Rating: 6/7 (Good Plus, worth repeating)

The central insight: you feel visceral aversion to your goals when they conflict with your values. Actual repulsion. Bailey argues this happens because we're trying to run incompatible software.

His framework works as a hierarchy: values feed priorities, priorities contain goals, goals generate plans, plans shape present intention. Values are the broadest level—trans-situational, desirable goals that serve as guiding principles across your entire life. You might have a set of core values, but countless priorities that flow from them, and even more goals that serve those priorities.

The book's real utility is the diagnostic. From the known research, Bailey maps twelve fundamental values along two axes: whether you're oriented toward conserving your current state or improving things, and whether your focus is on yourself or others.

The twelve values: self-direction, stimulation, pleasure, achievement, power, face, security, tradition, conformity, humility, universalism, benevolence.

I took the assessment (I love an assessment) and scored high on:

  • self-direction (choosing your own thoughts and actions),
  • universalism (protecting welfare of people and nature), and
  • face (preserving image, avoiding humiliation).

Bottom three: conformity, tradition, and, humility. lmao

That maps precisely onto pastoral tensions I live with. High self-direction plus low conformity explains why traditional church structures chafe even as I'm committed to institutional life. High universalism drives progressive theology. High face reveals why criticism lands harder than it should, why I overthink public perception.

Bailey's philosophy of productivity works because it starts with identity rather than tactics. The tactics matter—he offers plenty—but they're downstream from knowing what you actually value. Goals that align with your values feel like moving toward yourself. Goals that conflict feel like self-betrayal, which is why willpower eventually fails.

Chris Bailey narrates the audiobook himself with a genuinely pleasant-to-listen-to-voice. The final chapter summarizes everything cleanly if you need the framework at a glance.