Knowing vs. Acting on Your Values
Perhaps it’s the fast-paced modern life, the relentless busyness, information overload, the fear of missing out, or the discomfort of commitment. Whatever the reason, many of us find ourselves caught in a common dilemma: a wide gap between talking about our values and truly living them out.
We openly share our values yet struggle to translate them into tangible behaviours. Many people claim that openness to novelty and life challenges is a core value, but they frequently find themselves avoiding difficult situations or refraining from behaviours that expose them to new experiences.
This incongruity becomes a barrier to a life of genuine fulfilment, a barrier we cannot afford to overlook because valued living is where we create meaning and richness in life. A value-driven life is a path to a satisfying life. One we are inherently motivated to pursue goals. One where we display actions that reflect what truly matters to us.
The positive outcomes of a life lived in line with our core values shouldn’t be underestimated. From improved wellbeing to dealing with depression and chronic pain, increasing the ability to commit to projects to enhanced achievement, there is ample research evidence for its fulfilling experience.
So, if leading a valued living has so many benefits, how can we bridge the gap between our values and behaviours?
How do we transition from mere knowledge of our values to taking action?
There are straightforward strategies we can learn from some fascinating research studies and integrate into our daily lives.
But first, what are we talking about when we’re talking about values?
There are different approaches to values, but I’ll draw from Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT). According to ACT, a value is a freely chosen, desirable, and dynamic pattern of activity. It represents what truly matters to you and the positive personal qualities you aspire to possess.
Within this framework, values are active; something you do rather than merely a noun. Connecting with loved ones, sharing, caring, being generous, practicing patience, love, curiosity, humility, or compassion, and showing up with honesty, driven by faith are some examples. Values in ACT framework resemble certain psychological strengths (or positive characteristics).
Identifying your values serves as a compass in life, aiding in setting goals that you are more likely to commit to and follow through.
In The Big Book of ACT Metaphors, the authors present a metaphor to demonstrate the importance of living a life in line with our core values. Consider the process of identifying and acting on your values as similar to remodelling a house. Imagine having a set budget and resources but discovering a serious crack in the foundation. Ignoring the crack and focusing solely on decorating the house may lead to structural issues over time, requiring more time and money for repairs. Identifying and living in line with your values is like having a solid foundation. As the authors state, “Living a valued life means that even when things don’t go perfectly, not only will you still be standing, you’ll maintain the integrity of the building.”
Another way to think about values is to perceive them as mirrors of the soul, reflecting a true picture of what someone is genuinely about. When you discover your core values, you stop being pulled into other people’s agendas because you now have your own map. Instead of acting on immediate impulses or fear of discomfort, you base your decisions on what truly matters to you.
Values also give us the will to face challenges and adversities. Following our values can create discomfort but it’s in the service of something bigger.
Consider people actively seeking feedback at work or in their personal lives, even when the feedback is sometimes difficult to hear. What guides these people is the value of growing and continuously becoming better individuals, better professionals. The difficulty of hearing unpleasant feedback serves the purpose of development (a value), motivating them to persist seeking input from others.
Why do you some people share their mistakes, failures, or wrongdoings with others even when it might be emotionally painful to do it? Once again, the answer lies in the power of values. What matters to those people (their values) is honesty, connection, and/or vulnerability.
Now that we have an understanding of what we mean by values and how they can help us live a better life, let’s explore how we can move from knowledge and understanding of values to actions.
Unless our values are accessible, they are unlikely to guide our actions.
One of the most important barriers to value-action gap is lack of accessibility and reflection.
Research on priming shows that people primed with values are more prone to exhibiting behaviours consistent with those values. Consider the research where participants primed with environmental values were inclined to select an environmentally friendly TV set compared to those not exposed to such values.
The rationale behind this lies in our heightened attention to information and actions associated with these primed values.
In another priming research, researchers found that priming self-direction values increased curiosity behaviours, while priming achievement values enhanced task success.
