How many times have you had a decision to make and you just can’t seem to feel comfortable about what you want or feel you have to do?

Do you often make up your mind to do something but struggle to get started?

What’s important to you?
Our values are the internal compass that guides us through life. Whether we are conscious of them or not, they are behind all of our thoughts and actions. Without even knowing it we make choices based on our core values and their underlying meaning to us as individuals.

This then has an affect on our choices and decision making. When we make decisions in support of our values, we get a feeling of confidence and motivation, which helps to build a passion for achieving the things we want to do. If, however, we make choices that take us against our values, we become uncomfortable and feelings of unrest and unhappiness can set in. This feeling is often felt in our stomach area and is frequently referred to as ‘gut instinct’.

Unfortunately, in most of our day to day lives there are often times when our values will conflict with our day to day circumstances.

• An employer or partner’s values may differ from our own.
• Your personal views conflicting with your companies professional values.
• Conflicting ideas on how to bring up children.

From time to time our own values can also work against each other causing us distress.

• The desire to spend time with family, against the need to work to provide a better life for our family.

When we add our beliefs to these values, whether they are positive or negative we can often get stuck in a rut and spend life simply treading water and never achieving the things we dream of.

Benefits of identifying your core values
Understanding your values and what they mean to you increases your ability to make choices that help you to feel comfortable with where you are going and in turn, enable you to feel motivated about acting on those decisions. Understanding your values is a key element to living a positive and fulfilling life. You will find that your confidence is increased and day to day life feels much more positive.

When you understand your values you can tailor your internal talk and decision making in line with those values to give yourself a positive approach to life.

The following exercise is designed to help you to clarify your personal values and put them in order of priority, whilst helping you to work out how best to work in favour of those values. Values elicitation exercise