Think when you have felt the most enthusiastic in your life. It probably hasn’t been while watching the news or scrolling social media or even while zoning out to a podcast or the radio. We feel the most enthusiastic when are connected in to our why, in the present moment, and thinking of ways to move forward in the flow of creation. When we are in a creative state, enthusiasm is all around us. And a creative state is not just reserved for the stereotypical “Creative” type. Whether you are a financial analyst, a pilot, a preschool teacher or a painter, the creative state is that feeling when you are 1000% “IN” whatever you are doing. You are present.
The feeling that I get when I am painting, for instance, is the feeling everyone should get when they are doing whatever “their thing” is. If you dont get that feeling, then maybe you need a new “thing.”
In 2019, I paid a lot of money for an art business course. The only part of the course I did was the intro in which we were given a list of about 100 words and we had to choose our top words as our core values. It’s not rocket science, but it was so illuminating for me that it almost made the cost worth it. (I could also have just…done the rest of the course, and that would have probably given me the cost-value as well lol.)
My entire life up until this point, I’m pretty sure I would have chosen my “why” as something that I “thought I should say” or something my mother would approve of. As absurd as this sounds, I dont think I’m entirely alone here. So often we are on autopilot and our motivation is something that aligns with an outside influence instead of our own true internal “why”. Think about the people you know in your life right now. How many are living their life in full alignment with who they truly are, at their core? I know a few, but most are not. And if you are choosing your why based someone else, at least make it a person whose life you would want. It’s like what they say about taking advice—don’t take advice from someone who isn’t in a place you would want to be. Similarly, don’t let your why be influenced by someone or a group who aren’t living the life you want to live.
Doing this exercise, something in me decided to be honest for once and really choose the ones that most resonated. My top words, initially, were freedom and success. I felt silly admitting that success is important to me, and I felt wrong somehow for not choosing something altruistic and idealistic. Admitting to myself that success mattered was my first step. Because the truth is that being honest with ourselves and showing up in the world as our truest self—that is the most altruistic thing we can do. I was so floored by the shift that happened when I accepted my true “why” that I forgot about the course and fell down a rabbit hole of developing a whole formula to explain our “why”.
Through this formula, I found that my North Star is a combination of Total Freedom, Success + Recognition, Personal Impact, and Financial Security. For each category, there is more than one factor—but in your most important categories—Freedom in my case—your why can encompass the whole category. Lower down in importance for me, but still part of my why, is security, for instance. And for me security means finances, and not so much physical home or space. For someone else Security might be at the top of their list, in which case we would call it “Total Security”. They might be motivated above all else by security in their home and physical surroundings, family, love life, finances, and so on. For me, being someone for whom freedom is most important, I feel secure as long as my finances are in order. I could sell my house and give everything in it to goodwill and still be ok. The rest can fall apart and I’ll still feel “safe”.
Of course these words can mean something different to each of us, so we need to take this one step further and define what our words actually mean. In my coaching work, we go deeper into what each word means to us, using my North Star Formula to figure out my clients’ unique 4-part code. Then we reverse-engineer it to see what parts of their current life matches up with their top “why”—and if not, then what is matching up with someone else’s why—be that a parent, a spouse, or society.
Here is a list of 45 common core values, or “Why Words”—what are your top 4? Remember, there are no wrong answers—if you want to be famous, or wealthy, or whatever it is—then you will be doing the world a service if you admit this and get on that path sooner rather than later.
Freedom
Security
Wealth
Success
Peace
Humanitarianism
Idealism
Family
Joy
Purpose
Individuality
Collaboration
Authenticity
Achievement
Adventure
Growth
Happiness
Authority
Autonomy
Status
Balance
Beauty
Fame
Boldness
Compassion
Challenge
Stability
Community
Friendship
Contribution
Creativity
Curiosity
Faith
Justice
Leadership
Learning
Peace
Pleasure
Popularity
Recognition
Reputation
Respect
Service
Spirituality
Success