Stephen Covey and his Seven Habits -- Is Comfort the Goal

It seems to me that often our society pushes the notion that comfort is the ultimate Good in life. This is a sentiment that many hold, whether they realize it or not, that is pushed by advertising and marketing strategies, but that goes largely unexamined.

Covey suggests however that comfort, or pleasure, or self in general, is not a worthy goal, but that instead that it is principles that should be the focus of our lives.

This is surely not to say that no pleasurable emotions, or feelings of comfort, should be allowed to guide our decisions; on the contrary, it could be argued that, when we arrive at a decision that seems "right", there is often a requirement that we feel "comfortable" or "at peace" with that decision.

The key point, however, is that comfort should not be the GOAL of life; it perhaps should be A goal, but there is so much misery in the world that kind-hearted people with good conscience can do a lot to alleviate, simply making our own personal comfort our objective is unworthy of who we are as human beings.

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Stephen Covey :

Independence vs. Interdependence

Independence is not the final goal in the thinking of Stephen Covey.

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Stephen Covey emphasizes that is it INTERDEPENDENCE to which we should strive.

Covey's idea is in fact a re-statement of one of those things that is so obvious we never think of it. For example, if you are an autonomous, single man, living in an apartment, working from your computer, you may have the illusion of independence. But, wait, did you build that apartment? Do you not have an interdependent relationship with your landlord? If you pay by cheque, do you not have a relationship with your bank? And the bank, does that bank not invest in all kinds of projects and endeavours right across the world?

What about the electricity that powers your computer? Who built the dam that powers the hydro-electricity for that power source? Who runs your city government that laid the infrastructure for the power lines, and who voted for those city officials?

There is no question: psychological independence is a worthy pursuit; but the facts remain: we are all highly interdependent, nevertheless.

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Stephen Covey and his Seven Habits -- Put First Things First

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Why did I decide to focus on Stephen Covey and his ideas?

Stephen Covey belonged to a group of authors that I used to spend a lot of time focusing on, a group that included Robert Ringer, Susan Jeffers, and other "self-help gurus."

Stephen Covey's work in particular drew me because, ultimately, I am aware that we all live along a time line. In other words, we don't get very long: if you are now forty and you live into your sixties, let us say, you only have 1,000 weeks left! Even if you're twenty and you live to be eighty, that's still only 3,000 weeks...

With this in mind, I wanted a resource that could help me focus on the question: Given I only have, perhaps 2,000 weeks, and maybe less, of my life to live, then how can I best spend my time? I mean, it is hardly an inconsequential question: unless you are a Buddhist or a Hindu, you probably believe this is your only life on earth, the one and only time you've got in this kind of reality, and you may well believe that this is the only form of existence you will have period! So, it matters deeply what you do with your time.

Covey combines "time management" with "seeking out an overall vision." In other words, it is one thing to have an effective time management tool, but this is useless if you do not know what targets you should be aiming at.

Covey's ideas, then, lend themselves to a combining of deep philosophical issues with practical everyday concerns.

Thus, for me, the two overarching habits of the seven habits of Stephen Covey are: Begin with the End in Mind (meaning, find out what it is you should be focusing on), and then to Put First Things First, meaning to stop sacrificing your most important goals to less important tasks...

In the end though, you must Begin with the End in Mind first! In other words, Put first things first, and the "first thing" in this sentence is figuring out what "ends" you should have in mind.

None of the other self-help books I was looking at, including the more academic work of Aaron Beck, for example, emphasized this. In other words, no-one else seemed to pay such rigid respect for the idea that we all live along a time-line, ie., we have to decide what we are doing in the bounds of "the space-time continuum", because there is quite literally no escape from this: for humans, time appears as linear, and this is the foundation for all action, all goal-setting.

Stephen Covey forces you to pay heed to the linear march of time, by asking you to decide what the First Things are that you should be doing.

Stephen Covey and his Seven Habits -- First Thing in the Morning

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If Stephen Covey's Seven Habits philosophy seems to you to make sense, then the challenge is to live with it for a period of time, to test out its worth. This is the essence of scientific method: follow your hunch that you think something might be worth pursuing by testing it out in the real world. Indeed, much of the "self-help" movement suggests such projects as a "thirty day challenge," even if this is not done so specifically by Covey.

Covey emphasizes planning, but he suggests planning based on the week rather than the day. This is because, for most people reading this, you are already in a society that divides things up into seven day cycles, so it only seems appropriate that a good starting point would be to fit it with what the rest of your community is doing.

Covey, however, does not neglect the obvious issue that life comes to us in "day-tight compartments," that is, like most(?) species, day and night and our bodies are somehow in sync. The key is not to live in "day-tight compartments" that are so tight that they become divorced from the bigger picture.

Covey, again here, turns to the concept of roles, under which can be grouped goals. He suggests therefore, at the beginning of each week, slotting in the goals you have as related to the roles you have determined yourself to have, across the week. Of course, in practice, these are usually going to be "sub-goals" or "mini-goals", but the emphasis, nevertheless, is working on objectives, and not simply on filling up your schedule.