Sixteen Words That Give You Permission…to Admit What You Want (Part 2)

Summary

Podcast Summary: "Sixteen Words That Give You Permission…to Admit What You Want (Part 2)"

Podcast: Becoming You with Suzy Welch
Host: NYU Stern Professor Suzy Welch
Episode Date: April 21, 2026
Episode Focus: Exploring “the language of values” by unpacking six of Suzy Welch’s personal values as examples, with anecdotes and research-based insights.

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Episode Overview

This episode is the second in a three-part series where Suzy Welch, an acclaimed decision-making expert and NYU professor, delves into the core idea that articulating your values—clearly and unapologetically—gives you permission to admit what you really want in life. By sharing her own values (ranks 11 to 6 of her sixteen), and the nuances around them, Suzy aims to help listeners develop the language and courage to recognize and own their own core motivations. In classic Suzy style, the conversation is honest, insightful, and peppered with real-world examples, research, and personal stories.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

The Purpose of Values Language (03:10–06:31)

• Articulating Purpose: Suzy highlights that finding purpose is scientifically linked to happiness and even delayed aging, but most people never get practical guidance on how to actually find theirs.
• Three Data Sets to Purpose:
  • Aptitudes (cognitive & emotional strengths)
  • Economically viable interests ("opportunities")
  • Values (ways you want to show up in life)
• Defining Values: Suzy distinguishes values from virtues, noting, “Values are choices... choices based on our inner deep beliefs and desires.” (06:06)
• Why Language Matters: Without speaking fluently about values, you may never fully discover or live your purpose.

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Suzy's Personal Values Inventory (11–6)

1. Luminance (Fame) – #11 (07:21–13:59)

• Meaning: The desire to be seen, recognized, or known; the value commonly associated with fame.
• Notable Quotes:
  • “It’s very, very painful to have fame as a top value and not be able to live it. It’s hard to be honest with yourself about this.” (09:01)
  • “We call that the authenticity gap… the distance between how much you have a value and how much you’re living it.” (09:58)
• Data: Only 3% of Americans have this in their top five; usually stigmatized as “vain” or “shallow.”
• Anecdote: Suzy describes a friend who denied her test result showing fame as her top value, but eventually realized (and found relief in naming) this unmet drive.
• Practical Insight: If you have luminance as a high value, don’t hide it—find healthy, fulfilling outlets (public speaking, leadership roles, community work).

2. Affluence (Money/Wealth) – #10 (15:20–25:06)

• Meaning: The value of wealth and financial security—how much is “enough.”
• Notable Quotes:
  • “How much money is enough for you? That’s a choice.” (15:28)
  • “I want you to know the number. Your classmate right here, he knows the number. …And I want you to know the number.” (16:24)
• Gating Value: Affluence determines many career/life decisions; people’s 'enough' can range from modest comfort to luxury.
• Anecdotes:
  • Business school story contrasting two students’ very different financial goals (owning an apartment above a shop vs. a private jet and helipad).
  • Suggestion: Couples should secretly write down their “enough” number and share it to avoid future conflict. (20:24)
• Data: Only 33% of Americans have affluence in their top five values; 25% have it in their bottom five.
• Practical Insight: Money as a value can shift with life circumstances; clarity helps prevent resentment and misalignment, especially in couples and family businesses.

3. Non Sibi (“Not for Oneself”/Helping People) – #9 (25:06–32:14)

• Meaning: Motivated by helping others one-on-one; distinct from systemic or world-changing help.
• Notable Quotes:
  • “Non Sibi as a value is how you want. Do you want to organize your life… around the actual feeling of helping people.” (26:00)
  • “She purposely came in dead last so someone else would not. That is non sibi.” (29:32)
• Anecdote: Touching story about Linda, a breast cancer survivor who consistently finished last in survivor walks to spare others that emotionally difficult experience.
• Data: 47% of Americans have it in their top five values; 14% at the bottom.
• Practical Insight: Knowing where you fall on non sibi is key for career and relationship alignment.

4. Family Centrism – #8 (33:09–37:57)

• Meaning: The desire for family to be the central organizing principle of one’s life.
• Notable Quotes:
  • “People tend to say that family is a virtue, family should always come first... Well, guess what? For most Americans, it doesn’t.” (33:09)
• Data: Only 9% have this as their top value; 44% in their top five; 19% in their bottom five.
• Anecdotes:
  • Suzy candidly describes being judged as a working mother whose family centrism was not her top value.
  • Story of her daughter-in-law joyfully discovering that full-time motherhood truly aligned with her values.
• Practical Insight: Family centrism is highly personal and culturally loaded. Misalignments between partners or generations are common but should be discussed, not judged.

5. Beholderism (Aesthetics/How Things Look) – #7 (39:51–44:52)

• Meaning: Elevating beauty, style, and aesthetics in environments, possessions, and self-presentation.
• Notable Quotes:
  • “You have high beholderism if you like your environments to be elevated, if you like your clothing to be beautiful, if you care about how things look.” (40:39)
• Anecdotes:
  • Suzy’s story of tracking down a museum key in Finland to see Alvar Aalto’s chairs (“I was out of my mind because my beholderism was being so fulfilled.” (44:45))
  • Friend who could care less about personal appearance—​a healthy reminder that not everyone is wired for aesthetics.
• Practical Insight: High or low beholderism can impact relationships and career choices (fashion, design, architecture, or just daily happiness). No judgment either way, just clarity.

6. Work Centrism – #6 (44:52–54:52)

• Meaning: The drive for work to be the organizing principle of life, beyond financial need.
• Notable Quotes:
  • “I love work. I’m a person for whom work is just enormously motivating… I don’t hurt anyone with my desire to work.” (47:44)
  • “If people have called you a workaholic your whole life… I’m not a workaholic. I have high work centrism.” (48:44)
• Data: Only 19% of Americans have work centrism in their top five; almost 40% in their bottom five.
• Anecdotes:
  • Listener realization: a wife who thought her husband’s “workaholism” was a problem realized they both had high work centrism but chose different family roles (50:44).
  • Story of a retired home ec teacher who, compelled by work centrism, immediately found a new job at a supermarket for the joy of “work for work’s sake.” (51:14)
• Insight: High achievement with low work centrism is possible but can be confusing—Suzy theorizes this may be due to the “broken contract” around work and achievement in today’s economy.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On “the authenticity gap” (values vs. reality):

  “We call that the authenticity gap. It’s the distance between how much you have a value and how much you’re living it.” (09:58 — Suzy Welch)

• On money/affluence clarity:

  “How much money is enough for you? That’s a choice… I want you to know the number.” (15:28, 16:24 — Suzy Welch)

• On family centrism:

  “People tend to say that family is a virtue, family should always come first… Well, guess what? For most Americans, it doesn’t.” (33:09 — Suzy Welch)

• On work and personal fulfillment:

  “If people have called you a workaholic your whole life… I’m not a workaholic. I have high work centrism. I hurt no one with my desire to work.” (48:44 — Suzy Welch)

