Valuey Essay: My Values

My Values By definition, a value is something that you hold in high regard, something that is of vast importance to you and fundamentally influences your principles and standard of behavior toward others. At times, I have felt challenged to pinpoint my exact values considering it can be somewhat difficult to step outside of oneself to assess what is important to you at your actual core, other than the most obvious ones. The most obvious value would be the parenting I use with my daughter, as this to me, is the utmost importance. Shaping a child to develop into a thoughtful, accepting, and subjectively respectable adult, while also trying not to impose your own beliefs on them is not a simple task. Nevertheless, it is one that I cherish wholeheartedly,

Contrary to my upbringing, I have always held this close to my heart. To me, it is imperative that a person feels as though they can openly and comfortably be themselves without the fear of ridicule, persecution, or backlash. E.g., throughout my life, even as a young child, I would suppress my surprise when someone divulged an unexpected detail about their life as I can remember trying to put myself in their shoes; appreciating what it took for them to be that vulnerable. In my mind, I tell myself that I hope a person would accept me for who/what I am, so they should be afforded the same decency. Among the numerous values I have discovered to be significant to me, the final one I will list is gratitude. Growing up in a situation of having the bare minimum, being grateful for what was there was ingrained into me early on in my life. Being grateful is not only something I expect from myself, but I anticipate it from others, also. This value can be a double-edged sword as it places expectations on not only myself, but upon people that do not share the same value which can potentially be stressing for both parties. My values have been influenced by the experiences of my past, experiences I hope to have in the future, though mostly by the person I

Being able to mold her into an upstanding person is not the sole aspect that matters to me though. Her being able to favorably reflect on her childhood feeling as though her parents were unfailingly there when she needed them, loved her unconditionally and supported her as her own individual person is vital. Not to discredit my parents as both were adept in their own ways, nonetheless, my goal is to far surpass who they were/are as parents. My mother was not your archetypal nurturing, caring, motherly type which I cannot fault her. Parenting, especially mothering is not for all. Rather, it was my father that did most of the nurturing as he eventually ended up raising two of his three daughters on his own, so of course, it presented itself as a necessity. Nevertheless, my father was not encouraging with his words or actions. However, with my daughter, I seize each chance to build her up in hopes that one day she will be a resilient, confident woman or anything else she chooses to be. Along with this statement is my value for acceptance. One day when I was probably seven, the Pride parade was being covered on the Today Show, all I remember is my parents giving my sisters and me a lengthy, venomous talk about how being that way was morally condemnable, an abomination. Even at that age, that message did not register with me as being true. In result of the nonacceptance I have witnessed