1. Family 2.Health 3.Friendship 4.Wisdom 5. Enjoyment

6. Personal Accomplishment 7.Creativity 8.
Loyalty
 9.Location 10.
Integrity
11.community 12.Personal Development 13.Independence14.Leadership 15.Wealth 16.Service 17.Prestige18. Expertness 19.Security 20.Power

Today is Saturday, I went up early and skyped with my family in China. According to Lunar Calendar, today is “the double ninth festival”, which is also my lunar birthday. Thus, I had a great talk with my parents and told them my miss to them. This represents my top value of “family”. At noon, I cooked lunch with my friends and we went to Safeway after that. This represents the value of “friendship”. In the afternoon, I went to the library and studied for my major course. This indicates the value of “wisdom”. Then, I went to the gym and had a short work out. I think this reflects my “health” values. I think my top 5 values match well to the activities that I pursued today, and my top 4 values” family, health, friendship and wisdom” all represented in my daily activity. I think “enjoyment” is also represented, since I enjoyed doing my work including study, and I had fun when I was thinking and understanding.

1. For the belief patterns I inherit from my family, I think is “family, health, wealth and prestige”. My parents always tell me, “No mater what happen in your life, remember, your family will always support behind you.” I am so encouraged by this word, especially when I went abroad and lived alone in the U.S. I never felt lonely when I remember this word. The “health” value is inherited from my grandmother, she was very good at sports. She keeps fit now even though she is over 80 years old. She told me the importance of exercise and that health is always my capital.
2. I think the “prestige and wealth” values are no longer valid according to my acknowledgement. Parents always put their hopes onto their children and hope them become successful or to be seen as successful person. However, I think doing something I enjoy is much more important than getting recognition from others. Different people have their own explanation about success. In my opinion, to have fun doing something can bring me a feeling of satisfaction. To me, that is called success. No matter what the results are or how much money I can get from it.
3. Recently, my goals for myself that I have yet to pursue are my plan to further my study in graduate school about nutrition and my plan to travel around the south part of the U.S.
4. I am working on my applications to some graduate programs and I think the goal will come true in the future if I make enough effort. In addition, I am talking with my friends recently, who had experience about travel to southern part of the U.S. I want to get more information and experience before starting my plan of self-driving travel.

After reading Lewis’s article” A Question of Values: Six Ways We Make the Personal Choices That Shape Our Lives”, I find it is really helpful to understand and re-examine my personal values through the four basic interior mental modes and two major synthetic mental modes. According to the author, sense experience, deductive logic, emotion and intuition are the only four basic methods that we come to know something (Lewis,10). I agree with this point because I find these four modes almost cover all circumstances when I develop my values at first glance. For example, when I operate chemical experiment at the lab, my knowledge is directly gained from my own five senses. I can only interpret the results through what I have seen, touched or smelled. In addition, we need deductive reasoning to understand surrounding with consistency. For instance, we all know that we need to take the responsibility to our families. By deductive logic, we understand that our country is a bigger family that we all have responsibility to it. Thus, we may develop “loyalty” as our lifelong value. The author also mentioned two synthetic modes, called “authority” and “science”. I agree with his example about authority, since religion belief is always associated with authority, emotion and intuition. We are born with different cultural backgrounds. For me, the belief that Buddha is sacred and can bring people good luck, formed early in my heart since my childhood. In addition, my emotion and intuition automatically give Buddha with awe and belief.

At the last, the author indicates that, “ Sorting through available value choices in a systematic way is arguably more important than any of the other discretionary things we do”(Lewis,18). I totally agree with this idea and I find this reading really help me to re-examine my personal values. Without clear values, our life won’t be satisfied and happy. I am curious, besides these six ways to develop values, are there other modes to help us get to know something?