Living Your Values Creates A More Rewarding Life

Knowing Your Personal Values Enables Easier Decision Making  

It is interesting that some people's values are formed in their early years, while for others these become cemented later in life. Also, for some people recognition of their core values comes only through facing hardships, heartaches and difficult challenges, while for others the formation of their values comes through contemplation, reflection and various other cognitive approaches.

Core values unconsciously, and sometimes even consciously, guide and govern our decisions, particularly our major decisions. Hence, they help determine and steer us toward our futures.

When we know what is important to us ── when we know what our values are ── making decisions and taking action is so much easier and comfortable. 

When decisions and actions are taken with the perspective of your values in mind, your confidence in these decisions and actions is increased and you are more readily able to put self-doubt aside and cast off the criticisms of others.  As Roy Disney, brother of Walt, points out, "It's not hard to make decisions when you know what your values are."

Adds novelist William Faulkner, "I have found that the greatest help in meeting any problem with decency and self-respect and whatever courage is demanded is to know where you yourself stand. That is, to have in words what you believe and are acting from."

Likewise, when you take action or make decisions that are not in alignment with your values, three things happen almost automatically:

                  1)            Your self-doubt escalates.

                 2)            Your confidence level drops.

                 3)            The criticisms of others have an air of truth about them.

In fact, the criticisms of others will sting sharply, because deep inside your spirit is being pinged by the error of your ways. Even though the "mental you" and the "emotional you" may not admit or accept your spiritual reaction, your body will receive signals from your soul that something is not right (often a gut feeling, clammy hands, or a sense of anxiety). 

Unfortunately, due to ego-led stubbornness or a false sense of self confidence created by talking to yourself, you may try to override your spiritual sensations by trying to rationalize or justify your misguided action or decision. 

Trying to convince yourself to ignore the signals of your spirit is most assuredly a sign that you actions or decisions are not in alignment with your core values.

Consciously living your values will result in a more rewarding life. 

As author Ayn Rand said, "Happiness is that state of consciousness which proceeds from the achievement of one's values."

This article is excerpted from the Amazon best-selling personal development book Project You: Living A Determined Life, available in Kindle and paperback formats at Amazon.