Discovering Values, Motives, and Life Goals

Want a better life?

More Happiness?  More Well being? How do you get yourself motivated today to improve your life?  How come no one ever taught you this before?

Let me share a secret with you. A secret that the most accomplished people already know.  A secret to living the good life that no one has taught you before.

Archer woman aims her arrow at the target

What is that secret?  — Motivation always starts by deciding what interests you. We call these interests your “Values.”  Set a goal to accomplish something new in that area and you will attain more of whatever you value.  It is a magic formula that really works!

Values + Goals + Action = A Better Life!

Most people want more out of life than what they are currently getting.  But they may be afraid to dream of anything important out of fear that they won’t get it and then will feel disappointed. If you know your values you need never fear again. Values and Goals naturally lead to action. Repeated action leads to results. You naturally move toward what you value. Pura Vida!

Let’s put it in action right now.  Try the following exercise —

 

Exercise Step One:

Take out a sheet of paper.  Write a list of everything you value.  It may take several pages but it is good to get it out on paper where you can look at it.  Consider what you value in the different areas of your life:

  •    Personal Emotional and Mental Self,
  •    Family and Spouse or primary relationship,
  •    Friendships and Community relationships,
  •    Career and Financial,
  •    Spiritual life
  •    Possessions and living quarters,
  •    Physical condition and health, and

You can add any other area that is important to you.

Our values are what motivate us, they are what we think is important – what we value. Sometimes they are the things that excite us and sometimes they scare us. But they are never boring.  At the Weekly Wisdom Game we cherish learning about a person’s values.

Exercise Step Two:

Write a Goal or two that moves toward what you value.  Just a little one. Small steps lead to greater things.  It is better to make goals so small that you can do them right away and in one event.

Tiny goals organize our actions so that we move toward a better life.   Consider whether you would benefit from having goals to improve in the areas of your values?  When we define our values and work toward improving them, we are working toward Virtues. Virtues are the values that make us better people.  We want to be Virtuous people, right?

When you know your own values and virtues you can more easily stay focused, and you will find many ways to accomplish goals that satisfy your values.  If an action doesn’t serve your values, make you a better person, why would you do it?

When you know another person’s values you can be of better service to them.  You can help them in ways that support their values. You can show them how a proposal you are making helps them satisfy their own values.  You can motivate them to take actions in service of their values. You can convince them to do things that are important to do. At the Wisdom Games this last weekend we learned how to discover another person’s highest values. Values are the key to motivation, influence, getting going, and building trust.

Be aware that there are two types of Values.  Those you move away from and avoid and those you move toward.

The first are the important negatives in life that make us afraid or worried.  We protect ourselves by avoiding them. We need a few of these in our lives. As an example we all have a value for Safety.  We avoid danger. It is important to know our negative values so that we can quickly make decisions to avoid them when we have to make a choice.

The second type of values are the ones that we move toward.  We want more positive values in our lives because they are our desires and help us fulfill our physical, emotional, and social needs.  An example of a “toward” value is Love. Most of us want to move toward more love in our lives.  By listing our positive values we can set goals to take action and move toward fulfilling those values.

 

Take Action Now — Tiny Action!

Look at your list of values and pick one or two that are most important to you. Choose your highest values and decide to do something to make your life better starting today, starting right now!  Set a small goal that relates to your highest value. Try to find the smallest, next step that you can take right now. Or set a specific appointment with yourself to take this first step toward your goal and your value as soon as is physically possible.

This is the principle of taking lots of Tiny Actions. These are easy to do because they are so small. But you will feel good about accomplishing them, getting them out of the way, and getting the ball rolling.  Then you can do another action because each one is so easy. Do a number of these and they add up quickly. Your life will thank you for it.

 

You Deserve to Live a Happy Life

I know, easy and great, right?  Why didn’t anyone ever already teach you this stuff?

Happiness doesn’t come so much from momentary pleasure, or from doing activities, or attaining possessions. Happiness comes more from working toward achievable goals that serve your own personal values.

If you know your values and do a little work on them every day, you will be feel satisfaction along the way.  And that will make your life happy. Exciting to begin with!

As you achieve the goals you set, you will see that they move you toward the things you most Value, and that will make you even more happy.  Even more exciting!

Finally, (and this is the best part!)  the most important happiness comes when you look back on your life and realize that you have lived according to your values and achieved many goals that made a difference.

 

Learn A Lot More

If you would like to Play the Game of Life at a higher level every single day, please consider coming to join us at The Weekly Wisdom Game.

A community of mutually supportive, emotionally intelligent players meets every Saturday in San Pedro area of San Jose, Costa Rica to support one another, do community service, and learn skills and games that grow our ability to live the good life of well being.

Please come join us!  We need people like you with good Values!

 

To Register and save your space at The Weekly Wisdom Game:  http://wisdomgamecr.com

For more information LIKE our Facebook Page:  https://www.facebook.com/WisdomGameCR

 

The Observant Project Leader

Engineering mindful self observation and mindful other observation

As engineers, it is not the technical problems that drive us crazy. It’s the miscommunicated requirements, the broken commitments, the capricious change requests that make us insane. If everyone just saw things the way we do, wouldn’t everything be so much easier? But they don’t. We’re all different, so we have to compensate for what looks like, from our perspective, other people’s’ “idiocy.”