• On becoming fluent in values:

  “The limits of my language mean the limits of my world. You can open up your world.” (55:59 — Suzy Welch, invoking Wittgenstein)

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Important Timestamps

• [03:10–04:30] – Foundations: Purpose and values methodology introduction
• [07:21–13:59] – Luminance (fame) value and stories
• [15:20–25:06] – Affluence; contrasting student stories; practical exercises for couples
• [25:06–32:14] – Non Sibi; Linda’s breast cancer survivor story
• [33:09–37:57] – Family centrism; being judged for not making family #1, generational insights
• [39:51–44:52] – Beholderism; Finnish design, real-life examples
• [44:52–54:52] – Work centrism; “workaholic,” supermarket story; achievement/work centrism paradox

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Flow, Tone, & Takeaways

With energy, humor, and real candor, Suzy Welch demystifies the process of self-discovery through the lens of values. She reminds listeners that values are not universal, nor are they “better” or “worse”—they are choices, sometimes painful to admit but necessary for living authentically. The stories are diverse—ranging from epic quests for beauty to the everyday meaning in supermarket aisle-running—and all drive one point home: Expressing your true motivations, without shame, is the most direct path to a fulfilled and purposeful life.

Actionable Advice:

• Take the Values Bridge test or reflect deeply to rank your values.
• Discuss money and family values openly in relationships.
• Own your “unpopular” values—they point to paths for authentic happiness.
• Use the language of values to bridge differences rather than judge.

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Next up: The final instalment, with Suzy’s top five values and further discussion on becoming fluent in the language of values.

Transcript

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[Susie Welch]

Hello.

[Commercial Narrator]

Guten Morgen.

[Susie Welch]

Guten Morgen. Bespeter bisch Speta. I have to tell you something. I have to tell you something that my sister, Della, 10 years ago she was traveling around the world. Her kids were completely launched.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

Her first marriage was over and she was exploring. She was looking for herself and her future.

[Susie Welch]

She was on a journey and she

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

stopped along the way at a very

[Susie Welch]

remote ashram in India. She was doing yoga, she was going

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

to meditate, and she was just going to reflect there.

[Susie Welch]

And the second day there, she was eating in the very peaceful dining area

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

and a tall, very handsome man approached

[Susie Welch]

her and asked if he could join her. He spoke to her in Italian and she was like, sure, but I don't speak Italian. And he said, oh, no worries.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

I just assumed you're Italian. You look Italian.

[Susie Welch]

And he said, actually, I'm German.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

That's German we were just listening to. Anyway, they have been together very happily ever since. It's really a beautiful love story.

[Susie Welch]

But this love story has involved my sister living in Germany half the year and spending like the past 10 years trying to learn German. She's dutiful and she practices every single day. And she would still only describe herself as proficient.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

And occasionally she sends me examples of wacky German words that are just mind

[Susie Welch]

bending, like fer schlem bess er ung.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

It means an improvement that actually makes things worse.

[Susie Welch]

What? Like, this is a fantastic word which is a perfect segue to what we

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

are going to do today on the

[Susie Welch]

podcast because we're Learning the best 16

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

words in English because they have the

[Susie Welch]

ability to set you free to be yourself and to live your purpose. That's what we're going to do today together. And I cannot wait. Because guess what?

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

You will be able to pronounce all of the words that I'm going to teach you today. And so will I. I'm Susie Welch,

[Susie Welch]

and this is becoming you. Okay, so if you're a returning listener. Hi. Hello. I want to declare my everlasting love for you.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

Thank you.

[Susie Welch]

But if you're new, let me tell you that we're in the middle of a three part series here on the Becoming you podcast about the language of values, personal values. And the way we're doing that, to get right to the point and to be super blunt, is that we're marching

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

through my personal values one by one, all 16 of them.

[Susie Welch]

Yes, I'm going public with my values as a means to teach far and wide what values are and specifically help people understand once and for all what their values are. I mean, that was a lot. I just said a lot. So let me slow down and back up a little before we roar forward. All right, look, we all want to

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

live our purpose, right? We are told that from the day we could start thinking about the big

[Susie Welch]

question, what do I want to do with my life? What should I do with my life? Everyone says, go live your purpose. It's the only way to find happiness. And they are not wrong.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

Living your purpose is actually proven scientifically to make you happy, healthier, and happier.

[Susie Welch]

And believe it or not, the scholarly journal Geriatrics just came out with a very well documented paper, a study that showed that people actually can delay aging or reverse aging. Reverse it by having and living a purpose in their lives.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

But here's the thing. In my opinion, no one ever tells

[Susie Welch]

you how to find your purpose. It's like you're just supposed to go out and find it yourself. It's going to drop out of the sky on your head. But this is where becoming you the methodology comes in. I'm a behavioral scientist and I'm a professor, and I developed this methodology over the course of 20 years. And now I teach it at NYU and all around the world.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

And every single part of the methodology is based on research and scientifically validated. But best of all, it's proven in the real world because about 500,000 people

[Susie Welch]

have used it and reported its efficacy. And if you're into data, the efficacy rate is 94%, which is pretty freaking great.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

Now, the method is simple on its face. It says to find your purpose, you need to excavate three data sets. You have to find out what your aptitudes are.

[Susie Welch]

Aptitudes are your cognitive proclivities what you're really good at, what your brain is

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

wired to be good at. And we do this in two ways.

[Susie Welch]

We talk about your intellectual cognitive proclivities and aptitudes, and then also your emotional proclivities.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

That happens to be a fancy way of talking about your personality. So that's one big data set.

[Susie Welch]

The second set of data that we excavate are your economically viable interests. We call these opportunities.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

For short, this is the work that

[Susie Welch]

calls you intellectually or emotionally or both, but also pays you what you need and want to be paid. The third set of data that you need to excavate to figure out your

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

purpose with this methodology, those are your values. Values. That's a complicated word. Everybody thinks they can define it. Then you ask them to define it.

[Susie Welch]

And you know what they start defining? They start defining virtues, things that everyone agrees are good, like fairness and honesty and decency. And those are all fabulous things, but they're virtues. Values are choices. There are 16 values that describe the way that we want and need and desire and we're motivated to show up at work, in life, in relationship, at play. Those are values. Values are choices about how we live. Choices based on our inner deep beliefs and desires. But the system, this becoming a system that leads you to your purpose, it doesn't work if you don't know your values very well. If you just know them generically or fuzzily, you've got to know them really well.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

We actually have a test for that.

[Susie Welch]

You can find it in the show notes.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

It's called the Values bridge.

[Susie Welch]

It rank orders your values from 1

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

to 16, but you can also learn

[Susie Welch]

your values just by learning the language

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

that I'm teaching in this podcast.

[Susie Welch]

These three podcasts, what is called the Welch Bristol Values Inventory, which I invented as part of my PhD research. So as part of teaching this language, I'm explaining my values one by one, starting at the very bottom, coming up to the very top. In our last podcast last week.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

Go listen to it if you want.

