Our values are at the very centre of what we are as people. Our values determine our beliefs about the world and even more importantly, about ourselves. Our beliefs determine our attitude to life in general and everything that happens to us, and determine our expectations. Our values are pretty much our personal philosophy of life.

It is your values that ultimately determine your actions and the decisions you make in every area of your life. If you're not sure what your values are, one of the best ways to find out is to look at your behaviour and your actions, particularly when you're faced with a number of options, or under pressure. If you look at the way you have behaved in the past, the choices you have made will give you a pretty accurate indication of your values, as you will always act according to what is most important to you at any time.

Most people have many different values with varying degrees of importance. Their order of priority may change in varying circumstances, but generally there will be some that have the strongest influence over most of our behaviour. The reason you should be aware of your values and know and understand yourself, before setting your goals, is that it's important that your goals are compatible to your values.

For example, if Dave spends an extra 2 or 3 hours a day on top of his full time job working on opportunities that will help to create a better future for himself and his family, he has decided that this is the most valuable use of his time. He is expressing his most important values. If Jim decides that this time is better spent watching TV or socialising with friends, he is also expressing his most important values.

If you set a goal for yourself to be financially independent and to retire at the age of 50, it's easy to see which of the above behaviours is most likely to bring about that result. Therefore, there's little point for anyone who consistently finds themselves behaving more like Jim than Dave setting such a goal for themselves.

This is an example of how values, goals and actions are interconnected.

If your goals are not compatible with your values and overall philosophy on life, you are likely to or spend a lot of time going backwards and forwards, or around in circles, achieving little. You are also likely to create inner conflict and imbalance, and to become frustrated and disillusioned with the whole idea of setting goals.

"Just as your car runs more smoothly and requires less energy to go faster and farther when the wheels are in perfect alignment, you perform better when your thoughts, feelings, emotions, goals, and values are in balance." - Brian Tracy