2/3 2010 Postponing Your Future 0 By: Joshua Freedman Three different people told me the same story last week: I’m too busy keeping my head above water to make progress on my real goals. On one hand, that’s a practical and realistic way of coping. Look, we’ve all experienced that some days we can barely tread water fast enough… and some days we sink… and on those days it’s “impossible” to put time and energy into the future. How can you invest when you can’t put bread on the table? All three had practical, legitimate reasons for “treading water,” they were not making weak excuses. There just has not been time. So that’s the “practical reality.” What about the “emotional reality”? What I noticed in all three conversations was a loss of energy and momentum. There’s an emotional cost to postponing your future, and when you’re calculating the choices of your day and week, this needs to be factored in. I suspect that when you factor in the emotional cost (in the extreme, dying a little more each day), the equation might change? You’ve likely seen this framework that Stephen Covey offers in First Things First: Covey points out that we need to avoid QIII and QIV, and shift more time to QII if we want to build the future. Good! Let’s do it!!! How? Well… that’s a problem. It’s a fabulous model, though most of us already know that we need to stop fighting unimportant fires and getting sucked into distractions… but we still do that. We’re choosing to put time in QI, QIII, and QIV, and shortchanging QII. Why? Because we’re not driven by “what we know.” We’re driven by what we feel. There’s some set of feelings boiling around this pattern of behavior pushing and pulling us. There are feelings before the choice (to shortchange QII). Then there are feelings the come immediately when we do what we’re doing instead… then there are still more feelings when we end the day saying, “*(@_!_)# another day with no time for QII.” If I can indulge in a bit of prognostication, I suspect that if your pattern is “do QI &III but miss QII” you’re feeling a mix of stressed, overwhelmed, impatient, excited, and focused (even driven). If you’re getting sucked into QIV then your feelings are likely to be bored, uncertain, distracted, lonely, or lost. Then, despite the knowledge that QII is the only way out, you still go to another quadrant, and, for the moment it feels good. If you’re QI and QIII focused, you probably get great feedback, maybe overhearing, “He’s so reliable….” “You can count on her….” If you’re escaping into QIII, you get a bit of relief. In any case, there’s a feeling payoff — an emotional benefit. What is yours? The first, and perhaps most important step, to getting out of the pattern is to recognize the emotional drivers. What’s triggering your pattern, and what payoff are you getting from it? Knowing that is not enough – you need to DO something with those feelings. That’s another article… but I’d love to hear your ideas (post a comment!) I also noticed that in these conversations, and many others – including many in my own head, there’s a refrain about being busy: “I can’t do this unless I can devote a block of time…” Many a project have lingered on my “to do” list because I told myself I didn’t have the six hours or three days or whatever to complete it. Consider this: If you had a month you could devote completely to your future, what would you do with that month? How about if you had one week? What could you do if you had one day? How about if you had five minutes? We all have time, but for most of us it’s fractured — five minutes here, and hour there. While it’s extremely challenging, somehow we have to reclaim those dribs and drabs of time and turn them into a worthy contribution. As usual, I would suggest the challenge lies not so much in the technical achievement of this end, but in the emotional transition we must undertake in order to bring the A game to these momentary matches. Survive or Thrive To conclude, here is powerful reminder from Karen McCown, Six Seconds’ Chairman: If you focus on survival, then your survival is at question; if you focus on thriving, then your survival is assured – and more is possible. Each week you have but a few discretionary hours to cash in: Will you spend or invest? ♥

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the seven habits of highly effective people®

Dr Stephen Covey’s inspirational book – 7 Habits Of Highly Effective People®

Dr Stephen Covey is a hugely influential management guru, whose book The Seven Habits Of Highly Effective People, became a blueprint for personal development when it was published in 1990. The Seven Habits are said by some to be easy to understand but not as easy to apply. Don’t let the challenge daunt you: The ‘Seven Habits’ are a remarkable set of inspirational and aspirational standards for anyone who seeks to live a full, purposeful and good life, and are applicable today more than ever, as the business world becomes more attuned to humanist concepts. Covey’s values are full of integrity and humanity, and contrast strongly with the process-based ideologies that characterised management thinking in earlier times.

Stephen Covey, as well as being a renowned writer, speaker, academic and humanist, has also built a huge training and consultancy products and services business – Franklin Covey which has a global reach, and has at one time or another consulted with and provided training services to most of the world’s leading corporations.

Stephen Covey’s Seven Habits of Highly Effective People®

habit 1 – be proactive®

This is the ability to control one’s environment, rather than have it control you, as is so often the case. Self determination, choice, and the power to decide response to stimulus, conditions and circumstances

habit 2 – begin with the end in mind®

Covey calls this the habit of personal leadership – leading oneself that is, towards what you consider your aims. By developing the habit of concentrating on relevant activities you will build a platform to avoid distractions and become more productive and successful.

habit 3 – put first things first®

Covey calls this the habit of personal management. This is about organising and implementing activities in line with the aims established in habit 2. Covey says that habit 2 is the first, or mental creation; habit 3 is the second, or physical creation. (See the section on time management.)

habit 4 – think win-win®

Covey calls this the habit of interpersonal leadership, necessary because achievements are largely dependent on co-operative efforts with others. He says that win-win is based on the assumption that there is plenty for everyone, and that success follows a co-operative approach more naturally than the confrontation of win-or-lose.

habit 5 – seek first to understand and then to be understood®

One of the great maxims of the modern age. This is Covey’s habit of communication, and it’s extremely powerful. Covey helps to explain this in his simple analogy ‘diagnose before you prescribe’. Simple and effective, and essential for developing and maintaining positive relationships in all aspects of life. (See the associated sections on Empathy, Transactional Analysis, and the Johari Window.)

habit 6 – synergize®

Covey says this is the habit of creative co-operation – the principle that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts, which implicitly lays down the challenge to see the good and potential in the other person’s contribution.

habit 7 – sharpen the saw®

This is the habit of self renewal, says Covey, and it necessarily surrounds all the other habits, enabling and encouraging them to happen and grow. Covey interprets the self into four parts: the spiritual, mental, physical and the social/emotional, which all need feeding and developing.

Stephen Covey’s Seven Habits are a simple set of rules for life – inter-related and synergistic, and yet each one powerful and worthy of adopting and following in its own right. For many people, reading Covey’s work, or listening to him speak, literally changes their lives. This is powerful stuff indeed and highly recommended.

This 7 Habits summary is just a brief overview – the full work is fascinating, comprehensive, and thoroughly uplifting. Read the book, or listen to the full tape series if you can get hold of it.

In his more recent book ‘The 8th Habit’, Stephen Covey introduced (logically) an the eighth habit, which deals with personal fulfilment and helping others to achieve fulfilment too. The book also focuses on leadership. Time will tell whether the The 8th Habit achieves recognition and reputation close to Covey’s classic original 7 Habits work.

Various phrases on this page are registered trade marks belonging to Stephen Covey.

Stephen Covey’s principles are protected intellectual property and feature strongly in the Franklin Covey organization’s portfolio of products and services.

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