Just a heads up, this is a ramble. It helps me to process and organise my thoughts when I write them out as I see them externalised and so I naturally become a little more objective towards them which then makes them easier to explore.
I played with my core value cards again. I realised it had been a few months, maybe even a year or so, since I last did them, and values can change as we change which happens naturally as we experience life. And as they underpin our feeling of fulfilment and happiness in everything, (relationships, work, personal day to day) they are good to have some awareness of. If ever you are struggling to do something, or it just doesn't feel 'right' but you can't put your finger on why - it'll be because whatever it is is not aligned to your values. They are like our subconscious rule book or standards that we unknowingly assess everything from.
My top 14 cards (yes I know we should narrow it down to 10 but these are my values, and I was playing)
- freedom
- calmness
- spirituality
- joy
- growth
- learning
- intuition
- empathy
- love
- humour
- kindness
- curiousity
- warmth
- happiness
So then to narrow them down I placed warmth under love as that is an essential part of love (my opinion - other opinions are available!). Happiness, kindness, and humour all similarly fall under joy for me.
Intuition and empathy came as an obvious part of the spirituality package for me.
Then I realised that ease was a better word for what I meant when I thought of freedom, as it means free to choose, to change my mind anytime for any reason, to experience whatever I want. So it made sense to me that growth and learning (aka change) fell under that. Growth and learning also fall under curiousity as that is a huge part of it for me. This led me to realise that spirituality is only important to me as I see it as a journey of discovery, or of remembering who I am, of learning about myself and why I am here, so in effect it is similar to growth and learning and curiousity.
So these are all bound together for me:
- intuition
- empathy
- growth
- learning
- spirituality
- curiousity
- freedom
This left calmness. Which was an interesting one for me. Not one that has ever come up in the past and is possibly then representative of where I am now and how I am choosing to experience life now. With ease. What did I mean by ease? I realised I meant ease to choose, to grow, to be curious, to be led by intuition. I swapped calmness for the word ease (my values my rules right?!) and then all of the above seemed essential elements to this.
My values as of September 2024 therefore are joy, love, and ease.
I have been practising being led by these (the brain plays habitual patterns until we give it an alternative that then can become the new habit). To always look for the joy, love, and ease in things. With the idea that if I cannot find any of them then its a no from me. And it has led to some wonderful experiences (as what we look for we will find. Remember we create our experiences inside - it is not dictated by external circumstance) and surprisingly the only 'no's' have been when my brain tries to run an old pattern of worry or complaining (to give it it's due it usually has to be tired and so on energy saving mode to try this).
Anyway, that's my ramble. Thank you for reading. If you felt disagreement at any point, please know that's normal as we are all individuals and words are subjective. If you ever wished to discuss this or have a guide as you explore your values of course let me know. To that end, in case it is useful, these are the ones I use and send to clients. From Amazon and usually about £20. https://amzn.eu/d/1hyVNu3
