We all aim to find meaning in life — and my values play an important role in this.

They provide me with a structure to approach my relationships and projects. They remind me of who I am (and who I want to be) when I’m distracted or feel lost.

Here’s 13 values that give me energy and make me feel alive.

  1. Dedicate my life to an ideal that I deeply believe in and will live and die for. As Yuval Noah Harari quoted Nietzsche, “if you have a Why to live, you can bear almost any How.” In the words of Sanskrit text, I need to live by my Dharma: a combination of my Varna (passion and skills) and Seva (understanding the world’s needs and serving others).
  2. Spend my energy with only people I love, care about, and am inspired by. Everyone else does not matter because it’s not the quantity but rather the quality of friends and family that will positively shape my life.
  3. Live my life the way I want to, not how others or society expects me to. So find what makes me happy and focus only on those things. As the sociologist, Charles Horton Cooley wrote: “I am not what I think I am, and I am not what you think I am. I am what I think you think I am.” I will never live my life in the way Charles describes.
  4. Understand that everything that I “own” is not mine and detach from all materialistic and superficial desires. As Jay Shetty quoted Ali, “detachment is not that you own nothing, but that nothing should own you.” Remember, everything good in life comes in the opposite equations.
  5. Don’t judge others and focus on their negative qualities, because it is wrong. Look past the surface, which is often shaped by their own adversities and experiences, and find the beauty in each person and be compassionate. As Radhanath Swami put it, “a saintly person will hate the disease but love the diseased.”
  6. I am special, but I am not entitled to anything. My story and my experiences make me who I am — no matter what others think. I need to always remember that. People don’t care about my hardships, they care about what I can do for them and the world.
  7. Be humble, because whatever you think you accomplished does not matter. As Mother Teresa told Radhanath Swami, “If you are humble, nothing will touch you, neither praise nor disgrace, because you know who you are. God is our witness. Never be disheartened by any failure as long as you have done your best.”
  8. Motivation is fueled by action. So don’t wait to be motivated, just go do it. Action → Inspiration → Motivation
  9. To connect with people understand them and their desires. Because, as Daile Carnegie championed, “to influence others to act, you must first connect to a core desire within them.”
  10. As humans, we are afraid of the unknown, the dark — both literally and figuratively. But as we begin to discover and chart our terrain, our fear disappears. Similarly, when something seems hard or impossible, it is because it is unknown. Not because it’s hard. So first start with, “this is new, but I’m going to figure it out,” and you will be able to accomplish anything.
  11. Life is not random. As per Newton’s third law of motion, every action has an opposite and equal reaction. If you work hard, you will get what you want. If you are kind, you will feel positive and happy (although the source may vary from time to time). Don’t be lazy and let circumstance and your environment decide what happens in your life and who you become.
  12. What I think I know is far less than what I know. So use every day to be less wrong about the world, yourself, and others. As Mark Manson put it, “the more you embrace being uncertain and not knowing, the more comfortable you will feel in knowing what you don’t know.”
  13. As Radhanath Swami said, “the practical lesson in all of this is that no matter what challenges await us, how we choose to respond to them determines our destiny in this life and in the next.” In other words, our current actions affect the future — for good or bad.

More than anything, I’m writing this article to hold my self accountable.