How to figure out your personal values
Your personal values indicate how you want to behave and what kind of person you want to be.
Life isn't just about results, or the route you take to get to those results, but also about how you behave along the way, about the kind of person you want to be.
What are personal values?
Your personal values indicate how you want to behave and what kind of person you want to be. They are your personal how, your qualities of doing and being. They are your answer to questions such as ‘How do I want to relate to the world around me?’ and ‘What kind of person do I want to be?’ For example, someone may want to behave in an honest way (value: honesty) and be an original and innovative person (value: creativity). Appendix A contains some examples of personal values.
Only you can decide how you want to live your life, so only you can determine what personal values are important to you. This doesn't mean you should only think about yourself. It means you decide what's important to you instead of letting others decide for you. You don’t have to defend or justify your values (although some values are more helpful than others, as you'll see further on). The same goes for other people. If someone has different values than you, it doesn't necessarily mean that those values are better or worse than yours, they are just different.
Values are not goals. Goals have an end date: once you've reached your goal, it's no longer a goal. Values are ongoing, they have no end date. For example, behaving honestly is an ongoing process for the rest of your life. Once you stop being honest, you no longer live by that value.
You can control how you behave, you can choose your actions. Your behaviour reflects what you find valuable to do, it reflects your personal values. Actions speak louder than words. For example, you think you value fitness, but you're out of breath after walking up a single flight of stairs. You believe you value gratitude, but you're never satisfied with what you have and always want more. You think you value nonviolence, but you sometimes slap people in the face when you’re angry.
Your character is defined by the values you choose to live by. Others see your personal values as character traits. For example, if you are known for always taking obligations to others seriously, you are seen as conscientious.
To figure out your life purpose read my blog post ‘How to figure out what to do with your life’.
Why is it important to know your personal values?
Your personal values act as a compass, guiding your actions, words and decisions toward how you want to behave and the kind of person you want to be. Focusing on your values reminds you of what really matters to you.
Knowing the values underlying a particular choice simplifies decision making. Let’s say a relative treats you poorly. How will you treat this relative? If one of your values is ‘respect’, you will treat this relative with respect. Since you also value taking care of your health and wellbeing, you may want to spend less or no time with such a relative. Making decisions based on your personal values prevents regret and self-blame.
Knowing your values can give you the courage to do or say what you think is right. If one of your values is ‘justice’, it can encourage you to speak up or act in situations where you or others are treated unfairly. And if ‘honesty’ is one of your values, it can give you the courage to speak the truth about your opinions, feelings and actions, even though some people might reject you for doing so.
Knowing your values can inspire healthier habits. For example, a heavy smoker has just become a father. He decides to quit smoking, since caring for his child (values: family, care) requires him to be fit and healthy and to stay alive at least until his child reaches adulthood.
Sometimes your values pull you in different directions. You must then decide which value is most important to you at this time in your life, and act accordingly. Let's say your company is offering you a promotion that will significantly increase your salary, but requires a lot of traveling abroad. One of your values is to spend enough time with your family, and another value is to provide them with financial security. After some deliberation, you decide to accept the offer, as financial security is the most important thing for you and your family right now. When you travel, you will call your family every night. This is not as ideal as being physically present, but it allows you to connect with your family on a daily basis.
How can you figure out your personal values?
Create your list of personal values using one or more of the techniques below, check the completeness of the list, assess each value for its helpfulness, and select your core values.
1️⃣ List your personal values
Use one or more of the techniques below to create your list of personal values. Write down your values, as you will need them for the next steps in this process and for future reference. Keep in mind that values are about how you want to behave (doing) or what kind of person you want to be (being). Appendix A contains some examples of personal values.
Give each value a name and a brief description of what that name means to you, preferably starting with ‘I’, such as ‘Honesty – I am honest with myself and others.’ It is essential to describe in your own words what each value means to you, as it is too general to just use a name. Don’t write a long paragraph, but only one concrete, personal sentence.
So get pen and paper, or open an electronic document, write ‘Personal Values’ at the top of a new page, and create your list of personal values. Aim for a list of ten to fifteen values.
👉 The funeral
Imagine arriving at a funeral. You walk towards the coffin, accompanied by solemn, sombre music. You pass members of your immediate and extended family, friends and some people you’ve worked with. You feel their shared grief. Oddly enough, no one seems to notice you. You arrive at the coffin, look inside… and see yourself lying there. It’s your funeral, a few years from today.
