How to Develop Your Personal Mission Statement Quotes

“When you live out of your memory, you focus on the past. When you live out of your imagination, you focus on the future.”
― Stephen R. Covey, How to Develop Your Personal Mission Statement

“Think about taking a trip on an airplane. Before taking off, the pilot has a very clear destination in mind, which hopefully coincides with yours, and a flight plan to get there. The plane takes off at the appointed hour toward that predetermined destination. But in fact, the plane is off course at least 90 percent of the time. Weather conditions, turbulence, and other factors cause it to get off track. However, feedback is given to the pilot constantly, who then makes course corrections and keeps coming back to the exact flight plan, bringing the plane back on course. And often, the plane arrives at the destination on time. It’s amazing. Think of it. Leaving on time, arriving on time, but off course 90 percent of the time. If you can create this image of an airplane, a destination, and a flight plan in your mind, then you understand the purpose of a personal mission statement. It is the picture of where you want to end up—that is, your destination is the values you want to live your life by. Even if you are off course much or most of the time but still hang on to your sense of hope and your vision, you will eventually arrive at your destination. You will arrive at your destination and usually on time. That’s the whole point—we just get back on course.”
― Stephen R. Covey, How to Develop Your Personal Mission Statement

“What lies behind us is nothing compared to what lies within us and ahead of us.”
― Stephen R. Covey, How to Develop Your Personal Mission Statement

“If you knew you couldn’t fail, what would you give your life to? If you knew you didn’t have to work for a living, what would you give your life to?”
― Stephen R. Covey, How to Develop Your Personal Mission Statement

“Whatever you can do, or dream, begin it! For boldness has genius, power, and magic in it.”
― Stephen R. Covey, How to Develop Your Personal Mission Statement

“Think about taking a trip on an airplane. Before taking off, the pilot has a very clear destination in mind, which hopefully coincides with yours, and a flight plan to get there. The plane takes off at the appointed hour toward that predetermined destination. But in fact, the plane is off course at least 90 percent of the time. Weather conditions, turbulence, and other factors cause it to get off track. However, feedback is given to the pilot constantly, who then makes course corrections and keeps coming back to the exact flight plan, bringing the plane back on course. And often, the plane arrives at the destination on time. It’s amazing. Think of it. Leaving on time, arriving on time, but off course 90 percent of the time. If you can create this image of an airplane, a destination, and a flight plan in your mind, then”
― Stephen R. Covey, How to Develop Your Personal Mission Statement

“The Three Lives We all lead three lives: our public life, our private life, and our deep inner life. Our public life takes place in a community setting, where we interact with others. Our private life is away from the public—we may be alone, with a friend, or with family members. But our deep inner life is our most significant life. It is where our heart is. It’s where we have the capacity to explore our own motives, to examine our own thoughts and desires, and to analyze our problems and our needs. We can go into this deep private life—we could call it a secret life—even when we are in a public or a private setting. Our secret life is where we are able to tap into the power of the four human endowments: self-awareness, conscience, imagination, and independent will. When you are dealing with the development of a personal mission statement, you need to go into the deep inner or secret life, which influences the other two. It is the part of you where you decide the most fundamental issues of your life. As the psalmist put it: “Search your own heart with all diligence, for out of it flows the issues of your life.” It truly is a secret life. No one knows the thoughts and intents of your heart. You alone have that awareness, and you can step in on your own deep inner life; you can examine, explore, and change it. Many people, unless they are in pain because of something they care about that is not being fulfilled, will not go into their deep inner life at all. In a sense, they’re not living. They’re just being lived, publicly and privately.”
― Stephen R. Covey, How to Develop Your Personal Mission Statement

“REFLECTION QUESTIONS What is truly important in my life? What would I really like to be and do in my life? What are my greatest strengths? What are my talents, possibilities, and true potential? If I had unlimited time and resources, what would I do? What are my deepest priorities? Which relationships do I wish to be lasting? Who is the one person who has made the greatest positive impact in my life? What must I do, and how must I manage my life, to constantly nurture these vital relationships? What kind of person do I wish to become? What are the principles I would like to live by?”
― Stephen R. Covey, How to Develop Your Personal Mission Statement

“The thing I learned is that you don’t invent your mission, you detect it. You uncover it, as it were.”
― Stephen R. Covey, How to Develop Your Personal Mission Statement

“The principles you live by create the world you live in. So when you change the principles you live by, you can change your world. Your mission statement serves to summarize the principles you want to live by.”
― Stephen R. Covey, How to Develop Your Personal Mission Statement

“Be Proactive. People are responsible for their own choices and have the freedom to choose based on principles and values rather than”
― Stephen R. Covey, How to Develop Your Personal Mission Statement

“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”
― Stephen R. Covey, How to Develop Your Personal Mission Statement

“First, the mission statement should be timeless.”
― Stephen R. Covey, How to Develop Your Personal Mission Statement

“This”
― Stephen R. Covey, How to Develop Your Personal Mission Statement

“We all lead three lives: our public life, our private life, and our deep inner life.”
― Stephen R. Covey, How to Develop Your Personal Mission Statement

