My Blueprint

I am so glad that we were able to do the blueprint assignment. It has completely changed my way of thinking. As I came in to school, I had no idea what I was going to do as a career. As the semester went on, I started to get more and more lazy. When we were introduced to this assignment and told we had to have it done in a week, I was really upset. I was really against it and was fighting it as much as I could. But I had to do it in order to get points. So I sat down and just hammered through it. The more I got through it, the more I got interested in it. It was at that moment that I realized how behind I am in planning my education. When you get in to school, there is always a little bit of time to figure things out, but my time was up. The time is now for me to look in to a career. I had not taken time to figure this out. I was just going through the motions and doing the work. As I did my four year plan, it got me excited about what I was getting myself into. My generals were pretty much all finished and it was time to pick a major. I found a whole new excitement and fire to finish out school. The reason I was getting lazy was because I was getting restless and bored with classes that I had absolutely no interest in. If I had not done this assignment, I would still be stuck in that deep hole. I would have no idea what I want to do and still be walking around in circles chasing my tail. Dr. Fawson, if you are reading this, I would definitely keep this on the list of assignments to keep on for next semester. It has helped me out immensely.

Seek first to Understand....

Throughout my life, I have always held my friends high. I have always tried to be the absolute best friend that I could no matter what the circumstance. But now that I have taken a step back and looked at what I do to them, I realize that there is a lot that needs to change. I noticed that I haven't really been listening to them. Whenever I would talk to them about a rough time they were going through, I would always say that I know how they feel. When in all reality, every one's situation is completely different than anyone else. That is what we are taught in 7 Habits. If we learn to actually listen to people, we will become very effective at communicating our thoughts and feelings to others. This obviously has to do with Seeking to understand, and then be understood. It has completely given me a paradigm shift in my life and things have really changed. I have grown closer to my friends because of this simple tool. It has been an amazing experience and I am going to continue to use it for the rest of my life.

Britt Crane - Law of the Harvest

I love this video.  I just bought a car and this video helped me to put things into perspective.  I felt like this would be a good video to show everyone because most of us are poor college students and we all have or will buy a car.  The point that I want to bring up is that too often we feel that we need things now that we truly do not.  The story of the golden goose is still one of my favorite stories and it applies well with this video.  We always seem to want super nice things, who wouldn't? But we see more and more people going into debt for ridiculous reasons.  We need to learn to be patient and the value of hard work. Its like we think that we need or deserve things NOW, right when we want them, without ever having done anything to get them or be deserving of them.  I feel like this is a dangerous pattern in our society. The Inside Job comes to mind.  And like this video points out if we can just be somewhat patient and work a little we can get what we want and come out on top.  First things come first.

Reply to win win

I liked dylans post about win win. It can be hard to always be thinking win win, but thats how everyone can work as a team and get things done. I found this video on youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-HOA66raW1I and it was really good, he talked about what thinking win win can do for us and how much it can help us. Everyone should check it out.
You have to be very unselfish to always be thinking win win, but in the end if your a team player you'll have a much better outcome.

7 Habits

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7UPt5fMFxSw
I've been watching youtube clips on the 7 habits book. It is a really good book! i am glad we had the opportunity to read it.  The hardest thing is applying what we learn from the book. I like how the work book helped us to apply it daily.

Each chapter is dedicated to one of the habits, which are represented by the following imperatives:

The First Three Habits surround moving from dependence to independence (i.e. self mastery)

• Habit 1: Be Proactive

Synopsis: Taking initiative in life by realizing your decisions (and how they align with life's principles) are the primary determining factor for effectiveness in your life. Taking responsibility for your choices and the subsequent consequences that follow. Getting things done.

• Habit 2: Begin with the End in Mind

Synopsis: Self-discover and clarify your deeply important character values and life goals. Envision the ideal characteristics for each of your various roles and relationships in life. It is always better to try and foresee situations. Predict outcomes and then think of worst case scenarios, will help come up with informed decisions.

• Habit 3: Put First Things First

Synopsis: Planning, prioritizing, and executing your week's tasks based on importance rather than urgency. Evaluating if your efforts exemplify your desired character values, propel you towards goals, and enrich the roles and relationships elaborated in Habit 2. Prioritization is the key to the success of any business or in any walk of life. Being proactive rather than being reactive leads to success.

The next three have to do with Interdependence (i.e. working with others)

• Habit 4: Think Win-Win

Synopsis: Genuinely striving for mutually beneficial solutions or agreements in your relationships. Valuing and respecting people by understanding a "win" for all is ultimately a better long-term resolution than if only one person in the situation had gotten his way. Everyone will feel inclusive and involved. A better environment of trust and loyalty establishes.

• Habit 5: Seek First to Understand, then to be understood

Synopsis: Using empathetic listening to be genuinely influenced by a person, which compels them to reciprocate the listening and take an open mind to being influenced by you. This creates an atmosphere of caring, respect, and positive problem solving. This can also avoid situations where the problem does not actually exist and its just a matter of misunderstanding. It is always said that listen double to what you talk since we have 2 ears to listen and one mouth to talk.

• Habit 6: Synergize

Synopsis: Combining the strengths of people through positive teamwork, so as to achieve goals no one person could have done alone. How to yield the most prolific performance out of a group of people through encouraging meaningful contribution, and modeling inspirational and supportive leadership. Everyone is a master of something and not everything. Positive potentials can be put together to achieve better results.

The last habit relates to self-rejuvenation;

• Habit 7: Sharpen the Saw

Synopsis: The balancing and renewal of your resources, energy, and health to create a sustainable long-term effective lifestyle. This is constant improvement of one's self in order to be a better human being and to sharpen one's skills in order to achieve better results.

the art of communication

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KWLF7JjU1sc


i think this video really speaks for itself, but communication is more of an art than anything.  I feel this video has a lot of great insight that relates to many of the principles that we have covered in class, especially the Covey Principles.  It is something that is improved over time, and really can accomplish the most important things in life such as business initiatives and personal relationships.  I also really enjoy how he presents this information.

my team

By working in a group I found it easy to bring together a lot of great and newer ideas. I felt that our group did great on our project. We all had different and unique ideas that eventually became one...our final project. Every single person in our group made a significant contribution. We did not have one person that stood out and therefore we successfully teamed together and worked as one. I am sure we will all receive a good grade on this assignment.