[Susie Welch]

We looked at my bottom five values.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

Belovedness, the value of romantic love. Eudaimonia, the value of self flourishing, Voice.

[Susie Welch]

The value of authentic self expression, Agency.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

The value of self determination, belonging, the

[Susie Welch]

value of friends and community. All right, so today we're going to talk about my middle six values. We're going to go from number 11 to number six. And look, my values are probably in

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

a totally different order than your values.

[Susie Welch]

It's just a way to teach you

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

how to speak fluent values.

[Susie Welch]

All right, let's Jump in with my number 11 value, and guess what?

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

It's luminance.

[Susie Welch]

That's the value. In a word, it's the value of fame. Sometimes people become famous by accident, all right?

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

Like, oops.

[Susie Welch]

They go viral by accident. During COVID Do you remember that video of the guy who was, like, having a work meeting and then his child came in and, like, a little strollery kind of thing behind him, and the nanny or the mother, the. The babysitter were trying to grab the baby out and, like, the whole world watched that and laughed as the guy freaked out on camera. So he was sort of famous for five minutes by accident. But most people who become famous, Lady Gaga, okay, for instance, or Madonna, they want to become famous. It's a value. We chose the words of the values very carefully because some freak people out and you say fame like, oh, God,

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

people already freak out when they find

[Susie Welch]

out that luminance is a high value for them. For me, it's number 11. For the vast majority of Americans, it's dead last. Only 3% of Americans have it as a core, a top five value, which kind of makes sense in a way, because not very many people get famous. Jim Carrey once very famously said the best day of his life would be when he couldn't go outside anymore because he would be too recognized. Oscar Wilde said the only thing worse than being gossiped and spoken about was not being gossiped and spoken about. Right? I mean, he was a person who also chose and sought fame. We judge other people and how much they want fame. She or he is a fame. You know what? I'm happy that some people become famous. Like, I'm really happy that Lady Gaga became famous. I'm happy that Florence from Florence and the Machine became famous so that everybody could enjoy and exalt in her incredible talent. But it's very, very painful to have fame as a top value and not be able to live it. It's hard to be honest with yourself about this. So I have a friend who took the values bridge, and she found me. She took it. She saw the results. She threw the results down in front of me, and she said, luminance is not my number one value. Now, I knew this person extremely well, and as soon as she said it, I knew two things.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

The efficacy of this test is extremely

[Susie Welch]

high, so it'd be very unlikely. It was wrong. But I knew something more important than that. I knew that luminance was her number one value. I knew it.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

And I knew further that the fact that she wasn't famous was a source of great pain for her.

[Susie Welch]

What's interesting about this person is that she chose a luminance adjacent feel. So she was near famous people all the time. And what I always thought was very strange is that she was constantly complaining about her clients. But when I saw her values, everything clicked for me. I thought, oh, this is a person who has very high luminance and feels frustrated by the fact that she's not famous and jealous of the people who are. That gap, that gap for her was huge.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

We call that the authenticity gap. It's the distance between how much you have a value and how much you're living it. So for her luminance, the desire to be famous was a very high value, and her gap was like 90%. She was around a lot of people who were famous and it filled her with anger. And, you know, this was one of those moments where understanding what your values are and how much you are actually living them or not can change your life. And that's what happened in this situation. She was confronted with the fact that truly inside, her number one value was luminous. She wanted fame, no shade. I mean, she wasn't hurting anybody with that desire. As soon as she saw it, she was able to actually let go of her anger at the people that she worked with. She was able to say, this is not about them. I have no reason to be angry at them. This is about a disappointment with something that happened with me. That I wanted to be an actress in this case, and I didn't have the self confidence or perhaps the skill, and I went into an adjacent field and. And so her value of luminance didn't go away, but her understanding of herself shot up and this was all for the good. I mean, it started off with her being very, very angry about seeing her values result. And I think luminance can stir up some real emotions in us because most people are not able to be famous. So you can really, really want it, but you don't always have the ability to get it.

[Susie Welch]

Now, for the vast majority of Americans, if you're listening to this, fame is probably not a value.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

It's going to be down at the very bottom.

[Susie Welch]

It's a definitely a peripheral value for most people.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

For me, it's pretty moderate.

[Susie Welch]

I mean, look, I'm here doing this podcast, right? I obviously have a comfort level with people knowing who I am. I. I'm often recognized on the street in New York, I'm recognized on the subway, and I don't dislike it. And I'm trying to be Candid here. It's hard to be honest about Lubin is, again, because of the sort of social sniff off of it. But I don't mind it when people, like come up to me in a restaurant and say, I've read your book or I love your podcast. And by the way, if you're loving this podcast, would you please leave us? A review really helps. Thank you very much. But anyway, that's luminance.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

If it's high for you first, maybe don't have a job where you're under a bushel. I mean, there's something in you that wants to be seen. But here's the killer thing about having a high luminance, and it's big. If you have high luminance, this is where knowing what your aptitudes are, which is the second part of the becoming you methodology comes in. You can want to be famous, but it takes a lot of skill to be famous. I mean, famous singers, Beyonce, Lady Gaga, you know, Florence, all right, they have talent that cannot be denied. So here's the thing about this value. You can have it and no shade again, but you may not have the capacity, the capability to get it. And so if you have it as a high value and you have a high authenticity gap, something's going on, okay? So either it's lack of self confidence, lack of access to the things that help you become famous, which you need time and resources, you need support. But it also may be that you

[Susie Welch]

just don't have the voice or you

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

don't have the ability to act, or you don't have the. You don't have what it takes to become famous. That's a conversation you have to have with yourself. I'm not a therapist, but I think you could have it with a professional. Perhaps that's a grappling you have to do. The same person who I mentioned earlier who had the high luminance and worked out her issues around it, had a friend in Hollywood who had high luminance. And it took him 15 years to come to terms with the fact that he was not actually going to become the kind of writer, producer, director he wanted to be. He just couldn't break in because he wasn't in the league of the other people. So luminance, it's one of these things where you can have that value, but you can't always live it. You can't. But you can find ways to be seen, you know, at your job. If you have a job where maybe

[Susie Welch]

you have a role with public speaking

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

or in your community Maybe you become a person who has a role in politics in your small community. If you want to feel seen and have a sense of fame, I have no problems with people trying to pursue that to get some feeling of it. All right, that is luminance.

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[Susie Welch]

I've heard my whole life that she indented the margarita.

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And then we're going to investigate those stories and find out how much of it is true. He gets a patent one month before the Wright Brothers. Oh my God. Please follow and listen to Family Lore, an Odyssey podcast, available now on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you get your shows.

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[Susie Welch]

All right, let us move on to the next value. My number 10 value, remember we're going backwards is.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

Drumroll, please.

