What do you value in life?
If you made a list of the things you most value in life, what you’d end up with is probably a list of the things you like to think you most value in life. And a lot of those would probably be different than the things you actually value, prioritize, and spend time on.
Don’t believe me? I’d suggest you talk with the Alien of Shame.
The Alien of Shame is an interesting concept I heard about on a podcast (of course). I think I heard about it on the “Excellence, Actually” podcast (although, I’m sorry, I can’t seem to recall which episode), and I think it is a concept attributed to author James Clear.
The concept is this: If an alien observed you for two weeks, what would he (or she … or it) come away saying your values are?
After watching how you spend your time for two weeks, there’s a good chance the values the alien would list would be different than the ones you’d like to believe.
If I asked you what values are most important to you, you’d probably say things like family, maybe the work you do, maybe helping others, improving your health and fitness, improving your knowledge.
But how do you really spend your time? If the alien watched you, would he see you prioritizing these things? Or would he see you devoting most of your time to your phone, or to television, to nightlife and boozing; how about snacking, or even porn? (Yeah, that alien sees all.)
What are you really prioritizing in practice, perhaps without even realizing it? There’s the theory of what you think you value. And then there is reality.
This idea is a powerful visualization tool to help you reflect on your life and how you really spend your time. What do you really prioritize and value with your time? And is it what you really want it to be?
This exercise is uncomfortable. But all meaningful change is inherently uncomfortable. All meaningful change is downright painful. But that doesn’t mean you should avoid it.
Getting things right takes hard work, and that sometimes means walking through the fire of honest self-assessment and facing our demons. It’s ugly. It’s painful. It will hurt you. But it is worth it to make your life better.