What Happens When We Project Our Life Values onto Others?

by maradm on December 16, 2011

  • Sumo

 Life Values

Each individual no matter where, what race, creed, colour, sex, age inherently has a set of Values.

There is a hierarchy to them. A priority, because we have a left brain, we serialise things and there is a priority to them. With that set of values, it determines how we sense the world and how we filter the world. How we act and react to the world.

For example, take a husband and wife, her highest values are her children. She’s thinking about educating, clothing and feeding them. Whilst her husband’s highest values are making money, running a business and providing for the family.  So imagine, they are walking hand and hand down a main shopping street. She sees things he doesn’t see and he sees things she doesn’t see. She sees school clothes, toys, books for the kids. He sees none of those things. In fact, he’ll avoid those things. He will see Fortune Magazine, a computer on sale, anything that might help him in his business and his finances, that is his set of values.

The hierarchy of any human being is the reality in which they filter their environment and therefore see opportunities according to their values. He will not see the opportunity for his kids education unless it high on his values. She will not see things that are high in his values. So they are both projecting their values on to the reality of the world and what they realise through their senses is their own reality, and they will determine their reality according to their value systems. So the hierarchy of their values determines how they sense the world, and how they act upon the world.  You cannot expect any other human being to live in any other way other than what their values will dictate.

Many times we project our values onto other people, expecting them to live in our values instead of honouring them, as they live within their values. So the only thing we can really expect is for anyone to live according to their own set of values. Anytime we expect them to live outside of their values, we are going to create a false expectation, aren’t we? Unless we learn the art of communicating our values that we are projecting onto them, in terms of their values. So in direct proportion in how well we are able to do express our values, they will then live according to their values, but, in a way that will satisfy ours.

So be sensitive to other peoples values, but most of all, be true to your own values. Define them, decide them and live them to their fullest. Do it now!

Maria Allegria

Previous post:

Next post: