Strengths, Values, and Passions
The Life Practices Challenge
Overview
This discussion will focus on identifying strengths, values, and passions, and exploring strategies to develop and utilize them effectively. Each person will have the opportunity to share their own strengths, values, and passions, along with how they have discovered and developed them.
Pre-Discussion Preparation
Use the activities below to identify your strengths, values, and passions.
Strengths
We have included the following activities to help you prepare for the discussion:
Try to identify 3–5 of your strengths.
We have included a list of strengths below to help you brainstorm. This is by no means an exhaustive list. It is merely intended to be a starting point in your own personal exploration of your strengths, so feel free to choose strengths that may not be on the list provided.
Ambition, Athleticism, Authenticity, Cleverness, Compassion, Charisma, Confidence, Considerateness, Courage, Creativity, Curiosity, Dedication, Determination, Discipline, Empathy, Enthusiasm, Fairness, Flexibility, Focus, Friendliness, Generosity, Gratitude, Helpfulness, Honesty, Humility, Humor, Imagination, Independence, Ingenuity, Industriousness, Initiative, Inspiration, Integrity, Intelligence, Kindness, Leadership, Logic, Motivation, Observation, optimism, Originality, Organization, Patience, Peacefulness, Persuasiveness, Respect, Responsibility, Spirituality, Spontaneity, Team player, Thoughtfulness, Thriftiness, Vision, Wisdom.
We have also included the following questions to help you identify your core strengths:
What knowledge and skills have you gained through education? Through your career?
What comes easily to you or feels second nature?
What do people ask you to help them with?
What qualities do you love about yourself?
What skills have others complimented you on?
Values
We have included the following activities to help you prepare for the discussion:
Try to identify 3–5 of your core values and trace their impact on your life.
We have included a list of values below to help you brainstorm. This is by no means an exhaustive list. It is merely intended to be a starting point in your own personal exploration of your values, so feel free to choose values that may not be on the list provided.
Achievement, Adventure, Balance, Community, Compassion, Competence, Courage, Creativity, Dependability, Development, Discipline, Diversity, Education, Enjoyment, Equality, Excellence, Family, Fairness, Forgiveness, Friendship, Health, Honesty, Honor, Humor, Imagination, Innovation, Justice, Kindness, Leadership, Learning, Likability, Love, Loyalty, Mastery, Passion, Peace, Perseverance, Pleasure, Power, Privacy, Purpose, Purity, Recognition, Recreation, Relationships, Respect, Self-reliance, Serenity, Service, Spirituality, Status, Strength, Success, Sustainability, Teamwork, Trustworthiness, Truth, Understanding, Uniqueness, Unity, Victory, Vitality, Wealth, Wellbeing, Wisdom, Wonder.
We have also included the following questions to help you identify your core values:
When you have free time, how do you spend it?
Think of the people you admire most. They could even be characters in books or movies. What qualities or characteristics do they have in common? Why do you admire them? What specifically do you admire about their decisions and their lives?
What are the key moments that have defined your life? Why did you make the decision you did? What values were at play during those moments?
What about you or your life are you proud of?
What is your favorite quote? Why do you like it? Does it express a value you have?
Passions
We have included the following activities to help you prepare for the discussion:
Try to identify 2–3 of your passions and trace their impact on your life.
We have included a list of passions below to help you brainstorm. This is by no means an exhaustive list. It is merely intended to be a starting point in your own personal exploration of your passions, so feel free to choose passions that may not be on the list provided.
Advocating for a cause Aerobics, Astronomy, Birdwatching, Blogging, Boxing, Calligraphy, Camping, Chess, Citizenship, Coaching, Collecting, Cooking , Culture appreciation, Cycling, Dancing, Developing friendships, Drawing, Education, Environment, Exploring new places, Family, Fashion, Film making, Finances, Fitness, Gardening, Genealogy, Golf, Hiking, Horseback riding, Ice skating, Interior decorating, Karate, Kayaking, Learning, Meditation, Music, Parenting, Photography, Plants, Playing an instrument, Political activism, Quilting, Reading, Recycling, Robotics, Running, Sailing, Scuba diving, Sewing Singing, Skiing, social activism, Traveling, Weight training, Woodworking, Writing, Yoga.
We have also included the following questions to help you identify your passions:
What do you do in your free time? The things you choose to do and explore during your own time are usually highly indicative of your interests.
What is the topic of the articles, magazines, books, and videos that you find yourself drawn to?
What do you spend your disposable income on?
What activity makes you lose all track of time?
What did you love to do as a child?
Discussion Questions
Below are a series of questions that may help facilitate your discussion. There is no need to answer every question; instead, feel free to focus on the questions that members of your group seem most excited about.
What are your strengths? How did you discover and develop them?
What are your values? How did you identify them, and how have you applied them?
What are your passions? How did you find them, and how have you pursued them?
How can your strengths, values, and passions support positive changes in your life?
What is one way you currently use your strengths, values, or passions to create positive change in your life?
Post-Discussion Activities
Below are two activities that you can complete after the discussion to deepen your learning and to prepare you to write your life story:
Identify the strengths, values, and passions that play an important role in your life. After identifying your strengths, values, and passions, you may want to write them down, so you can remember them when you are working on your life practices.
Record any important takeaways from both your own thoughts and those shared by others during the discussion.
Overview Video Research
Strengths
Duckworth, A. L., Peterson, C., Matthews, M. D., & Kelly, D. R. (2007). Grit: Perseverance and passion for long-term goals. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 92(6), 1087–1101. doi: 10.1037/0022-3514.926.1087
Park, N., Peterson, C., & Seligman, M. E. (2004). Strengths of character and well-being. Journal of Social and Clinical Psychology, 23(5), 603–19. doi: 10.1521/jscp.23.5.603.50748
Values
Edwards, J. R., & Cable, D. M. (2009). The value of value congruence. Journal of Applied Psychology, 94(3), 654–77. doi: 10.1037/a0014891
Fischer, R., & Schwartz, S. (2011). Whence differences in value priorities?: Individual, Cultural, or Artifactual Sources. Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, 42(7), 1127–44. doi: 10.1177/0022022110381429
Ren, T. (2010). Value congruence as a source of intrinsic motivation. Kyklos, 63(1), 94–109. doi: 10.1111/j.1467-6435.2010.00462.x
Sagiv, L., & Schwartz, S. H. (2000). Value priorities and subjective well-being: Direct relations and congruity effects. European Journal of Social Psychology, 30(2), 177–98.
Passions
Lalande, D., Vallerand, R. J., Lafrenière, M. K., Verner-Filion, J., Laurent, F., Forest, J., & Paquet, Y. (2017). Obsessive passion: A compensatory response to unsatisfied needs. Journal of Personality, 85(2), 163–178. doi: 10.1111/jopy.12229
Vallerand, R. J. (2012). The role of passion in sustainable psychological well-being. Psychology of Well-Being: Theory, Research and Practice, 2(1). doi: 10.1186/2211-1522-2-1
Zawadzki, M. J., Smyth, J. M., & Costigan, H. J. (2015). Real-time associations between engaging in leisure and daily health and well-being. Annals of Behavioral Medicine, 49(4), 605–615.
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