From the brilliant mind of Dr John Demartini and his polymathic knowledge of the world and human psychology, these words are taken from his teachings on the importance of identifying your highest most intrinsic value and the resulting difference in quality of life, meaning and fulfilment when living by your intrinsic values versus living by derivative values.
Read on for some powerful information that can make a profound difference in your life.
Every human being, regardless of age, gender spectrum, or culture, moment by moment is living with a set of priorities, a set of values, things that are most to least important in their life. That set of values is completely unique to each individual.
Now this hierarchy of values, or set of values, ranging from that which is most important to least important, higher in priority to lower in priority, higher in value to lower in value, is what is dictating our perceptions of the world. This is because we are filtering our reality through that hierarchy. Your highest values determine what you perceive, what you decide to do, and how you act in life, they dictate what you are dedicated to, who you are and ultimately your destiny. Your purpose and mission in life, which is intrinsic to you, is a reflection of what you value the most.
For example, if you go into a book store, and you are a mother with 2 young children, you may go over to the children’s books section. If you are a conspiracy theorist, you may go over to the Area 51 and unexplained mysteries section. If you have a vision of building a chicken coop, you may go over to the do-it-yourself section. Same bookstore, but the perceptions, decisions and actions of the individuals are dictated by their highest value and they will form a judgement on the bookstore according to how well it serves their highest value.
As you go down the hierarchy in your list of values into the lower values, they become more and more extrinsic - you will require external motivating factors to take action. Anything that needs external motivation to get you to move and do things is a derivative or lower value.
Your very highest value, the thing that’s most important in your life at any moment, is the most intrinsic value. Your identity revolves around it and it is how you will identify yourself. From the individuals in the bookstore, one may identify as a devoted mother, another as a socially aware citizen, and the last as an off the grid, self-sustaining handyman. The lower a value is on your values system the more it is disowned, the higher it is on the hierarchy, the more it is owned - it is an identity. Your intrinsic value, your real identity, is a non-derivative value.
Whenever something is highest on your values, you tend to absorb information related to it, you tend to make decisions around it more efficiently and you’re more likely to act. This means in the areas of your highest values, you’re disciplined, reliable, and focused on what you value most.
Conversely, you’ll procrastinate, hesitate, and frustrate about things that you value least.
When you have revealed what is highest on your hierarchy of values and accessed the most intrinsic value, you will become aware that it is here you are spontaneously inspired to act, and you are most inspired to do things. This is where you are going to excel the most and are intrinsically called to do it. This is where you grow your knowledge most and are often the expert in that area with a core competence allowing you to have a competitive advantage and awareness in that area of your life.
Your life demonstrates what you value most, revealing the hierarchy of values and your most intrinsic value (see values determination for specific questions to assist in this process, about values for more information, and bookings for values determination for a session to determine yours). Finding out what your intrinsic value is and prioritising your life towards that is very empowering; anytime you do whatever is highest on your values, your self-worth goes up, your confidence goes up, your achievements go up, your leadership emerges, you have more certainty, and you expand your space and time horizons. Our life expands when we are living intrinsically, and it contracts when we aren’t.
Physiologically, when you’re living by your highest value, blood, glucose, and oxygen flows into the forebrain and you wake up your executive centre, which is the source of your inspired vision, and activate the executive centre which is used for execution of intention. You become a visionary in your own life and you spontaneously act. You don’t need to be motivated. Those who are inspired by a vision have more vitality in life than those who are not.
Neurologically, in the brain, you have evoked potentials from outside stimuli, and you have spontaneous potentials from within. When you’re living according to your intrinsic value your spontaneous potentials go up, and your autonomic nervous system, which is made up of your sympathetic system (fight, flight, freeze -beta waves at 13 cycles per second), and your parasympathetic (rest, digest -delta waves at 3 cycles per second), come into perfect balance. Instead of the delta and beta waves you now get an alpha-theta wave which is 7 – 8 cycles per second, which is right in the middle. In that state, you get gamma waves and the corresponding synchronicity or eureka ‘aha’ and inspired moments. When you bring your mind to balance, the balanced autonomics give rise to the alpha-theta states, and you get inspiration and are inspired by your life. In this state the brain is more synchronised, there is more coherency, your circadian rhythms are synchronised and maximised, you have more physiological balance, and your health is empowered.
Anytime we are not living by our highest intrinsic value, and going into lower derivative values, we automatically create symptoms in our physiology. Symptoms in the body, our physiology, are offering feedback, trying to get us back to living in our intrinsic value.
Your intrinsic value is the most important value to know. By waking up the executive centre of the brain we access the most objective and centred state. Extrinsic or derivative values result in the blood, glucose and oxygen going into the amygdala, the animal brain, where we are biased, reactionary and driven by seeking pleasure and avoiding pain.
When you live according to your most intrinsic and highest value and are objective and centred, you are most neutral, your resilience and adaptability is maximised, and you are the most resourceful. Living according to extrinsic values results in the selective biases of the amygdala which is not neutral. When you are highly polarised with these subjective biases, you fear the loss of the things you label ‘good’ and fear the gain of the things you label ‘bad’ and are driven by ‘instinct away’ and ‘impulse toward’ as opposed to the balanced mind inspiration and intuition.
