CHAPTER TWO
Discover What Holds You Back
Your values lie at the core of your personality, as we have said before. When you are living in harmony with your values, you can tell because you experience peace of mind, calmness, and even joy. When you are out of balance and off track, you feel the opposite. Negative emotions, unhappiness, and discontent of any kind are nature’s way of telling you to return to your values. You can almost immediately restore your feelings of peace and happiness by returning to what is really important to you and then by refusing to compromise your values.
Everyone has had the experience of being in a stressful situation, an unhappy relationship, or a bad job. You knew deep inside that something wasn’t right. The worse the situation became, the more you felt forced to compromise your values instead of doing what you knew was right for you and insisting on your own happiness and well-being. The longer you stayed in that bad situation, the more stressed, unhappy, and actually detached from life and other people you became.
Finally, however, you took a deep breath, mustered up your courage, and decided to “do the right thing.” You walked away from the bad job, even though you didn’t know what you were going to do and even though you had bills to pay. You walked away from the bad relationship, even though you had no idea how you might ever find another, better relationship.
And then something absolutely terrific happened! You felt exhilarated. You felt wonderful. You felt happy and relieved. You felt as though a great burden had been lifted off your shoulders. You felt truly happy and almost laughed out loud as you walked away.
Why was this? The answer is simple. Whenever you decide to return to your values and get back on track, nature rewards you by giving you a feeling of joy and happiness. The purpose of this joyous feeling is to encourage you to live your life by your values more often.
The Obstacles to Happiness
There is no question that your values are central to your life and to everything that happens to you. Living by your values is absolutely essential for success, self-esteem, happiness, and peace of mind. Every time that you deviate from or compromise your core beliefs and values, you feel uncomfortable, unhappy, stressed, and anxious and you suffer low self-esteem. You don’t like and respect yourself as much. This is why we say that almost all problems in your personal life can be solved by a return to your values.
Why is it then that people get off track and compromise their values, leading to frustration, failure, unhappiness, and feelings of inferiority and worthlessness? There are several reasons, all mental and emotional. Fortunately, you can identify them and remove these obstacles from your pathway toward becoming the best person you could possibly be.
1. People feel a sense of undeservingness. This is one of the main obstacles to happiness in adult life. Many people feel that they do not deserve to be happy, to be popular, to be successful, and to be loved and respected by others. They do not feel that they deserve to be successful, healthy, and wealthy and to live wonderful, exciting lives.
2. People are unclear about their values. They have never taken the time to sit down and think through what is truly important to them, what they care about, and what takes priority over everything else in their lives. The minute they do and they begin to establish a path for their lives with clear direction, they suddenly feel happy and in control of their lives. They are no longer reacting to those around them. Instead, they are proactive. They make their own choices and decisions. Clarity is essential.
3. People are so overwhelmed with the feeling of being unfocused and out of balance that they don’t know where to start. They are stuck in a comfort zone and disconnected from the reality of what a balanced life looks and feels like. As a result, their feeling of busyness, having no time for what’s essential, causes them to make thoughtless and impulsive choices. They are often enticed by short-term pleasures and satisfactions that tempt them to compromise their values for a quick fix.
4. People don’t consider the long-term consequences of their behaviors. Short-term thinking is a major source of unhappiness, failure, and frustration in life.
The most successful and happy people practice long-term thinking. They project themselves forward into the future and become clear about where they want to be five and ten years from today. They then evaluate each behavior in the short term with regard to what they really want to achieve in the long term.
Developing a long-term vision of your ideal future dramatically improves the quality of your current decision making. The very act of taking a little time to think before you decide and act, and to be sure that your actions are consistent with the highest values to which you aspire, can improve your life dramatically.
5. People desire the approval of others, and they feel that only by compromising their values will other people like them, respect them, hire them, promote them, pay them, or include them. This desire can dominate the thinking, feelings, and behavior of adult individuals. They can become preoccupied with earning the approval of others and especially avoiding their criticism or disapproval.
Because the approval of the important people in your life, especially your boss or spouse, is closely associated with your feelings of security, and security is a key driving emotional factor, you can easily compromise your values in the search for this approval. But the truth is that the only person whose approval you need is your own.
Put Your Own Happiness First
The most respected people in every society are those who clearly and distinctively express their own unique personalities. They are sure and unequivocal about their values and beliefs, and they refuse to compromise them for anyone or anything.
Ayn Rand was famous for pointing out that the achievement of your own happiness should be your highest value or goal in life. She said that you can determine how successful you are by how happy you feel about yourself minute by minute and hour by hour. Your personal happiness should be the barometer by which you judge your actions and your behaviors and especially your values.
There is some confusion on this point. People are taught that seeking their own happiness is somehow selfish. We are supposed to seek to make others happy first. But the truth is that you cannot give away what you do not have. You cannot make someone else happy unless you are happy yourself. If you truly want to make others happy, become a truly happy person. There is no other way.
When you are clear about your values, goals, and priorities, you operate from your balance point. As a result, you feel happy, clear, and focused. You go through your day with courage and confidence.
Values, Authenticity, and Balance
You must choose to be true to at least one person: yourself. Having integrity and being authentic is the only way to succeed at establishing and operating from your balance point. As Shakespeare wrote, “To thine own self be true, and it must follow, as the night the day, thou canst not then be false to any man.”
Remember that your balance point is completely unique to you. You may find that you share values with others and connect and relate with them based on those values, but you will also encounter many differences. Your goal is to find what is right for you and then have the strength and confidence to move through your life committed to living your own personal set of values.
Don’t feel threatened or doubt your values based on comparing yourself to others. You need to do what is right for you and embrace the idea that other people are doing what is right for them. Remember, “Different strokes for different folks.”
Three Sets of Values
Imagine three women. The first woman decided that she wanted to get married and have children right after college. She chose to build her career after her children were all in school. The second woman decided to establish her career after college and spent ten years working hard to build a solid reputation and achieve success in her chosen profession. Only then did she decide to have children. The third woman decided to do both—to build her career while also getting married and raising children. All three women shared the values of having a career and being a mother, but each of them pursued those goals in her own unique way. Each of the three ways was a reflection of one woman’s values and the unique balance point that she had.
Decide today to live a wonderful life. Carefully examine each of the obstacles to happiness—the reasons that people give for compromising their true values and settling for less than they are really capable of.
Remember that each of these obstacles exists only in your mind, in your thinking. At any time, you can throw off your self-limiting ideas and become a fully functioning, fully mature, happy person. You can discard your limitations and liberate yourself to realize your full potential. You can determine your own balance point, your own set of values and goals, and return to it whenever you want.
ACTION EXERCISES
1. Select one self-limiting belief that might be holding you back from achieving the happiness and joy you deserve, and ask yourself, “What if this belief were not true; what would I do then?”
Whatever your answer, act as if it were impossible to fail, and it shall be.
2. Imagine that you have no limitations on what you can be, do, or have in any area of your life. Imagine that you had all the money and resources, talent and ability, knowledge and experience, and people and contacts that you require to achieve anything you really want. What is the first thing you would do differently in your life and relationships?