It’s time to talk about the Values thing.
A while back, I found a tool called The Values Deck. It’s simple: fifty-seven cards. Each card has a basic human value printed on it, like “A World at Peace” or “True Friendship” or “Health” or “Family Security.”
You sort the cards. There’s a method to it. You sort and you sort until you get down to the five cards that represent the values affecting your actual life and your thinking processes right now.
I tell people: These are not a tattoo. They aren’t meant to be inked on your arm forever. They’re a window into your recent thinking, that’s all.
I sorted them myself and it was a neat experience. Then I sat with my kids, my friends, and my wife while they did the big sort. I felt honored to be present as some of them really resonated with the exercise.
So, naturally, I took my fun little deck of cards to a big campout and shared it with a few dozen people. Then my employees. Then customers. Then randos that work in production at my friend’s pie company.
And now? You.
The deck and the experiences I’ve had with it have changed my life. I want to know my own values, and I want others to know theirs. But when I try to explain why it matters, I usually get blank stares.
So, I’ve stopped trying to explain it. Instead, I’ve started drawing it.
I see our lives like a tree.
Our Lived Experiences fall on us like raindrops and sun rays. We’re no more able to control the things that happen to us than we are the wind or rain. They splash down into the soil of our existence.
That soil feeds our Values—the Roots of our tree. To say ‘Our Values’ is really just to say our deeply held observations of the human experience.
But roots don’t grow alone. They’re connected underground by mycorrhizae—fungal networks that link tree to tree, allowing them to share water, nutrients, even information. One tree feeds another. Your values are shaped by your experiences, but they’re also fed by your community, your relationships, the network that holds you up when you can’t hold yourself. We grow together. The mycorrhizae make it possible.
Those roots feed the Trunk: our Beliefs. Beliefs are what happens when our values crystallize into structure. When they’re healthy, beliefs give us stability and shape. When they calcify, they keep us from bending with the wind. This is where we begin to answer the questions our lived experiences keep asking.
Hidden from view, beneath the bark of our tree, we hit the cambium layer—the xylem and phloem. The lifeblood. This is our Vision and Mission.
* Vision is the Why.
* Mission is the How. Most people think these are just corporate buzzwords. But in our tree, this is where internal processes turn into action.
Finally, we get to the Crown. The leaves and the Fruit. This is our Goals, Tasks, and Time Management. The things we actually do with our hands, think with our minds, endorse with our choices.
Here is the problem.
On Sunday nights, I like to “attack” my week. I plan ahead. I open Google Calendar. I open Google Keep. I get psyched and synced. I focus all of my attention on the Fruit: Tasks. Time Management. To-Do Lists. If we’re really effective people we spend whole weekends just setting Goals.
But we almost never tend the Roots.
We don’t think about our Values. Many of us are afraid to even touch our Beliefs. So our Values grow unkempt and wild. Our Beliefs go stale and harden like an old toenail. And we wonder why the Fruit tastes bitter, or why the tree feels shaky in the wind.
I think there’s a better way. It starts not by polishing the fruit, but by watering the roots. By pruning branches, by minding the whole tree and looking out for diseases or pests that may undermine our beautiful structure.
I’ve done this little exercise with a bunch of people now. My old grandma. My young nieces. Friends and strangers. And everything indicates that people have a much better idea of what to do with their Time (The Fruit) if they’ve spent adequate time thinking about their Values (The Roots).
So, I’m starting a project.
The cards in my deck are numbered 1 through 57. I’m going to take some time to think and write about every single one of them.
Maybe it’ll be interesting. Maybe it’ll help me understand the exercise better myself. And maybe it’ll help you be more observant of your own roots and the mycorrhizae connecting you to everyone else. Welcome to the woods.
