Focus on Your Values to Live a Meaningful Life

If you want to live a meaningful life, get clear on what you value in life.

If you prefer to listen, download this audio. 

 

If you want to live a meaningful life, focus on what you value.

Every day you make choices – some are small and some are big choices.

When you’re clear on what you value in your life or your business, it makes it easier to make decisions.

Values are your North Star – your compass.

For example, health is one of my top values so I make sure that I have that scheduled in my calendar so that it’s just as important as work or social time.

Your values give you clarity and focus.

When you’re clear about what you value, then you use that clarity and focus to make consistent decisions and take committed action in the direction that you want your life to go.

  • Values help you focus on living an aligned life.
  • Values are priorities that tell you how to spend your time.
  • You can use your values as a filter to make decisions.

For example, if you value success and achievement and that’s at the top of your list, and you get a promotion opportunity or more business comes your way, then it would be easy to make the decision to take the opportunity.

However if health and family are at the top of your values list and success and achievement is further down the list, then it would be easier to see what that promotion or added workload would take away from health and family.

One of my clients is struggling because all she does is work in two of her businesses. She longs to have time to be and to read and to have fun with her partner.

She has gotten clear about what she values at this stage of her life.  She wants to prioritize other aspects of her life over work.

She has to do this or nothing will change and work will dominate her life.

If you’re conscious of what you value then you use your time to make those values a priority.

You want to be mindful of living your life today and stop waiting for something to change before you start living.

I see too many people waiting before they live.

Waiting is the middleman. Cut out the middleman and stop waiting for something to change.

Step into the future you want right now.

You don’t want to have regrets about the way you spent your time.

What you focus on is what you get more of so this is why you want to be mindful about your values.

Values are your GPS – they will guide you to live the life you most want.

How to create your values list.

Get your values list here!

1. Make a list of 10 things you value using the list you can get your values list here. Start by asking yourself – what are the most important things that I value in my life?

For example, my top values are health, adventure, financial security, connection (friends and family), travel, nature.

There’s no hard rule for how long your list should be, but I usually prefer to start with a list of 10 values.

2. Prioritizing Your Values

The next step is to prioritize your list.

Come up with your top 5 core values – this is your focus for this year.

Ask yourself what is most important to me in my life today?

Often we aspire to be do or have something in our life.  For example if you want to be in better shape this year then that would be an aspirational value.

This is a great way to change your life. I recommend that you create one or two that are values you aspire to live out.

We change our life in the direction of the values we live out.

If you have competing values and you aren’t sure which one to choose, ask yourself, which would I rather do if I could do one thing.

3. Next step – what would each value look like in action – for example if adventure is my value – I would brainstorm adventures for the next year.

Adventure is a top core value for us in our household.  We plan a year in advance so that we always have adventures to look forward too.

This fall we’re going to Santa Fe and Taos in in our Airstream – this is the adventure value in action.

Note: Your values change as your life changes.

Now that John is retired, our values have shifted a bit. Time is more precious to us and the health is our most important value.

We prioritize that first so that we exercise almost every day in some way.

If you keep living by your current values, then you can expect to get similar results to what you’re already getting.

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If you want to take action on your life or business, sign up for a complimentary business breakthrough session with me here

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  1. Hi Sherold,

    I love this clear blog and really enjoyed your interview on the League of Luminary Ladies. I’ve been following you for a few years now and what you revealed about yourself in the interview was so interesting. Your process with your two businesses was important for me to hear. Thank you for being you! I too am a 6 on the Enneagram and have a background in Communications…

    1. Guylaine – thank you so much for following me and reading my blogs + listening to that interview. I got down
      and real. I think that I’ve learned how to be resilient and come back when tough stuff happens. I still have fear all the time yet I can work with it. That’s the key and I’m noticing old subconscious beliefs are behind some deep seated fears. So I keep chipping away at it. You can do it too. Work to alchemize the fear. I have a blog post on fear that will share at some point in the near future. Thank you again. I so appreciate you writing me.

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