In some way, and you don’t mind spending your time on this value. Publicly affirming a value

means you are willing to tell others about it. You have the right to publicly affirm your values,

but you do not have the right to impose your values on others. Doing something about a value

means taking action. Full values are those things which we work for, do something about, and

take action on. Acting repeatedly means there is a life pattern that is evident, and the stronger

the value, the more it influences your life. A value that is freely chosen from alternatives which

consequences we thoughtfully considered, of which we are proud and happy to the point that we

act upon with repetition and consistency is a full value.

I. Find in the Glossary the definitions of the key terms and give their Russian

equivalents.

II. Find in the text words which can be used as terms in other branches of

science. What do they mean?

III. Answer the following questions:

1. What are some of your tangible and intangible values?

2. How do we discover what our true values are?

3. Discuss the following statement: Do what you value; value what you do

(Sidney Simon).

Read the following text and guess the meaning of the key terms.

TEXT 4. LIVING WITH YOUR VALUES

Most of us have partial values that are in the process of being formed. Partial values, or value

indicators, include desires, thoughts not acted on, opinions, interests, aspirations, goals,

beliefs, attitudes, feelings, convictions, activities. It is easy to see that we can find out what

our real values are by examining our actual behaviors—the way in which we invest our time,

money, energies, and resources.

The most important thing to remember is that to claim a value, you must act in accordance to

what you say you believe. Values may either be conceived (stated) or operative (real). Many

individuals have conceived values but do not bother to implement them. Operative values are the

ones we work on. A direct relationship exists between our value structure and our motivation.

That is, what we value we will be motivated to work toward achieving. One way of clarifying

our stated or real values is by testing our values through priority ranking. This is a process

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whereby an individual takes inventory of his/her values, examines them, and puts them in order

of their importance. Next, the individual is asked to set a goal in relation to his/her stated top

values.

We are all motivated to maintain consistency within ourselves. We do not normally hold

values, beliefs, or attitudes that are mutually incompatible or dissonant with each other, nor do

we behave in ways contradictory to our values or attitudes. When there is dissonance between

attitudes and behaviour, the individual may modify attitudes rather than behaviour. To illustrate

these points, suppose that a cigarette smoker is aware of the dangers of smoking to his/her health

but continues to smoke. The individual is faced with two dissonant cognitions: ”I enjoy smoking,

or smoking is harmful.” The dissonance theory predicts that such an inconsistency would

produce an uncomfortable state that would motivate the individual either to give up smoking or

change his/her ideas about the risks involved in continuing to smoke.

This is a confusing world to live in. At every turn, we are forced to make choices about how

to live our lives. The highest level of moral functioning requires us to use ethical principles to

define our own moral standards and then to live in accord with them. Ideally, our choices will be

made on the basis of the values and ethics we hold. Being human, sometimes we may experience

confusion and conflict. Perhaps one of the most difficult things to do is to establish for ourselves

a consistent set of values. If we go against a value, we feel bad. Inconsistencies in our values

make us unhappy; they make us feel guilty. If we usually live up to our values, we are happy,

satisfied people with consistent value system. We can honestly implement only those values we

have consciously chosen. It is only when we have consciously chosen a value and affirmed a

way of acting toward it that the value has meaning for our own life. It is true that we can’t

always satisfy our values; many compromises must be made. Therefore, we need to learn when

we can afford to give up and compromise values and when we cannot. It is best not to

compromise values of high priority. Values that are not so important may be compromised

without destroying our self-concept. Actually, satisfied, happy people are people who do not

compromise their most important values but are willing to compromise their less important