Habit 1: Highly effective people are proactive
Your life doesn't just "happen". Your life is carefully designed by you. Every situation that you encounter presents a new choice and gives you a perfect opportunity to do things differently from the past and to produce more positive results in your life. Being proactive is about taking responsibility for your life. Highly effective people don’t blame their family or environment for the current state of their life. Proactive people recognize that they are responsible. They don't blame genetics, circumstances, conditions, or conditioning. They know that their own choices determine the course and shape the events of their life.
Habit 2: Highly effective people begin with the end in mind
Beginning with the end in mind requires imagination--the ability to envision in your mind what you cannot at present see with your eyes. It is based on the principle that all things are created twice. There is first a mental creation and second a physical creation. The physical creation follows the mental, just as a building follows a blueprint. If you don't make a conscious effort to visualize who you are and what you want in life, then you will empower other people and circumstances to shape you and your life by default. It's about connecting again with your own uniqueness and then defining the personal, moral, and ethical guidelines within which you can most happily express and fulfill yourself. Begin with the End in Mind means to begin each day, task, or project with a clear vision of your desired direction and destination, and then continue by flexing your proactive muscles to make things happen.
Habit 3: Highly effective people put first things first
Habit 1 or being proactive is about choice. Habit 2 is the first, or mental, creation. Beginning with the End in Mind is about vision. Habit 3 is the second creation, the physical creation. This habit is where Habits 1 and 2 come together. It happens day in and day out, moment-by-moment. It deals with many of the questions addressed in the field of time management. However, habit 3 is about life management as well--your purpose, values, roles, and priorities. What are "first things?" First things are those things you, personally, assign the greatest value. If you put first things first, you are organizing and managing time and events according to the personal priorities you established in Habit 2.
Habit 4: Think win-win
Think Win-Win isn't about being nice, nor is it a quick-fix technique. It is a character-based code for human interaction and collaboration. Most of us learn to base our self-worth on comparisons and competition. We think about succeeding in terms of someone else failing--that is, if I win, you lose; or if you win, I lose. Life becomes a zero-sum game. We all play the success game, which in the end no one really wins. Win-win sees life as a cooperative arena, not a competitive one. Win-win is a frame of mind and heart that constantly seeks mutual benefit in all human interactions. Win-win means agreements or solutions are mutually beneficial and satisfying.
Habit 5: Highly effective people seek first to understand, then to be understood
Communication is the most important skill in life. In order to be effective, communication has to be two-way. That is, you must be able to effectively listen as well as speak. You spend years learning how to read and write, and years learning how to speak. But what about listening? What training have you had that enables you to listen so that you really understand the other person? Most people seek first to be understood. In doing so, they may ignore the other person completely, pretend that they're listening, selectively hear only certain parts of the conversation or attentively focus on only the words being said, but miss the meaning entirely. This happens because most people listen with the intent to reply, not to understand. They wait and listen for the person to take a breath so that they can interject what they want to say. Highly effective people do just the opposite. They listen to the other person carefully to understand what they think or feel before attempting to get them to understand what they are thinking and feeling.
Habit 6: Highly effective people synergize
Synergize is the habit of creative cooperation, teamwork and the adventure of finding new solutions to old problems. Synergy doesn't just happen on its own. It's a process, and through that process, people bring all their personal experience and expertise to the table. Together, they can produce far better results that they could individually; two heads are better than one. Synergy lets us discover jointly things we are much less likely to discover by ourselves. It is the idea that the whole is greater than the sum of the parts. One plus one equals three, or six, or sixty. When people begin to interact together genuinely, and they're open to each other's influence, they begin to gain new insight. The capability of inventing new approaches is increased exponentially because of differences. Valuing differences is what really drives synergy. Do you truly value the mental, emotional, and psychological differences of other people? Or do you wish everyone would just agree with you so you could all get along? Many people mistake uniformity for unity or sameness for oneness. One word--boring! Highly effective people see differences as strengths, not weaknesses.
Habit 7: Sharpen the saw
Sharpen the Saw means enhancing your greatest asset --you. It means having a balanced program for renewing yourself in the four areas of your life: physical, social/emotional, mental, and spiritual. As you renew yourself in each of these areas, you create growth and change in your life. Sharpen the Saw keeps you fresh so you can continue to practice the other six habits. You increase your capacity to produce and handle the challenges around you. Without renewal, the body becomes weak, the mind mechanical, the emotions raw, the spirit insensitive, and the person selfish.
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