When living by your highest, most intrinsic value, the perceptions of both ‘good’ and ‘bad’, are transcended - things are neither ‘good’ nor ‘bad’, and being more objective you are able to see both sides, resulting in not using labels and not judging individuals.
This objectivity activated by living in your highest values results in less subjective bias and associated superiority or inferiority complexes within yourself. From this, you are more likely to perceive yourself on an equal level with other individuals and love them for who they are, resulting in flourishing relationships in business, family and social life.
If you put people on pedestals (exaggerating them and minimising yourself), you will envy them and want to be like them. By injecting their values into your life, you will be trying to live by these derivative values. As such, the clarity of your own mission will become clouded by the injected expectations, and you will not be able to see your own mission. You may then judge yourself for not living up to these expectations, and you will lose your objectivity. You are now unfulfilled, and will be operating from your amygdala, driven to avoid pain and seek pleasure. Each of your perceptions, decisions, and actions are based on your values, so living by injected values is going to have you doing lower priority actions until you get back to your intrinsic value and priority.
The amygdala is developed for survival, and as a survival mechanism it wants you to be biased (seeking prey avoiding predator). It wants you to judge. It wants you to be prejudiced. It wants you to discriminate. It wants you to avoid anything that challenges your values and seek anything that supports your values. Because of this, if you are being run from the amygdala, you go towards impulsive behaviours, addictive behaviours, and consumption. The amygdala makes you overspend and wipe out your wealth. It makes you overeat; makes you wipe out your health. It makes you be lustful. You will be more focused on instant gratification rather than long term vision, and your space and time horizons shrink. All the “passions” that are so popularly talked about, which are sources of suffering, are a result of the amygdala’s response, not the executive function.
As mentioned, the highest value is your most intrinsic value, your ontological identity, your teleological purpose, and your epistemological knowledge revolves around it. Your area of expertise, your leadership skills, your expanded awareness, and your enlightenment state, all revolve around that highest value. That’s your true identity. That’s your true, authentic self.
Structure your life according to what you value the most. Do something that inspires you. When you are doing something that inspires you, you can’t wait to get up in the morning and be doing it and, because you are inspired and magnetic, people can’t wait to be getting that service from you.
Fill your day with high-priority actions, and delegate lower-priority things to people who love to do those things that’s high on their values- if it’s high in their values they’ll do a greater job than you will. They’ll be inspired to do it. You’ll surround yourself with inspiring and inspired people. Delegation will liberate you from things that weigh you down, that are drudgery to you, and that you must be motivated to do. When living by your lower values you are draining yourself of energy as your mitochondria reduce their energy producing ATP the second you perceive you are doing lower-value actions. Motivation is therefore not a solution for human beings it is a symptom - a sign of doing something that is not inspiring. Living by motivation lends itself to a quiet life of desperation, not a life of inspiration. The second you live in your lower values you end up devaluing and depreciating yourself.
Who wants to have their life decided by impulses and instincts, being run by the animal mind, seeking instant gratification and costing long term vision? Life expands, has greater meaning and fulfilment when it is decided by your intuition and inspirations. As previously noted, when you live by your highest values your intuition is stronger and your inspirations are greater.
When you live by lower values you are no longer inspired nor intuitive as your impulses and instincts are running you, trying to divide the world into judgements, subjective biases and false attribution biases as a survival mechanism. You are trying to achieve a one-sided experience by seeking pleasure and avoiding pain, and the futility of this can lead to disillusionment within yourself and your life. If you live by lower values, you are more likely to be more narcissistic or altruistic sacrificing other people for you or you for other people. Within this dynamic there is no sustainable fair exchange, your relationships break down and you wonder what’s going on - usually blaming external sources with false attribution biases on everything around you instead of looking within, for your own prioritisation and selection. Why is this happening to me? You become a victim to circumstance. Additionally, as you exaggerate or minimise people on the outside, you are going to minimise or exaggerate yourself in contrast, resulting in an inauthentic state of being. Everyone wants to be loved and appreciated for who they are; how is this going to happen when you’re living extrinsically and presenting a false persona instead of your authentic self? People will see a persona and not the true you.
By living in your highest intrinsic value and prioritising your life you grow in self-worth, as well as net worth. This is because your intrinsic value is where you are most objective, most likely to have a sustainable fair exchange in your transactions with people and as a result people want to continue to do business with you, you are more likely to perceive yourself on an equal level with people so they are engaged, you are engaged, and people want to refer to you. You end up with more social connections and power, and more business opportunities. When you’re in your highest values, you’re more magnetic in all relationships.
When you live by your highest and most intrinsic value, you are waking up your creativity, your genius, your vitality and energy. It will help you in your business, your finances, and your relationships, your leadership, health, well-being, and vitality. Anybody that’s fulfilling their intrinsic value is inspired and that’s their spiritual contribution to the world. As you can see every area of your life is empowered by living in your highest values
Can you see the profound importance of identifying your hierarchy values and designing a life based around your highest values?
A life of duty or a life of design? You choose.
Identify your values so your life is decided by your intuition and inspiration. Master your destiny for a more meaningful and fulfilled life.
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