Stephen Covey (1932-2012)

Stephen Covey quotes

• The only person I know, is the person I want to be.

  Stephen Covey

• People simply feel better about themselves when they’re good at something.

  Stephen Covey

• When all you want is a person's body and you don't really want their mind, heart or spirit, you have reduced a person to a thing.

  Stephen Covey

• What is most personal ,is most general.

  Stephen Covey

• Think about it. People are put on the P&L statement as an expense; equipment is put on the balance sheet as an investment.

  Stephen Covey

• How you treat the one reveals how you regard the many, because everyone is ultimately a one.

  Stephen Covey

• No matter how long we’ve walked life’s pathway to mediocrity, we can always choose to switch paths. Always. It’s never too late. We can find our voice.

  Stephen Covey

• People are working harder than ever, but because they lack clarity and vision, they aren’t getting very far. They, in essence, are pushing a rope...with all of their might.

  Stephen Covey

• To touch the soul of another human being is to walk on holy ground.

  Stephen Covey

• These habits are basic; they are primary. They represent the internalization of correct principles upon which enduring happiness and success are based.

  Stephen Covey

• You might work on your attitude -- you could think more positively. You still wouldn't get to the right place, but perhaps you wouldn't care. Your attitude would be so positive, you'd be happy wherever you were.

  Stephen Covey

• The fundamental problem has nothing to do with your behavior or your attitude. It has everything to do with having a wrong map.

  Stephen Covey

• And our attitudes and behaviors grow out of those assumptions. The way we see things is the source of the way we think and the way we act.

  Stephen Covey

• It also shows that these paradigms are the source of our attitudes and behaviors. We cannot act with integrity outside of them.

  Stephen Covey

• To try to change outward attitudes and behaviors does very little good in the long run if we fail to examine the basic paradigms from which those attitudes and behaviors flow.

  Stephen Covey

• Not all Paradigm Shifts are in positive directions. As we have observed, the shift from the character ethic to the personality ethic has drawn us away from the very roots that nourish true success and happiness.

  Stephen Covey

• Our paradigms, correct or incorrect, are the sources of our attitudes and behaviors, and ultimately our relationships with others.

  Stephen Covey

• Our Paradigms are the way we "see" the world or circumstances -- not in terms of our visual sense of sight, but in terms of perceiving, understanding, and interpreting.

  Stephen Covey

• Paradigms are inseparable from character. Being is seeing in the human dimension. And what we see is highly interrelated to what we are.

  Stephen Covey

• We can't go very far to change our seeing without simultaneously changing our being, and vice versa.

  Stephen Covey

• Paradigms are powerful because they create the lens through which we see the world. The power of a Paradigm Shift is the essential power of quantum change, whether that shift is an instantaneous or a slow and deliberate process.

  Stephen Covey

• The character ethic is based on the fundamental idea that there are principles that govern human effectiveness

  Stephen Covey

• Principles are not values. A gang of thieves can share values, but they are in violation of the fundamental principles we're talking about. Principles are the territory. Values are maps. When we value correct principles, w

  Stephen Covey

• Principles are guidelines for human conduct that are proven to have enduring, permanent value. They're fundamental. They're essentially unarguable because they are self-evident.

  Stephen Covey

• n all of life, there are sequential stages of growth and development. A child learns to turn over, to sit up, to crawl, and then to walk and run. Each step is important and each one takes time. No step can be skipped.

  Stephen Covey

• This is true in all phases of life, in all areas of development, whether it be learning to play the piano or communicate effectively with a working associate. It is true with individuals, with marriages, with families, and with organizations.

  Stephen Covey

• If you don't let a teacher know what level you are -- by asking a question, or revealing your ignorance -- you will not learn or grow.

  Stephen Covey

• To relate effectively with a wife, a husband, children, friends, or working associates, we must learn to listen. And this requires emotional strength. Listening involves patience, openness, and the desire to understand -- highly developed q

  Stephen Covey

• The Way We See the Problem is the Problem

  Stephen Covey

• This new level of thinking is what Seven Habits of Highly Effective People is about. It's a principle-centered, character-based, "Inside-Out" approach to personal and interpersonal effectiveness.

  Stephen Covey

• It says if you want to have a happy marriage, be the kind of person who generates positive energy and sidesteps negative energy rather than empowering it.

  Stephen Covey

• If the only vision we have of ourselves comes from the social mirror -- from the current social paradigm and from the opinions, perceptions, and paradigms of the people around us -- our view of ourselves is like the reflection in the

  Stephen Covey

• "Begin with the End in Mind" is based on the principle that all things are created twice. There's a mental or first creation, and a physical or second creation to all things.

  Stephen Covey

• Most people do not listen with the intent to understand; they listen with the intent to reply.

  Stephen Covey

• Treat a man as he is and he will remain as he is. Treat a man as he can and should be and he will become as he can and should be.

  Stephen Covey

• When the trust account is high, communication is easy, instant, and effective.

  Stephen Covey

• Most people do not listen with the intent to understand; they listen with the intent to reply.

  Stephen Covey