[Susie Welch]

Affluence, money, wealth. There's two values that I call gating values, okay? Where they sort of like they're top of the funnel. Everything kind of, you know, is. Is decided by where you stand, stand on them. One of them is place, which we'll talk about next week, like where you want to live. The other is money. How much money is enough for you? That's a choice. And, you know, there's all these presumptions, oh, all Americans want to be rich. All people want. No, there's a real continuum about how much money is enough for different people.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

Some people, you know, there's that Bruno

[Susie Welch]

Mars song, I want to be a billionaire so effing bad. And he's like riding in a car throwing money at that's really wanting wealth.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

Look, we all want financial security. The things thing that's really important. What the test is trying to find out. And even if you don't use the test, what you need to find out and what you really need to know candidly about yourself is how much money you know, in almost a dollar figure, how much money fulfills your value of affluence. And so, look, I one time had an amazing experience around this teaching my MBAs. I had a student in my class, he was German, and we were talking about affluence. And he said, look, I am very clear on this with myself. I just want enough money to afford the apartment over the store that I want to open in Essen. Essen is a town in Germany. And I said, okay. And he said, that's just not that much. I will have enough for a vacation a year. And he had this sort of sense about affluence. It was obviously not a top value for him. If I had to guess, it was probably 11 or 12. Okay. Sitting right next to that student was another student, and he was fairly coming out of his skin. Okay. He. He was agitated as the student from Germany was speaking. I knew a lot about this student because he was spending the semester trying to switch fields. He had been in one field, and he was trying to make a big left turn into another field. And he said it was because the work in the other field was more interesting to him. But the weird thing about him that I knew from office hours was that he loved his previous field and he had mixed feelings about leaving it. But he was doing everything like networking crazily to move into this new field. He was very agitated. I could feel his body language. And he said, professor Welch, you want to know. You want to know the number? The amount of money that we want? And I said to him, you know, actually, my friend, I don't want to know the number. Especially in this public setting with large class. I said, I want you to know the number. Your classmate right here, he knows the number. It's the amount of rent above the shop in Germany. And I want you to know the number. You don't have to tell me. He goes, no, you want to know it. It was getting, like, kind of like combative with me. And I said, I. I don't want to know it. And he said, well, I want to know it. Which was an interesting admission. So I said to him, okay, okay, let's not talk numbers. Let's do this, my friend. I said, when you fly to Europe with your Family or for work? How do you get there? Business class or first class? And he looks at me shocked. And I said, what is it? And he said I am flying my own plane.

[Susie Welch]

And he said, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

I said, okay, so is it a charter? I get you now. Is it a charter like a net jets where you sort of have a fraction ownership or do you like own a plane?

[Susie Welch]

Like planes are very expensive, private plane,

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

$10 million more, right? And he said, well of course, my own plane.

[Susie Welch]

I said, okay, now we're getting a

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

sense of how much money is enough for you. And it's quite different from the student sitting next to you, okay? And then I said to him, when you fly home and you land your private jet probably at Westchester Airport, which is close to the Connecticut suburbs, I said, how do you get to your house in northern Westchester County?

[Susie Welch]

How do you get there?

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

Do you get driven or do you have a helicopter? And again he looked at me, he was dead serious by the way. He said, a helicopter? And I said, and do you land on a helipad and your kids have their own helipads? I was kind of at this point, the class was laughing and it was getting kind of wild. And I said to him, what about a helipad pad for each child? And he said, not really joking, what's wrong with that? That is a different level of affluence as a value. I'm going to put the kid who wants the store in Germany, the little rental above the store in Germany, it may be 9, 10, 11, 12, who knows? But this kid, I'm going to tell you, had one on affluence, the accumulation of wealth.

[Susie Welch]

I don't care about the reasons if

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

he's paying his taxes, as I like to say, I don't care, okay? And if the money is gotten properly,

[Susie Welch]

all these things need to be said, I suppose.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

So listen, his is probably at number one. And by probably I mean is it number one. This led me to think about him changing fields in the field he had been in where he loved the work. It was not a high paying field. And he was trying to go into a field where the pay was much. He was trying actually to go into entrepreneurship, which is in many ways if it works out for you, where you can make the most money. And I understood his hunger to change fields in a totally different way. He was not motivated by what he was saying, which was the work over there was less interesting to him.

[Susie Welch]

It wasn't about the work, it was about the affluence.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

And we all have our own story to tell on this front.

[Susie Welch]

I have this suggestion. There's so many money problems in couples.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

I actually believe that before a couple

[Susie Welch]

gets married, they should each take a piece of paper and write down on it the money. The amount of money they would have in the bank where they would say, that's enough. And then they should fold it up and hand it to each other, because

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

that's a big thing to find out after you're actually married.

[Susie Welch]

It's an important thing to know up front, but. But even more important, it's important to know it about yourself. How many Americans do you think have this as a top five value? It's only 33%. I mean, I think the supposition is everybody wants it, but it's not true. Get a load of this. 25% have it as a peripheral down in the bottom five. I'm sort of squarely in the middle, and I have a. Look, I am a complicated situation because I grew up in very modest means, all right?

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

I.

[Susie Welch]

My family had sometimes had money and sometimes didn't have money. And it went up and down and up and down depending on whether or not my father was well and had a job. And so I had this very uncertain relationship with money. Sometimes we had great vacations, and other times we were eating what my brother was able to catch, going fishing. And this made me nutty about money. And I then was very, very motivated. When I graduated from business school, I had the option to stay at Harvard Business School and get my PhD. And I said no to that, to go work at Bane because of what Money? I mean, and I even said it out loud, like, I want money. I was driving a car at that time, a Toyota Tercel, where you could see the highway through the floorboard. Now, as time went on, my life really changed. I started to work, I made some money. I then entered into a marriage where

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

I became very financially secure. And I believe that these seismic events

[Susie Welch]

contributed to money becoming less and less of a priority to me because it doesn't have to be. You know, I remember one time I was. When I was in business school, I was sitting next to a guy who had come from Goldman Sachs to business school, and then he was going back to Goldman Sachs, and I being very judgmental in those days, even though money was a motivator for me, me, me, please forgive me. I was 26 years old. I said to him very snarkily, so why are you going back to Goldman Sachs? I said it kind of like sarcastically, like, there could only be one reason. And he turned to me with complete earnestness and he said, I just love the instruments. And what he was talking about was financial instruments. And he goes on, he like went into a rhapsodotic kind of like a, almost like X rated rhapsody about how much he loved financial instruments. I was like my mouth hanging open, like whoa. I didn't know somebody could do that. I watched this person's career because he was so fascinating to me. He stayed in investment banking. He's now a big partner at Goldman Sachs. I think he really did love the financial instruments. I'm not saying he wasn't motivated by money also, but he actually cared about finance. Finance is a whole field. I mean, there's people who get PhDs in it because they love it. So we do have data that shows that people who are in the field of finance actually have affluence as a higher value. So I can't unpick it if they're

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

not hurting anybody and they're paying their taxes.

