Defining our Values
I like to think of Values as a compass to help us define the direction we want to move in our life. Dr. Brené Brown (Daring Greatly and Daring Way Curriculum) describes Values as a Lantern, lighting the way. Whatever the image, the important distinction is that values are not the same as goals. Goals are the things that we work towards and achieve throughout our life. They are wonderful and valuable achievements that we can accomplish and work towards and cross off our list. In contrast, values are ongoing actions, like a direction that we keep moving towards.
Values are the things that are our guiding principles. What you want to stand for, or how you want to cultivate yourself as a person. How you want to be as a mother, or father, as a friend or member of society. Values are the deepest most central way that we want to interact with the world, other people in our lives and ourselves.
When we define them, they become like chosen ways of being that can guide us through our lives and in particular when times are hard internally or in the world around us. For example, if you want to be a kind empathic member of society, that is a value because it involves an ongoing action, reacting with kindness and empathy in your relationships, for example. In contrast, a goal may be helping someone through a volunteer effort, equally important but it can be crossed off or achieved, but the value of Kindness moved you towards making the choice to volunteer. The value of kindness and empathy is never ending and always available to you.
The following is a list of values that people often identify. It is not an exhaustive list! You may find something else has more meaning and that is great! Here is your process to define your own values:
Think of an area in your life that you want to focus on; family, parenting, marriage, social relationships, work/education, play, community, etc.
Then explore what is most important to you in that domain. You may ask questions to yourself like “In parenting, I would like to be a parent who…” Or “In my community, I would like to be a person who is…”
Limit yourself to 2 Values! If you begin with a long list, that’s ok! This is hard to do because many things matter to us but this is so important. When life is hard, we can really only be guided by one or two things. More than that and we can become overwhelmed. Just take a minute to rank them between 0 (not important), 1 (somewhat important) and 2 (very important). Once you get to the most important work those down to your two most important values.
Define for yourself what living that value looks like. Be specific as if you were watching yourself in a movie, living that value. What would you see yourself doing, name those things and write them down!
Live them for a bit. See how it feels and what gets in the way of living your values. Good luck and have fun with it!
