Understanding Your Values

Conscious or not, our values impact everything we do. Great days are often great because they reflect our most cherished values. Crappy days are [sometimes] crappy because the things that matter most to us are absent. Why am I talking about this? Because when we understand what we really care about, we can intentionally prioritize those things.

That's why I start the same way with all my clients (career, body image, and life coaching): with a coaching activity designed to unearth your values. Once I understand your values, I tailor my coaching to the things that matter most to you specifically. And once you understand your values, you can tailor the rest of your life that way too.

So once you understand your values... what do you do with them?

You can use them to make decisions! Big decisions like:

• Should I switch jobs?

• How do I search for my partner?

• Where should I focus my social change work?

Small decisions like:

• Should I take a nap or go to dance class?

• Should I clean the house or write a new song?

These are all examples of questions that do not have a correct moral answer (though many of us receive messages about the "correct" way to pursue careers, love, activism, exercise, and cleanliness).

The answer to these questions is not about what anyone else would do. It's about values.

What happens when we're not in touch with our values?

When we're not in touch with our values, it becomes easy for other values to run the show- like the values of a culture.

For example: in the U.S. the dominant culture believes that:

• If you don't have something nice to say, you shouldn't say anything at all

• Hard work is the most important

• Thinness is within your control and has something to do with self-worth

But these might not be your values!

For example, you might value things like:

• Self-expression over harmony

• Rest and authenticity over hard work

• Inherent self worth and love, over thinness-by-any-means necessary

When we are clear on our own values, we are less likely to expel our precious energy pursuing the dominant values, instead of our own.

When we know what matters most to us, we have the ability to notice when other values are running the show. Then we can say, "Stop! Switch drivers!" Put the dominant culture's values in the backseat (where yes, you might still hear them shouting at you to work harder or get thinner but where they no longer have authority) and put your own values in the drivers' seat where they belong.