The 12 Core Values are an attempt to bring people together through a framework of living together that people can agree upon.
I have always followed the news, paid attention to current events and obsessed about needs and conflicts and dangers. Meanwhile I am actively engaged in my local community with businesses, nonprofits, schools and faith-based groups. I have always wanted to fix things, but I realized that all of this is not about me, and is far beyond my power to fix. Likewise, I try to see things from as many different perspectives as possible. One day in early 2016 I embarked on a little thought exercise to defy everything I saw that was wrong with the world, and try to come up with a combined list of things that were right with the world instead. Several days later, I had the 12 Core Values in hand.
Why do we need these 12 Core Values?
There are endless words that people have already selected. In many ways, words are like real estate ... groups stake them out and claim them like territory. I tried to find words that were not already claimed exclusively by one group of people or another, because I think that building bridges across groups of people is so essential. It seems like people are more polarized now than ever before. I think a huge part of building successful communities is to look for common ground instead. The 12 Core Values are intended to be that framework of common ground and agreement.
You might think that 12 Core Values is way too many. Maybe we should have three or five at the most. I get it. And I think that individual people or companies or faith-groups might really rally around three or five of the 12 Core Values. That's fine. But when I'm trying to look at covering all the bases of big community issues and how to solve them, I think that we need all 12 Core Values. We play many different roles in our lives, and these 12 Core Values touch on all of the different roles.
What about the ones that are left out? Where are basic notions like justice or liberty or fairness? There are some concepts that are SO big and important, that I think they cascade across and underneath and above all of the 12 Core Values and they get represented that way.
Our goal is to build great communities across our nation. I invite you to express yourself, and tell me what you think. I want to hear stories about how you are working to build your own community. Please let me know!