Last week, my close friend Moayad Bahaydan, read The Halo Effect! post. He noticed that I am reading the book Thinking Fast & Slow by Daniel Kahneman. We discussed some books suggestions. Then, Moayad recommended me a book. Moayad works in Aramco as an Associate Engineer. He told me that Aramco provides a course about that book’s concepts. Also, he told me that the employees who took that course are always suggesting it strongly to others and they consider it as a unique experience. So, what do you think is that course?
The course’s name is: The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. It is based on Stephen Covey’s iconic book: The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. Moayad suggested me to see YouTube videos as summaries of that book instead of reading it. I saw some nice videos and I will start to summarize now:
Habit # 1, Be Proactive
Being Proactive is about focusing on what is under your control. In other words, proactivity is nothing but being responsible for your actions. Instead of blaming the circumstances that you have no control over, you do your responsibilities fully. As Rayan Holiday once said: ‘You only control how you play. You do not control what your teammates do; you control how you play. You do not control the size of your contract; you control how you play. You do not control what do they say about you on your back; you control how you play. You do not control the weather; you control how you play. You do not control whether your opponent cheats; you control how you play. You do not control yesterday’s game; you control how you play today’.
Stephen Covey explained proactivity by an example of two circles inside each other’s. The bigger circle’s name is circle-of-concern, the circle inside it called; the circle-of-influence. Reactive people focus their attention, time and energy on the bigger circle, wasting their resources on things that they cannot control. On the other hand, proactive people focus their powers on the circle-of-influence. Solving problems which can be solved by them, improving themselves, helping the people around them, etc.
Now, here is where the magic happens; when you focus on the circle of influence for a timeframe it gets bigger and bigger, and more things become under your control.
Habit # 2, Begin with The End in Mind
What do you want to feel on the last day of your life with all wasted opportunities and possibilities to grow and prospect? What do you want to feel on the last day of the month without achieving your target? What do you want to feel at the end of the day after you had wasted the whole day scrolling down your phone and watching TV Series?
Beginning with The End in Mind means that you should have a destination. So, you can sail through life’s oceans with a compass in your hand. You may work harder than anyone else, but without a compass, you will discover in the end that you reached a wrong destination. You can simplify this habit in the following sentence: “If you want to build a building, you should first have its drawings”.
Habit # 3, Put First Things First
I will leave you with this amazing video that explained this habit in less than two minutes:
I want to add to this video an amazing terminology that I have been taught during the Life Skills Class in the university. The Four Quadrants of Time Management shown in the following figure:
Note that; highly effective people focus their energy on Quadrant 2. Unsmart super hard workers focus on Quadrant 1, running and firefighting every day.
Habit # 4 ..........
Wait, let us continue next week with the rest of the habits. See you Guys.
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حمستني أقراه
Excellent blog, Khalid!
Keep writing and continue to inspire us.