“your destination is the values you want to live your life by. Even if you are off course much or most of the time but still hang on to your sense of hope and your vision, you will eventually arrive at your destination. You will arrive at your destination and usually on time. That’s the whole point—we just get back on course.”
― Stephen R. Covey, How to Develop Your Personal Mission Statement

“It’s an interesting process, because as we find out who we are, we also find an energy and focus to our lives. Often this process involves detection, rather than selection; it’s something that we discover inside ourselves. Sometimes people say to me: “Blaine, I’ve thought about it a lot and nothing really specific and concrete is coming to mind. What am I going to do?” Usually what comes to mind is the old line the gentleman says, “Sometimes I sits and thinks, and sometimes I just sits.”
― Stephen R. Covey, How to Develop Your Personal Mission Statement

“Which relationships do I wish to be lasting? Who is the one person who has made the greatest positive impact in my life? What must I do, and how must I manage my life, to constantly nurture these vital relationships? What kind of person do I wish to become? What are the principles I would like to live by? What have been my happiest moments? How do I want to be remembered? And, finally, how can I serve others in a meaningful way throughout my life?”
― Stephen R. Covey, How to Develop Your Personal Mission Statement

“What is truly important in my life? What would I really like to be and do in my life? What are my greatest strengths? What are my talents, possibilities, and true potential? If I had unlimited time and resources, what would I do? What are my deepest priorities?”
― Stephen R. Covey, How to Develop Your Personal Mission Statement

“If we work upon marble, it will perish. If we work upon brass, time will efface it. But if we work upon immortal minds, and instill into them just principles, we are then engraving upon tablets which no time will efface but will brighten and brighten to all eternity.”
― Stephen R. Covey, How to Develop Your Personal Mission Statement

“To live, to love, to learn, to leave a legacy.”
― Stephen R. Covey, How to Develop Your Personal Mission Statement

“Your vision is the end, the destination. Principles are the means, like the flight plan. Vision is who you really are and what you could become. Principles are those unalterable truths you feel so strongly about that you are willing to accept them as your own set of values.”
― Stephen R. Covey, How to Develop Your Personal Mission Statement

“Our secret life is where we are able to tap into the power of the four human endowments: self-awareness, conscience, imagination, and independent will.”
― Stephen R. Covey, How to Develop Your Personal Mission Statement

“Viktor Frankl shared a brilliant insight about developing mission statements. He said, “The thing I learned is that you don’t invent your mission, you detect it. You uncover it, as it were.” You see, everyone has special gifts, unique qualities, and characteristics. And they need to work inwardly until they detect those aspects.”
― Stephen R. Covey, How to Develop Your Personal Mission Statement

“The history of the world teaches that the power of joy in people doesn’t come in getting, it always comes in giving, contributing, adding more. The more you give, the more you live. If you’re about something better, live for something higher than self.”
― Stephen R. Covey, How to Develop Your Personal Mission Statement

“Think about taking a trip on an airplane. Before taking off, the pilot has a very clear destination in mind, which hopefully coincides with yours, and a flight plan to get there. The plane takes off at the appointed hour toward that predetermined destination. But in fact, the plane is off course at least 90 percent of the time. Weather conditions, turbulence, and other factors cause it to get off track. However, feedback is given to the pilot constantly, who then makes course corrections and keeps coming back to the exact flight plan, bringing the plane back on course. And often, the plane arrives at the destination on time.”
― Stephen R. Covey, How to Develop Your Personal Mission Statement

“He who has a ‘why’ can live with any ‘what.”
― Stephen R. Covey, How to Develop Your Personal Mission Statement

“The body, the heart, the mind, and the spirit. The essence of these needs is captured in this phrase “to live, to love, to learn, to leave a legacy.”
― Stephen R. Covey, How to Develop Your Personal Mission Statement

“If we work upon marble, it will perish. If we work upon brass, time will efface it. But if we work upon immortal minds, and instill into them just principles, we are then engraving upon tablets which no time will efface but will brighten and brighten to all eternity.” I”
― Stephen R. Covey, How to Develop Your Personal Mission Statement

“The Three Lives We all lead three lives: our public life, our private life, and our deep inner life. Our public life takes place in a community setting, where we interact with others. Our private life is away from the public—we may be alone, with a friend, or with family members. But our deep inner life is our most significant life. It is where our heart is. It’s where we have the capacity to explore our own motives, to examine our own thoughts and desires, and to analyze our problems and our needs. We can go into this deep private life—we could call it a secret life—even when we are in a public or a private setting. Our secret life is where we are able to tap into the power of the four human endowments: self-awareness, conscience, imagination, and independent will. When you are dealing with the development of a personal mission statement, you need to go into the deep inner or secret life, which influences the other two. It is the part of you where you decide the most fundamental issues of your life. As the psalmist put it: “Search your own heart with all diligence, for out of it flows the issues of your life.” It truly is a secret life. No one knows the thoughts and intents of your heart.”
― Stephen R. Covey, How to Develop Your Personal Mission Statement