I had a review of this book almost completed in my spiral notebook that I keep in my backpack and that I take everywhere (now there is a highly effective habit!) but every brilliant insult I wrote about this load of fertilizer has to take a backseat because I just discovered that there is a website 7habitsstore.com which forced me to rethink all of the vitriol I'd penned while sitting in a café thinking about this book (sitting in cafés and thinking: another highly effective habit) because the merchandizing of this book somehow lowered my already rock-bottom opinion of 7 Habits.

Just looking through the obscenely over-priced merchandise is enough to merit a 1 Star rating for the book on Goodreads. How about a 7 Habits poster for your children for only $39.95? Seriously, if someone I knew were teaching their child the word “synergize,” I would call protective custody immediately and have the child removed from that home. Just that thought makes me shudder. There are dozens of spin-off books, so this toxic waste site and “self-help” book has spawned a library of moronic literature. Someone please pound a stake through its heart!

Here’s the thing, I think that the people who claim that this book somehow guided them on their path to riches and fame just don’t give themselves enough credit for working hard. They could also credit the fortune cookies they have read along the way which have a stronger intellectual base than anything in this idiotic treatise. His list of 7 habits are either completely stupid or mind-numbingly commonsensical. I have often said that most self-help books could be reduced to a 3x5 index card. If there is anything even remotely interesting contained in this book, it could fit on the back of a postage stamp using a marker pen.

He actually uses the fable of the Golden Goose and spins it into a chapter. Wow, what an intellect! The lesson is to take care of things or they won’t work well for long. Now there is a great lesson to teach people…except almost everyone learns that one at around age 6.

¡Spoiler Alert! Here are the 7 habits and I am not making this shit up:

1 - Be Pro-active
2 - Begin with the End in Mind
3 - Put First Things First
4 - Think Win-Win
5 - Seek First to Understand
6 - Synergize (Yeah, I don’t know what that word means either)
7 - Sharpen the Saw

The thing is, no one can define success or effectiveness for anyone else. I'm sure that many people feel that Donald Trump is effective and successful. I think that he's a huge asshole and a total loser. It all depends on your perspective.

One thing I know for sure is that if I follow these 7 habits, I'll be successful for sure, but how do I follow without losing interest or without forgetting?
So, I need to read again and again.

Unable to grasp the habits in it's entirety in first reading, will be reading a paperback version of this in future. But I'm thankful for this book and I'm glad I read it.

My boss really hates the word synergy and now I know why.

Decidedly a classic in business books but I have to agree with other reviewers...this book made such a difference that the principles embedded themselves in business culture. And so it felt like it didn't teach me anything new. But I respect the difference it made! I did like the author's reflections at the end.

Paradigm shift

We must look at the lens through which we see the world

We first have to change ourselves, have to change our perceptions

We see the world, not as it is, but as we are

The United States today is the fruit of paradigm shift

Paradigm is the source from which attitudes and behaviors flow

Listening

Listening involves patience, openness, and the desire to understand

Problem

The way we see the problem is the problem

Habit

The intersection of knowledge, skill and desire

Happiness

What we want now and what we want eventually

Dependence to independence to interdependence

Life is, by nature, highly interdependent

Effectiveness

(1) What is produced (2) capacity to produce - (P/PC)

Effective people are not problem-minded but opportunity-minded

Effectiveness lies in the balance

Social paradigm

More projections than reflections

Freedom to choose

Can you look at yourself almost as though you were someone else?

We are not our feelings. We are not our moods. We are not even our moods

Between stimulus and response, man has the freedom to choose

We are free to choose the action, not to choose their consequences

Reactive people

Reactive people build their emotional lives around the behavior of others

Driven by feelings, conditions and environment

Proactive people

Proactive people are driven by values -- carefully thought about

Their response to the stimuli is a value based choice or response

What hurts us

It's not what happens to us, but our response to what happens what hurts us

Victor Frankl

Three central values in life:

