We're continuing our theme of starting fresh with #SeptemberisthenewJanuary. Last week I proposed a small fashion challenge to shake up your cool weather style. Now, we're diving right into headspace.
The fame and the fortune are up to you, but certainly: peace of mind, balance, better relationships, better finances, maybe even happiness…
I’ve come across a few self-assessment tools over the last couple of years that help you identify your personal values, with the aim of aligning the activities and priorities of your life to what is important to you. They say this framework can help you with the kinds of things that feel icky but seem inevitable like unfulfilling jobs, guilt about your work-life balance, consumer debt, materialism and consumer culture, social media woes like FOMO, working hard and not getting where you want, the game of keeping up with the Joneses. You know what I’m talking about.
Well, I’ve always felt like a fish out of water in certain areas in my life, chafing against certain standards and expectations, and really struggling either to meet the standard or find a suitable alternative. And while I’m not famous or fabulously wealthy, doing those assessments and reviewing them in various ways periodically, I do feel OK. And that’s a hell of a lot better than how I have felt for most of my adult life, in spite of tough decisions I have to make to stay aligned with my priorities and stay solvent, for example.
I picked up a book last year called Emotional Agility by Susan David, PhD, when I was really struggling with making decisions about some of my next steps in life. I was tired of being whipsawed by my emotions. Various things needed to change, I felt stuck, and I was absolutely miserable and at wit’s end.
Dr. David is a psychologist and consultant who has studied emotions, happiness, and achievement for over 20 years, and developed the framework of emotional agility that can help us navigate life toward our own definition of success.
So let’s walk through the basics.
Why it’s important to identify your values
Aristotle: “You are what you habitually do.”
Dr. Susan David: “When we make choices based on what we know to be true for ourselves, rather than being led by others telling us what is right or wrong, important or cool, we have the power to face almost any circumstance in a constructive way.”
— circumstances including subconscious stereotypes, limiting beliefs, academic achievement gaps, gender bias… Dr. David cites numerous studies of groups facing cultural or gender bias, health conditions, as well as individuals in extremely tough ethical conundrums (conundra?) who were able to preserve their self-worth and achieve their goals, simply by having a strong sense of their core values.
When we go along to get along, mindlessly choosing the things that are “shoulds” and “supposed to’s”, we may find ourselves doing all kinds of things we don’t believe in, possibly dealing with consequences to our mental and physical health, and missing out on accomplishments we want to achieve.
Dr. David says, “We expend a lot of energy on these kinds of counterproductive decisions, energy that would be better put toward achieving our goals. Making choices and negotiating relationships without a clear set of governing values at the front of your mind is taxing labor"– everything is up for grabs, and you end up faking your emotions to fit those “shoulds”.
What are values, really?
“… I see values not as rules that are supposed to govern us, but as qualities of purposeful action that we can bring to many aspects of life. … Above all, a value is something you can use. It helps you place your feet in the right direction as you journey through life, no matter where life leads you.” Susan David, PhD
In Emotional Agility, she describes values as:
- Freely chosen, not imposed
- Ongoing, not fixed like goals
- Guiding rather than constraining
- Active, not static
- Bring freedom from social comparisons
- Foster self-acceptance
- Allow you to get closer to the way you want to live
How to identify your values
Dr. David lists a few questions to help you start clarifying your values. These would make great journal prompts, or, if you want to be more public about your process, essay or discussion prompts.
- What relationships do I want to build?
- What do I want my life to be about?
- How do I feel most of the time?
- What kinds of situations, activities, projects, make me feel most vital?
- What topics or situations do people consistently seek my advice on?
- Is there a time I feel most myself?
And perhaps for a daily journal habit, to track your alignment over time, or just a meditation focus:
Morning: If this were my last day on earth, how would I act to make it a great final day?
Evening: As I look back on today, what did I do that was actually worth my time?
Dr. David gives many more case studies and practical advice for how to make this truly workable in your day-to-day life, with the clear caveat that it is “not easy.” Emotional agility takes real resilience and patience and a willingness to sit with the discomfort of changing your thought patterns, and putting negative emotions and experiences to use to guide you toward what you want your life to look like.
David makes it very clear, over and over: this is hard work. Our brains seem to be hardwired to be anything but emotionally agile. I'm by no means successful at this, and I see it more as a practice to return to over and over, rather than a one-off magic spell that will change your life.
But I’d rather go through periods of temporary discomfort and struggle than live a life of unease or outright misery because I’m living according to other people’s standards that just don’t ring true for me.
For more, watch her en-couraging TED talk here.
There's even a quiz to get you started – find it here.
For another take on this concept, I also suggest Martha Beck’s North Star books – she elaborates on the same idea of “walking your why” or living with purpose, just using slightly different language than the framework in Emotional Agility.
Are you going to try some of these ideas to
redesign an area or two of your life this September?
Share your thoughts in the Comments below,
and share this article with a likeminded girlfriend!
I'm definitely going to look into David's book. She had me at the word "emotional." It's something we seldom talk about in this society, as if it wasn't important!
I’m so glad it’s resonating for you. The more I read and think about her work, I think there’s so much more to mine from the perspective of just that: what our emotions can tell us about ourselves and how to lead our lives. I’m seeing parallels with Danielle LaPorte’s core desired feelings concept…
Thanks for this reminder! A lot in here to digest and refer back to repeatedly. FOMO is a major drag on my thoughts and a complete waste of time. Truly, forming our values and trusting in them can be the foundation that we need to navigate through increasingly troubling, distracting times. They are the refreshing, reforming cocoon we can retreat to then emerge from, strengthened anew.
I’m happy to hear it’s a helpful prompt, Mary Ruth. Is there anything more liberating than saying, Nope, that’s not for me, and swooshing onward?