[Susie Welch]

This is capitalist free society. And they have a right to go work at a job where they can fulfill their value of affluence. Of course this gets very complicated because there are so many professions where people, on the face of it, just so obviously deserve more. Like elementary school teachers.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

I wish that we lived in a world, and I bet you wish it too, where elementary school teachers were paid more so that they could have their value. Most elementary school teachers, I'm going to guess they have the value top value of non sibi, the desire to help people or radius, the desire to change the world. Or maybe they have the value of low scope, where they want to have predictability and psychological safety, which you can often feel with children. The choice you make when you have the high non sibi, it often means that you have to compromise on your value of affluence. Is that fair? No, it's not fair. And if I made the rules it would be different. I would be remiss in finishing this part about affluence if I did not say something about how often the value of money can be toxic in families. And I actually there's two becoming you coaches. We have certified coaches in the Becoming youg methodology whose practices are entirely focused on bringing the values work into families so that families can actually start to talk about money and how much money matters. Family business is a very, very complicated thing. And my hats are off to anybody who stays in a family business and sustains it. Because what happens is you. You start to hope and expect that everybody in one generation as the the same values as the next generation. And there's a couple of lightning rod values within family units. Affluence is one of them. I mentioned earlier that I think that couples should fold up the piece of paper and hand it to each other. I think in family businesses that wouldn't

[Susie Welch]

be a bad idea as well. So it's a complicated politicized value. I get that. But again, the thing you have to be clear on to understand and to live your purpose fully is where you are on the continuum, how important the accumulation of wealth is to you. And for me, it's number 10. Where is it for you? All right, we're moving on now to my ninth value, non sibi, which means not for oneself. This is the value of the desire to help people help people in a very intimate, one on one individualistic way. There's another value for wanting to help people in a way that changes the world. That's radius. We'll talk about that next week. It's one of my top five values, radius, but right now we're talking about non city. We don't use the word that has been used in other values inventories around this one, which is altruism. Because altruism is generally a virtue. This is a Good Samaritan. There's somebody who's, you know, suffering on the other side of the road and you go over and you help them. They're in need.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

That's altruism.

[Susie Welch]

And it is a virtue when you help people who are in need. Non sibi as a value is how you want. Do you want to organize your life, organize your days, organize your profession around the actual feeling of helping people.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

It's very interesting.

[Susie Welch]

We have found with some of the data that we've collected, pediatricians and nurses tend to have non sibi as a number one value. This impulse to help people in intimate ways, you were looking right in their eyes. 47% of Americans have non SIBI in their top five values and 14% have it down at the bottom. Now, do we hate these people who have it as a peripheral value? I've had many students, not many, but I've had some students who have non sibi down 15 or 16. Generally, you know, if they saw you, you know, struggling and you fell down in a hallway, they'd run over and help you. What they don't want to do is have careers in hr. They don't generally want to be in service working with clients. It doesn't. Helping people is not what Turns their crank. Now, you may prefer to hang out with people who have high non sibi like you.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

You like people who like to help people.

[Susie Welch]

Let me tell you my absolute favorite

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

example story of non sibi. I love it and I'm not going to tell you the person's name.

[Susie Welch]

Why?

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

Because she's so non sibi. She doesn't. She's not doing it so people will know her. She's doing it because of her value or non sibi. So let's just call her Linda. This is an absolutely true story, by the way, documented in newspapers and so forth. Linda was a mild mannered administrator in a government office in a small town in Maine, minding her own business, living her life and helping people in ways. She was a friend, she was a good sister and mother and so forth, member of her community. And then at age 50, like so many other women, she discovered a lump and she went to the doctor and ended up that she had breast cancer and she had surgery. The prognosis was excellent and she went forward and they had chemotherapy. As the chemotherapy wound down, as happens in so many treatment centers with cancer, they started to recommend that Linda start to participate in survivor walks and runs. This is to build your strength back, but it's also to have you meet other survivors and it's to build encouragement for you and people stand and they cheer and it's meant to make you feel very good. But she went every week and every weekend to these survivor runs and she found that they made her feel so much worse because she kept on coming in dead last and she was like, am I not really getting better? I just feel so desperate.

[Susie Welch]

This is.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

Everybody's cheering, but I can barely finish these now. As time went on, she did get better. She got her strength back and she started not coming in dead last, but she made a decision and that was, she quietly decided for herself that going forward, she was completely cured of cancer, by the way, and it has not reoccurred since the story. So 10 years cured, she made the decision that going forward, every single weekend, she would drive around. I mean, she would drive up to 200 miles, she would drive around on the weekends and she'd go to survivor walks and runs and she would participate. She would find the people who were dragging, who were coming in dead last. She'd run up alongside them, she'd ask how they're doing. She looked like she was just doing the race because she was in cancer treatment. And she would say, how are you doing? And they'd be like, I, I'M really dragging here.

[Susie Welch]

This is, this is quite hard.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

And she'd say, yeah, yeah, just go on without me. My knee kind of hurts. I'll be behind you. And she purposely went out weekend after weekend after weekend. And she purposely came in.

[Susie Welch]

I can barely tell this story.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

She purposely came in dead last so somebody else would not. That is non civvie. I mean that that's helping people in an intimate one on one way. And just that she didn't know their names. She needed and wanted to help. That was her value.

[Susie Welch]

And she did this under the complete cover of silence.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

She told no one but her husband. And she did this, I mean, I think for three or four years it went on. And then she and her husband were at a church barbecue and her husband, he loved her and admired her and

[Susie Welch]

he boasted about her to a person

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

that they knew at church who was married to a reporter.

[Susie Welch]

And the reporter did a story about

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

it and she was devastated. I mean she asked them not to do it and they said this is a beautiful story, people need to know. And it was like a real interesting, you know, like should it be or shouldn't it be?

[Susie Welch]

Her cover was kind of blown and

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

she was very upset about it.

[Susie Welch]

And a year went by and she started to do it again because enough

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

time passed and people. I tried to actually get her on the podcast. She was like, no, don't you understand? I don't want to be known for this. She is the queen of non city.

[Susie Welch]

It's almost a personality type to really get so much visceral pleasure out of helping people in small, intimate, individualistic ways. You can organize your whole life. What are we doing this weekend? Let's go find something that sort of fulfills that need. What job do you have? I love the feeling of helping people.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

It's interesting, right?

[Susie Welch]

You would think with the work I do helping people find their purpose that non civic would be like a top value for me. But this, but that work, the work that I'm doing is covered very strongly by radius. I always frame up my work with becoming you as a is the war against nihilism. There's too many people who feel like life doesn't matter, that it's not worth living, we're all going to die. And I feel like becoming you, which helps people find their purpose, is the antidote that we are waging the war of love against nihilism. So when I think about the work of becoming you, I'm like very 20,000ft.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

I'm really.

[Susie Welch]

That's a very. That that's what differentiates radius from non sibi. It's like I'm talking about systemic change related to that.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

I used to do one on one coaching.

