Welcome back to our Summer blog series called Unwrapping our Values. It is important to us that you know who we are, what we believe and where we are coming from…
3. Respect – We believe that all persons are deserving of respect and unconditional positive regard. No matter what behaviors are presented, each person is human and deserving to be seen with a lens of hope.
When we say all people we really mean ALL people. For us at Second Shift respect for people has nothing to do with their appearances, beliefs, actions, identities, orientations, practices, choices or behaviors. It is simply because they are human and we believe they deserve to be revered with dignity due to their humanity.
Unconditional positive regard is a term used by therapist, counselors and other helping professionals. Basically it is similar to giving people the benefit of the doubt. It means that we believe that people always have reason for what they do. And that generally people do the best that they can and are often working or hoping for change. We choose to assume that people rarely choose to do something intentionally malicious. It is a concept that accepts all individuals’ rights to make choices for themselves.
Respect is so closely tied to our next value “Understanding” that I will continue this discussion there
Thanks for following us through this explanation of our driving values.
By Tammy Spence LMSW, CCTP Executive Director