Clarifying Your Values After Starting Recovery

When symptoms begin to ease and daily life starts to feel a little more manageable, many people in recovery find themselves asking a big question: “Now what?” After spending so much time focused on managing anxiety, intrusive thoughts, or urges, it can feel unfamiliar to shift attention toward building a meaningful life. This stage of recovery is where approaches like Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) become especially important. ACT is an evidence-based therapy that not only helps people relate differently to distressing thoughts and feelings, but also supports them in reconnecting with their values, which are the deeper qualities that give life direction, purpose, and meaning.

Treatment often focuses on reducing distressing symptoms and unhelpful patterns, but recovery isn’t just about what you’re moving away from; it’s also about what you’re moving toward. ACT emphasizes this transition from symptom management to values-based living, helping individuals clarify what truly matters to them and take steps toward a life that feels rich, fulfilling, and aligned with who they want to be. That’s where values come in.

“Values are like a compass, they help you find direction even when the path feels uncertain.”

Why Values Matter in Recovery

During periods of struggle, life can become centered almost entirely around managing anxiety, compulsions, urges, or emotional pain. Days start to revolve around avoiding triggers, reducing discomfort, or simply trying to “get through.” It’s easy for personal goals, interests, and relationships to take a backseat when so much energy is going into symptom control.

As symptoms become more manageable, recovery creates space to reconnect with what often gets lost in the process: your sense of purpose, identity, and direction beyond the problem. This is where values become especially powerful. Values help shift the focus from “How do I make this feeling go away?” to “How do I want to live my life, even when this feeling is here?”

For example, instead of waking up and asking, “How do I get through today without a panic attack?” a values-based lens invites a different question:

“What’s one small thing I can do today that aligns with being the person I want to be?”

That might look like going to class even with anxiety because you value growth, calling a friend despite discomfort because you value connection, or practicing an exposure because you value freedom and independence. The symptoms may still show up, but they no longer get to be the sole decision-makers.

Values give you a steady reference point when anxiety, intrusive thoughts, or urges appear. Rather than organizing life around avoiding discomfort, you begin organizing it around what matters. This shift is central to Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) and reflects the core process of psychological flexibility, which is the ability to act in ways that are consistent with your values even when difficult thoughts and emotions are present.

As Kashdan and Rottenberg (2010) describe, psychological flexibility allows individuals to stay engaged in meaningful life activities while making room for internal experiences, rather than needing those experiences to disappear first. In other words, the symptoms don’t magically vanish, but when you’re connected to your values, anxiety becomes less of a barrier and more of something you’re willing to experience in the service of what matters.

This is where recovery begins to feel less like a battle against symptoms and more like a process of building a life that feels worth showing up for.

Values vs. Goals: Why the Difference Matters

People often confuse values and goals, but understanding the difference is an important part of recovery. Goals are things you can complete or check off, such as graduating, getting a job, finishing treatment, or reducing symptoms. Values, on the other hand, are ongoing qualities of living such as growth, honesty, compassion, connection, or courage. You never “finish” a value. Instead, you practice it again and again through your actions.

For example, “making a new friend” is a goal. “Being a connected person” is a value. “Completing ERP” is a goal. “Living with courage and freedom” reflects values. Goals give direction, but values give them meaning.

This distinction matters because when goals feel blocked, delayed, or disrupted, as they often are in recovery, values remain available. Even on hard days, you can still choose a small action that reflects who you want to be. In this way, values create continuity. They allow progress even when symptoms, setbacks, or circumstances make external success feel far away.

Common Areas to Explore

Values are deeply personal, but here are a few areas many people reflect on during this stage of recovery:

• Career & Learning: Pursuing meaningful work or developing new skills.
• Creativity: Expressing yourself through art, music, writing, or innovation.
• Spirituality: Connecting with something larger than yourself, whether through faith, reflection, or community.
• Relationships: Nurturing friendships, family bonds, or romantic partnerships.
• Health & Well-being: Prioritizing physical and mental health in a balanced way.
• Community & Contribution: Finding ways to give back or be part of something meaningful.

You don’t have to have everything figured out. This process is about exploration, not perfection. One helpful way to begin is through a simple values assessment exercise.

A Simple Values Assessment Exercise

Step 1: Brainstorm.‍

Review the areas above and write down two to three examples for each that feel meaningful or important to you. Don’t overthink this, write whatever comes to mind.

Step 2: Look for patterns.‍

Circle three to five words or phrases that feel energizing, emotional, or deeply resonant. These often point toward your core values.

Step 3: Test them against hard moments.‍

Ask yourself:
“If pursuing this meant facing discomfort, uncertainty, or anxiety, would it still feel worth it?” Values usually involve challenges. If something feels meaningful even when it’s hard, it’s likely value-driven.

Step 4: Name your values.

‍Try to summarize your top values into three to five core themes, written in a few simple words (for example: growth, connection, authenticity, compassion, courage).