Three people will give a short speech. Write down your answers to the following questions:
🤔 What would I like these speakers to say about my character?
🤔 What kind of person, life partner, parent, child, friend, employee or colleague would I want their words to reflect?
The answers to these questions are your personal values. For example, you would like these speakers to mention that you were curious about many things (curiosity), a loving parent to your children (parenting) and that you always took responsibility for your actions (responsibility).
👉 Your 100th birthday
Instead of imagining your funeral, imagine what you’d like people to say about your character on your 100th birthday.
👉 Life values questions
Write down your answers to one or more of the following questions. Assume that you are not guided by other people’s judgements and opinions, and that you do not need to please or impress anyone.
🤔 What kind of person, life partner, parent, child, friend, employee or colleague do I want to be?
🤔 What personal qualities would I like to bring to my relationships or in the workplace?
🤔 How would I treat others if I were my ideal self?
🤔 What does it mean to me to be a good person, life partner, parent, child, friend, employee or colleague?
Notice that all these questions are about how you want to be, not how you want others to be.
The answers to these questions are your personal values. For example:
Family time – I am a parent who spends sufficient time with their family.
Respect – I behave with respect towards myself and others.
Authenticity – I engage authentically with other people.
👉 From goals to values
How to get from your goals to your personal values is described in my blog post ‘What you think you want is not what you really want’.
2️⃣ Check the completeness of your list of values
Check the completeness of your list of values by answering the question
🤔 Which personal values are missing from my list?
For example, if you go to the gym five times a week to lift weights and do aerobic exercises, you would expect ‘Fitness – I do whatever it takes to be fit’ to be on your list.
Add missing personal values to your list.
3️⃣ Validate your list of personal values
Some personal values are more helpful than others in creating the life you want. Go through the personal values in your list and check for each value if it meets the requirements below.
🤔 Is the value based on reality?
If a value is not based on reality, you get into a fight with reality. You always lose that fight. For example, being happy all the time is not a helpful value because it is not based on reality. You were not made to be happy all the time. Wanting to be happy all the time actually diminishes your happiness. The same goes for wanting to be liked by everyone.
🤔 Is the value constructive?
Values should have positive, beneficial effects for yourself or others, not harmful effects. Aggression is not a helpful value because it is destructive. Aggressive behaviour hurts others, damages your relationships, and often makes matters worse.
🤔 Can you fully control the value?
A value you cannot fully control makes your happiness dependent on external circumstances. Being popular is not a helpful value because you can't control other people's opinions. You also don't have complete control over being famous or rich. You only have complete control over values that are internally oriented, such as honesty, creativity, or integrity.
🤔 Are you willing to pay the price that living by this value entails?
A value is only helpful if you are willing to pay the price that living by that value entails. For example, being authentic to other people may annoy or offend some of them. Being and staying physically fit requires regular exercise. And to be physically healthy, you may need to drink less alcohol and sleep more. Are you willing to pay that price?
If a personal value does not meet one or more of the above requirements, ask yourself what the influence of this value is on yourself and the people around you. If this value doesn’t help create the life you want, you may want to remove it from your list and stop acting on it.
4️⃣ Determine your core values
Your core values are foundational to who you are. They offer the strongest guidance in your life and play a crucial role in shaping your decisions. Determine your three (plus or minus one) core values by answering questions such as
🤔 Which personal values are most important to me?
🤔 Which personal values should be on my tombstone?
You can also use techniques such as pairwise comparison to determine the relative importance of your values. Appendix B contains a brief description of the pairwise comparison technique.
Colour or circle your core values to make them stand out on your list.
🎉👏🎈
Periodically, for example weekly, reflect on your list of values and revise the list if necessary. It may take several weeks or months to understand exactly what your values are and what they really mean to you. Some values may become more or less important to you over time, especially after major changes in your life, such as having a child.
How can you live more in line with your personal values?
Knowing your personal values isn't very helpful if you don't live them, for instance due to low self-esteem or fear of rejection. In a well-designed and well-lived life, you behave in accordance with your personal values, in line with the kind of person you want to be (integrity).
Periodically (e.g. once a week or month) assess which value you want to work on and align your decisions and actions with this value.
