Welcome! This website is here to serve all who come here: our goal is self-understanding, self-knowledge and thereafter, self-satisfaction. We will be looking at the core Human Values, personality type as delineated by the MBTI, and a few other odds and ends that might help you to understand yourself – and others in your world – a little bit better.
Preamble: Human Values and the MBTI
Human Values
The values we possess are guides to action we undertake. Values are our internal codes of conduct, the principles upon which we base our lives and make our decisions. Our values are first given to us by our parents. These values develop, expand and are tested in experience. Values are tested in action and obtain greater dimensionality and effect when we interact with other people. These people can be role models, or they may be people we clash with. We are continually tested with our choices for action and inner reactions; Human values leave us with inner peace, not inner disturbance.
Human values give us a bedrock against which we may evaluate situations, propositions, events and experience. We have something to fall back on when we engage in the practice of living with human values. Human values form our character bank, that which we can fall back on when we face challenges.
Other people impress their values upon us. We may take on the values of people we admire, such as our peers, our teachers, or elders in the community. Our moral values are often sourced from our faith. We also obtain moral values from the society and culture we engage with. The practice of human values also includes self-knowledge. This points to an important principle – that of self-inquiry. Up to 70% of our time should be spent in self-inquiry. If we do not know our inner self, then our lives will be spent in reaction to outer phenomena; we will be trapped in maya, illusion, and reacting to what the world presents to us.
Our values often include universal principles such as truthfulness, peace, love, right action and non-violence. These principles are often essential for our personal and social progress. In our observation, when we reverse the order of perception, we can often work out what values are active and driving a situation or an event or a reaction (our own)(someone else’s) when we analyse the motives of either ourselves or others. We keep in mind that behaviour reveals choices – and that choices are based on our values. Our values guide our actions.
The MBTI – Psychological Type
C.G. Jung (Swiss Psychologist) gave a broad outline of Psychological Type. He identified Introverts and Extroverts, Sensing and Intuition, Feeling and Thinking functions, and used this with clients in his practice. The MBTI takes this one step further, identifying which functions and preferences people use comfortably, their preferred styles of gathering infomation and making decisions.
The MBTI, developed by Katharine Cook Briggs and Isabel Briggs Myers, was inspired by Jung’s typology but designed as a practical tool for self-understanding and personal development. A framework of 16 types was given so that people could understand and utilise their preferences: internally for self-understanding, for harmony in the family, for insight at school (learning styles differ for types) and in the workplace. The MBTI is also useful for understanding differences in relationships, and what people like to do for their relaxation.
Understanding Sub-Values
We have referenced the Five Human Values – what we might call core values; but then, what do they look like in action? In behaviour, in feeling, in doing things, in achieving our outcomes? What might be associated examples of their aspects?
Truth might be illustrated in accuracy, discrimination, curiosity, honesty, integrity, prudence, self-reflection, sincerity and wisdom.
Right Action we know from observing and feeling courage, determination, efficiency, fortitude, healthy living, independence, intitiative and perseverance.
Peace is known via calmness, concentration, contentment, equanimity, forbearance, optimism, restraint, self-discipline, self-esteem and temperance.
Non-violence can be seen in cooperation, concern for ecological balance, fairness, justice, respect for diversity, respect for life, respect for property and benevolence.
Love as a value is experienced by compassion, charity, consideration, faith, forgiveness, hope, humanness, interdependece, selflessness and tolerance.
There may be some cross-over of sub-values within the core values. Nonetheless, practice of any of these values leads to true humaness, human life that expresses what it means to be human (homo sapiens) – the man or woman who has wisdom.
The Goals of this Website
Our goal with this website is to help people with self-understanding, and living with values which enable human flourishing, satisfaction and peace. To that end, we employ the MBTI, the Five Human Values, reference spiritual preferences, and if useful, add a little astrology. The goal is not to confuse but to enable self-uderstanding, self confidence, self discipline and self-satisfaction!
This page is © Rev. Chris Parnell, who learned about type in 1975; completed a workshop with Isabel Briggs Myers in 1980 and a member of the Australian Association for Psychological Type. He completed a Diploma in Human Values in 2004. ✺ All Rights Reserved.