Becoming Wildly Resilient Practice: Identifying Values

Listen as new host Amy Rodquist-Kodet, certified health coach with UK HR Health and Wellness, leads you through a process for identifying, narrowing and integrating your values. You can download the worksheet below to follow along. Each month, Amy will explain a new practice you can try to build your resilience and thrive more. 
 

Mentioned in this episode 

• Worksheet: values worksheet
• Support: consult with a health coach
• Support: UK Human Resources work-life and well-being 
• Support: UK HR YouTube playlist

Connect with us 

Have feedback or suggestions for future topics? Email us at healthandwellness@uky.edu. 

You can listen and follow all episodes of "Becoming Wildly Resilient" wherever you find your podcasts. Spotify listeners can also interact with questions and polls or send a voice memo within the app. Find us on social media and YouTube by searching @ukywellness or by email at healthandwellness@uky.edu.

Transcript 

Introduction [Amy Rodquist-Kodet]: [00:00:00] You are listening to Becoming Wildly Resilient, brought to you by University of Kentucky Human Resources Health and Wellness. Join us as we explore tools, practices, meditations, and conversations with members of the UK community. Together we will discover how we can thrive at work, home and beyond. 

Amy Rodquist-Kodet: Hello, everyone! I'm Amy Rodquist-Kodet, Health Coach with University of Kentucky Health and Wellness. And welcome to Becoming Wildly Resilient practices, where each month we'll dive into a tangible research-based tool or tip to help us thrive more in the areas of life that matter most. 

So, this month we're [00:01:00] going to dive into values. And values help us live with direction and purpose like a guiding compass. So, if I were to say like, "Pop quiz, let me hear about your top three to five values." My guess is you probably have some clarity around what's important to you. Somebody might say something like, "Uh, leadership or compassion," right? 

But my guess is it would probably be helpful to have a practice that would guide you through uncovering your most important values. So that's what we're going to do.  

And according to Dr. Susan David, a Harvard Medical School psychologist and author of one of my favorite books in the last few years called “Emotional Agility,” she writes about [00:02:00] the importance of resilience through knowing and defining our values. And she says, values aren't theoretical. They help us to orient toward the life we want to live and to put one foot ahead of the other as we move toward that life.  

So, let's use this month's practice to go deeper into the values that are most important to you in this time and space. You'll probably find that your top 10 values are pretty consistent through most of your adult life, but depending on different life stages and different things that you have happening in the here and now, certain values might rise to the top. 

So, let's focus in on those and the way that we're going to do that is in the show notes you will be able to find a really helpful worksheet. [00:03:00] And what we're going to do for this moment is I'm just gonna kind of walk you through pretty quickly what you can expect and how you can best utilize this worksheet. 

So, at the very beginning, I would invite you to sit down with a piece of paper, with maybe a computer or your notes app on your phone. Take yourself out to a park or a coffee shop. Find some quiet time. This will probably take you probably 15 minutes on the short end. Maybe 25-30 minutes on the longer end. Give yourself an invitation to really carve out space for this. 

And in the beginning, uh, the first question is, "What drives you nuts?" What gets under your skin and makes you bonkers? What are the things and the people and the actions that feel like fingernails on a chalkboard? All right, so that's where you're [00:04:00] going to start.  

And then the question next to that is, "What makes you come alive?" So, it's the kind of other side of the coin. What lights you up? What are the things and the people and the actions that bring you a lot of joy, a lot of connection, right? What is that? So, play around with that a little bit.  

And then that next question is, "What is a peak experience from your life?" And what I mean here is to think about an experience that pointed you towards deep satisfaction. This is an experience that really, in the midst of it or reflecting back on it, you think about, "Yeah, this is who I am. This is what I'm meant to be doing. This is really, really important to me." So that's where you're going to start with those three questions. So, give yourself a good five minutes or so to play with that.  

On the [00:05:00] second page, you're going to begin to curate your top 10 values. And this is trickier than it sounds. There's a listing here of, I don't know, probably 25, 30 values. You know, everything from achievement, balance, community, creativity, harmony, joy, nature, meaning, security, variety, resourcefulness... lots of things, right? 

And how I'm going to invite you to look at this and think through this is to ask yourself as you're like perusing these lists of values - and sidebar, this is not an exhaustive list. If you are culling through this list and you're like, "Oh man, I would really like to add a few values onto here that I don't see," please do, right? Make this really specific to what you are wanting to focus on.  

So, [00:06:00] as you're looking through these top 10 values, ask yourself, "Which of these values are most important to me?" Which of these values help you find your way in the dark? So, when you're going through a really hard time, when it feels like a tidal wave of overwhelm and stress and difficulty and suffering is happening all around you, what do you hold on to? What fills you with a sense of purpose?  

So, you let those queries really be your guide as you circle your top ten values. So, think about the top ten. And after you do that, I'm going to invite you to go back and curate it even further by bringing it down to three to five values.  

