YOUR YEAR SERIES – WHAT DO YOU VALUE?

EP #71

 

“Do I need a life coach?” You’re listening to Episode 71, with Rhiannon Bush

 

Welcome to the Do I need a life coach? Podcast. We’re here to discuss the ins- and outs- of the life coaching industry and give you tools to use, to see for yourself. I’m your host, Rhiannon Bush. Mother, management consultant and a passionate, certified life coach.

 

Well hello my friends, and congratulations on completing the first block – episodes 67-70. By now you’ve done some deep-thinking work to have worked out your Perfect Average Day and your SMARTER Goal and we’ve broken your SMARTER goal down into manageable steps with dates to give you your action plan – which I hope by now looks pretty and appealing and you’ve stuck it up somewhere and all those dates are in your calendar?

 

Today we’re going to start going into deeper layers. We’re going to talk about what drives our behaviour. This may help you see why you may or may not have achieved goals in the past.

 

This work is a combination of things I’ve gathered from Dr John DeMartini, Brene Brown, Kristina Karlsson and other amazing coaches who’ve taught me about values and how to identify what yours are.

 

Money is a great indicator of what you value – because you’ll spend money on things you value first. Ever wondered how someone’s so happy to spend money on something you think is ridiculous – like I used to spend so much money on DVDs and shoes. I have two feet. I can only wear one pair of shoes at a time and they were not cheap shoes. But I also spent a lot of money on the coffee machine we have. And that’s not something I regret. At all. But if you’re not a coffee drinker, you won’t understand how I could justify spending so much on a coffee machine, am I right? It’s about what you value.

 

Your values. Your values are the beliefs and principles that you believe are important in the way that you live and work. The human brain will cycle around the same thoughts repeatedly – we have 60,000 thoughts a day, 93% of which are the same. So what does your mind keep choosing to focus on and come back to? What thoughts, once the distractions of life have happened around you, do you keep returning to? Whatever is highest on your list of values will be the thing that you repeatedly focus on because it means something to you. It’s important.

 

There are things that matter to you, it’s about identifying what and this can be in different areas of your life. For example:

1. What do you think about when it comes to family? What are your underlying opinions?

2. What do you want in your career? Or financially? Or both? Do you want to start a business?

3. How about romance? Do you have a partner? Do you want one? Do you want many? What is important to you about relationships or connections and the impact they have on you?

4. The same questions can be applied to your friendships and connections.

5. When I say ‘health’ what comes to mind? Broken down into nutrition, exercise, intellectual, mental and spiritual health.

6. What about growth? Personal development? What are you aiming to achieve? Do you crave more?

7. What hobbies do you just do to have fun? How do you have fun? What makes you laugh? If that’s not something you value, what is? How do you have down time?

8. When have you been the most fulfilled? Happy? Sad? Conflicted?

 

Identifying what you are repeatedly and commonly thinking about -how you’d love your life to be, what you would love to do, what you would love to have is an important step in identifying your values.

 

And when you identify your values, answering the above questions becomes so much easier. Because if you’re someone who values family but you work 80 hours a week, you’re going to feel internal conflict. If you’re someone who craves connections with others but are then forced to isolate due to COVID, that’s going to be incredibly challenging. If you’re someone who follows and respects rules, but then work with someone who’s happy to bend them, you’ll find that difficult. Our behaviour and decisions is all based on our values. And we have them, whether we are aware of them or not.

 

Now, sit somewhere quietly. Open up the list and really consider this. Do it on purpose. Remain open and simply contemplate.

 

The easiest way to do this is to go through a list I’ve provided in the show notes, that you can work through to identify your values. Start by reading them all, and then as you’re going through the list, circle the ones that stand out to you.

 

These are things like:

• Happiness

• Stability

• Peace

• Integrity

• Family

• Trust

• Loyalty

• Wealth

• Culture

 

There’s a huge list to go through in the show notes. Start by getting your list down to 10 top values. Do this by going through the list and as you read them, highlight or circle any that resonate with you. Any you feel matter and are important. I trust there’ll be more than 10 by the time you’re done  and that’s ok.

 

The next step is to categorise. Do this by grabbing different coloured marker pens and with those, find values you’ve highlighted that are similar. There will be synergies I promise. If you can’t connect some of them, it’s ok to leave them on their own.

 

When you’ve done the whole list and have groups of similar values, ask yourself “if I had to choose one of these over the other, which would it be?”.  Pick the value that most resonates with you in each category. Keep going until you have your 10.

 

Then whittle that list down further until you get to 5. Ideally, you’ll be guided by two. Yes. Two.

 

Your values are often deeply ingrained into your psyche. Many of them are passed down from your parents – either because of, or in spite of. And Brene Brown took me through an exercise that changed how I saw my values and identified them. She asked three questions:

1. Do I use these values as a filter through which I make important decisions and set boundaries? (For example, you want to buy a house but you love freedom and adventure)

2. When things are going wrong and my back’s against the wall, how do I behave? (For example, you’re resigning from your job and moving to a competitor, how do you conduct that conversation? Or if someone’s micromanaging you and you hate it, how do you behave?)

3. When I’m not in alignment with my values, what feelings come up? (i.e. resentment)

 

Your values are what drives your behaviour, because they’re filters through which you see the world and navigate your way through it. If we don’t consciously choose our values, we can end up misguided and being driven in a way we can’t explain – and didn’t choose.

 

I’ve listened to people say that respect and honesty are two values to be careful with – because they can mean such specific things to different people and often, they’re driven from one’s ego.

 

When I realised my top value is honesty, it made complete sense to me because whenever I felt left out, upset, out of alignment, or had difficulty making a decision, it was because someone wasn’t being honesty with me, or I wasn’t being honest with myself.

 

Now you have your list, is there anything missing? Or are there any values you’d like to change. While values are a deeply ingrained part of who we are, they can be shifted and the first step to do this, is to list values you want to have instead and simply ask yourself what that looks like for you? Apply it to your life.

 

If you’re not sure, is there anybody you admire, or like? Why? What do you believe their values are? Use that to try on like a jumper for yourself. If the jumper fits, keep it. If not, throw it away and be done with it. Move onto the next.

 

Are these top values, values you’re proud of?

When living through these values, would you be satisfied being perceived as these?

If you had to make unpopular decisions, would these values enable you to sleep at night, even if you’d upset people because of the decisions you’d had to make?

 

The final step after you’ve identified your top values, is to write out what they mean to you. Get specific about it. This will reinforce why they’re important, and bring your conscious awareness to understanding how you live each day through these values.

 

Realising your values is life changing. It will help you on your way to goal achievement by guiding your decisions and choices to focus your behaviour. Go through this exercise with light and excitement as you delve more deeply into who you are.

 

What will you choose to value, to achieve the outcomes you want to achieve?

 

I’ll see you soon.

 

 

 

Hey! Before you go, I always find reviews really helpful when looking for new information or insights…

 

I you’ve found this podcast valuable, please take a minute to write a quick review about what you’ve found most beneficial for you, so other people can benefit from your insights, and listen in too. I would LOVE that!

Also, if there are any topics you’d like me to cover specifically about life coaching or the life coaching industry, visit rhiannonbush.com to contact me. Thanks for joining and I’ll see you in the next episode of Do I Need A Life Coach?!

 

 

Please note, this transcription may not be exact.