[Susie Welch]

It took me away from what I wanted to do, which was to develop the methodology, you know, to do the research around it. And so I didn't enjoy so much the one on one look. I of course really like the people I work with, but I didn't want to devote more time to it. And that's a reflection of my somewhat lower non sibi.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

The question for you is where you

[Susie Welch]

fall on non sibi. Non sibi can be a wonderful value to live into, but the important thing to look at is your authenticity gap with it. Again, you may hold it as a value and hold it very high, and if you've got a gap, it means you're not fulfilling it enough.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

That can actually be quite painful.

[Susie Welch]

It's in you. You want to help people. But other times you have non sibi as a low value or lower, like I have it as a moderate value. And you can have a negative authenticity gap, which means your work is kind of making you do it more than you want. These are things to really pay attention to, both how high or low the value is for you, and also how much you're living it or not living it. I will say one last thing about non civi. It's a value that really matters in relationships. It's complicated when you have high non city and your partner has low non city because you will find how you spend your time to be really different. I mean, this is an impulse to want to help people and organize your life around like what you're doing again on the weekend, on vacation, when you're thinking, thinking about your partnership and why it's working or why it isn't working. The non city value is one to take a close look at. All right now we're coming up on one of the big lightning rod values. I have it at number eight, sort of dead center, right?

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

There's 16 values.

[Susie Welch]

It's family centrism, how much you want your family to be the organizing principle of your life. This is so contentious because people tend to say that family is a virtue, family should always come first, family comes first, family comes first. Well, guess what? For most Americans, it doesn't. Most Americans, wanting to have your family be the organizing principle of your life, wanting every single time you make a decision or take an action that family considerations drove it. That is the case for only 44% of Americans and only 9% have family centrism as their top value. How do you like that? All right. You know, I wrote about this for the Wall Street Journal right before Thanksgiving. Because right before Thanksgiving, people are making plans with planes, trains and automobiles to get home for Thanksgiving. And not everyone is happy about it. So right before Thanksgiving, I thought, you know, everybody's turning their lives upside down, travel to get home for Thanksgiving, just like they do every year. How many people really, really have family as a top value? I wanted to know. So we took a close look at the data. 9% and 44%, that's less than half, have it in the top five values. We judge each other about this day and night, don't we? And 19%, almost 20%, have it in the bottom five. Now, when I was. I'm a mother of four, when I was raising my kids and I was working full time, I was judged non stop for my family centrism. My level of it, which was I said to my kids, I love you very much. I'm going to spend my life helping you be you. But guess what? I'd like you to help me be me. I love work. I'm going to continue working. Someday you're going to be gone and

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

I'm still going to be here.

[Susie Welch]

And I don't want to be thinking, who am I and what did I

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

do with my life?

[Susie Welch]

This method worked out for me. I was living my values. I had no resentment towards my children and they're my best friends. But I was judged bitterly by family members like, oh, my God, you know, I remember somebody who will remain nameless

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

here telling me, your kids are going

[Susie Welch]

to be so effed up because you did not put them first. And I said, as soon as you can show me the study that has the absolute linear correlation between how much a mother works and how emotionally healthy her kids are. I will stay home. I loved my kids in their bone marrow. I still do. I endeavor to know who they were. Sometimes they did not come first because family centrism was not my number one value. Sometimes they did. I mean, there was a time where my son was a senior in high school and he was. Wrestling was a huge important part of his life. And he came to me and my husband and he said, I really need you at every match this year. It matters to me. And we blew up a lot of things to get to every single, and I mean this word very literally, every single stinking match. I mean, there's a special place in heaven for the parents of wrestlers. I mean, if you've Ever drove, driven carpool with a bunch of high school wrestlers. Come sit by me and we can, we can, we can cry into our hands together remembering those experiences. Anyway, in general, I was not organized.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

I didn't wake up in the morning

[Susie Welch]

and think, you know, kids, family first, second and third. And to this day I love my kids and they love me, but we do not organize our lives around each other. That's why my family center, centrism is dead center for me. Where is it for you? Do you organize your life around it? If you do and you love it and you don't have an authenticity gap, power to you. I mean, congratulations. Great. Guess who's just like that? My daughter in law.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

She was a public school teacher.

[Susie Welch]

I think she thought she was going to go right back to teaching. She was so identified with her career. And guess what? She was a spectacular teacher. And then along came her kids. I suggested that they get babysitting help, okay, because she's on her own. And my son said to me, mom, Michelle has found her purpose. It's at home with the kids. I could have wept from happiness for

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

them because they knew their values and they were living them. No conflict, they understood her value. His value also top value, family centrism. And they were fully living into it.

[Susie Welch]

Family centrism, again, your choice. Sometimes a very hard choice to explain, sometimes a very hard choice that you feel like you have to defend. I mean, the statistics would show that

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

the number of women in childbearing years

[Susie Welch]

who are having children is dropping. I don't know if that's just because it's very hard to bring your kids and expensive to bring your kids into the world today, or if it's because women are finally coming to terms and able to say, in our social and cultural environment, family centrism is not my number one value. Don't impose it on me. It's a lower value for me. Look, the data of it only being in the top five for 44% of Americans would suggest that's maybe what's going on. Again, I know that family is thought to be a virtue in many cultures. When we finally start having the values bridge being used in other cultures, we're starting it in China and India and the UK Coming up soon, it'll be interesting to see where family centrism falls.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

There's definitely a cultural component to this one. All right, that is family centrism.

[Susie Welch]

Where is it for you? Where does your family expect it to be for you? Lot of conversations in family when some

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

people have high family centrism and other

[Susie Welch]

people have it low. But you know what? Let's not point fingers and say you're this, you're that. Let's talk about how family centrism is a choice and some people are higher and some people are lower. Let's build the bridge to have the conversation instead of picking on each other.

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[Susie Welch]

My next value coming in at number seven. So we're creeping towards my top values is one that when people find out they have it in their top values, they I say they often have to go into a support group. They're kind of mortified. They're like, no, no, it can't be. This is the value of beholderism. The value that reflects how much you care about how things look. Your house, your stuff, yourself. It's one of the oldest value values in the scholarly literature. It's typically called aesthetics. Okay, that's what it was called in the Alport Strang Values inventory in the 1940s in the Schwartz values inventory in the 1990s. Aesthetics, we call it beholderism. I think it has a little bit more understanding to it once you. You hear what it means. You have high beholderism if you like your environments to be elevated, if you like your clothing to be beautiful, if you care about how things look.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

If you look at a table that

[Susie Welch]

says set and you want to change something about it.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

I show my students a video where there's this woman, and she's running around

[Susie Welch]

her apartment, and she says, I love stuff. I love stuff on top of stuff. Stuff like this, stuff like that.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

And she's just pointing to all the

[Susie Welch]

beautiful stuff in her home.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

And, you know, she is getting joy and. And she's probably spent a huge amount of time curating that space. You just get the feeling that her days are spent curating her space to have beautiful stuff.

[Susie Welch]

This person has high beholderism. I always think about Tom Ford as being the high king of beholders, and everything looked perfect. Now look.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

No shade on people for whom beholderism is a lower value. I am related to many of them and have many friends who are like this.

