The Values Sort

Ahh, responsibility. That’s in the eye of the beholder I suppose. I think people think I’m quite responsible. I could be wrong. You know those graphs, negative correlations ? I bet the longer people have known me, the less they think I’m a super responsible guy. That sounds defeatist. Negative self talk. But maybe that’s just true for everybody. The better you’re known in the context of a communit...

Loyalty is important, right? The card says faithful to my friends, group . I am deeply faithful to my friends. Particularly in recent years, as mortality has become so very real to us, a lot of priorities and things I thought were important have fallen away. But not so with friendships. The opposite! I’m loyal and faithful and defensive and ready to do battle. Building on recent essays, it’s often...

I value forgiveness. I need forgiveness. I feel a weight in my chest when I do not forgive. I feel a weight now. I have wrongs to forgive. I know I do. Recently I started dreaming again after a long time of not . One of the first dreams I had, I think, was ultimately about forgiveness. I’ll skip some details, but essentially I was in a dilapidated old theater. Ceiling tiles were water stained, and...

Honesty. It’s such a lonely word. Everyone is so untrue. So says Billy Joel. So say I. Do you suppose that’s right? Everyone is so untrue? I have been untrue. I have betrayed those I love the most. I have told small fibs and I have told damned dirty lies. Most of all I have massaged the truth for various reasons. I have told people what I thought they wanted to hear, and I have withheld informatio...

When I was young there was this book that came out, The Five Love Languages . It was a decidedly Christian book, but the concept made its way into broader culture. Perhaps you’ve heard of the book or the idea. It doesn’t matter. The five love languages concept was introduced to me early, and it’s stuck in my brains. They’re Physical Touch, Words of Affirmation, Acts of Service, Receiving Gifts and...

When I was a child I was diagnosed with ADHD. That will come as a great shock to anyone who’s met me. (I kid.) Chaos has been inside my brain for as long as I can remember. The stiller I try to be the more I notice the cacophony. I don’t know what it’s like to be inside anyone else’s brain and I never will. But I am an unceasing stream of thoughts and ideas and impressions. All the time, you guys....

File Settings Done Title Description Thumbnail Will be cropped to a 3:2 aspect ratio Upload Scheduled for Mar 5 at 2:16 pm Send email to everyone ∙ Edit It’s difficult for me to talk about a world at peace . Partly, maybe, because I don’t know if it’s a real thing to be valued. Can it even be a thing? Can we even wish for this in good faith? I know for sure it can be a chosen “top five” value, bec...

Equal opportunity for all. How about that? Women? Transfolks? Racial minorities? God, I don’t even know what to write about equality . My mind only goes to my sweet partner, my dear wife. Yesterday we were cleaning the house, the whole family, and we came across our wedding video. We were married in 2006, and we got a poorly shot wedding video burned onto a DVD. We hadn’t paid for a videographer,...

There’s a whole book of wisdom in the Bible. It’s called the book of Proverbs. There are, conveniently, 31 chapters in the book of Proverbs, reading one chapter a day makes for a tidy month of wisdom. And that’s what I did, a lot of times. Solomon, son of King David, was approached by God in a dream and offered anything. God said “Hey, tell me what you want me to give you, and I’ll see what I can...

Folks I feel strongly about this one. I’m about to come on strong. You ready for some strong? I’m feeling strongly. I do this values sort exercise with everyone I can. All the time. Ask anyone who hangs around me and they’ll tell you, I’m basically a one-trick-pony at this point in my life. I don’t care if you’re a Republican or a Democrat or a Solarpunk Revolutionary. I want to know your values a...

Now look at those peaches, won’t you? There’s a farm near my home where you can still U-pick. Blueberries, cherries, raspberries apples and yes, peaches. We go there several times each season. This used to be a part of people’s lives—picking and choosing their own fruit. Flowing with the seasons. People would know when it was a good year for green beans. A bad year for apples. I can think of few t...

I don’t know if I’ve made the mechanics of this exercise clear. Probably many of the folks reading this have done the exercise with me and do not need this primer. But for the rest of you, here is how it works. There are 57 total cards in the deck. We are discussing them one by one here, in this project. When you “do your values” with me, we sit across a table, or on a couch, or at the sidebar of...