Poor communication is the cause of most team problems. And that is what we should expect. You were hired for your engineering and technical prowess, not public relations or customer service skills. But if we are going to get through this together and make the project a success, we are going to need to become better observers and better communicators. Surprisingly, that doesn’t start with communication though. It starts with detailed mindful observation so that we can tell when things go off the rails. You can’t fix a problem you don’t see!

In 27 years of running team based projects and coaching project managers, I have come to the conclusion that getting good at this stuff is up to each of us, individually. Observing our own internal and external changes in behavior makes it easier to notice those changes in our team partners. Being able to read their unconscious micro expressions is the most valuable tool in establishing effective communication. It makes it possible to recognize when the words a stakeholder is saying do not reflect what they are actually thinking.

For example, being able to predict that a person is becoming angry, annoyed, tense, tired, motivated, excited, or any other intense emotion, gives you a chance to decide how you want to respond to these stressful situations. You might ask more clarifying questions, take a break to reset emotions, or steer the discussion toward a more detailed description of requirements or commitments, for example.

Observing your own behavior and managing it is different from observing someone else’s. If a manager has just “jerked your chain” for the umteenth time by changing work-product specs while demanding that the deadline must stay the same, it is valuable to observe yourself becoming frantic, so that you can calm yourself before your emotions affect the way you communicate to that manager, or to your subordinates who count on your support.

Careful observation of another person increases your ability to respond respectfully to their mood, when you can read the clues to their emotions. The best professionals depend on this skill to time critical communications so that they are more likely to elicit the responses they need from their bosses, peers, team members, and customers.

We all try to predict how others will respond. But our theory of their minds is only as good as our ability to understand our own mind and notice how other minds differ from us. That is why we must start by studying our self. The Buddhists call this “mindful self-observation” and it is easy to describe but can be difficult to do. We all have a tendency to get so caught up in what we are thinking that we forget to notice that there is an “us” who is doing that thinking and feeling. This is where mindfulness training can help.

Begin by trying to notice what goes on with you at all times. Start with low risk situations and exercise your awareness for short periods like say 4 or 5 minutes at a time. Watch how your own mind works. Not only your responses to yourself, but your responses to others. I like to do this at meetings when I am not the person leading the discussion.

Notice when something triggers an emotion inside you. Notice how you evaluate it as positive or negative, how it is being triggered, what behavior does it manifest in you, and ask yourself, “Is this the behavior that I want to represent?”

If not, determine what you want instead, and take steps to change toward a more appropriate response. Avoid “judging” yourself. Notice what makes you happy or sad, and notice what happens in life that prevents you from being present in the situation before you— what throws you back into memories or forward into future hypothetical possibilities?

The main function of this personal observation is to improve communication between you and your team and to better understand your own attitudes, feelings, and habits of thought.

Researchers have shown that much of communication is nonverbal. To understand another person’s nonverbal behaviors it is paramount that you really understand your own. Then you can pay attention to another person’s body language, understand better how they are reacting, and respond with choice to their total communication. Instead of just the words that they use. Mindful self observation is the beginning of this self understanding.

Once you can watch your own behavior, you can practice keeping up with the content of a conversation at the same time.

Then it is time start to study the other person’s facial gestures, body language, hand gestures, posture, movements, etc. These are almost always outside of the person’s conscious awareness. So if you can keep track of your own inner responses while tracking the person you are communicating with’s non-verbals, you will be lightyears ahead of them in project discussions and stakeholder negotiations. It can begin to look almost like you can read minds. What you are really doing is picking up on their nonverbal micro communications.

For example, there are many ways to say “yes”. Depending on the pitch, tone, rate of speech, and the volume of the way it is said, the word “yes” can mean “yes,” “YES!”, “no”, “maybe”, “I don’t know,” “probably,” etc. Perhaps they shake their head slightly “no” while saying “yes.” People regularly change their outside expressions before they are consciously aware on the inside. This allows you to respond to their experience even before they are fully aware of it themselves.

Learn to watch for the following personal observation clues:

  • skin color changes,
  • muscle tone changes,
  • changes in breathing,
  • lip size changes,
  • changes in posture,
  • changes in voice tone,
  • volume changes,
  • rate of speech, and
  • incongruity between any of these.

When you learn to pay close attention to not only what a person is saying but also to how they are saying it, as well as their outer behaviors that are accompanying their words, you become a powerful force for communication clarity. Like all worthwhile skills, it takes some practice. But as a super-observer you improve your chances of guiding your team and the projects that you take on to real success.

 


If you find this interesting and would like to learn more, please get in touch. We offer hands-on, experiential workshops to refine your team and management skills, and we specialize in working with technical people and engineers who never wanted to learn this fluffy stuff but were so good at what they were doing that they were asked to lead others. Call or WhatsApp +1-512-507-5464