[Susie Welch]

They just don't care how their houses

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

look or how they look. I actually have a friend who is probably beholderism at number 16. She is absolutely brilliant. She has unbelievably high achievement. I mean, I could list all of her values for you, and it's. Beholderism is not one of them.

[Susie Welch]

And how.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

What is one of the ways I know this? Well, she often walks around with a gigantic knot in her hair. She's about my age.

[Susie Welch]

I mean, she has a huge knot in the back of her hair.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

And I see it, and I say to her, can I take it out of your hair? That's my high beholderism, because what business is it of mine?

[Susie Welch]

And she says, literally, she'll say to

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

me, oh, I just don't care.

[Susie Welch]

Now, for a long time, I would literally think.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

I know this is gonna sound terrible, but I would think there's something wrong with her. There's nothing wrong with her.

[Susie Welch]

Her knot in her hair is not hurting anybody.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

She has had a spectacular professional career. She just doesn't care about her looks at all.

[Susie Welch]

I mean, not defiantly, by the way.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

I mean, there's not a screw loose. She just. She puts everything in front of her looks. And I think her mind is a beautiful thing. And she's just never gotten to a place where it matters to her. She also doesn't care when her clothing doesn't match. Or when she wears the same thing five days in a row, which I've seen her do.

[Susie Welch]

This is just lower beholders.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

Hey, by the way, high beholders and people and low beholders and people can drive each other out of their mind. I mean, in marriages. Well, usually marriages with people with very different levels of beholderism, they don't happen because it shows up really early. Because one person wants to spend a ton of time at the gym or shopping for, for something special in the living room and the other person is like, this is not how I want to spend my time. Again, just to make a quick point, values are life organizing principles. If you have high beholderism, you're organizing your life around elevating your, your stuff,

[Susie Welch]

your spaces, your how you look.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

It's how stuff looks. And if you have lower beholderism that

[Susie Welch]

is like just not of any interest to you. I mean, I was not too long ago giving a speech at Google in, in New York.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

If you've ever been to their offices

[Susie Welch]

in New York, you know what I'm about to say. I mean, aesthetically so beautiful. And I, I thought, look, I'm blowing up my career. I've got to work in this. I mean, people make decisions about where to work based on how the off. If you have high beholderism based on how the office looks and feels. And people with low beholders, they just don't care. Other things matter more. Now here's the thing about beholderism. People with high beholderism tend to find each other. The whole fashion industry, everybody is high beholderism. Of course, architects tend to find each other. Speaking of architects, my dad was an architect. And when I grew up in my house, we talked about what we used to call design design all the time. What was beautiful, what buildings were beautiful, which pill were beautiful. And there was an architect that my father revered. His name was Alvar Aalto, Finnish architect. He designed furniture and chairs. And when I was my Jack and I were in, my husband and I were in Yaroslava, Finland, which is a

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

tiny town, seventh largest town in Finland.

[Susie Welch]

It's got four people in it, but it has a huge conference center there. And we were there both giving speeches together. I found out that the museum of Alvar Aalto was in Yaroslava, Finland. I said, jack, we've got to go, we've got to go. You will not believe how beautiful these chairs are. He's like, okay, Susie, not really getting all bent out of shape about a Finnish architect's chairs. We went to the museum. It was closed. I tracked down the mayor of Yaroslava, Finland, and said, do you have the key to the museum?

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

Lo and behold, she did, right?

[Susie Welch]

As I said, there were only four people in this town. And she opened up the museum for us. We actually got to know where she was a fabulous person. We ended up having dinner with her. But she walked us around this museum and there's a picture of Jack and me standing in of front, front of all of these Alvar Alto chairs, which were sort of up on a wall like paintings. And I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm radiating. I'm like glowing around and he's looking long suffering. I was out of my mind because my, my, my beholderism was so, being so fulfilled. My love of design, my love of aesthetics. All right, that's high beholderism. You would think it would pop higher for me than number seven, but it just so happens that, that there are six values that matter more to me. This is the beauty of understanding our value system. Okay, so we one time had an influencer, a big influencer, fabulous human being who came to one of our three day intensives. I teach Becoming youg on the NYU campus in three intense days. Anyone can come. You can find out more about it on the website if you want. And I teach the whole methodology in three locomotive like days. She got her results back. Beholderism for her was number one. She spent her whole life working in fashion magazines and living in the fashion world. And it's been complicated for her because that's a hard business. And she saw it, and at first she was like, I don't get it. I don't get it. And then slowly, like the next hour later, there was a break. And she came up to me and she said, this explains everything. It explains every choice I made, even some choices that weren't good for me. Because the draw towards aesthetics and people who loved aesthetics as much as she did, was the driving motivator. Some people say, is that really a value? It's really a value. And it can really, really help you find your purpose if it's high for you. And of course not, it doesn't play into your purpose if it's low. But figure out where it is for you. All right, Moving on to the last value, another one that makes people's heads blow up with opinions. And this is the value of work centrism, how much you want work to be the organizing principle of your life. I mean, time was that you just assumed your life was going to be organized around your work. A couple of generations ago, not so much anymore. So listen to this data. Work centrism, which is my number six value out of 16, so pretty high value for me is a top five value for only 19% of Americans. And it's a peripheral value, a bottom five value for almost 40% of Americans. It's in the middle for Everybody else. Only 20% of Americans want to organize their life around work and find work to, for work sake, just to be a driving motivation. And almost 40% say work is what you do to live. It's not the other way around. You absolutely just work so that you can have, you can do the cool stuff you want to do when you're not working. So I, I love work. I, I'm a person for work is just enormously motivating. I, when I was a little girl in my artsy fartsy, hippie dippy family, I saw, I was the store with my mom and I saw a woman walk in in a bow shirt, that's what he used to wear in those days, and carrying a briefcase. And I could immediately sense that she worked okay. And I said to my mom, what is that? And I pointed to the briefcase and my mom went, yuck. And I remember thinking to myself, I want one of those. I don't really often like, want to unpick. I'm, I'm not in the business of figuring out why everybody has their values. That's a whole separate field. It's called values formation. It's for you and your therapist to talk about where your values come from. I'm much more interested as a scholar and as a person who is a practitioner in this space. I'm much more interested in taking your values as they are and figuring out how to get you to your purpose in the fastest and most joyful way so I can think about where my high work centrism came from. I'm a real outlier in my family and I'm a real outlier in American society in general, American culture. My kids, who are all gainfully employed, do definitely have lower work centrism. I work on a team with other people. I am sure most people don't have as high work centrimus centrism as I have. But I'll tell you something, my close friends do. We tend to find each other because we don't have to apologize for our high work centrism. You know, by the way, that you

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

have high work centrism, if people have

[Susie Welch]