1️⃣ Choose which value to work on
Asses to what extent you live in accordance with your personal values and choose the value you want to work on.
Using your list of values, write down your answers to the following questions:
🤔 Which of my values am I currently living by?
🤔 Which of my values am I neglecting?
🤔 Which value should I start working on?
Don't be hard on yourself if you realize you've been neglecting your values for a while. We all neglect our values from time to time. Now just connect to your values and use them to guide your current actions.
2️⃣ Align your decisions and actions with your values
Suppose you have neglected your health and you want to live more in accordance with the value 'health'. Then, when making choices or decisions that affect your health, always ask yourself: What would a healthy person do? For example, would a healthy person take the stairs or the elevator? Drink a sugary drink or water? Go to the gym or stay home? And then do what you think a healthy person would do.
You can ask such a question for any value, because values are qualities of doing and being. What would someone who values financial security do? What would an honest person do?
Behaving in line with a value is not always easy, especially if it means stepping out of your comfort zone. Don’t let your thoughts or feelings stop you from behaving in a way that matters to you. Ask yourself: Am I going to act on my personal values or how I feel right now?
References
The happiness trap, by Dr Russ Harris
The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, By Stephen R. Covey
The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck, by Mark Manson
Read my summary of this book / Buy the book at bol.com (affiliate link)
Personal Values: How to Know Who You Really Are, by Mark Manson
https://markmanson.net/personal-values
How to Find, Define, and Use Your Values, by Irina Cozma
https://hbr.org/2023/02/how-to-find-define-and-use-your-values
9 Surprising Superpowers of Knowing Your Core Values, Psychology Today, by Meg Selig,
Appendix A – Examples of personal values
Below are a few examples of personal values. If necessary, search online for ‘personal values list’ for more extensive overviews. Notice that values are properties of doing (how you want to behave) or being (the kind of person you want to be).
Values related to ourselves
Achievement – being performance oriented
Balance – being balanced, no extremes
Challenge – doing challenging things
Courage – doing what is right or necessary despite fear
Creativity – being original or innovative
Curiosity – wanting to know more about people or things
Excellence – being extremely good at some things
Financial security – having enough money to meet your basic needs
Fitness – doing what it takes to be fit
Freedom – being free to choose how you live
Gratitude – being thankful for what is good in your life
Health – looking after your health
Independence – think and act for yourself
Integrity – act in accordance with your principles
Justice – acting in a way that is fair
Meaning – doing what is meaningful
Meticulousness – being careful, accurate, and precise
Perseverance – to be persistent, persevere
Responsibility – taking responsibility for your actions
Self-compassion – being kind to yourself and avoiding negative self-talk
Wellbeing – taking care of your wellbeing
Values specifically related to family
Family time – spending sufficient time with your family
Parenting – being a loving parent
Values related to others (our tribe including family)
Authenticity – engage authentically with other people, genuine, real
Boundaries – setting, upholding and respecting boundaries
Caring – being caring for others
Collaboration – working together with others
Connection – strive to connect with others
Coaching – helping others develop skills and abilities
Conscientious – being careful or diligent and taking obligations to others seriously
Contribution – make valuable contributions to a common goal
Empathy – seeing the world through other people’s eyes
Honesty – being honest with yourself and others
Loyalty – remaining steadfast in your support for something or someone
Nature – connecting with nature
Respect – being respectful towards others
Safety – preventing and not causing injury or danger
Service – being of service to others
Support – assisting others
Appendix B – Pairwise comparison
Pairwise comparison allows you to determine the relative importance of your values.
Using your list of personal values, go through the following steps:
👉 Compare the personal value in the first row of your list with the value in the second row. Give one point to the value that is most important to you. You have to make a choice, you can't give both values half a point. Do the same for the value in the first row with the value in the third row, then the first row with the fourth row, and so on until the first row with the last row.
👉 Compare the personal value in the second row with the value in the third row. Give one point to the value that is most important to you. Do the same for the value in the second row with the value in the fourth row, then the second row with the fifth row, and so on until the second row with the last row.
👉 Repeat this procedure with the third row, then the fourth row, and so on until the penultimate row.
👉 For each personal value count the total number of points.
👉 The personal values with the three highest scores are your core values.
A simple example with just a few personal values: