Personal or core values are concepts often vehiculated in our society. They seem to shape who we are and influence our actions, helping us determine what is important and meaningful in our lives. By identifying and adhering to our values, we can live more authentic, fulfilling lives and make choices that are in harmony with our true selves. On the contrary, when we live in contradiction with our core values, either at work or at home, we get stuck, resentful, and unhappy. But what exactly are these personal values, why do they matter so much, and how does one define and live by them? Read along to find out!
Personal values are the key beliefs and principles that guide our daily actions, behavior, and decision-making. They are the concepts closest to our hearts, the ideals we aspire to, the behavioral standards we stand by. If you want, personal values are what we know to be right and what drives our actions, oftentimes at a subconscious level. Of course, one person may have multiple personal values with different degrees of priority. And although values usually have a positive nuance, there is negativity within some of them, too.
Moreover, as Heraclitus wisely said, “The only constant in life is change.” Therefore, personal values may change throughout our lives. To better understand why and how this happens, you must understand how core values form.
Personal values mix innate values, upbringing observations, culturally instilled ideals, and experience-based ideas. For instance, all humans value health and love, which are intrinsic values. At an early age, we tend to adopt the values of our parental figures. For example, if efficiency is appreciated more than creativity in our household, we will prioritize being efficient and getting things done and let drawing to someone else. Religion and faith, overall, on the other hand, are the legacy values of our cultural environment.
Our values may change throughout our lives. We may start by valuing friendship and family relations above all, but due to personal circumstances, we may come to appreciate autonomy and curiosity more, for example. We may prioritize fame at some point, but we may understand safety more after a dramatic incident. The priorities constantly change, although some values may always come first.
Tip: Personal values are different from company values.
Personal values matter because they dictate our behavior, aspirations, and drive. As they represent how one would like to live their life, their priorities and values interfere in every decision we make, whether in our professional or personal lives. And because they are so deeply ingrained in us, we follow their lead whether we know it or not.
Furthermore, we all have personal values even if we’ve never considered them. Unconsciously, we’ve picked up innate, cultural, and experiential values and let them rule our lives. So, when one feels lost, stuck, or in the wrong place or situation (e.g., job, town, relationship, etc.), it is usually because they live in contradiction with their core values or haven’t bothered to define a set of values that represents who they really are.
In general, personal values matter because they:
Actively considering personal values may seem a bit artificial in the beginning. People tend to go for good values because they want to be perceived in a certain way. However, being honest with yourself is of utmost importance. So, here are 40 core value examples, in alphabetical order, to help you find the ones you resonate the most with:
The meaning of accountability is to take responsibility for your actions and decisions and be answerable to others for the outcomes. It involves being reliable and trustworthy, ensuring that you follow through on commitments and promises, even those to yourself.
When you focus on achievement, you’re focused on setting and working diligently toward attaining goals. Some goals might be harder to achieve, while others are easier. Yet, even completing some small tasks can help you with the momentum and give you a sense of progress.
It is the sense of pride and fulfillment that comes from reaching milestones and overcoming challenges. This value drives individuals to pursue excellence, embrace perseverance, and celebrate their successes, both big and small. The dark side of being an achiever is stepping on bodies to reach your goals.
We all had to work with stiff people. They are not flexible at all. They are difficult to work with. On the contrary, adaptability represents the ability to easily adjust to new conditions and environments.
Are you not sure how to implement this value in your life? Being adaptable or flexible involves being open to change, responding to unexpected challenges, and being resilient in the face of adversity. This value is essential both in personal life and at work. In personal life, think about having better relationships with your peers, being more receptive, and being able to let things go.
An adaptable person is not stubborn and always focuses on continuous learning and growth. Many times, successful CEOs (think about the likes of Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, or Sam Walton have the adaptability value that translates to the capacity to thrive in various circumstances.
Seeking adventure is defined as seeking new and exciting experiences, often involving exploration, risk-taking, and stepping outside one's comfort zone. A courageous professional drives individuals to seek out novel situations, embrace uncertainty, and find joy in the unknown.
Vasco da Gama is an example of an explorer with a high sense of curiosity, wonder, and a willingness to push boundaries and discover new horizons.
This value is not always well understood, yet it is one that you should know the meaning of and even implement in your life. An altruist is someone who is concerned for the well-being of others, often manifested through acts of kindness, generosity, and compassion. It involves putting others' needs ahead of one's own and seeking to contribute positively to their lives without expecting anything in return. An unselfish individual shows value, fosters empathy, social harmony, and the desire to make a meaningful difference. As a manager, you might write appreciation letters to your employees, collaborators, and partners to blend this value at work.
Who doesn’t like ambitious people? Not dreamers, but individuals who can drive to achieve success and reach their highest potential. The strong drive for success will encourage professionals to aspire for greatness, take initiative, and continually strive for personal and professional growth.
This value fosters a proactive mindset, resilience in the face of challenges, and a relentless pursuit of one's dreams. Like achievement, left unmanaged, ambition can drive you to burnout or unfair behavior toward others.
Who doesn’t know who Gandhi, Steve Jobs, or Oprah are? They are all authentic leaders with a high authenticity quotient. They have high purpose, long-term goals, and are not easily distracted.
How can one show authenticity as an individual? A good first step is being genuine in one's words and actions and transparent in one’s actions and intentions with others. Authenticity encourages honesty, integrity, and a sincere connection with others. It is the foundation for building trust, fostering meaningful relationships, and living a life that is aligned with one's core principles.
Balance as a personal value is maintaining a harmonious equilibrium between different aspects of your life, such as work, relationships, health, and personal interests. You might think about work-life balance, and you are right. This is because balance involves prioritizing and managing your time and energy effectively to avoid overextension and burnout. This value emphasizes the importance of moderation, self-care, and the pursuit of a well-rounded, fulfilling life.
Beauty is very personal. It can be inward or outward. Someone can see the beauty in a person, and someone else can see the beauty in a pair of jeans. This is why we like to say that beauty as a personal value is closely linked with appreciating aesthetic qualities, whether in nature, art, people, or everyday surroundings.
A highly visual person will recognize and cherish the world’s charm, elegance, and delicacy. Beauty fosters a sense of wonder, creativity, and a deep connection to the world around us, encouraging individuals to seek it and create it.
Boldness is the willingness to take risks and act confidently amid uncertainty. It means stepping outside your comfort zone, embracing challenges, and asserting yourself towards your goals.
“You don't lead by pointing and telling people where to go. You lead by going to that place and making a case” - Ken Kesey.
A bold manager can guide teams through challenges. Such behaviors foster innovation and inspire others to follow suit.
Especially in work contexts, collaboration is the act of working together with others towards a common goal, finalizing a list of to-do tasks, brainstorming for a solution, or being part of a team of accountable professionals. But collaboration takes place in personal life: helping your neighbor with some house renovations or gardening.
Collaboration is about not working solo, but as part of a group of individuals that share ideas, resources, and responsibilities, and leveraging a group's diverse skills and perspectives to achieve more than could be accomplished individually. Collaboration essentially drives teamwork, mutual respect, and collective problem-solving to new heights.
What is community as a personal value? We say that community means encompassing the sense of belonging, support, and cooperation among individuals who share common interests, goals, or localities. It also means being a good friend, parent, worker, or human being. As an active individual, your commitment to the collective good will foster a spirit of unity and togetherness.
Compassion means deep empathy and understanding for the suffering of others, coupled with a desire to alleviate it.
Compassionate managers are more empathic, connect more easily with their peers, and see the issues also from the other person’s point of view. Understanding others involves practicing kindness and taking action to support and help those in need. You need to know that the opposite of compassion is indifference. When you have a deep sense of connection and moral integrity and are more caring, you have high compassion values.
Competency is the ability to effectively apply skills, knowledge, and experience to perform tasks and solve problems successfully.
When you’re a junior at a new job, you feel like everyone else is much more experienced and confident than you. And when you have a few years of experience in a specific role, you feel like you are the elephant in the room. And this is good. As a value, competency involves continuous learning and improvement, striving for excellence, and proficiency. Competency may encompass trust, credibility, and the capability to achieve set objectives efficiently and effectively.
Confidence is the belief in your abilities and the assurance that you can rely on your skills, judgment, and decision-making to handle challenges, obstacles, and opportunities with poise and effectiveness. Managers like to work with confident professionals because they know they can rely on them to deliver good results and take on hard jobs. Confidence leads to resilience, assertiveness, and the ability to inspire trust and credibility in others.
Courage doesn’t mean you have to go to the moon, but it does mean facing your fears and managing risks with bravery and determination. A courageous person is willing to take risks and confront challenges head-on. This individual will not feel the absence of fear but will accept it and act despite it, embodying resilience, strength, and moral fortitude.
Creativity is imagining, exploring, and implementing new ideas, solutions, or approaches. Whether you’re an advertising genius like David Ogilvy, aiming to reach the heights of Picasso as a painter, or want to create smashing hits like Rihanna, a creator is also a software engineer, a copywriter, or a team manager. Each one of these jobs involves thinking outside the box, challenging the status quo, and embracing innovation. Creativity is not limited to the arts; it spans all fields and disciplines, enhancing problem-solving and enabling progress.
Who doesn’t want to learn, grow, or become a better person? Curiosity is the first step. By knowing that you’re a sponge that likes to go through the rabbit hole and is not afraid to make progress by asking questions, exploring, and studying multiple areas of interest. For knowledge seekers who make this a personal value, we want to let them know that it encourages open-mindedness, experimentation, and the pursuit of originality, fostering a dynamic and adaptable mindset.
Former US Secretary of State Colin Powell famously said: A dream doesn't become reality through magic; it takes sweat, determination, and hard work. Determination is being firm on purpose and driven to get where you want to go despite adversities. A determined individual is like a strong leader.
How to show determination in your life?
Remember, determination or grit usually fosters hard work, focus, and a certain amount of ambition.
Fairness is the act of treating everybody fairly regardless of their personal or professional features and your personal gain. Remember, the world is not always fair, yet you can act accordingly as a professional positioning with this value high.
As a manager, you can say that people are valuable and deserve fair treatment, unbiased assistance, and respect. Fairness fosters justice, trust, and collaboration, and helps you manage conflicts, find efficient solutions, and improve teamwork.
Generosity is often seen as a virtue and refers to unconditionally giving to others. It may take many forms, from providing resources to giving time, opportunities, or knowledge. Generosity involves empowering others, not pitying them, and believing they could succeed if given the right tools.
Gratitude is the ability to be grateful for everything positive in your life, big or small. It involves you constantly showing appreciation for what’s meaningful and important to you, acknowledging positive outlooks, and being aware of others’ contributions to your success. Gratitude fosters positivity, optimism, and respect, and comes from a place of abundance rather than one of scarcity.
President Thomas Jefferson famously said, "Honesty is the first chapter in the book of wisdom." The definition of honesty is speaking truthfully and fairly. We can also say that honesty is often associated with authenticity and integrity. It denotes a moral character and guides ethical behavior, builds trust, and provides a sense of reliability. At work, a culture of honesty fosters transparency, dignity, and mutual respect.
Humility is defined by the ability to remain grounded regardless of the situation. Honesty also means being accountable for your mistakes and remaining open to contrary ideas and opinions. Modesty, unpretentiousness, or humbleness are alternative ways to define this value.
As a professional, defining your behavior as a lack of arrogance is the way forward to showcase this value. Humility fosters openness, determination, and fairness, and usually goes hand in hand with authenticity.
Independence is the ability to solve whatever task comes your way without relying on others. It influences how you live, work, make decisions, communicate, and solve problems. Independence as a value fosters determination, achievement, responsibility, and confidence. Often, it comes with a good dose of curiosity and creativity.
Integrity is the ability to act fairly and ethically correctly in all aspects of life. It means doing the right thing, being accountable for your actions and decisions, and following one standard regardless of the situation. Integrity works closely with honesty, transparency, and authenticity. It fosters trust and collaboration.
Justice is very similar to fairness, but has a more social approach. Justice is often synonymous with social justice, meaning following the rules of society, providing equal opportunities for everybody, ensuring freedom of expression, liberty, and moral rightness. Philosophically speaking, justice is the supreme, most fundamental virtue.
Kindness is treating other people well, fairly, and respectfully. It is compassionate and non-judgmental, and the foundation of well-being and collaboration. Kindness fosters good relationships, teamwork, and selflessness. At the same time, it may require courage and determination because being kind doesn’t mean having no boundaries.
Knowledge as a value is the ability to think forward, learn, innovate, and acquire the skills that help you get things done. It involves curiosity, ambition, determination, focus, and learning abilities. Knowledge may extend to multiple areas of expertise. Often, a person valuing knowledge will be eager to know as much as possible about as many things as possible.
Leadership is managing a group of people with a common goal. It refers to supporting individual and group endeavors, uniting and motivating the group, and convincing them to work together. At the same time, leadership encompasses other values, such as collaboration, empathy, achievement, determination, and hard work.
Learning is a value that fosters growth and progress, both at a personal and a professional level. While knowledge can emerge from education and/or life situations, learning usually relates to a classic education (e.g., academic education, courses, books, workshops, etc.). Having learning as a value often includes being curious, patient, and determined.
Love is an innate value that refers to building strong and meaningful relationships with other people. Unfortunately, it is an essential value that sometimes gets a low priority behind more active values such as ambition, courage, and achievement. However, love should always be in your top five personal values because without it, nothing is possible.
Do you have faithful, committed friends? Friends who say that will take you from the airport and keep their word. Friends who drop their activities and come to help if needed. Well, you are a fortunate one. Loyalty is about building trust, remaining faithful, and offering stability.
Loyalty is important in personal and professional interactions. Loyal individuals are appreciated because they are good at communication, collaboration, and teamwork. Having someone’s back when in need is a component of leadership, too. However, loyalty shouldn’t be prioritized above justice, fairness, and equity.
Optimism as a value is the ability to remain positive and confident even when things don’t go exactly to plan. It’s the belief that you have the skills and tools to deal with whatever comes your way. Optimism is not being unrealistic or in denial but being practical and gathering all the necessary knowledge and resources to take you through a challenging time.
Award-winning author James Clear has a famous saying, “Rome wasn't built in a day, but they were laying bricks every hour.”. We say patience is the power to wait, stick with the current task or situation, and be resilient through tough times.
Patient individuals approach things with determination and optimism. They rely on calmness, confidence, and inner strengths. Like optimism, patience is realistic and resourceful. Calm fortitude means staying in control for as long as the situation demands it, regardless of the stress, rather than becoming anxious and frustrated.
Chinese Philosopher Confucius once said, “Respect yourself and others will respect you.”
Respect may be seen as two values in one.
The line between loyalty, honesty, and respect is very thin, yet we need to know that respect reflects both on the inside (self-respect) and on the outside, and balancing the two may be challenging.
Responsibility is the combined ability to be accountable for your actions and decisions and to act purposefully. It fosters determination, resilience, patience, boldness, and achievement. The definition of responsibility is taking ownership of an action and seeing it through. It is also a key value of leaders and requires knowledge and resourcefulness.
Tip: What is the difference between accountability and responsibility? Responsibility involves handling assignments, while accountability focuses on creating them, even for oneself.
Spirituality is the belief that we are part of something greater than us. For most of us, it's primarily about a belief in God and active participation in organized religion. Spirituality blends with ethics and moral behavior and usually offers guidelines for life purpose, relationships, and general conduct. Often linked to religion, spirituality may start as a cultural value and evolve into something more personal. It ranks high in people’s core values lists.
Trustworthiness is the ability to establish a level of comfort and mutual respect between yourself and others, such as coworkers, employers, employees, and friends.
Trust, therefore, strengthens relationships, improves teamwork, motivates people, and empowers you and everyone around you to dream big.
When people are trusted, they foster a safe, stable environment, transparency, collaboration, and responsibility at work.
Wisdom is a combination of knowledge, learning, experience, and character. It involves open-mindedness, empathy, adaptability, trustworthiness, curiosity, and many other traits. At the same time, wisdom encompasses sharing your findings with others, helping them grow and reach their potential, and being a leader.
Defining your core values is a crucial step in personal development and self-awareness. This step can come early in your life, after a discussion with a good friend, or at work when discussing with a coach.
You might have picked up several values from your family upbringing or social environment – think about school or adolescence, yet you can constantly review and optimize. If not, you are at their mercy without carefully curating and defining them. We propose some points to guide you through the process of defining your core values:
By putting together multiple personal development resources, we’ve produced a personal values shortlist with the most common 20 core values people relate to. Here they are:
You can have as many values on your list as you want. However, a strong five core values are enough to help you make good decisions. So, prioritize your values and rely more on those truly important to you. For example, we all value fun but at different levels, which change throughout our lives. At 20, having fun may seem more important than at 40, and come back on top of the list at 70.
Living by your values requires intentionality and self-awareness. Here are a few steps to help you align your daily habits with your core values:
By consistently practicing these steps, your values will naturally guide your behavior, leading to a more authentic and fulfilling life.
Conclusion
Personal values are essential for a purposeful life. Aligning your actions with these values fosters integrity and fulfillment. Remember, living by your values is an ongoing journey shaped by life experiences.
Embrace this journey with intention and self-awareness; your values will serve as a reliable compass, guiding you towards your true self and a more meaningful existence.
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