It is important to learn to act according to one’s personal values and to be true to oneself. To do this, there are different keys to personal growth that must be taken into account, such as being aware of one’s own strengths and virtues, as well as promoting the development of new values.
In this Psychology-Online article we will talk about the human values, what they are, the types there are and we will offer you a list with examples. We are going to explain to you in detail what human values are, the types of values that exist and what each of them consist of.
What are the human values
When we talk about a person’s values we are referring to the set of rules that facilitate harmony and coexistence in society. These norms are valid in a specific time and era and are part of human development, since they emerged through growth, humanization and the conquest of freedom.
In short, these are human values that have appeared as a result of people’s efforts to conquer themselves and love others.
Types of human values
Human values can be classified by its nature and characteristics. According to philosophical knowledge, the main types of values are the following:
- Moral values: those related to virtues and fulfillment as human beings. The objective of the is the pursuit of virtue, of what is good and what is not.
- religious values: These human values are determined by different religions and are usually based on concepts of kindness, faith and sacrifice.
- Human values: those values inherent to people and their nature. Its main objective is to improve coexistence and promote empathy.
- Universal values: are those values of a person that can be applied to all societies, cultures, economic status and religion. Tolerance and respect, for example, are two types of .
- aesthetic values: They aim at one’s own beauty and the joy of harmony. These values apply especially in art and creative expression.
- intellectual values: values of human beings who focus on the search for knowledge and truth.
- Physical values: following the theory of , this type of human values are focused on maintaining a certain level of well-being and physical health, thus avoiding states of illness or weakness.
- Social values: are those that are recognized by a culture or society and whose objective is to strengthen human ties.
- emotional values: Closely linked to the previous point, we find these values of the human being. Affective values are those related to love, affection and interpersonal pleasure.
- Economic values: one of the most prevalent types of values today are economic values. These aim to search for monetary stability and achieve more economic profits. Among these types of values, we find business and professional ones.
List of human values and their meaning
A large part of the cultures that exist today have these types of human values and help us to know how to act with oneself and with other people. A person who has his personal values well defined and who acts consistently with them is someone who surely has good emotional stability, a good one, and, therefore, his quality of life is also very good.
On the contrary, a person who is not consistent with their own personal values is more likely to notice their emotional well-being altered. Next, we will show you a list of the most important human values, briefly explaining what each of them consists of.
- Love: it is an extremely important and powerful value, it is a principle of union and connection between ourselves and the universe. We can manifest love towards others by doing good through our actions.
- Friendship: Just like love is one of the most precious values and can even be considered as a part of love too. It is a relationship of affection, support and trust between two people or more.
- Goodness: This is a quality that people have who will always try to do good to others and in which evil does not exist.
- Trust: we can say that more than anything it is an act of faith, since the person who trusts places security in something or someone.
- Fraternity: it is a bond of union and good correspondence between brothers or between those who consider themselves as such.
- Honor: This is a quality or a deep feeling of one’s own dignity.
- Honesty: this is a quality of people that makes them act with rectitude and consistency, respecting the rules in order to have a good coexistence with others.
- Justice: it is about acting fairly with oneself and with others, giving each person what they really deserve according to their actions.
- Freedom: it is about acting with free will in a responsible manner and without harming anyone. A person who is free can do what he really wants as long as what he does does not directly or indirectly affect other people. In the following article you will find more information about .
- Peace: it is about acting harmoniously with other people to achieve excellent coexistence within society or with the family.
- I respect: it is about the value and good treatment that we give to ourselves and others, recognizing qualities, merits or situations in particular.
- Responsibility: a person is considered responsible when he or she is capable of taking charge of his or her own actions, making his or her own decisions and acting in accordance with them.
- Solidarity: it is about helping others without expecting to receive anything in return, collaborating in the cause of others.
- Tolerance: When a person is tolerant, they show an open and non-prejudiced attitude towards other people’s opinions, even if they are different from their own. In this article you will see.
- Courage: it is about facing with courage and determination all the difficult situations that we encounter in life, regardless of the fear that this may cause us.
How to change personal values
Now that we have provided you with a list of human values, we are going to introduce you to some psychological keys so you can improve your personal values. When we do not feel comfortable with the personal values that we have adopted throughout our lives and we would like to make a modification or add others to those we already had, in most cases this is not going to be an easy task.
Why is it not easy to change our personal values? It is difficult because all or almost all of our lives we have acted based on what we now have and we have turned them into deeply ingrained habits; however, despite this, we can always do something to adopt positive values.
Next, we will provide you with a series of tips so you can adopt more positive values in your life:
- Identify your own values and personal strengths: Once you have done this, determine which of them you can improve and what type of negative actions you need to modify.
- Identify which are the new values that you would like to adopt.
- Commit to improving: Actively participate in developing your new values and improving the ones you already had. For example, if you would like to be more responsible, from now on stop blaming others for your own actions and take charge of them and make your own decisions.
- Understand and respect the values of others practicing empathy.
- Give yourself time to adapt: Be aware that you will not be able to modify them from one day to the next, since it is a constant work. Just as it took you time to adopt the ones you have now, you also have to wait a while to get used to new human values.
Advantages of being faithful to your human values
Now that you know examples of human values, it is important that you know the advantages of acting according to your own values. The fact of having have your personal values identifiedas well as putting them into practice, has a series of advantages so valuable that the sum of each of them helps to increase your balance and emotional well-being.
If you want to make a , you should know that the advantages of being faithful to your human values are the following:
- Help to know you more to yourself
- Provides greater emotional stability.
- They help to have a better relation with oneself and with others.
- It makes you a more whole person.
- When you act consistent with your personal values, it’s easier than taking your own decisions not hesitate.
- Help to know what your true priorities are and, therefore, give you valuable information about where to invest your time.
- Others will perceive you as a more confident and trustworthy person when they notice that you act in a way that is consistent with your own values.
This article is merely informative, at Psychology-Online we do not have the power to make a diagnosis or recommend a treatment. We invite you to go to a psychologist to treat your particular case.
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Bibliography
- Negrete, L. N (sf). Universal values. Retrieved November 24, 2018, from https://www.uv.mx/psicologia/files/2014/11/VALORES-UNIVERSALES.pdf