Top 745 Quotes & Sayings by Stephen Covey - Page 11

It's incredibly easy to get caught up in an activity trap, in the busy-ness of life, to work harder and harder at climbing the ladder of success only to discover it's leaning against the wrong wall. It is possible to be busy - very busy - without being very effective.

Be proactive. Ask yourself, "Are my actions based on self-chosen values or on my moods, feelings and circumstances?"

The process of building trust is an interesting one, but it begins with yourself, with what I call self trust, and with your own credibility, your own trustworthiness. If you think about it, it's hard to establish trust with others if you can't trust yourself.

It is extremely ironic that the more we care about what people think about us the less we care about people, and the less we care about what people think about us the more we begin to care for others

Success in one role can't justify failure in another.

Trust is a function of both character and competence. Of course you can't trust someone who lacks integrity, but if someone is honest but they can't perform, you're not going to trust them either. You won't trust them to get the job done.

Belief is another word for paradigm. It's a synonymous. Your belief of the way things are. Values are the way things should be, it's a paradigm of the way things should be. Beliefs are the paradigms of the way things are.

Nevertheless, the only way we can move from where we are now to where we would like to be is to accept where we are now.

Interdependency follows independence.

Leadership is communicating people's worth and potential so clearly that they come to see it themselves.

I win the private victory when I have made my mind up and commit to live by correct principles and to serve worthy purposes.

When a person has access to both the intuitive, creative and visual right brain, and the analytical, logical, verbal left brain, then the whole brain is working...And this tool is best suited to the reality of what life is, because life is not just logical-it is also emotional.

The character ethic, which I believe to be the foundation of success, teaches that there are basic principles of effective living, and that people can only experience true success and enduring happiness as they learn and integrate these principles into their basic character.

Trust is a competency. It's something you can get good at. It's a strength you personally, and your team and your company can master. Being good at it will elevate every other strength you have.

Proactive people carry their own weather with them.

People are social beings and want interaction and social learning is the primary form of learning, just as word of mouth advertising is the highest form of advertising.

If I really want to improve my situation, I can work on the one thing over which I have control-myself. I can stop trying to shape up my wife and can work on my own weaknesses. I can focus an being a great marriage partner, a source of unconditional love and support. Hopefully, my wife will feel the power of proactive example and respond in kind. But, whether she does or doesn't, the most positive way I can influence my situation is to work on myself, on my being.

When I started teaching I realized that I had never had such a level of satisfaction and such a feeling of fulfillment and sense of contribution. Just like that. But, usually it's more cumulative, slow, evolutionary and less revolutionary.

By centering our lives on correct principles and creating a balanced focus between doing and increasing our ability to do, we become empowered to the task of creating effective useful and peaceful lives.

Over time, I have come to this simple definition of leadership: Leadership is getting results in a way that inspires trust.

People with a scarcity mentality think there is only so much in the world to go around. It's as if they see life as a pie. When another person gets a big piece, then they get less. Such people are always trying to get even, to pull others down to their level so they can get an equal or even bigger piece of the pie.

If we spend most of our time concerned about things we cannot truly directly influence, what we can influence will be reduced. If we spend our energies on those things over which we can expect positive results, we will expand our influence.

Synergy is everywhere in nature. If you plant two plants close together, the roots commingle and improve the quality of the soil so that both plants will grow better than if they were separated. If you put two pieces of wood together, they will hold much more than the total weight held by each separately. The whole is greater than the sum of its parts. One plus one equals three or more.

People and their managers are working so hard to be sure things are done right, that they have hardly have time to decide if they are doing the right things.

In addition to self-awareness, imagination and conscience, it is the fourth human endowment - independent will - that really makes effective self-management possible. It is the ability to make decisions and choices and to act in accordance with them. It is the ability to act rather than to be acted upon, to proactively carry out the program we have developed through the other three endowments. Empowerment comes from learning how to use this great endowment in the decisions we make every day.

If you don't let a teacher know what level you are -- by asking a question, or revealing your ignorance -- you will not learn or grow

The essence of synergy is to value differences-to respect them, to build on strengths, to compensate for weaknesses

In our own lives, having a mind-set of expecting to win increases our odds of winning. It helps us get better results. And better results help us increase our credibility and self-confidence, which leads to more positive self-expectancy, and more winning - and the upward cycle continues. It becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.

If you want the secondary greatness of recognized talent, focus first on primary greatness of character.

Trust is the one thing that affects everything else you're doing. It's a performance multiplier which takes your trajectory upwards, for every activity you engage in, from strategy to execution.

I am fortunate to have a very helpful team that enables me to spend time doing things that are important but not necessarily urgent. People who have no such team need to also make these larger decisions so that they can cheerfully say No to that which is urgent but not important.

