Values define and express shared purposes as a human community. We are part of multiple communities—family, work, religious and civic organizations, and nations—each of which are defined by their values.
As a family, we value caring for each other, helping each individual grow and thrive, and doing things that make us close and deeply engaged with each other. Yet, while we are part of many value-based communities, we are not fully defined by any of them. Our lives can be viewed as self-creations composed of numerous choices to take action, pursue opportunities, create relationships, and focus time and energy. We have to make choices as our lives are limited but our possibilities are endless. Every day we make choices about what to do. Over our lives, we create major commitments and projects as we try to act in ways that are helpful and supportive of ourselves, those we care about, and the wider community.
- How do we organize our actions to best achieve what is most important and valuable in our lives?
- How can we intentionally align the values we hold with how we actually spend our lives?
- How can we leverage the fire that comes from shared values to create a harmonious group or community?
Life choices arise from inner “compasses” that create a navigational structure for our lives. We call these inner guides values as they dictate what is important for us to do.
Activities that Arise from Values
A value is an inner pattern that motivates or guides us to want to act in a certain direction, with a certain intention of goal. Here are some examples of activities or preferences that arise from values:
- We want to take care of our family or homeless people.
- We want to be a designer or engineer.
- We want to climb mountains, visit Tuscany, or go to church and pray.
- We care about friends, parents, our community, or the natural environment.
- We value our country and are willing to work long hours for a community goal or candidate.
- We have a vision that creating a new product will bring joy to customers and serve the community.
Each of these stems from something we value that offers us direction, allows us to choose one action over another and inspires us to act. We think of these inner motivators as “values.” But our values are not “things,” little computer programs that lead us to do something. Rather, they are inner constructs that lead us toward the goals and inspired actions.
Defining them helps us to develop a greater understanding of what they are and to be clearer in what we do. Our actions in turn help to further define our values and live in line with them. This gives us a sense of personal authenticity, of being aligned with our internal moral compass. Values do not “cause” our actions; they are just shorthand to define and organize what is important to us. A value is not a thing; it is a construction that allows us to make sense of what we are doing, and our reasons for doing so.
While some of us naturally feel we make good choices and that our values and lives are in harmony, others fret and struggle to achieve this harmony and integration. The conflicted feel pulled in different ways and struggle to do what they would like to do. They want to be the person they would like to be, not the person they actually are. One of the ways we harmonize our actions is by consciously defining a set of guides that help structure and organize key choices to fit our overall ideals and goals. By defining these “values” we narrow the gap between what we want and what we do. We become authentic or congruent so that what we want, what we believe, what we say, and what we do all come together.
Our Values Can Evolve
To achieve this alignment it helps to clearly define our central values and prioritize them. As we travel through new territory in our life we want our compass to be clear and visible. Our behavior reflects many different values. Some are deeper and more comprehensive; some are more situational and less important. When you look at a list of values most of them seem to be good and important. But our lives have limited time and we make choices that reflect some values more than others. To better understand yourself it is helpful to have some ranking/priority of your values.
This can be done as a hierarchy, a list of values roughly arranged in order of their importance to us as we act right now. That hierarchy is made visible when we create a pyramid of values with the most important at the top. People don’t easily give up or change their values. But values shift and evolve while moving through stages of life. At any time in life, some values are emerging while others become less important. What was important in your early 20s may be different in your 50s.
For example, a young person can be unconscious about health and physical self-care, while seeking adventure by participating in extreme sports. But by middle age, they increasingly focus on maintaining daily health and avoiding risky ventures. A young single person has different values than a married person with three small children. Through experiences and stages of development, some of our values evolve while others remain relatively constant. If we are an artist and creative person we are not likely to become a salesperson or engineer.
Values that drive these career choices are not likely to change much.
This is the first in a series about values. Check back for more information in the coming weeks. Reprinted with permission.
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