Stephen Covey and his Seven Habits "self-help" -- Musings on Stephen Covey and the Seven Habits

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Stephen Covey would normally be placed by most commentators under the rubric of self-help. When I think of it, however, I think this does an injustice both to the Seven Habits and to Stephen Covey.

Covey actually advocates NOT focusing on the self. In short, the self is not a worthy focus of our own attention, unless it is in the service of something greater than that self.

This flies in the face of much that we find in psychotherapy. There seems to be an assumption in the orientation of many modes of therapy that it is somehow worthwile to focus on the development of self.

My view is that probably you need to attain a certain threshold of self-satisfaction, ie., of contentment. BUT THIS IS NOT THE ULTIMATE GOAL OF LIFE.

Covey emphasizes this point very well: for Covey, the goal of living is not independence (although the first three habits of the seven habits focuses on this), but effective INTERDEPENDENCE (dealt with in the second three habits of the seven habits).

In other words: YOU are not the goal of life; the goal of life is to SERVE SOMETHING GREATER THAN YOURSELF.

Stephen Covey Seven Habits: What Motivates Us According to Stephen Covey

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Stephen Covey and his Seven Habits movement, or theory, is worth taking seriously. By this I do not of course mean accepting slavishly: I mean taking a look at what he says, and deciding for yourself whether what you think jibes with the ideas of Covey.

Covey is very interested in what motivates us. Another way of saying this is: What is important to us?

Of course this is a wide question. Clearly we operate in so many domains, we are relatives, lovers, neighbours, workers, members of associations, members of a political society, consumers, and so on. Even if you live in the jungles of Papua New Guinea, I think we can still apply all of these labels to you: Man (and Woman!) has a set of universal experiences.

Covey handles this problem of the complexity of an individual life by suggesting we split the way we see ourselves up into "roles" (much like I have just done in the previous paragraph). ONLY THEN should we turn to focusing on goals.

Covey suggests we write down the roles we see ourselves as possessing. You might be the member of a mosque; you might be the member of the community of Madison, Wisconsin; you might be a father; a son; a neighbour; a steel construction worker, and so on. In short, write down the roles that you see as most important to you, that you fulfil.

Once you have done this, identify some key goals you would like to achieve in each of these areas.

This, then, is the process of clearing up what MOTIVATES US. That is, find out what roles we see as most important for us, then identify some key goals in each of these areas. By the end of the exercise, you should have a much clearer idea of the targets you would like to aim at, in other words, be much more sure of what it is that may be motivating you... This sort of exercise lies at the heart of the work of Stephen Covey.