First Things First

While on the topic on Priorities and Urgency, here is the classic view of how to live a happier and less stressed life... It is a key learning point from Stephen Covey's "The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People" and "First Things First" books. They are definitely worth reading !!!

The goal is to focus your efforts on quadrant 2 (proactive: important and not urgent) in order to reduce the amount of time you need to spend in quadrant 1 (fire fighting: important & urgent). You get this time by becoming more self disciplined and spending less time in quadrants 3 & 4. (not important)

This sounds straight forward and simple in theory, however it is HARD in reality... This is why Covey wrote a whole book on it... The biggest challenges from my perspective are:

• determining what is IMPORTANT vs unimportant
• letting some of the "Import Urgent" go (maybe they aren't so important)
• keeping focused and active (not procrastinating and avoiding)

By the way this works for companies as well as individuals !!! So what is important and how are you going to proactively pursue it, while side stepping the snares that keep you unhappy and stressed out in quadrants 1, 3 & 4?

Is this concept working for others?

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