| name | mark-manson-values-psychology |
| description | Mark Manson's values-based psychology and wellbeing system — value discovery (desert island, eulogy, frustration forensics, forced ranking), behavior-first value change via cognitive dissonance and incentive design, and the three-layer happiness stack (affect / life satisfaction / meaning-purpose) worked backwards from meaning. The mindset layer for transformation coaching. |
| version | 2.0 |
| format | completion-engine |
| workflows | 3 |
| source | claude.ai export 2026-07-01 |
Mark Manson — Values Psychology & Wellbeing
Mark Manson (3x #1 NYT bestselling author, The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck; Solved Podcast with researcher Drew Birnie) treats values as the cornerstone of mental health: living in accordance with one's values is the single strongest driver of lower stress, resilience, meaning, and life satisfaction. His system builds on Schwartz's value theory (values = emotionally-charged, trans-situational, ranked strategies for meeting universal psychological needs) and gets prescriptive: discover values through gut-level thought experiments rather than surveys, change values by leading with behavior and incentives (feelings follow action via cognitive dissonance), and build durable wellbeing by pursuing meaning first so satisfaction and good affect arrive as byproducts. This is the mindset/transformation layer of the coaching stack — it sits under training, nutrition, and habit work, explaining why clients self-sabotage and what makes change stick.
Available Workflows
| # | Workflow | Produces |
|---|
| 01 | 01-discover-core-values.md | A ranked value hierarchy with dispositional/aspirational tags and an alignment gap report |
| 02 | 02-change-a-value.md | A behavior-first value change protocol: target value, sacrifice ledger, incentive architecture, 30-day action track |
| 03 | 03-architect-durable-wellbeing.md | A three-layer happiness diagnostic (affect / satisfaction / meaning) plus a meaning-first rebuild plan calibrated with practical wisdom |
Quick Reference
- Values answer three questions: What matters? What is worth pursuing? What kind of person do I want to become?
- Six markers of a true value (vs. preference or need): linked to strong emotion · motivates action · trans-situational · used as a moral yardstick for self and others · ranked in a hierarchy · involves trade-offs.
- Needs vs. values vs. preferences: needs are universal and permanent; values are chosen strategies to meet needs and change over a lifetime; preferences are context-bound tastes with no identity weight.
- The Sacrifice Test: your top value is not what you want most — it is what you are willing to give up everything else for. To raise a value's priority, give up more for it, don't want it harder.
- Discovery beats surveys: gut-reaction thought experiments (desert island, eulogy, forced ranking, frustration inventory) reveal values more reliably than analytical scoring.
- Change runs behavior-first: act the value → cognitive dissonance resolves in the value's favor → identity follows. Pair with incentives ("show me the incentive, I'll show you the behavior").
- Happiness stack: affect (minutes-days) → life satisfaction (months-years) → meaning/purpose (years-decades). Most people work forwards from affect; work backwards from meaning — it inoculates against the downswings of the other two.
- Practical wisdom: values are volume knobs, not switches. Calibrate at the margins (achievement 10→9, community 4→6); the dispositional core doesn't wholesale change.
Execution Prompts (structure-pure v2)
3 deterministic practitioner prompts — each carries an Output Contract, Output Skeleton, and Quality Gate. When a deliverable matches one, Read it and honor its contract instead of improvising the output shape.
- Durable Wellbeing Architecture — [SUBJECT/COMPLAINT] —
skills/mark-manson-values-psychology/references/prompts-v2/architect-durable-wellbeing.md
- Value Change Protocol — [TARGET_VALUE] vs. [COMPETING_VALUE] —
skills/mark-manson-values-psychology/references/prompts-v2/change-a-value.md
- Value Hierarchy — [SUBJECT] —
skills/mark-manson-values-psychology/references/prompts-v2/discover-core-values.md
