I recently finished the book ‘The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People’. There are many books that attempt to explain the secret to success, sometimes coming across far too practical; if you don’t for X or Y you won’t achieve Z. Whilst others are too vague and ‘spiritual’, giving no tangible actions – this book seemed to find the balance!
The book tells stories, gives examples, and provide frameworks to help understand and implement the habits. The whole book was very interesting; sometimes obvious, other times eye opening.
There’s one habit I want to talk about, habit 7: Sharpening the Saw.
Essentially this habit is the ability to take a step back and re-charge to become for effective. The analogy is a workman sawing away at a tree. He is in the zone and working 100% efficiently, however, the saw it blunt. Someone suggests he stop and sharpen the saw. Scared of breaking his rhythm he angrily refuses, exclaiming he may never be as efficient again if he were to stop. Yet if he sharpened the blunt saw, he could chop down the tree in half the time, even with a slower motion. The principle makes sense!
However, there is another reason this habit sticks in my mind so clearly. A quote from Gary Vaynerchuk on ‘meditation and mindfulness’. (Jump to 21min 50sec)
Doesn’t this sound exactly like the workman? Or perhaps Gary really is superhuman 🙂