These become your compass. When you’re facing difficult decisions, uncomfortable emotions, or moments of uncertainty, you can ask yourself:
“Which choice aligns with my values?”

Over time, this question becomes one of the most powerful tools in recovery.

Examples of Reflection Prompts

Take a quiet moment, grab a journal or open a note on your phone, and reflect on these questions:

• “When I picture the kind of person I want to be, what qualities stand out?”
• “Which activities or people give me a sense of meaning?”
• “If I could remove all obstacles, what would I want my life to be about?”

These prompts can help you uncover the values that have always been there, even if they were overshadowed during more difficult times.

Make Your Values Visible

Once you’ve identified a few core values, the next step is to bring them into your daily life in a way that’s visible and tangible. Values are much more powerful when they’re not just ideas in your head, but cues in your environment that gently guide your choices.

Some people find it helpful to use digital reminders, such as setting their top values as a note on their phone’s lock screen, creating a recurring reminder with a short values-based question (“What choice supports the person I want to be today?”), or adding a meaningful phrase to their email signature or calendar.

Others prefer physical cues placed in everyday spaces. This might look like writing values on index cards and placing them on a bathroom mirror, desk, or nightstand; keeping a small note in a wallet; using a bracelet or ring as a symbolic reminder; or placing a sticky note on a laptop or water bottle with a word like “courage,” “connection,” or “growth.”

You can also link your values to habit anchors, such as existing routines you already do each day. For example, reading your values while brushing your teeth, before opening your laptop, after taking medication, or before going to sleep. Anchoring values to daily habits helps integrate them into the rhythm of your life rather than keeping them abstract.

These small visual and environmental cues can be especially helpful when anxiety, urges, or self-doubt show up. In those moments, seeing your values can ground you, remind you why the work of recovery matters, and help shift your attention from “How do I escape this feeling?” to “How do I want to show up right now?”

Putting It All Together

Clarifying your values isn’t about creating a perfect life plan or becoming a different person overnight. It’s about slowly reconnecting with what matters and letting those values guide your choices, even when things feel uncomfortable. Recovery becomes less about constantly fixing symptoms and more about building a life that feels meaningful, grounded, and self-directed.

If You’re Just Starting

If values work feels new, keep it simple. Choose one value to focus on this week. Then identify one small action you can take that would express that value, something that takes 10 to 15 minutes or less.

For example, if you choose a connection, that might mean texting a friend. If you choose growth, it might mean reading a few pages of a book or practicing one exposure. Afterward, take a moment to notice what it felt like to act on a value, rather than just think about it. Many people are surprised to find that even small values-based actions create a different kind of satisfaction than symptom monitoring or avoidance ever could.

If You’ve Identified Values but Struggle to Act on Them

This is extremely common. Knowing your values and living them are two very different things, especially when anxiety, depression, trauma, OCD, or long-standing patterns are involved.

This is where therapy becomes especially important. Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) focuses on building the skills needed to move toward values even when fear, self-doubt, or urges show up. Instead of waiting to feel ready or confident, ACT helps people learn how to make room for discomfort while still choosing actions that reflect who they want to be.

In this sense, values don’t replace therapy, they guide it. They become the “why” behind exposures, behavior changes, and emotional work.

When Values Conflict

Another common experience is realizing that values sometimes pull in different directions.

You might value:

• Career growth and family connection
  
  
• Honesty and keeping the peace
  
  
• Self-care and supporting others
  
  

When values conflict, it can feel confusing, paralyzing, or guilt-inducing. People often worry that choosing one means betraying another. In reality, values conflicts are not problems to eliminate, they’re signs that you care deeply.

In these moments, values work becomes less about finding a “perfect” answer and more about asking thoughtful questions:

• “Which value needs more attention right now?”
  
  
• “Is there a way to honor both, even in small ways?”
  
  
• “Which choice moves me closer to the person I want to be in this season of my life?”
  
  

Sometimes the answer will change depending on context. And that’s okay. Values are not rigid rules, they are living directions.

When Values Feel Unclear or Constantly Shift

For many people recovering from trauma, OCD, chronic anxiety, or long periods of emotional distress, values can feel blurred or disconnected. When symptoms have dominated life for a long time, identity often becomes organized around coping, surviving, or avoiding. Values clarification in therapy is often part of rebuilding a sense of self beyond a diagnosis.

This process takes time. It can involve experimenting, reflecting, grieving old identities, and discovering new ones. Therapy provides a space to explore these questions safely and to develop a values-based identity that isn’t defined by symptoms, but by meaning.

A Process, Not a Destination

Values-based living is not something you “figure out” once and then complete. It’s an ongoing process of noticing, choosing, adjusting, and recommitting. Some weeks will feel aligned and purposeful. Others will feel messy and uncertain. Both are part of recovery.

What matters most is not doing this perfectly, but continuing to return to the question:
“How do I want to show up right now?”

Over time, those small moments of choosing values, again and again, begin to shape a life that feels fuller, steadier, and more authentically your own.

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