it’s now late summer 2024, I have completed sea trials with the Pathfinder and am now working on the post trials snagging list. Unfortunately, for me, I added to the difficulty by having another stroke or maybe just an extension of the previous one. Last week I announced that I have retired from sailing, certainly in the way that I had intended, although I may look into building and paddling a sailing canoe of some kind just to get on the water locally with.

I have though also launched into a new venture because both the way and the means have both suddenly opened for me. The venture is that Canadian Psychologist Dr Jordan Peterson has recently announced that enrollment is open for his online ‘academy’ although as yet i’m not sure which course I will choose to follow.

For a little bit of history here I started following Dr Peterson’s work in 2015 with his filmed lecture series on the psychology of personality ; this just before he became famous to some and notorious to others – I actually manged to get to his first public lecture in London UK, at about the same time of his clash with TV journalist Cathy Newman – that famous ‘gotcha’ moment.

My interest came on the back of a study into risks and safety in the clinical setting which was part of my extended role in the then specialist nurse team that I worked with. My question or investigation into Peterson’s work on psychometrics left me wondering if there was a direct link between over confidence and clinical risk and/or poor decision making in clinical practice. At around the same time Peterson released his own online version of the Big 5 personality traits test and later his ‘know yourself’ methodology which seemed to work well for those otherwise struggling and failing with their university courses.

Dr Peterson often said at this time that he thought that it should be possible to offer an online based university level course and several years later this is what he has just announced. I suspect that there will be one course at least in psychology and that is what I would like to study – I feel that, having now sat through 3 years worth of his lectures at the university of Toronto I have some lead in on the subject and as it happens I am familiar with a lot of the reading material that he recommends.

Part 2, a new hope

Sorry about the obvious Star Wars reference but my partner has very smartly suggested I would benefit from some way of getting out on the water even if it is only locally. We live in the Tamar valley just upstream of the normal limit of tidal navigation although not far away is an access point on the water (Cotehele quay) which has a slipway and small compound used by the local gig rowing club. I intend to approach them and see if they would allow me to keep a small craft o some kind on a launching trolley there. What I have in mind is either a sailing canoe or a sailing tender – something like CLC designs ‘Passagemaker’ – either of which I should have the skills and tools to build at home.

Exciting times !