(1) Experimental: what happens to us

(2) Creative: what we bring into existence

(3) Attitudinal: our response in difficult circumstances

Meaning comes from within

Love

Reactive people make it a feeling

Proactive people make it a verb

Circle of concern / circle of influence

Where we focus our time and energy

Reactive people focus on circle of concern

Proactive people focus on circle of influence

Areas of problems

(1) Direct control

(2) Indirect control

(3) No control

Proactive approach

Change the formula, change the result

Change from inside-out

Acknowledge a mistake, correct and learn from it

Begin with the end in mind

All things are created twice. First in mind, then physically

Accept the responsibility for both

Habit 1 says "you are the creator". Habit 2 is the first creation

Habit 1 says "you are the program". Habit 2 says "write the program"

Management / Leadership

Management is the bottom line

Leadership is the top line

Management is the efficiency in climbing the ladder of success

Leadership determines whether ladder is leaning against the right wall

Leadership: constantly monitor environmental change. Organize resource in right direction

We are trapped in management paradigm, thinking of control, efficiency and rules instead of direction, purpose and family feeling

Rescripting

Through imagination we can visualize the uncreated worlds

Through conscious we come into contact with universal laws

Combined with self-awareness, these two help us to rescript our own script

Mission

People can't live with change if there's not a changeless core inside them

Sense of who you are, what you are about and what you value

Fankl: We detect rather than invent our missions

Goals

Goals give structure and organized direction to your personal mission

Center of life

Whatever is at the center of our life will be the source of our security, guidance, wisdom and power

Security represents your sense worth

Guidance means your source of direction

Wisdom is your perspective on life

Power is the faculty or capacity to act

Principles

Principles are deep, fundamental truths, classic truths, generic common denominators. They are tightly interwoven threads running with exactness, consistency, beauty, and strength through the fabric of life

Brain

Left hemisphere: logical, verbal, parts and specifics, analysis, sequential thinking, time bound, manage

Right hemisphere: intuitive, creative, wholes and relationship, synthesis, holistic thinking, time free, lead

Expand your mind. Visualize in rich detail. Involve as many emotions and feelings as possible. Involve as many of the sense as you can

Affirmation

Five basic ingredients: personal, positive, present, visual, emotional

Put first thing first

Habit 3 is the second (physical) creation

Time management

First generation: notes and checklists

Second generation: calendar and appointment books

Third generation: prioritization, setting goals

Fourth generation: challenge is not manage time but to manage ourselves

Urgent

Urgent means it requires immediate attention

Its visible

Important

What contributes to your mission

Four quadrants

(1) Urgent / important

(2) Important / not urgent

(3) Urgent / not important

(4) not urgent / not important

As long as you focus on quadrant one, it keeps getting better

Samuel Johnson

There could be no friendship without confidence, and no confidence without integrity

Golden Rule

Do unto other as you would have others do unto you

Relationships

In relationships, the little things are the big things

In relationship, fear replaces cooperation

People are very tender, very sensitive inside

Keeping a commitment or a promise is major deposit

Breaking one is a major withdrawal

The cause of almost all relationship difficulties is rooted in conflicting or ambiguous expectations around roles and goals

Integrity

Integrity is conforming reality to our words

Leo Roskin

It is the weak who are cruel. Gentleness can be expected from the strong

Rebellion

Rebellion is the knot of heart, not of mind

Think win-win

It means that agreements or solutions are mutually beneficial, mutually satisfying

Win-win sees life as a cooperative, not a competitive arena

There is plenty for everybody

Belief in third alternative

Win-lose

Authoritarian approach. Prone to use position

We are deeply scripted in the win-lose mentality since birth

The academic world reinforces it

Lose-win

No standards, no demands, no expectations, no vision

Seek strength from popularity or acceptance

Intimidated by the ego strength of others

Win-lose people love lose-win people

Character

Your example flows naturally out of your character

Your character is constantly radiating, communicating

Listening

Most people do not listen with the intent to understand, they listen with intent to reply

They're either speaking or preparing to speak

Filtering everything through their own paradigms

Reading their autobiography into other people's lives

The opposite is empathetic listening

Ethos

Personal credibility. Integrity

Pathos

Empathic side. You are in alignment with other's trust

Logos

Logic. Reasoning part

Synergy

The whole is greater than the sum of its parts

Synergy is everywhere in nature

Everything is related to everything

It is creative cooperation

To value and respect the differences

There is psychic synergy taking place in our own head

Manage from the left, lead from the right

Sharpen the saw

Renewal of four dimensions in balance

Quadrant II activity

Build your body in three areas: endurance, flexibility, and strength

Writing is a powerful way to sharpen the mental say

Be a positive scripter, an affirmer

See unseen potential in people

See them in fresh way

The upward spiral

Keep progressing, we must learn, commit and do (repeat)

