7 Habits of Highly Effective People: A Book Review

                Change starts from within.

                Stephen Covey’s Book entitled “7 Habits of Highly Effective People” has divulged and articulated the epistemology of Personal Development. He has even said that highly successful people seem to have naturally developed them.

                7 Habits move us through the paradigm of inter-related and synergistic principles of effectiveness, each one powerful and worthy of adopting and following in its own right.

                First paradigm directs us from Dependence, the era in our life when we need to rely on others to care for us, to Independence, the period when we are already capable to make our own decisions and take care of ourselves. Dependence to Independence Paradigm contains the first three habits namely, Be Proactive, Begin With the End in Mind and Put First Things First, respectively.

                Through our imagination we could understand the first habit, “Be Proactive”, with the use of one small circle surrounded by a bigger circle. The small circle is our circle of influence. The bigger circle is our circle of concerns. We have myriad concerns in life but only a few of them do we have control. This is the explanation behind why the circle of concern is bigger than the circle of our influence. Proactive people focus their efforts on the things over which they have influence, and in the process often expand their area of influence up to the time of seizing the area of concern. Proactive people master the principle of personal choice and take responsibility of their life. They have the habit of focusing effort to areas in life where they have means of control and influence. Worries that disrupt their activities of daily living and stresses in life is lessened thus, providing them the momentum to go forward into the challenges of the race called successful life.  Meanwhile, reactive people often focus their efforts on areas of concern over which they have no control. Their complaining and negative energy tend to shrink their circle of influence. In easy words, being proactive is the ability to control the environment, rather than have it control you. Being able to control the environment through the use of one’s self awareness, imagination, conscience and independent will gives one the power to produce the result he desires, the principle we call effectiveness. We cannot move into the next habit without working first on our basic character by becoming proactive.

 
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