Understanding Personal Growth

Three stages of human progress: "dependence, independence, interdependence." The untrained or immature human being is dependent on his surroundings, instilled ideas, and natural surroundings. Independence corresponds to the human being standing on his feet and fending on his own. Finally, Interdependence is when the abled human being can interact positively with his fellow human beings.

(Steven Covey’s “The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People”)

 To break out of Dependence, the first habit:

—Be proactive. (This is the Principle of Personal Vision). First, be self-aware, then look at what people think of you, then decide that you need not be as you appear either externally or to others. You may be able to change you're being complete. You have free will. You need not be reactive but can genuinely act from the basis of a well-defined plan. You can decide to act first before conditions box you in a situation. You can look at your surroundings and decide which is your circle of influence and which is not and how you can modify your circle of influence. You can choose to be somebody instead of having things. You can learn to accept the consequences of your actions. Finally, it would be best if you learned to keep your commitments.

Then, the second habit:

—Begin with the end in mind. (This is the Principle of Personal Leadership) Look at where you want to go. What does "being successful" mean to you? What is important? "All things are created twice." Leadership is the first creation. Management is the second creation. The leader has a vision. The manager implements the vision. If you do not plan, things will evolve independently and become out of control. You need to re-script: impose your vision on situations and become the first creator. You may want to develop a Big Picture vision: it is your Personal Mission Statement. In this statement, you will have to include the following values: Security, Guidance, Wisdom, and Power. You need to recognize your centers: some of us are spouse-centered, family-centered, money-centered, work-centered, possession-centered, friend/enemy-centered, or Church centered. Try to find your de facto center. The ideal would be to be Principle-Centered. To develop a Personal Mission Statement, you need to use your whole brain: your mind and emotions, logic, and intuition. Then you can try writing a Mission Statement for your family, and your organization.

Habit number 3:

—Put First Things First. (this is the principle of Personal Management) This is where you are going to put your plans into action. You first have to be convinced that you will succeed. Then you have to organize your time and activities to lead to your success. You have to learn and refuse to follow distracting leads. Then learn to delegate: to use someone else's time is the best way to maximize yours. But empower in ways that the people you charge can use their wits and mind to achieve the goals you want them to succeed.

When you have been well trained in the first three habits, you would have achieved Private Victory. With the following three habits, you are seeking Public Victory. Now you are aiming at Interdependence. In that respect, the first thing to know is that it is most important to build a reservoir of Goodwill towards you (the emotional bank account); you can do that by listening to people and keeping your commitments. Do not hesitate to apologize when the occasion calls for it.

The fourth habit:

—Think Win-Win (Principle of Interpersonal Leadership) In any situation, look at the interests of the person you are dealing with. Make it a necessary goal that both of you will come ahead or you are not interested in the relationship (Win-win or No deal). For Win-win, you need character first, which includes a sense of Integrity, maturity, and an Abundance Mentality. With character, you need to build relationships with others and make agreements with these others.

The fifth habit:

—Seek First to Understand, Then to be Understood (This is the principle of Emphatic Communication). To be a leader, you need to communicate. First, the communication must come from the other to you: listen with care (emphatic listening) to understand the other's situation. In the process, you will build your Goodwill with that person. If you do not listen, you will tend to prescribe a remedy to a situation without having the correct data or diagnosis. You need to tailor your advice to that person; you cannot prescribe the same treatment to everyone. Then seek to be understood. Again, the communication goes from one to the other. You have to communicate your logic effectively, but you must communicate in the frame of reference of the person who listens to you. Your communication is an ethos to pathos to logos.

The sixth habit:

—Synergize (Principle of Creative Cooperation). When social interactions work well, there is a bonus to work done together. The work of two people working together at maximum efficiency is equal to three people working independently. It takes flexibility and openness to work synergically. Most influential organizations and especially businesses work synergically. All the members work with a win-win approach in their interrelations. The alternative is negative synergy, where negativism is reinforced in a community. To work synergically, we need to value the differences of the "other" in front of us. We have to understand that synergizing is the way nature itself works.

The seventh habit:

—Sharpen the Saw (Principle of Balanced Renewal). Habit seven derives from a story: a person is busy sawing a tree but makes little progress. A passer-by asks him how come he makes so little progress. The active person says that the saw needs sharpening, but he does not have the time to sharpen the saw. To renew ourselves, we need to act on the physical, the mental, the social/emotional, and the spiritual plans in a balanced manner. Essentially, we need to re-enforce ourselves in our vision and resolve. If we do that properly, we will go up the spiral and become an even better person.

From Independence to Interdependence

However, in the following passage of the book, Covey explains that enlightened individuals move into a state of Interdependence after achieving independence.

While Dependence refers to relying on others to take care of us, Interdependence refers to cooperation for a greater goal. And because there are limits on how productive we can be as individuals, but virtually no limit on how productive we can be when we strategically collaborate with others, being "highly effective" requires Interdependence.

Our biggest successes in life come from collaborative efforts.

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