Principle-centered people are constantly educated by their experiences.

If my sense of security lies in my reputation or in the things I have, my life will be in a constant state of threat and jeopardy-a fear that these possessions may be lost, stolen, or devalued. If I'm in the presence of someone of greater net worth, fame, or status, I feel inferior. If I'm in the presence of someone of lesser net worth, fame or status, I feel superior. My sense of self-worth constantly fluctu-ates. I don't have any sense of constancy, anchorage, or persistent selfhood. I am constantly trying to protect and insure my assets, properties, securities, position, or reputation.

The exercise of true leadership is inversely proportional to the exercise of power.

While I believe in the power of positive thought, I do not believe that you or I can simply psyche ourselves into success or peace of mind.

Results matter! They matter to your credibility.

When people have a real sense of legacy, a sense of mattering, a sense of contribution, it seems to tap into the deepest part of their heart and soul. It brings out the best and subordinates the rest.

...churchgoing is not synonymous with personal spirituality. There are some people who get so busy in church worship and projects that they become insensitive to the pressing human needs that sourround them, contradicting the very precepts they profess to believe deeply.

Success comes from the ability to view each arising problem as an opportunity for self improvement.

The greatest and most inspiring mountain climbing achievements in history are not so much stories of individual achievement, but are stories of the extraordinary power of a unified, talented, prepared team that stays loyally committed to one another and to their shared vision to the end.

They [Nazi captors]had more liberty, more options to choose from in their environment; but he [Viktor Frankl] had more freedom, more internal power to exercise his options.

Trust is clearly a key competency. A competency or skill that can be learned, taught, and improved and one that talent can be screened for.

'Efficient' scheduling and control of time are often counterproductive. The efficiency focus creates expectations that clash with the opportunities to develop rich relationships, to meet human needs, and to enjoy spontaneous moments on a daily basis.

Through it all I have learned that parenting is basically a life of self sacrifice.

Management is clearly different from leadership. Leadership is primarily a high-powered, right-brain activity. It's more of an art it's based on a philosophy. You have to ask the ultimate questions of life when you're dealing with personal leadership issues.

I believe that God is the source of all the universal, timeless principles. And to Him, I give all the credit and the glory. However, to a person who is not religious, I believe they can live to the highest level of their conscience and develop spiritual intelligence that surpasses most people, including many religious people, who profess but do not practice.

It is one thing to make a mistake, and quite another thing not to admit it.

I won't take time to repeat all the obvious benefits of physical exercise but will only underscore the well-attested fact that a program of regular exercise increases one's efficiency in every facet of life, including the depth and restfulness of sleep. And the time taken can be minimal; just a few minutes of calisthenics and running in place in one's room or jogging around the yard or block is often sufficient. Exercising doesn't take time. It saves time. Still, few consistently do it.

Love - the feeling - is a fruit of love, the verb.

You basically get what you reward. If you want to achieve the goals and reflect the values in your mission statement, then you need to align the reward system with these goals and values.

If you don't set your goals based upon your Mission Statement, you may be climbing the ladder of success only to realize, when you get to the top, you're on the WRONG building.

Listen, involve, synergize at work. Then you will bury the old and create an entirely new winning culture which will unleash people's talents and create complementary teams where strengths are made productive and weakness are made irrelevant through the strengths of others.

In many situations involving service recovery - the problem itself became the catalyst for the creation of even greater trust as the companies took the issues head-on and worked through the difficult problem in a way that restored confidence.

Power is the faculty or capacity to act, the strength and potency to accomplish something. It is the vital energy to make choices and decisions. It also includes the capacity to overcome deeply embedded habits and to cultivate higher, more effective ones.

I keep my phone number unlisted and rely on my associates to handle all voice mail, e-mail, faxes.

In our personal lives, if we do not develop our own self-awareness and become responsible for first creations, we empower other people and circumstances to shape our lives by default.

If I try to use human influence strategies and tactics of how to get other people to do what I want, to work better, to be more motivated, to like me and each other-while my character is fundamentally flawed, marked by duplicity and insincerity-then, in the long run, I cannot be successful. My duplicity will breed distrust, and everything I do-even using so-called good human relations techniques-will be perceived as manipulative.

Principles always have natural consequences attached to them. There are positive consequences when we live in harmony with the principles. There are negative consequences when we ignore them. But because these principles apply to everyone, whether or not they are aware, this limitation is universal. And the more we know of correct principles, the greater is our personal freedom to act wisely.

Only as we keep an open communication with our deep inner life will we have the wisdom to make effective choices.

The key to the many is often the one; it is how you regard and talk about the one in that one's absence or presence that communicates to the many how you would regard and talk about them in their presence or absence.