Describe your personal principles and how they rule your life, relationships and the work that you do.
As you move through life and find value in and of different things, sometimes they'll be fleeting and sometimes they become really important for a period of time or from a certain age.
Either way, they have the capacity to change as you evolve and gain a higher perspective in life and certain situations. Oftentimes, it's not that these values change altogether for you, but they develop or simplify to be more aligned with your belief systems.
Your personal principles on the other hand will inform your values, they tend to be more universal and so when you get really clear on them, they'll present in the permanence of who you are and your personality traits. While more subtle than specific in nature compared to your values, you'll find it difficult to skirt around them because they are so engrained in the way you the operate.
That's why if you're living by your principles in one area of your life and not allowing them to have much influence elsewhere you will likely feel an imbalance.
For example:
One of your principles may be:
"To always live in the moment"
And the value you've put in place to support that is:
"Make the most of every day and build a career that supports the lifestyle I want to lead"
But in this instance, it doesn't matter how satisfied and secure you feel in your career and daily habits.. if you move away from that principle in other areas of your life by turning down opportunities or not taking risks, then you will eventually feel a misalignment (one you perhaps can't see at first).
On the other hand, you'll notice it more immediately when you abandon your values, because it'll make you feel guilty or resentful for not doing the "thing" you said means so much to you.
You can see now how getting a handle on both allows you to better determine your priorities, create intentions and build sustainable habits.
So if you got to this question on Page 38 in your In The Words journal and were unsure where to start or found you stuck to only thinking about your principles and not so much how they feed into values, try revisiting to get clear on your bigger picture.
This is your bright life.
Dana