Find Your Actual Values
Last week’s email was about the impact of a podcast I listen to often- Mayim Bialik’s Breakdown. Mayim and Johnathan interviewed Dr. Susan David about her book Emotional Agility (the Emotional Agility Quiz and Book are at this link). If you need to get on my email list to get the behind-the-scenes, more raw stories, and learn more about what I do, that link is here: Be an insider!
Boy oh boy! I was taking notes like my effin life depended on it! It was SO good. I haven’t been able to stop thinking about how my values impact my decisions. Annnnd I’m learning what order my values are really in.
If you’ve ever done a workshop or been in a corporate meeting where they ask you to list your top three values.
Integrity.
Honesty.
Trust.
There are 3-4 others that show up on the list but almost all the participants put these on their list and wait for their gold star. So many people put the same things because they think they have to…they don’t want to stand out or be judged. Or maybe they just repeat what they hear from their employer so they seem like a team player.
Are they good values to have? Yes.
Are they everyone’s top values? No.
AND THAT IS OK!
These definitions came from Dr. Susan David (paraphrasing after listening 4580 times with some of her actual phrases).
Surface acting is when you put on your smile no matter what you feel and you engage in huge amounts of emotional labor. You are faking it basically and creating burnout.
“Autopilot is when you feel cynical every day when you go to work and it’s actually crushing you inside.” Burnout comes from going on autopilot.
Holy Sh!t! That made my jaw drop and my eyes bulge.
I’ve used autopilot for years thinking it was keeping me from burnout. My almost daily autopilot schedule went like it does for so many other working parents.
Make breakfast and the lunches.
Pack the lunches.
Do the school dropoff.
Go to the office.
Pick up the kid.
Make dinner.
Rush the bath routine.
Try to relax and do something fun…if you aren’t completely exhausted.
According to Dr. David, autopilot causes you to stop engaging in a beneficial way. Her examples rang true and kinda hurt my heart. Your child wants your attention after a stressful day and you play with your phone, ignoring them. (OUCH!) You stop engaging at work because you are cynical and don’t have faith that your opinion matters to your employer. (DOUBLE OUCH!)
I can think of many more areas we go on autopilot that rob us of a meaningful, emotionally fulfilling experience.
Not talking to your partner about something important keeps you from sharing your entire being. This creates an invisible, but solid feeling wall between you.
You go to dinner with others but are too preoccupied with other things you “should” be doing to really listen to the conversations.
You don’t stop to enjoy the beauty of the flowers you planted. Thank you timed sprinkler system for taking care of them so I can take a few pics and post them online to show how amazing my life is that I don’t really participate in.
I could go on for many, many more hours on this but I’ll stop. I think you get the picture.
Thankfully she was asked about how you know the thing you are doing aren’t aligned with your values. If we live by our values, our life won’t give us such a great desire to disengage. (I mean, we all do it but 2 hours a week versus 20 is a huge difference!)
When your values are not aligned with what you were doing, she said you may not actually notice it at first. Maybe you might not even know what your values are, but they surface. Because I watch and listen to a lot of true crime when I'm not trying to improve myself, I thought “just like a dead body.”
When your values surface to show you what you are not doing AND when dead bodies surface, both are Oh Sh!t moments.
I’m so glad I started listening to what my body (some also call this intuition) was telling me.
While the other values I listed earlier are important, they are not the ones that are the most important to me. The ones that make me feel happy, safe, and excited to be in a situation are:
Transparent Honesty (honesty without transparency tends to be half truths)
Creativity (this is more than visual, tangible creativity; creative solutions are very important in this world)
Connection (building relationships with others)
I hope you can set aside some time to think about your values…the ones that make you feel happy, safe, and excited to be wherever you are. Share them below!
Peace and love,
Teresea
Photo credit: Unsplash; Lee Wright
