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We need strong habits in our lives in order to achieve greatness. Aristotle once said "We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit."
The first three habits are all about going from being dependant to being self-reliant. One of the greatest virtues a master must develop is independence - working with yourself.
1 - Be Proactive
You focus on positive results. You focus on solutions, instead of problems. Where unsuccessful people fingerpoint, take no responsibility for their actions and try to always shift the blame on others. You understand things don't always go as planned, but it's how we react to them that defines our character. You hold yourself accountable, even if the problem at hand might not be your fault. This way you can take a stoic objective look at what happened, figure it out and keep it from happening again. If you're stressed by something that is out of your control like bad wheather, you save your energy by not complaining and keeping a calm, peaceful mind about it. If you can actively do something about it, like take control of your nutrition and fitness, focusing on staying healthy through workouts, sleep and meditation, then be proactive and go for it.
2 - Begin with the End in Mind
If you have no goals, you can't strive for them. So, if we decide to lose some weight at the gym for example, we know we want to burn a lot of calories until we're about 10 pounds lighter and we keep track of it with a workout plan leading all the way up to achieving that goal. You ever notice how the people with the least ambition seem to have no goals in life? That's not a coincidence, as you need to plan all the way to the end, as Robert Greene would state.
3 - Put First Things First
You prioritize what's important and urgent and you don't work for work's sake or waste time and energy on unimportant tasks as a
form of procrastination. The next step is always the most important one. The unsuccessful avoid the work that they should've gotten done weeks ago out of fear of rejection or confrontation, but no matter how unpleasant the task is, if it's essential to getting ahead, you push through it. Also, by not forgetting what's important to us, like family, friends and health, we don't get too caught up in work. You put yourself first, because it improves everything you focus on after. Interdependence is just as important as independence - working with others.
4 - Think Win-Win
You understand that the best deals in business and in overall life benefit all parties involved. Not only do you get value out of the equation, but you're giving value back. Gary Vaynerchuk said "Whoever gives value first, wins." You're not focusing on what you can get or take. You focus on what you can give and how you can be helpful to others. The rich are generous, not because they have a lot of money, but they have a lot of money, because they are generous. I think that's a pretty good line right there.
5 - Seek First to Understand, Then to be Understood
You emphasize with other people and you understand that you might not always be right, so you keep an open mind and try to see the other person's perspective. By understanding where they're coming from and what concerns they might have you can communicate with that person more effectively and thus both grow through a constructive argument. When you see something out of the ordinary, you're not quick to judge and put it in a box. Instead you embrace new ideas and learn throughout the process.
6 - Synergize
You seek to share resources and work together, because you know you will be stronger, faster and smarter, when you help eachother out through collaborative teamwork. If we take a look at soccer, we see that every player has a function and their goal is to get the ball into the net and they only way they can achieve that is by synergizing. By teamwork.
So far we've seen that these first 3 habits establish your self-reliance and the other habits develop your social dynamics.
The 7th Law is more general and influences every part of your life.
7- Sharpen the Saw
Sharpen the Saw is about Continuous Improvements. Here, the sharpness of the saw symbolizes how effective, how good you really are and the fact of the matter is that we need to work on ourselves until the day we die. The saw is never sharp enough. I remember one of my teachers asking me "Isn't that sad? That you never reach a stop sign?" and after thinking about her question many times now for years, I can say, I stand by the response I gave her. "No," I said "there's something beautiful about that. We don't get to see the stop sign, because it is not until our last breath, that we stop pursuing a better self." In other words, what happens to a flower when it stops growing? It dies. I think we are very similar in that regard. The meaning of life for me, and I'm not alone in this, is fulfilling my true potential. I want to be the greatest man I can be and I want to encourage others on their path to becoming their best self. This is what Stephen Covey calls the 8th Habit. Finding your voice and inspiring others to find theirs.
thx for reading
The first three habits are all about going from being dependant to being self-reliant. One of the greatest virtues a master must develop is independence - working with yourself.
1 - Be Proactive
You focus on positive results. You focus on solutions, instead of problems. Where unsuccessful people fingerpoint, take no responsibility for their actions and try to always shift the blame on others. You understand things don't always go as planned, but it's how we react to them that defines our character. You hold yourself accountable, even if the problem at hand might not be your fault. This way you can take a stoic objective look at what happened, figure it out and keep it from happening again. If you're stressed by something that is out of your control like bad wheather, you save your energy by not complaining and keeping a calm, peaceful mind about it. If you can actively do something about it, like take control of your nutrition and fitness, focusing on staying healthy through workouts, sleep and meditation, then be proactive and go for it.
2 - Begin with the End in Mind
If you have no goals, you can't strive for them. So, if we decide to lose some weight at the gym for example, we know we want to burn a lot of calories until we're about 10 pounds lighter and we keep track of it with a workout plan leading all the way up to achieving that goal. You ever notice how the people with the least ambition seem to have no goals in life? That's not a coincidence, as you need to plan all the way to the end, as Robert Greene would state.
3 - Put First Things First
You prioritize what's important and urgent and you don't work for work's sake or waste time and energy on unimportant tasks as a
form of procrastination. The next step is always the most important one. The unsuccessful avoid the work that they should've gotten done weeks ago out of fear of rejection or confrontation, but no matter how unpleasant the task is, if it's essential to getting ahead, you push through it. Also, by not forgetting what's important to us, like family, friends and health, we don't get too caught up in work. You put yourself first, because it improves everything you focus on after. Interdependence is just as important as independence - working with others.
4 - Think Win-Win
You understand that the best deals in business and in overall life benefit all parties involved. Not only do you get value out of the equation, but you're giving value back. Gary Vaynerchuk said "Whoever gives value first, wins." You're not focusing on what you can get or take. You focus on what you can give and how you can be helpful to others. The rich are generous, not because they have a lot of money, but they have a lot of money, because they are generous. I think that's a pretty good line right there.
5 - Seek First to Understand, Then to be Understood
You emphasize with other people and you understand that you might not always be right, so you keep an open mind and try to see the other person's perspective. By understanding where they're coming from and what concerns they might have you can communicate with that person more effectively and thus both grow through a constructive argument. When you see something out of the ordinary, you're not quick to judge and put it in a box. Instead you embrace new ideas and learn throughout the process.
6 - Synergize
You seek to share resources and work together, because you know you will be stronger, faster and smarter, when you help eachother out through collaborative teamwork. If we take a look at soccer, we see that every player has a function and their goal is to get the ball into the net and they only way they can achieve that is by synergizing. By teamwork.
So far we've seen that these first 3 habits establish your self-reliance and the other habits develop your social dynamics.
The 7th Law is more general and influences every part of your life.
7- Sharpen the Saw
Sharpen the Saw is about Continuous Improvements. Here, the sharpness of the saw symbolizes how effective, how good you really are and the fact of the matter is that we need to work on ourselves until the day we die. The saw is never sharp enough. I remember one of my teachers asking me "Isn't that sad? That you never reach a stop sign?" and after thinking about her question many times now for years, I can say, I stand by the response I gave her. "No," I said "there's something beautiful about that. We don't get to see the stop sign, because it is not until our last breath, that we stop pursuing a better self." In other words, what happens to a flower when it stops growing? It dies. I think we are very similar in that regard. The meaning of life for me, and I'm not alone in this, is fulfilling my true potential. I want to be the greatest man I can be and I want to encourage others on their path to becoming their best self. This is what Stephen Covey calls the 8th Habit. Finding your voice and inspiring others to find theirs.
thx for reading
