Valuable Lessons

One of the Disney movies that I remember watching a lot while growing up was Bambi. It was one of my younger sister’s favorites; she loved watching the animals run by on screen. Her favorite character was the rabbit: Thumper. One of his quotes from the movie that was repeated a lot in my house was “If you can’t say something nice, don’t say nothing at all”. It quickly became an important value for me and my sisters and still is to this day.

Values are incredibly important in life. They can add purpose and guidance where there might not be any. The principles or values someone holds can say a lot about that person оформить займ на карту без отказа срочно. According to Jarrod Davis, they can also help us shape the future into what we want it to be. In a blog written for the Barret Values Center, Davis explains the four areas of values: individual, relationship, organizational, and societal. Each area showcases how a person or an organization uses values to operate and guide their life. Things like loyalty, sustainability, creativity, teamwork, caring, etc. are all examples of values that people can have. 

A lot of values are shaped at a very young age by the people around us and the media that we consume.Media targeted at children include very simple values that the movie or show intends to teach them. Things like “if you can’t say something nice, don’t say anything at all” or “a true hero isn’t measured by the size of his strength, but by the strength of his heart” can teach a child important values that they can carry through the rest of their lives. According to an article by Laura Davis and Janis Keyser, one of the ways children learn about values is “through their exposure to the larger world”. This includes media, their friends and family, books, and anything else they might be exposed to. That is why it’s important to encourage good values at a young age- and why it can be so hard when childhood values clash with adult beliefs (and vice versa). 

I was raised in a very Christian household. Because of this, one of the first things I think of when I’m trying to define my values is a Bible verse: “Love thy neighbor as thyself”. This verse promoted empathy, kindness, generosity, and compassion, which is probably why it was so important for us to know. This idea has always been at the center of a lot of my personal values and probably always will be. However, as I got older, a lot of the Christian values that I was taught started to contradict both what the people in my church and my parents were saying. I started to question where I stood and what I truly valued in life.

This process was very difficult to go through and, for a lot of my teen years, I kind of ignored the conflict that was growing. I figured as long as I was nice to the people around me, as long as I “loved my neighbor as myself,” it didn’t matter what I believed or valued. This ignorance soon started to bother me as I found myself more and more at odds with the ideas around me. I finally got fed up with quietly disagreeing with my parents and started to truly consider what was important to me as a person. As I experienced more and became more educated, I slowly started to reconcile my own personal values with the values that were taught to me as a kid. I was able to see where bias might have come in when teaching me these ideas and started to think for myself about who I wanted to be and what I wanted from life. 

While I still have a lot of growing to do, I am now much more comfortable with who I am and how my values align with that. I have also been able to revisit religion recently and realize that my problem was never with Christianity or even with religion, but with the people that were teaching me one thing and encouraging me to do another. I started to realize the church my family was in was extremely toxic, backwards, and hypocritical. It is a relief to see my parents start to realize this too and break away from that particular congregation. I am no longer as religious as I used to be but I still value what my religious upbringing taught me. Recently they have left that church for another one and I can see them starting to ask themselves the same questions I did. Interestingly enough, these questions have taken them back to the values that were taught to us as kids. It just goes to prove that you’re never too old to go back and rewatch some classic childrens movies. 

Takeaway: Don’t be afraid to move away from what you know to find what’s important.


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By Callie Hedtke

Callie is going to be a senior at DePaul University in Chicago and is studying Graphic Design. She loves dancing and can usually be found at her school’s gym rehearsing for her next dance show. If she’s not there, she can be found at her computer playing video or out exploring.


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