What Values Are You Keeping in Your Wallet?
I was flicking through the TV channels the other night (like some old person who hasn’t been introduced to Netflix) and came across Samuel L. Jackson in one of those Capital One credit card commercials. You know these commercials because they always end with “What’s in your wallet?” I’ve seen these commercials a hundred times but I love Jackson’s voice and so I stopped thumbing the remote and watched.
For whatever reason, this time, this ending-question hit me differently. When I’ve watched these commercials before, I have understood the implication is if you don’t have this credit card, get one. Period. Ultimately, the marketing team is trying to get that message to its viewers.
But this question could be looked at differently. “What’s in your wallet?” could be more philosophical. The contents of your wallet could say a lot about you, couldn’t they?
For example, if you have every rewards card imaginable, it might suggest you are crazy about loyalty or at least being rewarded for loyalty. Or, if you keep every receipt, it might suggest you are madly organized or worried about balancing your bank account.
Let’s explore why you have these things. Did your parents collect every receipt? Do you always have cash because growing up it was ingrained that you should never be without it? Is there an old note from a spouse because they told you never to lose it?
In a lot of ways, your life might be just like your wallet.
You may have adopted behaviors, beliefs, values based on what you observed, what was modeled, what was stated, and what wasn’t. You’ve internalized. You’ve tried to live up to personas or expectations that have been deemed “right’ or “acceptable.”
Bottom line: what are you holding onto because you choose to and what are you holding onto because you believe you should? Is the life you have one of your own creation or solely based on others’ ideas and perspectives? It’s time to get curious about the contents of our lives.
My aim is to get you to a place where you are functioning from your point of truth. Where you are your authentic real self. Where you are aligned with your own ideas and desires. My goal is to get you to a pace of total self-awareness. And it begins with digging into and taking a hard look at your values.
Values influence our beliefs. Beliefs influence our actions. Actions get us results. So when we look at our own peak performance in any area of our life, values are the first step. They hold everything up.
Values are the foundational layer (one of six) of your success alignment or the path to complete self-awareness. Similar to Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, until the bottom of the pyramid is secured, you can’t make your way to the top. You can’t reach the top of the mountain if you haven’t entered the start of the trail.
The problem is, we are so influenced by the people and culture around us and their expectations, that often items the values we carry aren’t actually ours. We are just another Capital One credit card holder because we thought we should be, or our parents were. They’ve got the card, so now we’ve got the card. It seemed like the right thing to do.
The way I go about coaching people around values is different from the way most other coaches move people through values work. Other coaches hang out in the shallow end, keeping people safe and skimming the stuff off the top where it’s easy to reach. I dive right into the deep end and force people to look at the bottom of the pool.
Effective values work is not about reaching for the low-hanging fruit. These are the values passed down from family or shared in the workplace (some which may serve and others that may not) or those that come so naturally to you that you don’t have to reach for them. The values work I’m having people do is way deeper than that.
It’s ripping everything out of the wallet and now going, “Okay. What do I actually want in here?” It’s a conscious, active, intentional process of determining what is going to fulfill you for the rest of your life. What are the core values you are going to base your beliefs and therefore your actions on? What are you going to decide to fill your wallet (read: life) with?
Defining your values – from my perspective – is about answering this question: What emotional states do I need to ensure I meet my definition of success? Notice the two uses of forms of me. “I need.” and “My definition.”
When you understand your values it is easy to know when something is right for you, because your values are the things that are the most important to you – the things that you cannot live happily without. By knowing your values, you will be able to make decisions that you will find fulfilling and rewarding. By not knowing your values, you may make decisions that meet someone else’s values and may or may not make you happy.
Values are the first step toward becoming your authentic self. Remember, values influence beliefs, beliefs influence actions, and actions determine results. So what’s in your wallet and what do you want to have in your wallet? These may or may not be the same thing.
If you want to explore values more deeply, instead of just printing off a free list of words from the internet and circling the ones that stand out to you and having someone say, “Well, that’s it. There you go. See, wasn’t that simple?” I want you to join me for a conscious and deeper dialogue around the idea of values and their place in your personal life and performance.
Until then, ask yourself, “What’s in my wallet?”
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To discover your authentic self with a coach who can provide guidance, support, and a swift kick in the pants, consider joining my Unleash Your Legacy cohort. You can get a test of what we will be covering by joining me for the monthly live Empower Hour . Register and have the opportunity to be in the hot-seat, coached in real time on something that may be keeping you from tapping into that greatness you already have right there inside you.
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