The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People · Powerful Lessons in Personal Change

When Stephen Covey first released The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People,

the book became an instant rage because people suddenly got up and took notice

that their lives were headed off in the wrong direction; and more than that,

they realized that there were so many simple things they could do in order to

navigate their life correctly. This book was wonderful education for people,

education in how to live life effectively and get closer to the ideal of being

a ‘success’ in life.

But not everyone understands Stephen Covey’s model fully well, or maybe there

are some people who haven’t read it yet. This is definitely true because we

still see so much failure all around us. Now, I am not saying that by using

Covey’s model, or anyone else’s model for that matter, you can become a sure-

shot success, but at least we should have seen many more successes around us

already judging by the number of copies the book has sold! So, where is the

shortcoming?

There are two main problems here, and we are talking only about the people who

have read the book already. The first problem is that most people are too lazy

to implement the ideals of Stephen Covey in their lives. They consider his

masterpiece of a book as a mere coffee-table book or a book that you use for

light reading when you are traveling and then forget all about it. They do not

realize that this book contains life-changing information. Or, they take the

information and do not make the effort to actually utilize it so that it

becomes knowledge for them.

The second problem is that a lot of people have a myopic view of Covey’s

ideals. These are people who are impressed by the book already. If you ask

them what the seven habits are, they can rattle them off end to end, but then

they miss the larger picture. They do not understand that Covey was trying to

tell more than he wrote in words. There are hidden implications in this book,

yes, and a lot of people have just failed to see through them.

That is what we are trying to do. We are trying to show you how Covey’s book,

or rather, his model, was a complete model in itself. There was nothing amiss

about it. If you implement it, there should be no aspect of your life that

should go untouched. The only thing is that you have to understand these

ideals and try to implement them in your life.

But, before we barge into that area, it is extremely important to understand

what these ideals are. What was the model that was propounded by Stephen Covey

in his mega-famous book? We shall begin by trying to understand his model

first, and then interpret it in such a way that it pertains to every aspect of

our life.