Living by Your Values

Learning values. During your life­time your parents and teachers have been teaching you the values of our society. Sometimes you have not been aware that you were learning new values, but you have been learning them every minute. You have learned from watching others, hearing others, and observing your own actions. You have learned that some things are con­sidered right; others, wrong.

One interesting test of your values is to think of yourself as an invisible person. How would your actions change if you knew that no one could see you?

Try This
Test your own system of values by completing the sentence: I believe that the three most important things in life are ….

Your conscience. You have the power to weigh the worthiness of everything you do or say. All your life your mind has been at work filing away mental impressions of the way you have acted and the ways those you respect have acted. Out of all these impressions and memories, your con­science has been formed. Your con­science judges you for every action you make.

The society in which we live has cer­tain standards of behavior by which we guide our lives. Our consciences and the consciences of our parents and loved ones have picked up these stand­ards. Your conscience reminds you to study for a test, even though you may be tempted to do the opposite. In later years your conscience will help you to accept greater responsibilities and will become a more vital part of your per­sonality.

Guilty feelings. You may find that occasionally your conscience conflicts with something you want to do. If you do not follow your conscience, you will probably feel guilty or ashamed. Ev­eryone occasionally makes mistakes. It is important for you to know how to make up for them.

Perhaps the hardest part of making up for a mistake is admitting to your­self that you were wrong. If you quar­reled with your sister or brother over some small matter, you probably do not want to admit to yourself that you were partly to blame. Once you have admitted your mistake to yourself, however, it is much easier to make a sincere apology or to make up for the wrongdoing. Certainly you can see that you will command greater respect if you follow your conscience and also try to make up for whatever short­comings you can.

Values in your personality. You may have been able to conclude from the information in the last few pages that a person’s values can shape his personality. For example, a person who believes in the value of a good education is likely to be curious, interested in many subjects, and active in school affairs. His values have had a great effect on his personality.

You can see that a lack of strong values can affect personality, too. A person who does not value honesty would have a less than admirable set of traits in his personality. In the eyes of others, your values may well be the mark of your personality.

As you think about values and per­sonality, you will realize that they relate to both mental health and family relationships. Because of these relationships, you are likely to improve your family relationships as you im­prove your mental health and personality. An improvement in one area is likely to affect other areas as well.

Maintaining Mental Health - Understanding feelings of rebellion

Understanding feelings of rebellion. When you have become as old as you are now, you may find that you disagree with some of your parents’ and teachers’ values and ways of doing things. You feel that you want to make decisions for yourself and do not want someone to make them for you. You are learning to become independent and are forming more of your own personality.

The most important thing to keep in mind is that sooner or later you will work out your own ways of doing things. Instead of going your own way and ignoring the advice of adults com­pletely, talk over some of your prob­lems with your parents, clergyman, guidance counselor, and teachers. It may surprise you to find that they can be a great help in finding answers to your problems.

Never forget the possibility that you may be rebelling against people just for the sake of rebellion. You may be so eager to show that you are mature that you forget that most of your par­ents’ values are extremely sound. It is a mature person who can look at his own feelings of rebellion and realize that sometimes they have little basis in reality. If you can look at your feelings in this way, you have taken a giant step toward adulthood.

After you have considered these four areas of mental health–maintaining self-confidence, making ad­justments, controlling emotions, and understanding feelings of rebellion—-you may have a better idea of the ways to change your personality and main­tain good mental health.

Try This
Make a list of all the emotions you have felt today. Check the ones you think were not controlled as well as they could have been. Check the emotions you have felt today that you feel were of value to you.

Maintaining Mental Health - Making adjustments

Making adjustments. A second aspect of good mental health is the ability to make adjustments to different situations. You cannot succeed in everything you do, and in order to be happy you will have to adjust to situations in which you do not get what you want and to situations that you do not enjoy.

There are many things that could happen to make you unhappy or to disappoint you. Perhaps you worked hard and tried out for a part in a class play. But you failed to get the part. You may have needed more practice, or you may have failed to get the part be­cause there were others competing for the part who had more talent and skill. Or perhaps someone else got the part simply because he seemed to fit the part better, physically.

There are several ways you could react to such a failure. You could lose your temper and complain loudly, making everyone around you uncom­fortable. You could stay by yourself and daydream about being a successful and greatly admired actor or actress. You could make excuses for not going to the play and even become ill the day of the performance. But none of these would be a satisfactory adjustment. These are all ways of running away from the real difficulty.

What are some of the ways you could adjust? You could use the method of compensation. In this method, you would decide to do something to help make the play a success, whether that would mean painting scenery, selling tickets, ushering, or making posters. If you failed to act as well as others, you could accept the fact that you did not quite "measure up," and that perhaps you never would become good enough to take part in a play. Then, you could enjoy other activities that make a play a success. When you use the method of compensation to adjust to a failure, you are showing a mature attitude and signs of good mental health.

Think for Yourself
In what situations is compensation a mature method of reacting?