The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People: Powerful Lessons in Personal Change

by Stephen R. Covey

Covey found a similar pattern in personal effectiveness: first build upon a strong core of principles that are not open for continuous change; at the same time, be relentless in the quest for improvement and continuous self-renewal.

There is no effectiveness without discipline, and there is no discipline without character.

There is no real excellence in all this world which can be separated from right living. DAVID STARR JORDAN

we must look at the lens through which we see the world, as well as at the world we see, and that the lens itself shapes how we interpret the

We began to realize that if we wanted to change the situation, we first had to change ourselves. And to change ourselves effectively, we first had to change our perceptions.

Each of us has many, many maps in our head, which can be divided into two main categories: maps of the way things are, or realities, and maps of the way things should be, or values.

Each of us tends to think we see things as they are, that we are objective. But this is not the case. We see the world, not as it is, but as we are—or, as we are conditioned to see it.

The more aware we are of our basic paradigms, maps, or assumptions, and the extent to which we have been influenced by our experience, the more we can take responsibility for those paradigms, examine them, test them against reality, listen to others and be open to their perceptions, thereby getting a larger picture and a far more objective view.

Paradigms are inseparable from character. Being is seeing in the human dimension. And what we see is highly interrelated to what we are.