This is the last card in the section labeled “Self-Direction.” And honestly? I have big feelings about it. None of my five chosen values were found in this “Self-Direction” section. And having taken some time to reflect on them, I think that fact checks out. I am not a very private person. I am happiest when I’m a part of a larger whole. There is nothing— nothing —I can readily think of that I wou...

Do I have a value for independence? Look, I hate to make this a trilogy, but I gotta build on the last two: Freedom and Choice of Own Goals. We have established that I value Freedom (the environment) and Agency (the action). But when I pull this card— Independence —I find myself pausing. I guess my question is: What the heck is independence good for? What is it used for? You can’t live in it. In f...

​This one is vulnerable for me to write. I thought “Freedom” was the zinger, but this one hits closer to the bone for me on some levels. ​I did not choose some key parts of the life I have. I have made choices along the way, certainly. And it’s not as though I live in a swirling eddy of regret. I am not unhappy. The opposite, in fact. But I am here, in my forties, newly embracing an awareness of h...

Freedom looms large in my life. Let’s get into it. When I was a child, we sang songs about freedom. I grew up in the land of the free and the home of the brave! Let freedom ring, baby! When I was growing up in church, we sang songs about the things we were free from , and freed into . We talked about ourselves in terms like “freedom from bondage.” We looked to Jesus to “Set the captives free.” Whe...

Curiosity is easier the older I get. I think that’s because when we are young, we are terrified of looking stupid. I was. I still am, sometimes. But less so with every passing day. We pretend to know things when we’re kids. When we get older, we realize nobody knows anything, and it becomes a lot more fun to just ask, “How does that work?” I shot this photo on a moving blanket. It’s symbolic to me...

This card covers a lot for me. When you do the exercise, you have to sort concepts down from 57, all the way down to five. And as I’ve alluded here before, it’s not about finding THE FIVE, the ones that define you and box you in. It’s about identifying some of the things that have affected, are affecting your choices in your recent life, in order to better understand your position. It’s about allo...

We are moving from a Varied Life to an Exciting Life . They sound similar, but I think there is a crucial difference. If a Varied Life is external (the things that happen to us, often without our consent), an Exciting Life happens within . For me, excitement is fuel. It’s a rocket booster. I crave it. I can’t always control the variability of my life. As I wrote in the last post, lived experiences...

I have lived what I consider to be an extraordinarily varied life. I think we all probably have. Which I suppose would make it an ordinarily varied life. Who among us knew the trajectory of their lives at five years old? At ten? At twenty? Heck, even at thirty? I am now in my “sporty-forties.” And I am still (newly?) uncertain of what I want to do with my life. Where it will lead. Where I will end...

I am a middle-aged dad. That is how I imagine I’ll always think of myself. “Father” has become my calling card. It’s the lens through which I see myself primarily. Husband to my wife, father to my kids. One day, God willing and the creek don’t rise, I will add “Grandfather” to that esteemed list of identities. I am no stranger to the phrase, “Get down from there, you’ll hurt yourself.” Each night...

Okay, this is the third and final card in the “Yellow” category. The Hedonism Trilogy. We had Pleasure (The sensation). We had Enjoyment of Life (The attitude). And now, the big one: Self-Indulgence. If the other two made me uncomfortable, this one makes me want to run for the hills. “Self-Indulgent” is almost always used as an insult. It implies weakness. It implies a lack of discipline. It impli...

Okay, I’ll be honest. I looked at this card and thought, “Didn’t we just do this?” Card #12 was Pleasure. Card #13 is Enjoyment of Life. They sit right next to each other under the banner of Hedonism. Full disclosure, the next card in the deck is “Self Indulgence” And frankly, I want to skip them. I want to fast-forward to the Blue cards, (just you wait). The “Benevolence” cards. The “Universalism...

Let’s talk about pleasure. And let’s talk about the Values Categories listed on the top of each card. This is the first one that is listed under “Hedonism”, a word which many might be unfamiliar with. You may have noticed that each of the cards we’re talking about have a value “category” on top of the card. There are ten total categories we’ll work our way through, with a varying number of concept...

Yeesh. This one is a hot topic. I just watched a video recently and this person was basically saying that we don’t know what anyone’s thinking at any time. What they’re thinking about us. So when we think we know what someone’s thinking about us, we’re really ideating what WE might be thinking about ourselves. And it can be doubly shitty because we’re not only seeing the worst in ourselves, we’re...