The lord work from the inside out

The world work from outside in

The world would shape human behavior, but Christ can change the human character - Ezra Taft

And the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we began - T. S. Eliot

I spent four years at Columbia University in New York City in the mid-eighties. I thought I was getting an education -- but I wasn't. You see, I've learned the hard way that "education" really means learning how to deal with people, and one's emotional needs, and make plans for a rewarding future. The books I had to read at Columbia had nothing to do with anything as mundane as making a living or liking yourself or understanding how to work constructively with other people.

But the 7 Habits of Highly Effective People is different. I really, really wish I had read this book as a Columbia freshman in 1981. Of course it wasn't written till 1989. But I'm convinced that reading the 7 Habits would have taught me more than reading Homer's ILIAD or Plato's REPUBLIC.

What Stephen R. Covey does is so much more than just telling sales types how to win friends and influence people. He teaches you how to think about what you really want from life, and how to express those goals, frame them in a workable context, and make them possible by connecting with other people. Those are all skills I didn't have when I entered Carman Hall in the fall of 1981, and I didn't have them when I left Furnald Hall for the last time in 1985.

It seems to me that these fancy Ivy League colleges do nothing but rip people off, especially in the Humanities divisions. They don't teach practical job skills, or self-development, or leadership, or anything else. They don't encourage skepticism or independent thought. Nobody even pretends that reading Homer's ILIAD will help students find a job, or even know how to look for a job. Jobs aren't important, because, hey, only rich kids go to Columbia! And if you're not rich, you don't really belong, so who are you to question the curriculum?

Of course no one expressed it in quite that way. When I was at Columbia in the Reagan Eighties, a lot of the more left wing professors took pleasure in sneering at kids my age as being materialistic and lacking ideals. They really made you feel that you had no business hoping for any kind of practical benefits from your education. And they were really, really clear on the fact that undergraduates had no business asking for help. They weren't there to help. They were there to lecture. And they weren't thinking win-win!

If I could have my college education to do over again I wouldn't go to Columbia. I wouldn't read Homer's Iliad or Plato's Republic. But I would definitely read 7 Habits of Highly Effective People!

Why I Read this Book: There is nothing more valuable than personal development and improvement. This got me off to a wonderful start.

Review:

Stephen Covey is an absolute master mind when it comes to personal change. I received this book from my family one Christmas while I was at university. At first I was skeptical; no I should say I was pessimistic. That is a bit more honest. Does it not seem that most people perceive books on personal change and self improvement in a negative way? Pretty ironic wouldn’t you say? Well this was the first such book that I owned that fell into the “personal change” category. Since then I have read it numerous times and have read countless other books on the subject. It is safe to say that this book completely changed my perception on reality and it put me in a place where I was not only comfortable, but motivated, to read every other book like it that I could get my hands on.

As one can probably understand from the title, Stephen Covey presents his strategy for personal change and development through these seven habits that he has created to lead individuals in being as effective as possible. I will not get into detail about what the seven habits actually are because that of course would greatly take away from the power of this book. Do you really think Covey would spend over 350 pages discussing these seven habits if he could get the same point across by just listing them on one page? The things that make this book so powerful are not only the seven habits, but the stories, examples and explanation that thoroughly support each of them.

Through the seven habits Covey gets across so many fundamentals of leading a powerful life. I credit this work with so many positive things that have since done wonders for my life and my outlook on it. These include writing a personal mission statement, understanding the power of setting goals and then setting them, establishing clear values by which to live, effectively managing my time, understanding the significance of honesty and integrity, focusing on results and leading others.

If I had to claim a single most powerful benefit that I received from this book, (which is difficult because there really are so many) I would have to say it was learning the value of having my own personal mission statement. Unfortunately the idea of a personal mission statement does not go over well with most people. That is at least the experience I have had. The truth is that without a personal mission statement and a definition of what it means for you to be successful, how is one ever going to know when they have succeeded and what they should and should not do to get them closer to their goals? This clear definition does wonders for your motivation, drive and excitement with everything you do.

