Visit your Values

How many blogs/fanfics/youtubers/podcasters/etc. start their content with “Sorry it’s been so long since I’ve posted! I’ve just been caught up with <insert excuse>, but it’s so good to be back to all of you lovely <insert affectionate name>”? Is it a lot? Well whatever that number is, add 1.

Sorry it’s been so long since I’ve posted! I’ve just been caught up with getting moved in and settled up here in the cities. Then, there was my brother’s birthday (he turned 21) and labor day, so I’ve been nice and busy, but it’s so good to be back to all of you lovelies! I’ve been focusing on “The Secret to Life” and I’m going to keep with that as I challenge you, and then help guide you in how, to visit your values.

But first: Why? “Why do values matter? Why do I need them? Look, Deadpool is a pretty bad kitty and he doesn’t have any values (other than Vanessa and maybe Peter Parker), so can’t I be like him?” you ask.

Well, first, I would argue that even chaotic characters like Deadpool, Han Solo, and Cersie Lannister have values. Second, we’re trying to find the secret to life here. That means living a life of fulfillment. Without getting into moral philosophy (watch The Good Place for that), values are essential to determining what’s important to you. When you know what’s important, you know what will make you happiest – typically things aligning with your values. What you value determines your internal thoughts, relationships with others, and your goals.

Still not convinced? Well, let’s think like a business shall we? Once upon a time I was the president of this super rad organization called the Religious Life Community at Simpson College (check them out @simprlc). Well, we wanted to, as an organization, change our mission statement as we didn’t think the old one truly reflected our purpose. So, over the summer I researched a TON of websites that guided companies through creating a mission or vision statment. The number one step on almost ALL of the websites: determine your values. Why? Because you can’t know what you want to be for the community until you know what’s important to you. I’ll translate that: You can’t know how you can lead a successful life until you know what’s important to you.

Seriously. Your values are so fundamentally important to living a successful life. I’m living testament. I’ll talk more about that later, but seriously just do it.

Okay, hopefully by now I have convinced you to determine your values. “Great, now what?” you ask exasperated, notebook and pencil at the ready.

Step 1: Make a list. Write down all of the things that are important to you. These are typically nouns like “Honesty” or “Courage” or “Faith”. Go crazy! Write down as many words as you can think of and don’t be afraid to repeat yourself. Having trouble coming up with words? Google “personal value words” (or Bing or Yahoo, I don’t judge). Here was my list:

Step 2: Narrow the list. Go through and try and narrow it down to the top five or so things you value. Sometimes you can collapse things into one value. For example, Teamwork and Collaboration both collapsed together. Creativity and Inspiration were pretty similar ideas to me. But different words mean different things for different people. So, for me, Honesty and Transparency are pretty similar, but for someone else they’re completely different ideas. Sometimes we can’t collapse all of these ideas and we have to choose which ones to keep. This is important. Just because a value doesn’t make it into your top 5 doesn’t mean you don’t value it; it just means you don’t value it as much as some other things. This is OKAY. It’s more important to have a concise list to focus on than it is to not hurt any of your values’ feelings. Here’s my narrowed list:

• Relationship
• Balance
• Growth
• passion
• Vulnerability
• Justice
• Free-thought

Step 3: Define the list. For each value that you have remaining, give it a definition of what that word means to you and what it looks like to value it. Think about how it plays out in relationships, self, goals, etc. For example, Growth is important to me. For me,

Growth means continual development and learning spiritually, mentally, and emotionally; it means investing in others to help them grow; and it means never being “as good” as yesterday, but always striving to be better.

This will help significantly with the next steps.

Step 4: Narrow more if you have to. Get it down to five. Notice how above I have 7? All of these things are really important to me, but I wanted to truly focus on developing concise values so I could have concise goals. That meant that as much as they mean to me, both Justice and Free-Thought got knocked off the podium. This doesn’t mean that I don’t value these things. Service and justice still show up in my goals and the open-mindedness of free thought is incredibly important in how I want to raise my kids, BUT, they aren’t my top five. Again, this helps us stay focused. Focus = Speed. And Speed = Acheiveing Goals.

Step 5: Order. Now that you have your top five values with their definitions, it’s time to figure out what are the most important to you. For me, it was helpful to write them all out on notecards with the definitions on the back so I could physically move them around. At this step it’s important to ask questions like “Which of these relies on the others?” or “What do I crave more often?” or “Which of these is a part of everything I do?” Think about some goals you already have and how you react with others. It could be helpful to ask others, but be careful. This is an exercise of self-awareness and if you have to rely on others to tell you who you are, you’re not as self-aware. This is the real trick to this exercise. Knowing your values is important to setting up goals and leading a happy life, but knowing yourself is even more important. Maybe use your friends/family like the answers in the back of the book. Do the work, and then check your answers. And if you disagree, don’t be disuaded. It could be that you know yourself better than they do. Either way, now you have a list of your top five values organized by what’s most important. Here’s what mine looks like:

1. Relationship: Love God and love others. Friendship and family is more important than anything else. Teamwork is more important than individual work. Trusting others. It also means that I have to be intentional with communication.
2. Vulnerability: Flows from love. This means I need to be honest with myself and others. I need to pour into others. I need to recognize my own flaws. This pushes me to give back and be raw. This is where courage comes from.
3. Balance: Peace, Old/New, Logic/Creative, Pessimistic/Optimistic, In control/ out of control. Balance means no addictions and no obsessions.
4. Passion: This is raw fire, energy, dedication, excitement. It’s what gives life a purpose. I value it in myself and in other people.
5. Growth: development, continual learning, this applies to spiritual, mental, emotional, etc. it means never be the same as yesterday. Always be better.

Way to go! You did it! Now what?

Well, now your goal is to try to live your life and make some goals that are in accordance with your values.

For instance, my number one value is Relationships. Then I thought to myself, am I giving the best of my time, energy, and resources to relationships? The answer was “no.” So, I tried to change that. I put more priority on phone calls and face-to-face meetings. I’m trying to be more intentional about friendships by keeping up with them. I’m calling my parents and keeping them updated with my life. I’m building new friendships and I’m trying to do more things with others than just with myself.

Soon, we’ll talk about how your values can influence your personal goals and mission (kind of like a business), but until then I hope that visiting your values has given you some clarity about your life. I’d love to hear about it! Drop a message in the comments. Tweet at me. Genetically modify a pigeon into the late carrier pigeon and send me a letter. Whatever way you use, I’m looking forward to hearing from you!

Good luck in the real world,

Christopher