The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People (Stephen R. Covey) / quote 174 of 203
Roller coasting between centers
If you are... Self-Centered Security Your security is constantly changing and shifting. Guidance Your judgment criteria are: “If it feels good... “What I want.” “What I need.” “What’s in it for me?” Wisdom You view the world by how decisions, events, or circumstances will affect you. Power Your ability to act is limited to your own resources, without the benefits of interdependency. More often than not, a person’s center is some combination of these and/or other centers. Most people are very much a function of a variety of influences that play upon their lives. Depending on external or internal conditions, one particular center may be activated until the underlying needs are satisfied. Then another center becomes the compelling force. As a person fluctuates from one center to another, the resulting relativism is like roller coasting through life. One moment you’re high, the next moment you’re low, making efforts to compensate for one weakness by borrowing strength from another weakness. There is no consistent sense of direction, no persistent wisdom, no steady power supply or sense of personal, intrinsic worth and identity. The ideal, of course, is to create one clear center from which you consistently derive a high degree of security, guidance, wisdom, and power, empowering your proactivity and giving congruency and harmony to every part of your life.