How to Develop Your Personal Mission Statement

by Stephen R. Covey

“Begin with the End in Mind.”

The power of the personal mission statement lies in your vision and in a commitment to that vision, that purpose, and those principle-centered values. They will control your decisions, determine your outlook, and provide the direction for your future.

This idea—this principle—of beginning with the end in mind is based upon the concept that all things are created twice: first in the mind, as a thought or intellectual creation; and second in reality as a physical creation.

“The capacity for hope is the most significant fact of life. It gives human beings a sense of destination and the energy to get started.”

“Our wounds would heal.” This sense of the future somehow triggered the healing mechanisms and immune system inside their minds and bodies.

Nothing gives so much direction to a person’s life as a sound set of principles.

“Many persons have the wrong idea about what constitutes true happiness. It is not attained through self-gratification, but through fidelity to a worthy purpose.”

Your habit system, your value system, and your intuitive feelings are all different dimensions that must be blended.

It’s not maybe what we’d like it to be, but what it truly is.