And that doesn't mean that your top ten aren't important. They certainly are. But [00:07:00] if we were to focus on all top ten, uh, it would just, it's kind of too much, right? So, we need to make this manageable. So, we really want that sweet spot of three, four, or five values at your tippy top, right?  

So, in order to kind of cull it down further, ask yourself these questions. So out of your top 10, you're looking at those values, narrowing it down, "which of these values is most essential to who I am and how I want to live?" Which really, really resonates with who you are and who you want to be?  

Another question that can help you kind of narrow it down: what values help you to thrive? "What value describes me at my best?" Right? So, as you're looking through those top ten, which ones really, really describe you at your best?  

And is this a filter [00:08:00] that you can use to make hard decisions? I love thinking about values as a filter. Dr. David talks about this, of when you are going through a tough time, and you kind of put that difficult time, or a difficult request that somebody else has made of you, through the filter of your value, right? And you ask yourself, "Okay, is this thing that I'm about to do, is it getting me closer to who I am? And who I want to be, especially when it's a hard decision?"  

All right, so come up with your top three to five and star those. Those are the ones we're going to be working with, all right? And next, I'm going to invite you to think about how fully are you living into these values.  

So, of these three to five values, do they show up daily, personally and professionally? Because a lot of us hold values that are important to us, but if we really get honest with ourselves and think about, "huh, how is this value showing up? Do I see it [00:09:00] anywhere? Is it a reflection of the decisions that I'm making?" Uh, maybe yes, maybe no.  

So, without judgment, I'm going to invite you to rank these values on a scale of 1 to 10. 10 being completely satisfied with how you're living and how you're making decisions from a place of those values, right? So go through your top 3 to 5 and rank them. "How is this value showing up? How satisfied am I with each of these values of how they're showing up in my life?"  

And then after you've got that ranking, I'm inviting you to focus in on the ones that ranked below an eight. And there is no judgment here. Why I invite you to do this is to pay attention to a value that you say is really important to you, but it's not showing up as much as you'd like it to be. You're not satisfied with how much it's helping [00:10:00] you make decisions.  

And so, this is where we get really, really tangible. So, let's say you picked a value of harmony, right? This desire to be in harmony in peacefulness, getting along, respect. It happens to be a value of mine that, that ranks in my top three to five. So, what is one tangible thing you can do today to bring more of yourself into this value? Right? How can you bring this value more into your life? So, think about what behavior helps you to feel more harmonious.  

Maybe it's setting some difficult boundaries. Maybe it is cleaning up a certain room or space. I know for me, like, if I can clean off the counters before I go to bed, my space feels more harmonious, and it is a way that I wake up in the morning and it isn't total chaos, right?

In at least one room of the house. [00:11:00] So think about what is a tangible behavior that can bring this value out into life.  

And then what's a slippery spot behavior that is outside of this value? For me, something that's a real slippery spot is probably like social media before bed. It is something that pulls me out of harmony faster than most things - going down the doom scroll of reading a lot of news before bed or doing comparing and despairing on Instagram right before I go to bed. 

So, kind of noticing, "Man, what is a behavior that is outside of that value?" And notice it. Where can it be changed? Where does something need to shift? 

And then lastly, what is the example of a time where you were living into this value? Think about when this value was alive and well for you when it was thriving. Or if it has been a [00:12:00] while and you can't think of anything, think about what might it look like to feel like this value was thriving in your life. What would be the indicators of a thriving value?  

So, this is your invitation to play with your values this month. And we are here to help. So, if you find that you want to go deeper into this work, reach out to us. My colleague Jackie Carroll and I love to talk to people about values. Make an appointment and make a free 60-minute consult with Jackie and me if you are a UK employee, retiree or spouse. We would love to talk more about values and help you really get clarity on how to bring these values into life.  

Lastly, I would say write these values down. Put them in places you are going to see, right? Take those top three to five values, [00:13:00] put them on a sticky note, put them in your car, put them as a screensaver on your, you know, on your office computer or at your desk or, you know, wherever you are going to see them often.  

And ask yourself on a daily and weekly basis, "Hey, how did it go living into these values today? What worked? Where was it challenging? Where do I want to make a different choice tomorrow?"  

All right. I hope that was helpful. Looking forward to connecting again next month. Until then, be well.  

Outro [Amy Rodquist-Kodet]: Thank you for listening to Becoming Wildly Resilient.  

This podcast is brought to you by University of Kentucky Human Resources Health and Wellness. We offer a wide range of online and in person services to support the well-being of UK employees, [00:14:00] retirees and their spouses. You can find experts in mental health, personal resilience, nutrition and physical activity. We're ready to meet you where you are and address your unique needs.  

To learn more about the work-life and well-being services offered by UK Human Resources, visit hr.uky.edu/well-being. You can also connect with us on social media and YouTube by searching @ukywellness or by email at healthandwellness@uky.edu.