If you’re looking to build a more intentional life but don’t quite know where to start, identifying your core values can be a powerful launching-off point.
Why do core values matter for intentional living?
Our core values are the beliefs, ethics, and principles that guide us toward our ideal decisions, relationships, and behaviors.
As you might have noticed, however, people (ourselves included) don’t always live up to ideals. Our core values can be extremely powerful motivators, but they can also very easily get overpowered by all the other noise in our minds and lives. At best, we tend to overlook them when making decisions; at worst, we don’t even know what they are.
When we’re not living from our core values, we tend to feel dissatisfied with or disconnected from life, work, and the people around us. We might feel disappointed in ourselves, depressed or anxious, or just generally lethargic and unexcited about life.
Identifying our own true core values is a key step in creating and living a life by design rather than default. Having a strong sense of our values — and recognizing the need to exercise them regularly to build their strength — helps us slow down, think through decisions and problems, evaluate habitual patterns of behavior, and determine where we are in alignment with what we value most — and where we might need to revisit.
Tips to more effectively identify your core values
If you’re anything like me, identifying your core values may not be as easy as it sounds when push comes to shove. So here are a few tips that have helped me along the way.
· Leave the shoulds at the door. This was my biggest stumbling block when I first started taking quizzes to uncover my core values. I had so many voices in my head — “This is what my parents would want me to pick.” “This is what a successful person would say.” “This is who my friends probably think I am.” “This is what a good person would value.” It’s hard and can take practice, but it’s important to kick these voices to the curb for the length of the quiz (to the best of your ability). Otherwise, you’re just going to be identifying other people’s core values, not your own. Remind yourself that no one else is going to see your answers; no one is sitting over your shoulder judging you.
· Remember that values can change over time. Another key point to remember is that core values aren’t static; they shift over time. For example, maybe you’ve just come out of a really stressful time in life when you lost your job and were struggling financially. You’ll probably place a high value on safety and stability at this point in your life. As you get farther from that experience and feel more secure, your values will likely shift; you might find yourself being more excited about adventure and flexibility than keeping the status quo. Just because you value something during one season of life doesn’t mean it will be your priority forever. You are allowed to change.
· Be open to your results — even if you don’t like them. This can be a bitter pill to swallow, but sometimes you’ll get results you just don’t like. Maybe you always thought of yourself as a compassionate person, but your top five values keep coming up with compassion nowhere in sight. Maybe you pride yourself on being hard-working, but things like pleasure, sensuality, and adventure keep outranking industriousness. First, keep in mind that none of these quizzes are fool-proof; we of course want to take the results of these (and any personal assessment tool) with a grain of salt. Second, try to be open to what your results might teach you, not just about where you currently are but about where you want to go. Take any surprising or disappointing results as an opportunity for enhanced self-awareness and self-development.
Top 5 free quizzes to identif your core values
So without further ado, here are my top five favorite core values tests!
1. Personal Values Test — This one is short and sweet — takes less than 10 minutes — but whoo boy, does it make you think! The quiz starts with a long list of potential values and has you pick your top 10; from there, you pit each value against one another until you’ve narrowed them down to your top five. Sound easy? Trust me, it’s not! But it does force you to go beyond your “shoulds” and come up with your truly authentic answers.
2. Core Values Index — This test is top-rated, with an over-94 percent reliability rating. It’s also a quick one (10 minutes). The quiz consists of choosing two words that most resonate with you from groups of four; at the end, you’ll walk away with an understanding of your most dominant values. If you feel like springing for the paid version, you’ll get tips for how to use your core values effectively in work and life, as well as how your core values can unconsciously drive your behavior and decisions. Disclaimer: Even for the free version, you do have to enter your email address.
3. Determine Your Core Values — I love this one because it acknowledges that our values change over time. To start the quiz, you choose the lens from which you want to understand your values — present, future, what you value most in other people, what values make you angriest when they’re violated, what values are most important for humanity, and what values are most important to be enshrined in law. It’s a longer quiz (30–60 minutes depending how fast you go), but you’ll end with a ranking of your top values relevant to the framework you selected at the beginning. You can take this multiple times to explore different lenses.
4. Personal Values Assessment — This quick (10–15 minute) quiz gives you 20 scenarios that you rank based on importance. The results give you the three basic values that guide your personal motivation, as well as an explanation of each value and how you can apply them personally and professionally.
5. High5 Personal Values Test — Another one you have to register an email and create a password for, but I think it’s well worth it. The quiz uses a sliding scale you use to rank different statements in terms of how much or little you agree. The free version gives you a dashboard with your top five core strengths and their related value “families,” as well as a short explanation of each one. To get a more detailed report, you do have to pay.
Final Thoughts
Even if you are dead certain you know what your core values are, these quizzes can still give you new insights as to how they can be used in your personal and professional life. So if you’re looking to life with more intentional design, give yourself permission to go back to basics and reexamine your values!
Photo credit: Conall (Flickr)