Design a Life Around Your Core Values

Written by: Jennifer Loehding, Executive Contributor

Executive Contributors at Brainz Magazine are handpicked and invited to contribute because of their knowledge and valuable insight within their area of expertise.

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It's 5 am, and you're getting ready to head out to run a half marathon. The weather is supposed to be perfect, and you have trained adequately, but you are not quite feeling the excitement that you usually experience when a race is approaching. You have done several of these in the past, and you know you can rely on your training, but your head is not into this race. You signed up months ago. So, what do you? You hesitantly show up.

You arrive at the start line, and you line up. The signal goes off, and you begin your run. A few miles in, you start to feel fatigued and wonder if you will make it, but you push through and cross the finish line. Later, as you are recapping your race, you realize you didn't have a great race, but at least you finished.

Many things can affect your performance. If you didn't sleep well the night before a race, you would be tired. If you haven't trained well, you are going to be lacking in skill. In life, we have setbacks all the time in business, relationships, and our health. But we get back up and go on to have another great run the next time. We realize something wasn't particularly in our favor at that moment, and that's okay because we know it was fleeting. We still are passionate about what we are doing. We evaluate and improve.

Sometimes, however, our lack of performance may result from something more significant. We recognize that we are not motivated nor excited, and it won't resolve despite our commitment. Is it temporary fatigue, mental block, wrong timing, or burnout? We aren't sure, but we know that we are not particularly inspired about what we are doing, it's unrelenting, and we are not sure whether to give up or keep at it. We certainly don't want to be a quitter.

Eventually, we start to make excuses, or we sabotage our efforts. Perhaps we stay out late, and therefore we can't get up on time to train. Maybe we work overtime. So, we are unable to be 100% present. We justify the actions to feel better about our choices and eventually claim it didn't work out when we don't perform well or quit.

In our careers, we may see this play out in our performance as well. Perhaps we are struggling to find success despite our unrelenting effort to get better. We may feel unfulfilled and feel like we are swimming upstream but don't know why. I often use the example of my earlier businesses. I reached success in both very quickly. However, I had difficulty maintaining success because I became burnt out. I had discipline, but no matter how hard I applied it, I never truly felt fulfilled. Both businesses were similar in how they ran. I later realized that pieces of the business model didn't align with my values and what was important to me. Therefore, I was sabotaging my efforts. I learned that I wanted to sell my services, not someone's product.

Something as little as adding an activity you enjoy or letting go of something that doesn’t align with your values may seem insignificant. Whereas having a career you don't want or being in a toxic relationship may appear more significant. However, whatever you engage in, whether it aligns or doesn't align, has an impact on you. It affects whether you have success, lives a fulfilled life, and your happiness. We must be willing to do things we don't want to do to get what we want in life. We must be uncomfortable from time to time. We must get in alignment with our core values. It is essential to living a fulfilled life.

Should we learn to be happy in our situation? Don't get me wrong, I believe happiness is a choice, but I also think that we should do things that align with who we are as individuals that make us happy. When we do that, we will be healthier and more successful in all areas of our lives. We will be working from a state of flow, and things will happen with less effort. When we show up happier, we respond differently, we treat people differently, we make different decisions, we want to level up, and we want to improve our lives.

When we begin to understand the importance of our values, we can learn to make the necessary changes to improve our lives. In careers, we see this when someone leaves their corporate job and decides to pursue a career change. Perhaps an individual values autonomy and therefore decides they want to determine their work schedule. So, they open their own business to follow what they love and have the freedom to work it when and how they choose.

So how do we figure out if what we are doing is in alignment? I typically suggest we start by making a list of importance in the four categories: career, relationships, health & wellness, and time & money freedom. When we can determine what is essential in those areas, we can visualize our lives succeeding. We must then decide what we are doing well and what improvements we would like to see in each of the four areas. From there, we can start to implement small changes in a specific area. The slight changes may seem small, but over time can lead to notable change and greater happiness. You may not leave your job to be a writer, but you can certainly write in a little spare time and publish your book.

Keep in mind that you can always have a bad race, and you can always have a good race. Mindset plays a role. However, if you are doing something, whether in business or your personal life, and not having success, not feeling motivated or fulfilled, and it continues, it may be time to decide if what you are doing aligns with your values. You can always choose to be happy, but when you engage in things that support what is important to you, you don't have to choose because you will feel more fulfilled. It will reflect in your work, your relationships, health, and your cash flow. Be intentional about what you do and work to add things that will add value to your life. Lastly, if you feel stuck, it might be time to find a coach or a mentor that can help you discover how to align your life with what is important to you.

Cheers!

Want to learn more from Jennifer? Follow her on Facebook, Instagram, Linkedin, and visit her website.

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Jennifer Loehding, Executive Contributor Brainz Magazine

Jennifer Loehding is a mindset coach, blogger, speaker, author, and creator/host of the Starter Girlz Podcast. Her memoir—Beat the Toughest Obstacles—highlights the period in her life when she recovered from the pain and frustration that comes with a diagnosis of Atypical Trigeminal Neuralgia. After years of getting no answers from medical professionals, Jennifer decided to find the best path to healing for herself. Relentless research and dogged determination allowed her to get around the sabotaging behaviors in her own life, and she now lives pain and medicine-free! Now Jennifer desires to teach people tips that will help them TOO to have exponential growth. She channels her energy and enthusiasm into the podcast—Starter Girlz—which she hosts every week, interviewing athletes, entrepreneurs, and individuals, highlighting the strengths that have helped them not only succeed but overcome the challenges they have faced. Jennifer likes empowering people to achieve success by assisting them to recognize sabotaging behaviors—their source and how to get around them.