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Stephen R. Covey Quotes
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Stephen Richards Covey was an American educator, author, businessman, and keynote speaker. His most popular book is The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. His other books include First Things First, Principle-Centered Leadership, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective Families, The 8th Habit, and The Leader In Me — How Schools and Parents Around the World Are Inspiring Greatness, One Child at a Time. In 1996, Time magazine named him one of the 25 most influential people. He was a professor at the Jon M. Huntsman School of Business at Utah State University at the time of his death. Wikipedia  

✵ 24. October 1932 – 16. July 2012
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Stephen R. Covey: 125 quotes33 likes

Stephen R. Covey Quotes

“The key is not to prioritize what's on your schedule, but to schedule your priorities.”

Stephen R. Covey book The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People

Source: The Seven Habits Of Highly Effective People (1989), p. 161

“Without involvement, there is no commitment. Mark it down, asterisk it, circle it, underline it. No involvement, no commitment.”

Stephen R. Covey

“Independent will is our capacity to act. It gives us the power to transcend our paradigms, to swim upstream, to rewrite our scripts, to act based on principle rather than reacting based on emotion or circumstance.”

Stephen R. Covey

“Words are like eggs dropped from great heights. You could no more call them back then ignore the mess they left when they fell.”

Stephen R. Covey

“Begin each day with the blueprint of my deepest values FIRMLY in mind then when challenges come, make decisions BASED on those values.”

Stephen R. Covey book The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People

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

“If you want to have a more pleasant, cooperative teenager, be a more understanding, emphatic, consistent, loving parent.”

Stephen R. Covey book The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People

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

“Treat them all the same by treating them differently.”

Stephen R. Covey book The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People

Source: The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People

“To maintain the P/PC Balance, the balance between the golden egg (production) and the health and welfare of the goose (production capability) is often a difficult judgment call. But I suggest it is the very essence of effectiveness.”

Stephen R. Covey book The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People

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

“When air is charged with emotions, an attempt to teach is often perceived as a form of judgment and rejection.”

Stephen R. Covey book The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People

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

“I think the most significant work we'll do in our whole life, in our whole world is done within the four walls of our home.”

Stephen R. Covey

“My behavior is a product of my own conscious choices based on principles, rather than a product of my conditions, based on feelings.”

Stephen R. Covey book The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People

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

“The only person I know, is the person I want to be”

Stephen R. Covey book The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People

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

“We see the world, not as it is, but as we are -- or, as we are conditioned to see it. When we open our mouths to describe what we see, we in effect describe ourselves, our perceptions, our paradigms.”

Stephen R. Covey

“Don't argue for other people's weaknesses. Don't argue for your own. When you make a mistake, admit it, correct it, and learn from it / immediately.”

Stephen R. Covey

“We must look at the lens through we see the world, as well as the world we see, and that the lens itself shapes how we interpret the world.”

Stephen R. Covey book The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People

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

“The core of any family is what is changeless, what is going to be there──shared vision and values.”

Stephen R. Covey book The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People

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

“Motivation is a fire from within. If someone else tries to light that fire under you, chances are it will burn very briefly.”

Stephen R. Covey

“We not not our feelings. We are not our moods. We not even our thoughts.”

Stephen R. Covey book The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People

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

“If we do not teach our children, societ will. And they-and we-will live with the results.”

Stephen R. Covey

Source: 7 habits Family Collection

“Each of us guard a gate of change that can only be opened from the inside.”

Stephen R. Covey book The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People

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

“we're responsible for our own lives.”

Stephen R. Covey book The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People

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

“We hear a lot about identity theft when someone takes your wallet and pretends to be you and uses your credit cards. But the more serious identity theft is to get swallowed up in other people's definition of you.”

Stephen R. Covey

Source: The 3rd Alternative: Solving Life's Most Difficult Problems

“Attending church does not necessarily mean living the principles taught in those meeting. You can be active in a church but inactive in its gospel.”

Stephen R. Covey book The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People

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

“Make small commitments and keep them. Be a light, not a judge. Be a model, not a critic. Be part of the solution, not part of the problem.”

Stephen R. Covey book The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People

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

“But borrowing strength builds weakness.”

Stephen R. Covey book The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People

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

“We can't live without eating, but we don't live to eat.”

Stephen R. Covey book The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People

Source: The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People

“Interdependence is a choice only independent people can make”

Stephen R. Covey book The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People

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

“Your attitude determines your altitude”

Stephen R. Covey book The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People

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

“The power to distinguish between person and performance and to communicate intrinsic worth flows naturally out of our own sense of intrinsic worth.”

Stephen R. Covey

Source: Principle-Centered Leadership (1992), Ch. 11 : Thirty Methods of Influence

“Until you live, learn how to live.”

Stephen R. Covey book First Things First

First Things First (1994), Disputed

“Often we are so busy with sawing that we forget to sharpen the saw..”

Stephen R. Covey book First Things First

First Things First (1994), Disputed

“Our capacity for production and enjoyment is a function, in the last analysis, of our character, our integrity.”

Stephen R. Covey book The 8th Habit: From Effectiveness to Greatness

The 8th Habit : From Effectiveness to Greatness‎ (2004), p. 63
The 8th Habit : From Effectiveness to Greatness‎ (2004)

“Prepare your mind and heart before you prepare your speech. What we say may be less important than how we say it.”

Stephen R. Covey

Source: Principle-Centered Leadership (1992), Ch. 11

“In the last analysis, what we are communicates far more eloquently than anything we say or do.”

Stephen R. Covey

Source: Principle-Centered Leadership (1992), Ch. 4 : Primary Greatness, p. 58

“Wisdom is synergy of mind and heart.”

Stephen R. Covey book First Things First

First Things First (1994), Disputed

“Our life is result of our choices.”

Stephen R. Covey book First Things First

First Things First (1994), Disputed

“Make your life work instead of making life full of work.”

Stephen R. Covey book First Things First

First Things First (1994), Disputed

“Live the law of love. We encourage obedience to the laws of life when we live the laws of love.”

Stephen R. Covey

Source: Principle-Centered Leadership (1992), Ch. 11

“Self growth is tender; it's holy ground. There's no higher investment.”

Stephen R. Covey book The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People

Source: The Seven Habits Of Highly Effective People (1989), p. 62

“…when you get a good night's sleep and wake up ready to produce throughout the day.”

Stephen R. Covey book The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People

Source: The Seven Habits Of Highly Effective People (1989), p. 59

“Spiritual Intelligence represents our drive for meaning and connection with the infinite.”

Stephen R. Covey book The 8th Habit: From Effectiveness to Greatness

Source: The 8th Habit : From Effectiveness to Greatness‎ (2004), p. 53

“We don't invent our missions, we detect them.”

Stephen R. Covey

As quoted in What Matters Most : The Power of Living Your Values (2001) by Hyrum W. Smith , p. 111

“math>\textstyle\frac{3}{4} of world problems and bewilderment would be lost if we understood our opponents.”

Stephen R. Covey book First Things First

First Things First (1994), Disputed

“We are product of neither nature nor nurture; we are a product of choice, because there is always a space between stimulus and response. As we wisely exercise our power to choose based on principles, the space will become larger.”

Stephen R. Covey book The 8th Habit: From Effectiveness to Greatness

Source: The 8th Habit : From Effectiveness to Greatness‎ (2004), p. 62