AlignING With YOUR CORE Values
DOES YOUR LIFE REFLECT YOUR DEEPEST CORE VALUES?
Spring beams new life as days gets longer and the natural world around us begins to awaken from its winter slumber. It is time for new beginnings and for visioning the future. In spring people are more active and are busy planning, spring cleaning and de-cluttering their homes, planting new seeds or detoxing their bodies. Spring is also a good time to do a complete life assessment in order to ascertain whether your life reflects your deepest values.
ARE YOU THRIVING?
Taking an assessment of your life can bring you closer to joyfully thriving in life instead of simply surviving it. Often people live their lives robotically as automatons, and as time passes they habitually adhere to old, conditioned patterns of behavior that are not in alignment with the evolution or personal growth they have achieved. They follow a prescribed path on automatic pilot, feeling obligated and never questioning what they are doing or how they are doing it. Life becomes grey and dull.
Happiness is your birthright, and when you place your own happiness in the circle of your priorities, others benefit too. If you are not happily and peacefully living joyful exuberance in a fulfilling and satisfying way, then identifying your values and weighing them against your life can help you begin to thrive.
UNDERSTANDING VALUES AND THE SUBCONSCIOUS
The first step in the personal inventory process is to identify your greatest personal core values, because values answer the question of ‘why’ do we want this. When you become conscious of and operate in alignment with your innermost values, long-lasting results are possible. Personal core values motivate and inspire on a deeper level – at the level of the heart.
Values also have a lot of leverage at the subconscious level of awareness. The subconscious operates very similarly to a computer program and continually strives to fulfill the agenda for which it is programmed. Conscious will and volition are not influential enough to create success in a lasting way because people do not always consciously get in touch with what is truly motivating them at a deeper level (such as their values), and so intellectual approaches and willpower prove futile. When there is incongruence between our conscious and subconscious levels of awareness, the harder you try, the more you will spin your wheels! When you want to change something it is more effective to approach change at the subconscious level. This is because any programming buried in the subconscious that is in direct opposition with your conscious goals and desires can then be brought into harmony. The subconscious level of awareness has the power and is much more influential than the conscious mind. There must be harmony and alignment at all levels of awareness in order for your goals to be met in a sustainable way.
LIST OF VALUES
Values are held in the heart, and successful people connect to their deeply held values. Some common values are: community, commitment, hard work, honesty, reliability, simplicity, achievement, adventurousness, balance, belonging, generosity, happiness, humility, joy, piety, leadership, discipline, dependability, creativity, integrity, independence, inner harmony, excellence, empathy, spiritual growth, intelligence, family, self-reliance, and there are many more values listed in the following document.
IDENTIFYING YOUR CORE VALUES
Relax and ask yourself the following questions:
What’s important to me at the level of my heart?
Why do I want to achieve my goal? How will my life be different if I achieve my goal?
What truly motivates and inspires my heart?
What has to be true for me?
Lastly, identify times when you felt the most happy, fulfilled and satisfied. What were the values that were being exemplified during those times?
Write down your top 10 values. Then, prioritize them by comparing and contrasting. Start by comparing and contrasting the first two values on your list. If you could only satisfy one of these, which would you choose? Can you think of a situation where you would have to make that choice? Slowly but surely, you will find your list to be in order of priority.
LIFE ASSESSMENT
The next step is to examine your life and how you spend your time and energy. Does your life reflect your deepest core personal values? In other words, are you living in alignment with your deepest core personal values? Let’s say that amongst the top 5 of your values you listed excellence and fun, yet the reality is that you devote very little time to achieving excellence in any area of your life and you don’t have much fun either. What can you do to bring your life into alignment? The realization of your deeply held values and how you are truly spending your time and energy is often enough to set significant change in motion. From there you are empowered to direct and manage your life, rising above any obstacles.
Remember your core personal values – and then begin to live them.
Be Well,
Lisa