Book Excerpt:Making a Core Qualities List
Wouldn't it be Great to Have all of Your Best Qualities Right at Your Fingertips?
Published: 7/9/2021
by Nick Oredson
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Introduction
There are many positive traits that we can lose connection with as the result of trauma during our childhood. Exuberance, creativity, masculine traits (in girls) or feminine traits (in boys) are all examples of essential traits that can get strongly sanctioned by the adults in our environment when we are growing up. These sanctions can cause great stress to our developing minds and it is easy for core traits like these to get pushed into shadow early.
In addition, research suggests that a child experiences roughly a 300:1 ratio of negative feedback to positive feedback during the average upbringing. This means that for every positive comment we receive about ourselves we hear 300 negative comments. Because of the large volume of negative feedback we receive as children, it is very common for us as adults to approach the challenges of life through a deficiency model. This is the tendency to focus our attention on everything that is wrong with us when addressing a particular issue or problem. When considering a certain challenge, it is much more likely for us to have negative thoughts like "I’m just bad at math", or "I’m so disorganized" or "I have never been good at time management" rather than positive thoughts like "I am good with people" or "I am an expert in this field" or "I am good at reaching out for help when I need it". In thinking about any given issue, we tend to start by identifying all of our frailties and shortcomings immediately, while simultaneously ignoring our core strengths, skills and abilities.
The combination of having our core qualities actively suppressed, and the overwhelming amount of negative feedback we receive as children leads to a situation where we can easily be disconnected from our core qualities, and possibly even from the concept there is anything good inside us at all. As adults we can become dissatisfied with this programming and find ourselves wishing to reconnect with our lost positive traits and re-integrate them into our conscious lives. We can also decide that using a deficiency model when approaching challenges is not a strategy that is serving us anymore. Instead, we might decide to lead with our core positive qualities when approaching the challenges of life instead of reflexively identifying all of our weaknesses and problems first.
These prompts are based on the work of Fred A.J. Korthagen and Southern Oregon University professors Younghee M. Kim and William L. Greene. They present an opportunity to identify positive traits that we were not aware of and generate a core qualities list that we can then use when navigating challenges.
The Prompts
Take some time and consider the question What are my core strengths?. If you experience anxiety when considering this question don’t panic – this is very common. We are heavily socialized away from connecting with our gifts and strengths so don’t be surprised if you initially have the thought: I don’t have any good qualities!. The best way to approach this is to think about an event or a time in your life when you felt like you were truly at your best. Get into the details of the event and how it felt and then ask yourself: What core qualities do I have that were at play during that event? Think about a good moment as a parent, at you job, a creative endeavor, standing up for what you believe, anything that comes up where you felt truly at your best. Take some time with this and really consider what was active in you during that high point. If you really get stuck take a break from the exercise or ask a friend for some help. It is very common to have trouble warming up to this exercise and often our friends can see our positive traits much more clearly than we can.
Once you have created your list, write it down and keep it handy. When you are facing a challenge or some uncertainty and you feel that wave of negative self-image come up, consult your list and start making a habit of leading with your strengths!
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Comments? Questions? I would love to hear from you!
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