Tag Archives: 2016

The next step is Integrity. Always.

20 Sunday Dec 2015

Posted by in Character and Competence, Discipline

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“The challenge of living with integrity is always in front of me.” Stephen R Covey.

That’s a quote from his ‘new’ book, taken from miscellaneous writings collated by his family and colleagues. It is called Primary Greatness, and it does contain some interesting nuggets.

PG

It goes without saying that this website/blog is reflection of what it contains – primarily because primary greatness, and the compliance with the Three Resolutions that primary greatness is derived from, is something I desperately seek in myself. And, just as Dr C stated he had difficulty complying with his own sense of integrity on occasion, I have difficulty complying with my own – but probably a bit more often.

This afternoon I went for a one hour run, something I am pleased to say I can now do regularly (okay, once a week at the mo, but that’s pretty regular). Every step after the second mile was a reflection of my thinking that my integrity and compliance with the first two resolutions was reliant upon my not stopping. If I stopped, I wasn’t congruent. I’d fail. I didn’t want to fail, so I completed the run.

Each step, each compliant step, was exactly where Stephen Covey said the challenge is – right in front of me.

That is both the challenge and the benefit of integrity. The challenge of living in accordance with your values and beliefs, and with any laws or rules that relate to principle centred living, is constant. But it remains in front of us, in the sense that the ‘ego’ consequences any failure to comply is over if we so choose.

The principle consequences may still come to bite us on the posterior, of course. If we have broken a law that we’d normally have complied with (a minor one, of course) then punishment may still follow. That’s how principles work. But the effect on our integrity, or rather how we feel about our failure to act integrity, need only apply until the next occasion upon which it is tested – and on that occasion we can do better. And that’s how we develop and strengthen our ability to be people of character.

Off you go………..

2016’s a-comin’. Plan now to spend 2016 in compliance with The Three Resolutions, and by all means consider doing so by investing in the book, available HERE.

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Life’s too short to wait to ….. (enter here what you’re not doing)

01 Sunday Nov 2015

Posted by in Time Management

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“You may delay, but time will not, and lost time is never found again.” Benjamin Franklin

I chose this quote from the ‘father’ of time management to reflect how much I recognise that procrastination can be an obstacle to my success, although I don’t do it as much as I think I do. I put procrastination off whenever I can.

I was recently at an event run by John Grant, the founder of the YB12 – Your Best Year Ever brand, the brand of which I am proud to be a part (see HERE) and as he was speaking I made the following note on my course workbook:

“I don’t have time to wait to be the best I can possibly be.”

I am 53, with a birthday next month. Optimistically, that’s only 4 years older than Stephen Covey was when he published The Seven Habits. Realistically, I am 35 years older than Jenson Button was when he entered F1, so that’s a dream that isn’t going to happen.

Back to my point. We all have futures, most of us plan for them. Some have detailed plans, others have an ‘idea’ of where they want to go and will get there. Some have no idea. (Some of those wear sports clothes but never break into a sweat unless running from the Law.)

For so many, me included, the recognition that we have a future, and accidents and illness aside a fairly lengthy one, means that we also subconsciously perceive that we can put things off ‘just a bit’, as if we’ll still have the same amount of time left to complete that action as we had when we put it off! A day here and there doesn’t matter, after all. Or does it?

In our culture, a day frequently becomes a week – something we put off on Monday was “better done on a Monday so I’ll do it next Monday.” A diet starts on the first day of the month, so that’ll be next month.” Or a birthday. Or “It’s November the 1st today. Year’s almost over, and Christmas is around the corner, lots of planning to be done, etc. etc. so I’ll set some New Year’s Resolutions and start on Jan 1st.” Except we also know that Jan 1st means coping with the feelings, chocolates and booze left over from the night before and the 1st becomes the 2nd, and in no time at all – “Where has the year GONE?”

The likes of Bill Gates†, Steve Jobs, Ghandi, Franklin, Lincoln, Churchill and so on (pick your own) didn’t procrastinate. They took action. They took action and achieved more than most of us ever will, in some cases with no computers, no Internet, and no electric light . They maximised their use of time through planning and by NOT putting things off.

We all have a future. For some it will be longer than for others, so there’s no equality there.

But we all have NOW.

Use it better. ‘Cos it just passed you by at infinity times the speed of light. Another one went while you read that. And that. Ad infinitum.

† I like it when personal development writers use Gates and Jobs as examples of people who succeeded without a degree. Pause. They were at Ivy League colleges. Clue: not cheap places, having money and connections helps, and they had to have passed seriously hard exams and processes to get in. The degree was a given, if they’d stayed.

*If you want to stop procrastinating, and live reasonably close to South Wales, consider this as a valuable opportunity to learn how to stop procrastinating and get what you want in 2016.

https://threeresolutionsguy.com/total-focus-workshop-january-2016-south-wales-uk/