your kids don't know your values

Most families have values.

They're on the wall. Maybe in a frame. Maybe discussed once at a family meeting that happened two years ago and never again.

"We value honesty." "We value education." "We value being there for each other."

Nice words. But here's what I've learned after 19 years of marriage and 16 years of building our family across six countries:

Values aren't words.

Values aren't beliefs.

Values aren't the things you say matter to you.

Values are the decisions you make when those beliefs are tested. They're what you choose when it costs you something. When it's inconvenient. When the easier path is sitting right there, and you walk the harder one anyway.

A value isn't a value until it's cost you something.

Until then, it's just an aspiration. A preference. A nice idea you haven't actually committed to yet.

I want you to try something with me.

Don't answer these questions with what you think sounds good. Answer them with what's actually true. With evidence. With specific moments you can point to.

Question 1: What have you sacrificed for?

Not what would you sacrifice for. What have you actually given up? Time. Money. Comfort. Approval. Opportunities. The thing everyone else was doing that you walked away from.

What has your family cost you that you paid willingly?

If you can't point to specific sacrifices, that tells you something. It doesn't make you a bad person. It just means you might be living by aspirations instead of values.

Question 2: What have you fought to protect?

Not what would you fight for. What have you actually drawn a line around and defended? What boundary have you held even when it made things harder? Even when people didn't understand? Even when it would have been so much easier to just let it go?

Question 3: What will you NOT do, even if everyone else is doing it?

This is where values get sharp. Everyone around you is doing something. It's normal. It's expected. Maybe it's how you were raised. Maybe it's what the neighborhood does. Maybe it's what makes life smoother.

But you won't do it.

Where have you actually diverged from the script? Not in theory. In practice. In real decisions that had real consequences.

Question 4: What do you want to be known for when your kids tell stories about growing up in your home?

Not what you hope they remember. What are you actively building evidence for? If your kids described your family to a stranger twenty years from now, what would they say? What would they point to?

Let me tell you about a yacht.

During the world shutdown, we were in Bali. As some of you know, we follow a different health path. We eat fully plant-based. We most certainly did not even consider certain things that were being pushed at the time. It's just not what we do. And interestingly enough, during that whole crisis, none of us had even a slight cold in the years it all went down.

Bali was empty. Venues and excursions that normally cost thousands could be enjoyed for hundreds. One of them was a private yacht sail around the Komodo Islands. We were all in. Ready to book it with some friends.

Until they said the words: PCR test required to leave the dock.

It wasn't even a little difficult.

It was an automatic, no thoughts about it, hard pass.

Our friends tried the peer pressure route. Said something we've heard for so many decisions over the years: "Well, I'm just not going to let such a small thing ruin my fun and opportunities. For us, it would be letting a little test run our lives. It's not that serious."

And we were thinking the same thing. But ours was different.

It's not that serious for us to get on a yacht and go against our principles. There's no amount of fun to be had when our principles are set in stone. It's just water and sand. Not that important at all.

Hard pass.

We never looked back and never flinched.

That's what a value looks like when it's real. It doesn't require a committee meeting. It doesn't require weighing pros and cons. The principle is already decided. The only question is whether this situation applies. And when it does, the answer is already there.

Here's the uncomfortable truth.

Most families have a gap. A distance between their stated values and their revealed values.

Stated values are what you say matters.

Revealed values are what your life actually shows.

And they're often not the same thing.

I remember years ago, before we left the US again, I used to meet often with a mom and her kids. Our daughters were friends. We were good friends and still are. But something struck me one day.

By then we were already homeschooling. I was at her house when her kids came home from school. She was pretty upset because her daughter's lunch had been inspected. The teacher found a piece of organic 80% dark chocolate she had placed in the lunchbox. Apparently it wasn't an approved snack. Considered candy. Confiscated. Note sent home.

She showed me the list of approved snacks.

I laughed out loud when I saw goldfish crackers and other highly processed things on the approved list.

She was angry for a few reasons. One, that someone had the audacity to inspect her child's lunch. Two, that highly processed junk food was on the approved list while her gourmet, top-of-the-line dark chocolate was confiscated. Three, the teacher didn't even bother to ask about what was actually in it.

I asked her what she was going to do.

What she said next had me floored.

"I'll just leave it. I want my daughter to see us as a united front. If I say something, it might make my daughter have less faith in her teacher."

United front.

I pushed back, as we always had healthy debates. She agreed with me. But she said it was the beginning of the school year and this was the worst way to start off.

This was first grade.

Here's what I saw in that moment: a stated value in conflict with a revealed value.

She valued her daughter's health. She valued quality food. She was genuinely angry about the hypocrisy of the approved snack list. But when it came time to act on those values, another value won. The value of not making waves. The value of institutional harmony. The value of her daughter's perception of authority over her daughter's perception of her mother's integrity.

I'm not judging her. We all have competing values. We all make trade-offs.

But I knew in that moment, with even more clarity, that schools and I were not going to be a good fit. Not because schools are bad. But because I personally felt like I'd be a hypocrite sending my kids to participate in something I truly didn't believe in. If I sent my children into a system I fundamentally disagreed with, how would I expect them to respect me or believe in me as their guardian?

Hard pass.

Your kids don't experience your stated values.

They experience your revealed values.

They absorb what you do, not what you say. They learn from your choices, not your lectures. They internalize the patterns they watch, not the principles you preach.

And when there's a gap between what you say and what you do, one of two things happens.

Either they inherit the gap. They learn to say one thing and do another. They learn that values are performance, not practice.

Or they reject your stated values entirely. They see the inconsistency and decide the whole thing is theater. They throw out the principles because the practice didn't match.

Neither is what you want.

But here's the flip side. When your values are consistent, when your revealed values match your stated values, something different happens.

