Welcome back! It's good to see you again. Please note that I am now publishing all new material at my hub site: StephenPSmith.com
I have finally completed a series of posts on the 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, and I am ready to release the 7 Habits of Highly Effective People E-book!
For the new readers, here are all of the posts in the series:
If you are looking to get more information on how to implement the 7 Habits of Highly Effective People in a Getting Things Done-style system you are in the right place. Over the course of the next few pages you will encounter lessons in personal change that can transform your life.
Because this is not exactly a simple concept to implement, I have created a set of 7 lessons that will guide you through the stages of implementation over the next 7 weeks. This should give you a chance to focus on each new habit in your life for one full week before implementing the next one. Some of the lessons are supplemented by a follow-up worksheet that I have created to help you start implementing the new habit.
Leave a comment, or send an e-mail to - stephen [at] hdbizblog.com
If you found this post useful, please share it with your friends on Twitter using the tinylink http://tinyurl.com/5qzslq. Thanks, I appreciate it! Feel free to comment below, I enjoy discussing these ideas. ~@Stephen
Drew and Gavin have completed the gargantuan task of pulling together all of the submissions for the sequel to The Age of Conversation. I am very excited to be part of this project, and I believe that it will be a great success.
The following is a link-rich list of all of the 237 contributors, please do take the time to visit their sites and leave a thoughtful comment.
I am looking forward to working on something with each of the authors on this list in the future.
If you found this post useful, please share it with your friends on Twitter using the tinylink http://tinyurl.com/67f99s. Thanks, I appreciate it! Feel free to comment below, I enjoy discussing these ideas. ~@Stephen
David Allen calls the calendar your “hard landscape”. There is a reason for that, primarily because your calendar is the foundation of your productivity practice. The raw data you put into your calendar determines the information that comes out. This is the “landscape” that you are going to traverse on any given day.
What goes in your Calendar
Three types of raw data go into your calendar:
Time-specific actions - This is jargon-speak for meetings and appointments, some will be with other people and some will be for yourself. Make a habit of scheduling your Most Important Tasks for the day.
Day-specific actions - Less-structured than a meeting or appointment, this type of entry is for an action that needs to get done on a particular day, but any time is fine. I suggest that you use this category carefully, as your calendar should not become a to-do list. Your 3-5 Most Important Tasks will often fall in this category.
Day-specific information - This category of entry is for data like telephone numbers, directions, or specific information about a person you are meeting or the agenda for that meeting. If this category gets too bulky/takes up too much space, consider just writing a note in the calendar as to exactly where you can find that information.
Your Calendar is a Tool,
…not your taskmaster. Work toward the habit of limiting your calendar entries. To paraphrase Albert Einstein, keep the entry as simple as possible, (but not too simple) for you to be able to make the most of the information. A cluttered or messy calendar leads to a day of frustration!
Remember: the appointments that you make with yourself for your most important tasks are just as binding as appointments that you make with other people.
If you aren’t able to trust yourself to show up, how can you trust your system?
Where is your to-do list
I’d love to know what kind of information you are getting from your calendar, or what kind of assistance you are not getting.
(Click the links below to learn more about the specific questions)
Do you use a pencil for your entries, so you do not have to cross things out when there are changes?
Is your calendar format the right one to maximize your way of working?
Leave a comment, perhaps we can work together on a solution.
If you found this post useful, please share it with your friends on Twitter using the tinylink http://tinyurl.com/6lk4cb. Thanks, I appreciate it! Feel free to comment below, I enjoy discussing these ideas. ~@Stephen
The publishers of Dumbing Us Down call Gatto’s ideas about education “not easily pigeon-holed,” which is an accurate observation. Who else would stand up and tell us that schooling as we know it is not education, but a “twelve-year jail sentence where bad habits are the only curriculum truly learned” ?
According to Gatto’s observations, the seven lessons taught in public schools from Harlem to Hollywood Hills, are these:
1. Confusion (The natural order of real life is violated by heaping disconnected facts on students.)
2. Class position (Children are locked together into categories where the lesson is that “everyone has a proper place in the pyramid.”)
3. Indifference (Inflexible school regimens deprive children of complete experiences.)
4. Emotional dependency (Kids are taught to surrender their individuality to a “predestined chain of command.”)
5. Intellectual dependency (One of the biggest lessons schools teach is conformity rather than curiosity.)
6. Provisional self-esteem (“The lesson of report cards, grades, and tests, is that children should not trust themselves or theft parents, but should instead rely on the evaluation of certified officials.”)
7. One can’t hide (Schooling and homework assignments deny children privacy and free time in which to learn from parents, from exploration, or from community.)
Read it and weep.
If you found this post useful, please share it with your friends on Twitter using the tinylink http://tinyurl.com/57u8ny. Thanks, I appreciate it! Feel free to comment below, I enjoy discussing these ideas. ~@Stephen