the 7 Habits

I finally finished reading the 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. It took me forever because I had to wait for the rare quiet moments when I could concentrate and because I did so much re-reading as I went. This is definitely a work-in-progress book, one that should be read regularly as we continue to improve ourselves and work on these habits.

I'm in love with this book. And I wish everyone I know would read it. It's easy to assume that the primary intention is for the workplace but I found it's so much more for that. For me, I read everything within the context of parenthood. And the author is really good about giving examples from the business world but also example about raising children, building a marriage, communicating with friends.

Things that really stood out to me:
1. Listening! too often, I am guilty of what the author describes as listening "with the intent to speak". Instead, listen with the intent to really understand. without preparing what you want to say next, without putting into the context of your own experiences, without judging. Just listen.
2. time management. the book describes Quadrant I, II, III and IV activities. It's the difference in frantically running around to whatever seems the most urgent, rather, we need to asses what is best in the long run and what activities are the most important.
3. be proactive about what is within my circle of influence. Focus on what I am "response-able" for. (choose to see things as my responsibility, rather than blaming on other people or factors and proactively taking charge of how I respond/take action.)
4. Building Emotional Bank Accounts. Investing time and emotion into relationships. realizing how when can deplete that bank account and lose that relationship (especially applied to marriage and parenting) build the love, trust and communication so that we might be better able to ...
5. seek for win/win solutions. not win/lose or lose/win (yes there is a difference).
6. emotionally detaching myself when I disagree with someone else's choices so that I may preserve the relationship. when it doesn't involve me, don't let it emotionally affect me.
7. maintaining the P/PC balance. production and production capabilities, the idea that we have to take care of the golden goose if we want to continue to get the golden eggs. Take care of ourselves, our minds, our bodies, our relationships, our talents.
8. think things through to determine what the end goals are. otherwise we may exhaust ourselves cutting down trees before we realize we are in the entirely wrong forest.

I love this book. Now to spend time thinking about it, working on it and read it again in a year.

In the meantime, my next book is Financial Peace Revisited. It's the textbook that goes along with the finances class we took a few months ago. I read parts of it then but I feel so strongly about financial independence that I've registered as a volunteer coordinator so that I can help offer this class to others. Husband wants to offer it to the employees at his company so I'd like to read the whole book again before we start. After that will probably be the Millionaire Next Door because it was recommended so many times during the class. Then I may have to get back into some history books. I'm such a nerd.