7 Habits of Highly Effective People
I was hesitant to read this book because of the title. I’m always skeptical when I read books or articles that promise dramatic change in XX steps, or promise “secrets” to success, happiness, love, etc.
Still, over 15 million copies have been sold so I bought a copy and brought it to the beach (side note: beach + interesting book = great afternoon).
Thankfully, the book proved to be extremely interesting. So interesting that I took 8 pages of notes – all of which you’ll find below. This book will defiantly change the way I see things.
Notes
Our Paradigms are the way we “see” the world or circumstances — not in terms of our visual sense of sight, but in terms of perceiving, understanding, and interpreting.
The power of a Paradigm Shift is the essential power of quantum change, whether that shift is an instantaneous or a slow and deliberate process.
Paradigm Shifts, instantaneous or developmental, move us from one way of seeing the world to another. And those shifts create powerful change. Our paradigms, correct or incorrect, are the sources of our attitudes and behaviors, and ultimately our relationships with others.
Sometimes the conditioning of a lifetime can’t be reversed, regardless of what occurs
We see the world, not as it is, but as we are — or, as we are conditioned to see it.
Amazing how two people can see the same thing, disagree, and yet both be right.
What paradigm shift have occured your life? What caused them? Was it a unexpected death or illness? Was it 9/11? Maybe the recent economic downturn made you relaize life is too short.
Albert Einstein observed, “The significant problems we face cannot be solved at the same level of thinking we were at when we created them.
As we look around us and within us and recognize the problems created as we live and interact within the personality ethic, we begin to realize that these are deep, fundamental problems that cannot be solved on the superficial level on which they were created.
Sow a thought, reap an action; sow an action, reap a habit; sow a habit, reap a character; sow a character, reap a destiny.
For our purposes, we will define a habit as the intersection of knowledge, skill, and desire. Knowledge is the theoretical paradigm, the what to do and the why. Skill is the how to do. And desire is the motivation, the want to do. In order to make something a habit in our lives, we have to have all three.
Dependent people need others to get what they want. Independent people can get what they want through their own effort. Interdependent people combine their own efforts with the efforts of others to achieve their greatest success.
Basically, there are three kinds of assets: physical, financial, and human.
In our quest for short-term returns, or results, we often ruin a prized physical asset — a car, a computer, a washer or dryer, even our body or our environment.
When two people in a marriage are more concerned about getting the golden eggs, the benefits, than they are in preserving the relationship that makes them possible, they often become insensitive and inconsiderate, neglecting the little kindnesses and courtesies so important to a deep relationship. They begin to use control levers to manipulate each other, to focus on their own needs, to justify their own position and look for evidence to show the wrongness of the other person. The love, the richness, the softness, and spontaneity begin to deteriorate. The goose gets sicker day by day. Continue reading →
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