Vocare Spiritual Practice

Values: What are they and why do they matter?

Vocare

Vocare is an ongoing spiritual practice designed to help you discern and embrace your multiple vocations so that you can more intentionally live life on purpose. Vocare invites regular reflection upon values, openness, call, attentiveness, regret, and the experience of God’s presence.

Focus

You are invited to focus on your own values. Values are the things that we hold most dear, those principles or commitments that guide how we think, what we believe, and how we act. Values can be both tangible and intangible. They can be consciously present in our actions, and they can contribute unconscious influence upon our choices. Considering personal values with intention helps us to name what our values really are and to determine if what we aspire to value is actually demonstrated in our everyday lives. Use the time between the guided questions for your own reflection and meditation. Bring to mind an experience from your own life when you had to choose between conflicting values. Is this a value-centered choice that has been resolved, or is it a value-centered choice that is unresolved? How has this particular experience of value-centeredness shaped your life and its horizons?

Guided Reflection

Opening Prayer

Help me, O God, to value what matters and to live my life reflecting those values. In the name of +Jesus, Amen.

• What life values are present for you in this experience? Are they your most important values? 
• How does this value-centered choice invite or compel you to be open? How easy is it for you to be open to this? 
• What voices are calling to you through value-centered choice? Are these voices that you want to listen to? Why or why not? 
• As you consider this value-centered choice, what holds your attention? Is this where you want your attention to be? 
• What regrets does this value-centered choice bring to mind for you? What do you do with these regrets? 
• Where and how in this value-centered choice do you experience God’s presence?

Closing Prayer

Guide me to value what you value, O God, and to trust in your Word for me.
Shepherd my commitments,
that they may reflect your purposes in and through my life.
Show me when my values are misguided,
and move me to correct my ways.
In the name of +Jesus, Amen.