finding n maximum elements in a matrix

Hi all, I have a symmetrical matrix of size mxm with diagonal elements equal to one. The values range [-1,1]. I would like to find five off the diagonal maximum elements in that matrix and return col and row indices. So far I have the following. It does not really work for values < 0. Any suggestions:

   corrMat=rho - eye(size(rho));
   A=corrMat;
   sortedValues = unique(A(:));
   maxValues = sortedValues(end-4:end);

[Adam]

What aspect of it doesn't work for negative numbers? You mean you want -1 to be considered greater than -0.5?

[the cyclist]

Also, do you want to select both the above- and below-diagonal instance of the maximal elements? Since the matrix is symmetric, there will always be pairs.

[John Chilleri]

If you want to base "maximum" on magnitude, then perhaps insert an

A = abs(corrMat); % A = corrMat;

but this will fail with the unique function if there is an equivalent negative/positive value.