Therefore, values need to be cognitively activated. One way to achieve this is to consistently remind ourselves of our core values and regularly draw our attention to them, especially before taking an action. The more readily available a value is to us, the greater the likelihood that it will influence our behaviour.
Let’s close the gap: how we can leverage research to close that gap
Strategy 1: Prime yourself with values before you step into a situation.
We base some important decisions on our values, such as who to vote for or which job or course to take because we have more time and space to weigh the pros and cons. When it comes to more immediate actions, though, it’s more difficult to make a conscious choice.
But we can practice this by priming ourselves with values before taking an action.
Before replying to an email that pissed you off, pause and remind yourself your values. Perhaps you value kindness no matter what. You can communicate and express yourself, your needs, or your perspective while being kind.
If you’re a manager or a leader, reflect on how you’d like to show up before a team meeting. What matters to you the most? Perhaps it’s acting compassionately, in an understanding manner, being fair, or being patient.
Let’s imagine you’d like to resolve a conflict with your partner. Before having a conversation, think about your most important values in a relationship. Maybe it’s self-control, acting with care or love, or being open to experiences.
If you manage to act in line with your value(s), celebrate that. If you weren’t able to do that, that’s also okay; look for or create other opportunities in the future. It’s not a test or a competition. It’s about finding ways to engage with value-consistent behaviours more frequently.
Strategy 2: Use one or more value triggers.
Psychologist and co-founder of ACT, Steven Hayes, recommends utilising value reminders – physical prompts of your core values. With the help of a trigger, you can make a value more accessible.
The trigger can be anything that will help you remember the essence and importance of your value.
When starting a new project, whether it’s a consultation with a new company, a research endeavour, or a new class that I’m teaching, I jot down the most important things that matter to me regarding that project and the relationships with the people involved. For example, when I started this blog on Substack a few months ago, I initially wrote down what mattered to me the most (my values): showing up consistently, writing passionately and patiently, and embracing vulnerability and honesty. The list appears to me whenever I open my Substack folder on my computer. I intentionally made it visible and accessible.
There are different ways to create value triggers, and the best method for you depends on your own lifestyle and habits. Some people choose to carry their values on a paper or a card in their wallets, while others use post-it notes across their living or working spaces.
Strategy 3: Write about your values.
We lose touch with values when we don’t spend sufficient time thinking about and reflecting on them.
Reflection also serves as a powerful tool for us to pay more attention to opportunities or even create opportunities to act on our values.
The more deliberate the reflection, the better the chances that we close that value-behaviour gap.
A study showed that writing about your important values can reduce defensiveness and trigger other-directed feelings such as love and connection. Writing about important values reminded the participants of what they truly cared about outside of themselves. Connection and reconnection with values can, therefore, can result in more prosocial and compassionate behaviours.
Even merely thinking and writing about our values works, but it’s even better if it’s accompanied by the reasons why we choose those values in the first place. For example, one study showed that participants who discussed the reasons for valuing helpfulness demonstrated more helpfulness afterward. So, if you want to act upon a specific value more than you normally do, try to reflect on the reasons behind those values. What is it that makes you attach importance to that value?
Hold your values close, but lightly.
Now, a few more things to keep in mind.
It's okay to lose touch with our values but we can always refocus on what matters the most by the help of triggers. It’s normal to get disconnected from them from time to time, because our lives are busy and we might prioritise motion more than meaning. It might be worth pausing and reminding ourselves the things we value at work, in our personal lives, relationships with others, how we approach our environment and the societal issues.
Keeping values close by making them prominent in your mind is essential as they have a tendency to drift into the background. But keeping them close doesn’t mean approaching them rigidly. You can keep them close while holding them lightly. Allowing values to take new forms and develop over time is better than holding them tightly.
It's also worth remembering that you can’t be value consistent all the time. When you notice you’ve strayed from a valued path, simply reconnect with a value and identify the next small value-consistent step you can take.