Starting with V….
As the larger world seems full as ever of the volatility, uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity (V-U-C-A), on my first day off for the holiday this December, I wondered what I could do to lessen the negative consequences of the state of the world? My mind began to spin with all the possibilities. Can my actions alone make a difference? What is a big enough act to make a meaningful difference? I was quickly feeling small as my efforts alone might not amount to much. I was just about to give up when I remembered the meaningful experience of “being.” A thought bubbled up in my head that I didn’t have to do anything, but I could change my state of “being,” as I considered this VUCA world.
As a result, the idea of borrowing the acronym V-U-C-A and reframing it for the kind of “being” that can help me weather the world with more resilience immediately came to mind. But that’s a lot to bite off, so I have decided to start simply with V on this post and return periodically for each letter incrementally in the future. So here goes!
I thought a lot about what the “V” should be, and what really resonated with me. There were many words that jumped out, vulnerability, veracity, venerable, vibrant, virtuous, for example. But one word reverberated in my head—it’s something that comes up in my coaching practice quite a bit—“values.” This word was the loudest of my thoughts. I liked the idea of using my values as a guidepost to help me stay on course to have a happy healthy 2019. It also reminded me of a recent coaching session where my client was seeking a tool to guide him to stay on course to ensure that he is intentionally showing up the way he wants to. Earlier in our conversation he had been talking about his values. Ultimately by the end of our session he concluded that his values, indeed, were the exact tool he needed to check in on how he was showing up. How simple, yet powerful!
For me, just like my client, when I am living aligned with my values, I am content. Conversely, when I am not living my values, my world is generally in upheaval, and in discord, and I am not enjoying it. Righting the ship into the smooth waters of living my values can return me to equilibrium.
For some, it can feel daunting to dig into and come up with what we really value. Candidly, I admit that for me, this is because I am a “people pleaser,” which makes me cringe. But let me be clear, being a “people pleaser,” doesn’t mean I am necessarily skilled in actually pleasing people. It is instead, a strong motivator for me. As a result, it is sometimes hard to separate what I actually value and what I think I “should,” value. When I can separate “should,” from what is really important to me, I can get closer to the core of my values. My list includes integrity, dependability, acceptance, and compassion. For me, these four values show up a great deal and tend to be the drivers of my behavior—people pleasing or not! This doesn’t mean that I necessarily exemplify these values perfectly, but rather, as I see them, they motivate my behavior. I also notice in times when I feel in conflict with them, I experience discontent.
Let me give an example of how this has shown up for me. There was a recent situation where things were not going well for me. Several people in my sphere behaved in ways that disappointed and hurt me. For a two-week period, I was truly out of sorts. I saw what others were “doing,” “saying,” or “acting,” as a major problem and the focus of all of my negative—and it WAS negative—energy. I saw these individuals as acting with malintent toward me. Additionally, I was holding little space, if any, for compassion toward them or their intentions, even if I disagreed with their actions. As you likely can surmise, this was a miserable place to be, but for that time, it consumed me.
But I also recognized that while I was in this ugly space—I was also acting contrary to a value that I say is important to me—the value of compassion. So, I let go of my negative energy, my judgement, my disappointment and embraced my values. And even though it was hard, just the decision to do so, made me feel better. I spent the next several days using my daily meditation as a space to focus on compassion for those who challenged this value, and told my closest friends, family and colleagues about what I was going through and how I hoped to turn things around. Little by little, I returned to feeling like myself.
But let me be clear, although this was a conscious choice to change my perspective, it did not mean that any unacceptable behavior by others was somehow now acceptable. But it did mean that I could choose to no longer dwell in a place where I was not living my values. For me, no ones’ bad behavior actually justifies me not living into my values. When I act judgmentally and gossip and focus on other people’s shortcomings, I feel negative, and my world feels out of whack. Holding this space, no matter how righteous I may feel, does not serve me. So, returning to seeing others through a lens of understanding, empathy, and compassion usually returns me to a productive my comfortable space.
I offer a couple of ideas that helped synthesize my core values, and hopefully you might find them helpful too.
1) Looking at your behaviors, what are the themes that come up for you? What are the things you care about and look for, strive for, more toward, or come back to again and again?
2) Ask yourself what are the things that are super important to you that you will fight for? What is motivating you here?
3) Think about times when you were uncomfortable? What were the circumstances? Did they trigger a reaction against something you hold dear? Perhaps a violation of your values? What was it? What made you uncomfortable? What was important for you about that?
4) Notice when you are having these reactions and try using a journal to detail what was going on for you. What values are at play for you? How did you show up? Were you aligned with your values? If not, how is that serving you? If it does serve you, consider what other values are at play for you.
It hopefully won’t surprise you to know that there are times where I don’t live into my values. The important thing for me is to be aware of when this happens and, to be clear on what is causing me to act contrary to my values. Of course, when and where appropriate, I should take responsibility for it, too. What is really interesting to me is that this is often difficult to see in the moment for most of us. It is really easy to blame people, places, and things as an excuse or explanation for how I am showing up. When I think back on when I have been in this space, I usually feel stuck. But when I dig deeper, and I can see that my excuses or explanations are surface level and I have responsibility and some choice here. I can then figure out why I am acting contrary to what I say I value and decide if that is working for me or not. If not, I can work on figuring out in the current situation how I can return to my comfort zone of living my values. So, the next time your stuck, try thinking about how the situation relates to your values and take a crack at digging deeper.