The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People
Habit 1:Be Proactive
"Habit is the key to unlocking all the other habits and that's why it comes first. It says, "I am the captain of my life.I can choose my attitude.I'm responsible for my own happiness or unhappiness. I am in the driver's seat of my destiny' not just a passenger."
Your life doesn't just "happen." Whether you know it or not, it is carefully designed by you. The choices, after all, are yours. You choose happiness. You choose sadness. You choose decisiveness. You choose ambivalence. You choose success. You choose failure. You choose courage. You choose fear. Just remember that every moment, every situation, provides a new choice. And in doing so, it gives you a perfect opportunity to do things differently to produce more positive results.
Habit 2: Begin with the End in Mind
"Control your own destiny or someone else will."(Jake Welch)
So, what do you want to be when you grow up? That question may appear a little trite, but think about it for a moment. Are you--right now--who you want to be, what you dreamed you'd be, doing what you always wanted to do? Be honest. Sometimes people find themselves achieving victories that are empty--successes that have come at the expense of things that were far more valuable to them. If your ladder is not leaning against the right wall, every step you take gets you to the wrong place faster.
Habit 3: Put First Things First
"Organize and execute around priorities."
Habit 3 is Personal Management, the exercise of independent will to create a life congruent with your values, goals and mission. The fourth human endowment, Independent Will, is the ability to make decisions and choices and act upon them. Integrity is our ability to make and keep commitments to ourselves. Management involves developing the specific application of the ideas. We should lead from the right brain (creatively) and manage from the left brain (analytically).
Habit 4: Think Win-Win
"Think win-win or no deal."
Win-win sees life as a cooperative arena, not a competitive one. Win-win is a frame of mind and heart that constantly seeks mutual benefit in all human interactions. Win-win means agreements or solutions are mutually beneficial and satisfying. We both get to eat the pie, and it tastes pretty darn good!
Habit 5: Seek First to Understand, then to be Understood
"Diagnose before you prescribe."
When another person is speaking, we usually "listen" at one of four levels: ignoring, pretending, selective listening, or attentive listening. We should be using the fifth, highest form of listening emphatic listening.Active or reflective listening is skill-based and often insults the speaker. Emphatic listening is listening with intent to understand the other person's frame of reference and feelings. You must listen with your ears, your eyes and your heart. Emphatic listening is a tremendous deposit into the emotional bank account. It's deeply therapeutic and healing because it gives a person "psychological air."Next to physical survival, the greatest need of a human being is psychological survival - to be understood, to be affirmed, to be validated, and to be appreciated. Emphatic listening is risky. It takes a great deal of security to go into a deep listening experience because you open yourself up to being influenced. You become vulnerable. In order to have influence, you must be influenced.
Habit 6: Synergize
"The whole is greater than the sum of its parts (1+1=3)"
The essence of synergy is to value and respect differences, to build on strengths and to compensate for weaknesses. The author says that many of us haven’t actually experienced synergy in our family lives or in other interactions. We’ve been shaped into defensive and protective communications or into believing that life or other people can’t be trusted. Therefore we have a tendency to not open up to this highly effective principle which requires enormous personal security and openness and a spirit of adventure.
Habit 7: Sharpen the Saw
Four Dimensions of Self-Renewal: Physical, Mental, Spiritual, Social/Emotional
Your life doesn't just "happen." Whether you know it or not, it is carefully designed by you. The choices, after all, are yours. You choose happiness. You choose sadness. You choose decisiveness. You choose ambivalence. You choose success. You choose failure. You choose courage. You choose fear. Just remember that every moment, every situation, provides a new choice. And in doing so, it gives you a perfect opportunity to do things differently to produce more positive results.
Habit 2: Begin with the End in Mind
"Control your own destiny or someone else will."(Jake Welch)
So, what do you want to be when you grow up? That question may appear a little trite, but think about it for a moment. Are you--right now--who you want to be, what you dreamed you'd be, doing what you always wanted to do? Be honest. Sometimes people find themselves achieving victories that are empty--successes that have come at the expense of things that were far more valuable to them. If your ladder is not leaning against the right wall, every step you take gets you to the wrong place faster.
Habit 3: Put First Things First
"Organize and execute around priorities."
Habit 3 is Personal Management, the exercise of independent will to create a life congruent with your values, goals and mission. The fourth human endowment, Independent Will, is the ability to make decisions and choices and act upon them. Integrity is our ability to make and keep commitments to ourselves. Management involves developing the specific application of the ideas. We should lead from the right brain (creatively) and manage from the left brain (analytically).
Habit 4: Think Win-Win
"Think win-win or no deal."
Win-win sees life as a cooperative arena, not a competitive one. Win-win is a frame of mind and heart that constantly seeks mutual benefit in all human interactions. Win-win means agreements or solutions are mutually beneficial and satisfying. We both get to eat the pie, and it tastes pretty darn good!
Habit 5: Seek First to Understand, then to be Understood
"Diagnose before you prescribe."
When another person is speaking, we usually "listen" at one of four levels: ignoring, pretending, selective listening, or attentive listening. We should be using the fifth, highest form of listening emphatic listening.Active or reflective listening is skill-based and often insults the speaker. Emphatic listening is listening with intent to understand the other person's frame of reference and feelings. You must listen with your ears, your eyes and your heart. Emphatic listening is a tremendous deposit into the emotional bank account. It's deeply therapeutic and healing because it gives a person "psychological air."Next to physical survival, the greatest need of a human being is psychological survival - to be understood, to be affirmed, to be validated, and to be appreciated. Emphatic listening is risky. It takes a great deal of security to go into a deep listening experience because you open yourself up to being influenced. You become vulnerable. In order to have influence, you must be influenced.
Habit 6: Synergize
"The whole is greater than the sum of its parts (1+1=3)"
The essence of synergy is to value and respect differences, to build on strengths and to compensate for weaknesses. The author says that many of us haven’t actually experienced synergy in our family lives or in other interactions. We’ve been shaped into defensive and protective communications or into believing that life or other people can’t be trusted. Therefore we have a tendency to not open up to this highly effective principle which requires enormous personal security and openness and a spirit of adventure.
Habit 7: Sharpen the Saw
Four Dimensions of Self-Renewal: Physical, Mental, Spiritual, Social/Emotional
As you renew yourself in each of the four areas, you create growth and change in your life. Sharpen the Saw keeps you fresh so you can continue to practice the other six habits. You increase your capacity to produce and handle the challenges around you. Without this renewal the body becomes weak, the mind mechanical, the emotions raw, the spirit insensitive, and the person selfish.
