The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People Habit 1: Be Proactive

I recently re-read the Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, by Stephen Covey, for my book club. Since this is one of the classics of the self-help genre, I wanted to do a deep dive into it, and talk about each of the habits.

I believe in the importance of habits in self-improvement. But Covey is using a different definition of habit than how most people would think of it. You would typically think of a habit as something you regularly do. But the first six habits are more about how you think and who you are as a person.

This is fundamental to Covey’s approach. Most self-help books are external facing, in that they deal with actions and interactions with other people. But Seven Habits is more internal facing. Covey believes that our actions and the way we live our lives stems from our personal character, so this book is focused on helping the reader develop the right character ethic.

One thing that readers might find confusing is that Covey has a tendency to define things in non-standard ways. If you were to just read the chapter titles for the first three Habits, you would assume they are entirely different than what they actually are.

Starting off with Be Proactive. You would probably think of being proactive as taking the initiative, and dealing with things before they become problems, but that’s not what Covey means. (Not that he’s against these things, and they are covered in later habits. It’s just not what he’s talking about here.)

“Between stimulus and response, man has the freedom to choose.”

Covey is speaking about controlling your mental state. No matter what situation you were born into, what external factor you have to deal with, and what has happened in the past, you are always the master of your own mind. You have the freedom to see things in whatever perspective you want.

In this sense, proactive is an antonym to reactive. The key idea here is:

“Between stimulus and response, man has the freedom to choose.”

“As human beings, we are responsible for our own lives. Our behavior is a function of our decisions, not our conditions. We can subordinate feelings to values. We have the initiative and responsibility to make things happen.”

“We have the initiative and responsibility to make things happen.”

Now, I’ve previously posted about how I don’t like the word responsibility. Here Covey uses a rather wonky definition. He breaks it down into “response-ability”, as in the ability to choose a response.

The consideration here is to recognize that we make our own choices, based on what we see as the consequences of those choices, and our life situations are a result of those choices. Life isn’t something that happens to us; it is something we do ourselves. We ought to think in terms of the choices we make rather than reactive language. For example, you don’t have to go to that job you hate. You choose to go to work, because you prefer it to the alternative of losing your job, not receiving the paycheck it provides, and then not having the money for all the things you would buy with that money.

Covey explains that you have a Circle of Influence, which consists of factors that you can control. This is smaller than your Circle of Concern, which is all the factors that you care about and/or affect your life. The Circle of Influence is generally within yourself, while the Circle of Concern is the external environment, the weaknesses of others, your jerk boss, national politics, etc. The Circle of Concern also includes things that have happened in the past.

The more time you spend focusing on your Circle of Influence, where you can actually make a difference, the larger it will become, and the happier you will be. The more time you spend focusing on your Circle of Concern, where you can’t control things, the smaller your Circle of Influence will become, and the less happy you’ll be.

I think this is excellent advice. Covey is right that time spent brooding over things you can’t control is a waste, and a sap to your mental energy. 

Time spent brooding over things you can’t control is a waste, and a sap to your mental energy.

Controlling your mental state isn’t something you can just decide to do and expect to have perfect success at. But it’s worthwhile to adopt as a goal and work toward. When you find yourself getting upset about something, remind yourself that other people’s actions don’t control your mind. Ask if what you’re getting upset about is in your Circle of Concern or Circle of Influence. And if it’s not in your Circle of Influence, remind yourself that you ought to be focusing on something that is.

Will this make you happier all of the time? Of course not. And obviously just reminding yourself not to worry about things beyond your influence doesn’t necessarily mean you’ll be able to let those things go. 

But this mentality will work some of the time, and it’s worthwhile to do something that will make you happier sometimes. Plus, the more you practice it, the better you’ll get.

Next: Habit Two: Begin With the End in Mind.

Habit Three: Put First Things First