How living by the aligned values would look like?
So, using the examples mentioned, if you were to spend time with your birth family and relatives, you would feel like you are part of a community, part of a bigger unit. You would derive satisfaction from the sense of belonging, have a reliable support system, and enjoy your interactions, exchanges, and contributions toward the family.
If you were truly sincere about the importance of money in your life, you would enjoy creating security, learning about finances, and feeling a sense of achievement by building wealth.
If education were a genuine value for you, it would bring you joy and satisfaction to gain new knowledge, participate in discussions, learn new things, and maintain a curious and open attitude.
So, there’s a significant difference in the quality of emotions that you experience by investing your time in these areas. By dedicating our time and effort to aspects of life that genuinely align with our personal values, we find fulfilment in the process itself, rather than waiting for an end result.
How to find out what foundations are genuinely yours.
A few easy steps can help you identify if your life is built on your own foundations.
Ask yourself these questions:
- Do I feel safe in my life?
- Do I feel satisfied in my life?
- What areas of my life do I hate?
- What areas of my life do I love?
- If I were to die tomorrow, what would be my biggest regrets?
Note: Some of the questions above might sound a little drastic, but bear with me – you are answering them to get to know your genuine emotions and recognise what areas are causing you to feel the most intense feelings. Both negative and positive feelings are good as they indicate the strength of harmony or discord. They are our compass.
Answers:
What to do with all of it?
Now, experiment! Listen to yourself, listen to your emotions. Do not invalidate yourself – if you feel something, even though it doesn’t make sense or is not “supposed” to be there – listen to it: that feeling, that emotion has something important to tell you.
Especially if you are doing something and suddenly find yourself feeling that “this is meaningless.” That means you are really onto something: you have found an element that doesn’t align with the innermost core truth of who you are and how you want to live. Once you have heard, felt, or seen that – you have an opportunity to revise, refine, to keep or discard, to make it yours. And once you are in this process of seeing and recognising what fits you, what doesn’t, you will have an opportunity to replace the parts of the foundation in your life with something really strong and solid, something that will make you feel proud and fulfilled.
With all the love & support for you & your journey
Ruta
Main – Photo by Julian Jagtenberg
