There is direct correlation between setting and achieving your most important and meaningful personal goals and the level of your life fulfillment. By aligning your values, you can achieve greater health and personal benefits; by setting goals that are not in alignment with your highest values, the resulting effects on your mind and body can be disturbing and disordered.
When I was in clinical practice, I witnessed many amazing healings and transformations which inspired me to write a book called Count Your Blessings – the Healing Power of Gratitude and Love. While working on the book, I recalled my time spent working in a noted hospital in Houston, Texas, in the oncology ward, and I became friendly with some of the pathologists, oncologists and oncology nurses there. The head nurse of the oncology ward told me that when people would be admitted to the ward for cancer treatment, the staff would sometimes quietly bet on who would make it and who would not, judging by their personality and attitudes (remember, these were mostly more advanced grade three and stage four or five cancer patients with some that were already believed to be terminal). The staff had an 87 percent accurate predictability rate because they knew, by the way their patients perceived their life, and their attitudes, who had conscious or unconscious motives to survive, and whether they were going to pull through or not.
Since their patients’ outcomes had much to do with their perceptions, decisions and actions, and since these were primarily determined by their individual and underlying hierarchy of values, or what was most to least meaningful to them, it was important to identify what their hierarchy of values was and what was truly most meaningful and important to them in their lives – or what they truly desired to live for. It was important for surviving patients to have or set goals that were congruent with what was truly most meaningful and important to their lives for a greater survival rate or prognosis. Setting personal goals that matched their highest and most meaningful values so that they could envision living a more fulfilled and congruent life helped them awaken and strengthen their natural innate and acquired immune systems and more vital physiology, as well as enhance greater resilience and adaptability to stressful events – including cancer treatment and their challenges. Patients demonstrated greater levels of vitality and wellness factors when their intentions or goals were congruent with their highest values, which led them to feel more grateful and loving.
Once you recognize your true inner source of such energy and strength, which is this same congruency, there is much you can do to add not to only your survival but also your “thrival.” For one, you can change your goals to match what you truly value most so as to increase your level of congruency and fluidity. Or, you can change your hierarchy of values to match your primary goals, because, as we go through life, our values and goals can shift. The key is congruency. This can be done by stacking benefits or drawbacks to any one of your individual values, again for the sake of creating greater congruency. Up to the age of 10, you probably wanted to play. Between the ages of 10 and 20, you probably wanted to socialize. From ages 20 to 30, you probably want to concentrate on finding a special relationship and maybe sorting out your career path. From ages 30 to 40, you probably want to develop and stabilize your family dynamic or initiate your own business venture. From ages 40 to 50, you probably want to help get our children through their education. From ages 50 to 60, you probably want to see your children become independent and find their partners and further secure their own future economically. Each age has its primary aims or fulfilling objectives. But the key is congruency.
All through your life, your values have evolved; the things that cause your values to change are things that support and challenge your values most along the way. Anything that you perceive to over-support your highest values can make you more dependent and in some cases even weaker. Anything that you perceive to over-challenge your highest values can make you more independent and even stronger. A balance of both supportive and challenging events, help you remodel your value structure and both equally are essential for your maximum growth, development and resilience. For whatever your highest values are, they determine how you interpret, decide and act in the world.
Fulfilling any one of your values can create some degree of personal satisfaction, but fulfilling your highest value is the most satisfying and empowering. When you perceive, decide and act in a way that is congruent with your highest value, you are going to become more empowered and awaken your innermost resilient healer. When you perceive, decide and act in a way that is incongruent with our highest values, you are going to become more disempowered and make dormant your inner and resilient healer. Your resulting un-fulfillment will initiate an immediate gratifying and addictive behavior to compensate for your long-term un-fulfillment. The former strengthens your immunity and adaptability and adds wellness by bringing about eustress, while the latter weakens you and results in illness by initiating and promoting distress. So it is wise to consider living congruently now before a more life-challenging illness has to emerge to guide you to what is truly most meaningful and important. When you are congruent, you count your blessings and feel more gratitude and love.

Dr. John Demartini is a worldwide inspirational speaker who travels 360 days a year, a noted business consultant, and author of 40 books. He has produced over 60 CDs and DVDs covering subjects such as development in relationships, wealth, health, education and business. In 1982, he founded the Demartini Institute, a private research, education and service institute dedicated to exploring and expanding human awareness and potential with a mission to inspire men, women and children across the world to become purposeful and disciplined masters of themselves and dedicated, inspired leaders of others.