22 categories of intrinsic values
Greenberg's research mapped all human intrinsic values and found they cluster into 22 categories, including longevity, connection, nature, and spirituality.
Snapshot · Modern Wisdom
The Only 12 Lessons Buried In Every Self-Help Book - Spencer Greenberg - #1161
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Oct 10, 2026
Where this was said
Should We Focus on Intrinsic Values?
At 14:10 · chapter starts 12:56
Values work is the first stop in almost every coaching programme, and Greenberg has spent years studying why it so often fails to produce insight. His team's research mapped all human intrinsic values — things valued for their own sake, not as a means to something else — and found 22 distinct categories, from longevity and reducing suffering to connection, adventure, nature, and spirituality. The human brain encodes preferences directly, but determining whether something is truly intrinsic requires an extra cognitive step most people never take. Greenberg describes a friend who was inexplicably depressed despite having a 'great' boyfriend: when he asked her to list her own values and then her boyfriend's qualities, there was zero overlap. When he asked her to list her parents' values, it was a perfect match. She had been living out her parents' ideal life, not her own. The story illustrates how years or even decades can pass with people confusing what their culture or family values with what they themselves value intrinsically — and how a simple mapping exercise can make the mismatch instantly visible. The free intrinsic values test is available at ClearerThinking.org.
The Intrinsic vs. Instrumental Values Trap
Most people confuse things they value instrumentally (because they get them other things) with things they value intrinsically (for their own sake). Greenberg's friend stayed in a miserable relationship for years because she was living by her parents' values, not her own — the values map made the mismatch instantly visible.
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