Called you a workaholic your whole life, and you've been so. You feel so defended about it. I'm not a workaholic. I have high work centrism. I hurt no one with my desire to work. I don't. I mean, I've asked. I do put work before other things because I love it. And I think I'm building something with my company, and it brings me great joy and pleasure and intellectual stimulation, all things that really, really matter to me, as you'll see with my top values next week. But I would say that this work centrism can cause divorces, it can cause breakups, it can cause broken friendships because we judge each other. Here's one of my favorite work centrism stories. I was on the road with Hoda Kotb, the great Hoda. She has these programs where people come from around the world to spend a couple of days with her. And I was one of the speakers at one of her and one of her events. It was beautiful. And a woman came up to me, and she came up to me. She had actually read my book, 10-10-10, my first book. And she said, I want to talk to you. My husband works at ge. My husband had worked at ge. So this is why she was approaching me about it. And she said, he's a total workaholic. He would have that GE meatball tattooed on his ass if he could. Okay, that's the logo of GE is called the GE Meatball. And I said to her immediately, I don't use that word. Nope, I don't use that. I think your husband, he loves his work, right? She said, he loves it. Loves it to death. And I said, do you think that there's a possibility that he has high work centrism and you have low work centrism? That's another way of looking at it, isn't it? He loves his work. I said, is he hurting anybody with his work? And she said, no. And I said, well, then it's high work centrism, and you have possibly lower work centrism. And she said, I think it's actually wrong. I think he has high work centrism, and so do I. But we made the decision as a couple that I would give up my work to take care of the children. I said, oh, that's a different story. So instead of him coming home and working less, how about you going and starting to work now? She had told me her kids had grown up. And she said, I like that idea a lot better. I mean, it was a crazy thing. I mean, it was one of the most intense conversations I've ever had. There's a crazy kicker to this story.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

About a month or two later, I was teaching one of those three day

[Susie Welch]

intensives that I mentioned earlier. And I told that story because I think it's a good story to tell about work centrism. And at the break, a young woman came down and she said, that story you just told, that was my mother. She sent me to this. She sent me to this intensive. And what you, that point that you made to her blew her mind. That the whole point wasn't that she hated that my father had high work centrism. She had it too, and she wanted to express it. I mean, that's a huge, huge eureka for people, isn't it?

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

Let me tell you one last story about work centrism, which I love.

[Susie Welch]

I think it's actually the best illustration

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

of it that I've ever encountered in the wild. I was at a party, I met the aunt of a friend. This woman had been a home EC teacher in middle school, in a public school system her whole life, and she loved it. She taught sewing and other home EC skills to middle school students. But in the school system she was in, you were required to retire at age 60. And she had done so. She had started working when she was 21, worked all the way to 60, and then was retired. She went home and she was looking around the house and she said to me, that lasted about two days. She did not need money. They were comfortable, they had planned carefully. And this was not about. In fact, there had been no plans for her to work after she was retired from home ec. She looked around the house, looked this way, looked that way, and she thought, well, this will not do. And she said, she told me she got into her car and she started driving towards town. And the first thing she saw was this really large supermarket. And she pulled into the supermarket, she found the manager and she said, do you have any jobs? And he said, what do you want to do? And she said, what do you got? And he said, well, we actually are looking for people who run up and down the aisles and gather the groceries for people who call in their orders

[Susie Welch]

or bring in their orders.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

And then we do the grocery running. You want to do that? He looked at her because she was

[Susie Welch]

like in her 60s.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

And she said, I love that idea. Is there like a, you know, is there any reason why I couldn't do it? And he said, no, let's give it a try. So she like started that day as an aisle runner.

[Susie Welch]

And she told me she loves it.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

She said, I get up in the

[Susie Welch]

morning, I go to work.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

I, you know, everybody's like half my age. I go up and down the aisles.

[Susie Welch]

It's really fun.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

And I check out at 5 or 6 o' clock at night. And I said, oh, did you ever know you wanted to do that?

[Susie Welch]

And she said it wasn't the aisle running, it's the work.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

And she said, if I'd gone to that supermarket and they'd say, no, we're not hiring, I would have kept driving till I got to the Chick Fil a and I would have gone in and asked if they'd work. She left work for work's sake.

[Susie Welch]

It gave her meaning, it gave her momentum. You know, I'm not inside her heart or her brain. She just loved the activity of work.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

She found it running up and down the aisles in this supermarket. And she was just filled with delight about it. That's high work centrism. Now, low work centrism is just this desire as I described earlier. But I want to say one last thing about low work centrism, because sometimes people think about their values or they take the values bridge and they find a very interesting dynamic common.

[Susie Welch]

Okay, what I'm about to say, they

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

have high achievement and low work centrism. High achievement, high desire for success, high desire to be seen and felt as a success, low desire to work. This is a, hmm, how does that happen? Kind of moment.

[Susie Welch]

And I don't know the answer for it.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

I asked my students the other day, what's the reason for this? And they had their own explanations about it. But I have my own. I have a theory. And the theory is this. The contract around work is broken. For many people. It used to be if you felt as if you worked very hard, you reached achievement. And now because the economy is such that it is, and there's layoffs and companies shut down, and there's not an emotional contract between companies and their people as we had, you know, decades ago in our, in our country. People feel like I could work for years and years and years and not get achievement. I could work for years and years and years and it could mean absolutely nothing. And so I think people are more

[Susie Welch]

doubtful about the value of work in and of itself.

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

They still want achievement, but they think

[Susie Welch]

work that's not a bargain, I'm sure

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

I want to make. I think that's the dynamics that's going on. Do I have research on this? No, I don't. But this is my theory. And I'm going to continue testing it. I don't know if we can do a study on it. And if you have thoughts about it, by all means. Hello, it's Susie Welch. I'd love to hear them. Okay, that's my email.

[Susie Welch]

So, look, if you're like most Americans, you're listening to me and you're saying, what the heck are you talking about? Who possibly likes to work and finds work like the organizing principle of their life? Well, guilty is charged. I. I am one of them. I'm among the 19% who have this pretty high up. It's not my core because there's five things above it, but it's pretty darn close. A lot of Americans, 37%, have it down at the bottom. How about you? How does this play out in your relationships and in your conversations? If you accuse somebody of being a workaholic. Have you been accused of being a workaholic? Let's talk about work centrism for what it is, a value. We all came to our values by our life experiences. And we should all be allowed, I think, to live our values and to fully express them. That is part of the journey towards finding our purpose, which is what this is all about. All right, we have come to the end of our second of our three part series on the language of values. We're getting closer and closer. You speak in the language of values like a native. We'll get there. Only one more podcast to go where I'll talk about my top five values and then you'll have the full values inventory. And I hope you have a better sense of what your values are to enable you to have all the conversations about values that you can have once you have the language. It's like Ludwig Wittgenstein said, the limits of my language mean the limits of my world. You can open up your world. So what do you think about this language so far?

[Co-host or Guest (Possibly a colleague or co-presenter)]

I mean, have you begun to recognize

[Susie Welch]

your values in it? What do you think about this whole idea that we can have values as a choice? Let me know in the comments. Leave a review while you're at it. It really, really helps. I'm so glad you're here. Thank you for listening to this podcast, new and old. I love you so much. I'm Susie Welch. This is becoming you. I'll see you next week.