Re-e-VALUE-ating

Over the weekend, I attended a seminar given by a colleague who is starting a business called Velocity to help people be more successful with goal-setting and achievement. I'm pretty loose in that area...usually preferring to go with the flow. It's in my nature to resist anything that feels confining, rigid, prescriptive or something I "should" do. Usually if I set my mind to something, I get it done. Why formalize it? But I have to admit to a decided lack of discipline in certain areas of my life that having measurable goals and an action plan around might help.

During the workshop, the facilitators talked about the importance of knowing your personal core values. We all have them. But most of the time they operate under the surface of our lives. Why not bring them into the light and use them to gut-check every decision? Successful businesses do this - using their core values to ensure alignment between their offerings, their audience and their staff. So the theory goes that if my goals are going to be successful, they have to align with my core values. Makes sense. After all, I'm not really going to be motivated by something that doesn't really hit me where I live.

Yesterday was a rainy, dreary day - the perfect day to curl up next to the fire and play with concepts. I love doing this anyway, so this was a special treat. I started with a scribbled list that I wrote down during the workshop, then added to it, subtracted from it, combined some things, whittled it down and finally identified 10 values that I then started to prioritize. Halfway through, I realized that some of the items on my list weren't really MY values, but instead my beliefs about what my values should be. So I re-e-VALUE-ated.

At the end, these are the values I put on paper and hung next to my desk:

• Life-Long Learning - Growth comes from experience, curiosity and inquiry.
• Self Awareness, Self Reliance, Authenticity - Know thyself. Trust thyself. Be thyself.
• Relationships - Nurture the inner circle. Widen the outer circle.
• Creativity & Freedom - Possibilities are endless.
• Every Voice Counts -  Every perception is real and valid.
• Humor - Life is too important to take seriously.

Tonight, it's on to my personal vision...Should be fun!