I now have a personal mission statement that I can look to at any part of my day and ask myself “is what I am doing right now getting me closer to my mission”. If the answer is no then I should not be doing it. I just looked up at my statement as I was writing this and I can confidently say that writing these words to you is very in line with my life mission. It is pretty simple really. Do you know how good it feels to be doing things that get you closer to your mission? It is time to find out.

-Reading For Your Succcess

It took me months to finish the book, as I kept practicing and re-read the habits from time to time. Besides, the book's contents is very compact that requires full focus to absorb all the ideas. But it's worth. Remind me of principles in life, giving practical guides on how to change ourselves, how important human interaction is. Praises are not enough for this powerful book. It's a must read book for a man in his quest for excellence.

One of the best books to digest. Habits, good or bad, have an effect on each of us. This book clearly demonstrates 7-key habits of highly effective people that formulate a mindset that when a habit, becomes automatic. These habits can and should be formulated in whatever you do.

Stephen R. Covey is one of those people that have contributed to the cult of productivity that is now so prevalent in our contemporary society that really took flight in the early 2000s with its kickstart a bit before that when the internet boomed and big tech firms started getting hip. I can identify these authors because they make really huge sums of money through writing 10 or even 20 books where they just regurgitate more of the same things. I feel that if they cared about their audience they would write just one good book and blog the rest or allow their success to speak for themselves.
I used to be one of those people who idolized these types of individuals, but I began to associate them more with a cult where people are just coerced into buying more and more of their stuff instead of being inspired once for the change. Like a drug that you can't keep getting enough of or some illusory productivity scheme. I might have rated books such as this higher back in the day but now I've become more critical. I'm laughing a bit now because Kisosaki (Rich Dad, Poor Dad and sequels) literally copied the quadrant and productivity scheme in his books from Covey whose books came out originally in the 80s.
If you are in your 20s, have never read a productivity book before and think you want to improve yourself, this book may not be such a terrible read, which is what's convincing me to give it a 2-star rating (it was indeed "ok"). Otherwise it feels more of the same, as it resonates in such a huge part with Think and Grow Rich, How to Win Friends and Influence People and so on. Once you read one, you've read them all and only the easily impressionable would still give literature in this genre a higher rating.

@Edit in 2023: Went through the Blinkist version due to the curiosity of the summary. I always feel these oversimplified ideas are SO difficult to follow.

اقتباسات من الكتاب:

كوفي: كلما تمكنت من فهم الآخرين فهما عميقا زاد تقديرك لهم وزاد شعورك باحترامهم

كوفي: كتابة اليوميات التي تضم أفكارنا وتجاربنا ورؤانا وتعاليمنا تعزز صفاء الذهن ودقته

كوفي: لا توجد طريقة لتثقيف عقلك وتوسيع مداركك بانتظام أفضل من عادة قراءة الكتب القيّمة

كوفي: الصور الصغيرة من العطف واللباقة مهمة للغاية

جونسون: لا يمكن أن تكون هناك صداقة بدون ثقة، ولا ثقة بدون صدق

إيمرسون: عندما تصرخ في أذني لا أسمع ما تقول

كوفي: إن البداية الحقيقية للتأثير تحدث عندما يستشعر الآخرون تأثرك بهم

كوفي: الأمل يعني أن تكتشف أنك تمثل القوة الإبداعية في حياتك

كوفي: أهم إنجازاتنا تتطلب مهارات للتعاون والعمل الجماعي تفوق إمكانياتنا الحالية بكثير

كوفي: لا بد ألا نكتفي بالتعليم النظامي بل علينا تعليم أنفسنا باستمرار وإعادة اكتشافها

كوفي: قاعدة النجاح الحقيقية هي القدرة على الاستمرار والنمو

كوفي: الذين يعتادون كبت مشاعرهم بدلا من تحويلها إلى معان أكبر يكتشفون تأثير ذلك على تقديرهم لذاتهم وجودة علاقاتهم بالآخرين

I'm giving up at 30% and this has officially become my first DNF. I've put down some books for later for not being the right time. I can't say the same with this one. This is more like a "I don't wanna see you again ever" kind of book.

Amazon kept recommending me this damn book for some reason, always the first on the list. It felt like someone trying to sell me Herbalife. This is not for me, hell no.