By discovering your core values you will gain a valuable understanding of just who you are and what makes you tick – I feel this is a very important aspect of personal growth. This can be further enhanced by asking yourself – “what new values would be useful to me at this time in my life – to enable me to get where I want to go?” By discovering your values you can begin to resolve the hidden conflicts in your life, remove stress and give yourself more direction.
And we all have beliefs too, things we believe we can do and things we believe we can’t. The fact is – what you believe, tends to happen – so it is far more productive to believe you can – and then just do it!
Even if we haven’t though about it much, we all do have values. Some are core to us and follow us through our life and others dip in and out to match our needs in any particular circumstance. We may need more courage to do a certain task for a few months then we may slip back to more core values like compassion. Once you know what your values are you seem to have more choice in any given moment.
It can be difficult to write out all of your values, but it is very worthwhile. They become a kind of decision making matrix where if what is being asked of you is not inline with your values it is far easier to say no. It can be time consuming to explore and document your values, however, it is very worthwhile.
In my experience it is very useful to become the type of person who moves towards solutions rather than away from problems, because often the quickest way to find a solution is just to charge right at it, rather than pussy-footing around getting all anxious and fretful. Once your unconscious mind can see your clear list of values and can recognise that achieving these will be good for you, somehow, it just takes you forward. Of course, there will be ups and downs, but at least you will have a map reminding you of what is important to you.
It takes a while to pull all of your values together and think about what they mean to you, however, it is time well spent and the rewards can be very high.
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