“Sharing Values, Deepens Values”….Sathya Sai
Dear Readers,
In our December eNewsletter, we introduced Rosemary Marron, Director of The Institute of Sathya Sai Education, Ireland. She gave a presentation called “Sharing Values, Deepens Values” at BISSE’s Annual National Day on October 3rd 2009 at Abbey Primary School, Leicester. Please catch Part 1 of her talk on our website http://www.BISSE.org.uk
We now continue with Part 2….
“Sharing Values, Deepens Values”
...Sathya Sai
Presented by Rosemary Marron MBA MSc (MBRM)
At the Living Values Conference organised by
The British Institute of Sathya Sai Education
3rd October 2009 at Abbey Primary School Leicester.
Part 2
What is the role of Human Values in our Lives?
Values profoundly influence our lives. They are part of the very reality that each of us experience daily. They give structure to a life and point the way into the future. They help supply meaning to existence. They create specific motives, influence how we will perceive things, and help determine our thinking. They are prominent in the major choices of life, of partners, friends, occupations, and social groups. They are implicit in our conceptions of the good life. Values function both as constraints and stimuli.
An example taken from anthropological literature concerning the Hopi Indians from North-Eastern Arizona, indicates that an ideal individual can be summed up by the term hopi. This is usually translated as ‘peaceful’. It includes the following values:
(a) Strength – physical and psychic including self-control, wisdom, and intelligence
(b) Poise – tranquillity, and ‘good’ thinking
(c) Obedience – cooperation, unselfishness, responsibility, kindness
(d) Peace – absence of aggressive, quarrelsome or boastful behaviour
(e) Protectiveness – preserving and protecting human, animal and plant life
(f) Health
These values make up the Hopi – “one hearted”, good personality.
Aristotle searches for the highest value as the ultimate end which “is always sought for its own sake and never for the sake of something else”. “Hence it may be considered as certain that one’s share of happiness is contingent upon one's virtue and insight”. Ethical values and good conduct are accordingly the foundation of man's happiness.
Therefore the language or discourse of human values must be part of the language of everyday life.
Values operate across all levels
The table hereunder identifies various categories of values together with an explanation of what is at issue and sample values therein.
Name of value type |
Explanation of what is at issue |
Sample values |
1. Thing/item values |
Desirable features of inert things or of animal |
Purity(in precious stones)
Speed (in cars or horses)
|
2. Environmental values |
Desirable features of arrangements in the (nonhuman) sector of the environment |
Beauty (of landscape or urban design)
Novelty
|
3. Individual or personalvalues
|
Desirable features of an individual person (character traits, abilities and talents, features of personality, habits, life patterns) |
Bravery
Intelligence
|
4. Group values |
Desirable features of the relationships between an individual and his group (in family, profession, etc) |
Respect
Mutual trust
|
5. Societal values |
Desirable features of arrangements in the society |
Economic justice
Equality
|
What is the Concept of Value?
We can see that a concept of values is based on both the enduring and changing character that values possess. A value is a belief upon which a man acts by preference (Allport, 1961). In this context values have cognitive, affective and behavioural components. Rokeach (1973) distinguishes between two kinds on values, instrumental and terminal values. Terminal values may be self-centred or society-centred, intrapersonal or interpersonal in focus. In Sathya Sai Education in Human Values, the instrumental values are Truth, Love, Peace, Right Conduct and Non Violence.
The Measurement of Values
Do we always practice our values? This is the question of the relation of expression of a value to carrying it out in action (practice)….a very important question.
If values were to be defined as conceptions, that is, mental constructs, rather than action tendencies; we cannot automatically assume that they will or should produce action.
In light of this definition it seems best to regard a person’s expression of a value as the evidence of the value’s existence or reality, and then separately raise questions about its possible behavioural effect in that person.
The practice of values requires self-awareness. Let’s briefly draw on the Johari Window to look at the issue of values as conceptions and values in practice.
Abraham Lincoln’s main philosophy in life or the standard by which he lived his life was: “when I do good I feel good, when I do bad I feel bad”.
We can say that each of us possess many values, most of which are just lived and evoked in particular situations, rather than thought about. However in a situation where there is a choice of values, the higher value is to be chosen to be realised.
Milton Rokeach’s extensive work on human values identifies 18 instrumental and 18 terminal values, e.g.
Instrumental Values, e.g.,
• Ambitious (hard-working, aspiring)
• Broadminded (open-minded)
• Capable (competent, effective)
Terminal Values, e.g.,
• A world at peace (free of war and conflict)
Ronald Inglehart has conducted large surveys in human values, e.g.,
• World Values Survey
• European Values Survey
So what are your values?
If you were offered seven wishes for the whole of your life, what would they be?
If you were offered seven wishes for your child, what would they be?
The inquiry into values may be a values clarifying experience. While a person may be asked his/her values, he/she may never have had to put a value into words before. So while the value is there, time and reflection is needed for its emergence.
Therefore we can begin to think of a person as a system of values rather than as a cluster of traits.
What constitutes the essential character of value?
It has been said by Sathya Sai and others that values are at the goals of our striving, having as their purpose to render our existence meaningful and to achieve a fulfilment of our lives. ...” value” is considered to be present only when it can be encountered in some actual realisation, in some real occurrence. This belongs accordingly to the very raison d’etre of the value itself; otherwise we would remain locked within the realm of thought or imagination. In society we strive for it, for example, in seeking to achieve the ideal, of justice, of humanity, of a democracy worthy of man.
We end here and begin again with “What are the implications to stakeholders in the educational system?” in the April issue….
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