As my thinking moved from ‘Focus’ to ‘Values’ for BYLOS, I returned to Stephen Covey to refresh my thinking on ‘beginning with the end in mind’ and principle/values. He expresses principles as unyielding, inarguable objective descriptions of human effectiveness. Values are internal to an individual and subjective, so they may change. An additional search on “value exercises” provided lists of possible values which muddied the difference between principles and values for me. I settled on a definition of “Values” for my use which is in line with Covey’s idea that values are maps, to help keep me focused on what is important to me. From the value lists it is possible to have broad or narrow values. The English language can be difficult and I tired of searching through thesauri. My aspiration is to apply Covey’s ‘principles’ within my ‘values’. I chose a small number of broad value ‘bucket’ to act as focus points that I think of as areas that I “value” and should consider when choosing how to spend my time.
- Existence: Finances, Home Maintenance, Exercise, Medical-Health
- Professional: Things associated with software and systems engineering, Professional Orgs
- Relatedness: Family, Friends
- Spiritual: Self-awareness, Travel, Donations, Service So far, the things I’m doing fit into these buckets. I can add a bucket if I find that something doesn’t fit.
(2023-11-29)