Your children internalize them. Not because you lectured. Because you lived it. Because they watched. Because it was just how things were done.

I was out to dinner once with a woman in Bali. She asked me how I managed to get my kids to obey things when I wasn't around.

I was confused. It didn't make sense as a question.

She went on to explain. Apparently my daughters had been out with her and her daughter. They went to a restaurant. She offered them soda.

We do not drink soda. My daughters know this. Occasionally they might have some kind of lemonade, but in general, we don't do soda. And specifically, we do not drink Coca-Cola, Pepsi, or any of those brands. At all.

She offered it to them.

My daughters looked almost horrified and said, "Oh no, no thank you."

What she said next made me question her as a parent.

"I then said to them, it's okay, I won't tell your mom if you want one."

And they said, "No thank you. I don't think our mother would want us to have that."

That's how it ended.

My daughters told me about it later. They were genuinely disturbed that a parent would say something like "I won't tell your mother." They lost respect for her in that moment. Not because she offered soda. Because she tried to create a gap between what we stood for and what they did when I wasn't watching.

Please don't let me paint a picture of perfect kids who never do anything wrong.

What I have are kids who understand that the expectations we have for them come out of consistency and intentionality. They've watched other kids who are constantly sick. They've noticed what those kids eat. They've noticed what their parents allow. They find it strange when they go to dinner with kids their age and that child orders white rice and orange juice as a meal.

They might think it sounds fun to eat whatever they want. But they also understand quality. Because we've been consistent. Through and through.

Children want structure. They want consistency. And they lose respect when they see the gaps.

Consistency isn't about being rigid. It's about being trustworthy.

When my daughters were about six and eight, we had recently gone fully plant-based. I went first, then felt strongly that it was time to shift the whole family. We were already eating whole foods, so the switch wasn't difficult.

But we were out at a restaurant with friends, and one of my daughters saw pizza on the menu. Up to that point, she was fine with plant-based eating. She didn't like meat anyway, wasn't a big fan of eggs. But cheese. She wanted me to make an exception.

I did not.

And boy, did she throw the loudest, biggest tantrum. Right there in the restaurant.

I did not budge. I did not move. That was how we were eating now. I explained to her that if I make an exception now, what's the difference between me always making exceptions? Those exceptions become your life.

She could have anything on the menu that was fully plant-based, and there was plenty. That was the boundary. It held.

Two weeks later, we were out again. Some kids at a nearby table were eating pizza. She looked over at them and I thought, here we go.

What she actually said was, "Oh, that smells like vomit."

I told her it always smelled like that. She just no longer had it in her system.

She never asked for cheese again. That was eight years ago.

I'm not saying everyone should eat plant-based. That's not the point.

The point is: if you want to actually be what you say you are, you have to be willing to stand through it even when it's uncomfortable. Was she loud? Yes. Were some parents looking at me? Absolutely. Was I embarrassed? No. Because I was not taking the bait. I had already set it in stone.

We make decisions for our children based on what we genuinely believe is best. Once I've decided, unless I have a real reason to change, it stays. And there have been times I've had to change. When I had new information. When I thought differently.

We went from whole foods including meat and dairy to exclusively plant-based. I made the switch. I didn't move back. I didn't feel embarrassed about how we used to eat. When I had information that I thought was the best choice for us, I made the decision, I moved, and I didn't look back.

That's just growth. It's not a big deal.

But when you're in a decision, you're in it. You sit in it. And when it's time to move, you move fully. You don't half-step. You don't make exceptions that unravel everything you're building.

So how do you close the gap?

It's not complicated. But it's not easy either.

First, see it clearly.

Be honest about what your revealed values actually are. Not with judgment. With clarity. What does your life demonstrate that you value? If someone watched you for a month and had to guess your priorities based only on your choices, what would they conclude?

This isn't about shame. It's about awareness. You can't change what you won't see.

Second, decide if your revealed values are the ones you want.

Sometimes they are. Sometimes you look at your life and realize you've been building something good without having the words for it. Your unconscious values are solid. You just need to name them and own them.

Sometimes they're not. Sometimes you've been living by default instead of design. Running someone else's script. Optimizing for things that don't actually matter to you when you stop and think about it.

Third, make different choices.

Not perfectly. Not all at once. But differently.

Values aren't declared. They're demonstrated. They're built through small choices that add up. Through sacrifices that compound. Through boundaries that hold even when it would be easier to let them slide.

Every choice aligned with your stated values narrows the gap between who you say you are and who you actually are.

Try this.

Think about your family values. The ones you'd say if someone asked.

Now ask yourself: when was the last time this value cost me something?

If you can point to a specific moment, a specific cost, a specific choice that wasn't easy, you've got a real value. Something that's been tested and proven.

If you can't, you've got an aspiration. Which is fine. Aspirations are where values start. But they're not where values live.

Values live in the choices.

This is what the values section of The Family Launch Plan, grab a free copy, is designed to help you uncover.

Not just naming your values. That's the easy part. Anyone can pick nice words.

But writing down the evidence. The moments. The costs. The choices that prove the words mean something.

If you can't write evidence next to the value, it's not a value yet. It's an aspiration. And aspirations are just the beginning.

The work is turning them into something real.

Next week, I want to talk about vision.

Not "I want my kids to be happy." That's not vision. That's a wish. Every parent wants their kids to be happy.

Vision is specific. Vision is a picture of who walks out of your home at 18. What they believe about themselves. What they're capable of. How they move through the world.

And here's the uncomfortable part: vision also includes what they'll have to unlearn.

Because every family passes down gifts. But every family also passes down wounds.

More on that next week.

Azizi

P.S. If someone watched your life for a month and had to guess your values based only on your choices, not your words, what would they conclude?

Sit with that. It's where the real work begins.