Stephen Covey, author of The 7 Habits of Highly Successful People
You’ve probably read more worthless self-help books than you can shake a stick at. Lucky for you, there’s a gem out there that can improve your quality of life and be used to improve your tango mindset!
I visit a college buddy in 2005 and he hands me a cassette (remember those?) recording featuring the charismatic Stephen Covey, author of The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. I heard about this bald wonder in my leadership classes of yesteryear, but this is my first opportunity to embrace his ideas, so I take the chance.
As I listen intently, I imagine a scene where the auditorium lights reflect off his polished noggin and shed light onto his attentive audience.
CAUTION: Large Vocabulary Ahead
He throws around big words like paradigm and synergy, and persuades the crowd to believe that change is possible if you alter the way you perceive reality. Afterall, the world is your mirror.
Stephen outlines 7 basic habits that, if used wisely, result in increased self-awareness, control, and personal growth. So, in order of their paradigm-shifting potential, here are those 7 delightful habits:
- Be Proactive
- Begin With the End in Mind
- Put First Things First
- Think Win/Win
- Seek First to Understand, Then to be Understood
- Synergize
- Sharpen the Saw
Supplement Your Tango Practice with the 7 Habits
If you’re serious about improving your dancing, you put forth a conscious effort to take group classes, private lessons, go to milongas, attends festivals, watch videos, etc.
These activities are are essential for training our muscle memory and feeding our need for fresh knowledge, but at some point, you will hit a plateau where you question your progress no matter how wonderful it has been.
There are infinite reasons for a plateau:
- You learn all you can from your teacher and have to find a new one
- Seeing a couple dance differently than you makes you wonder about what you’re learning
- An injury keeps you from dancing Tango
- Someone rejects you at a milonga
The possibilities are endless and the plateau can happen when you least expect it! Your attitude is the first line of defense when this mental obstacle creeps into the picture to sabotage your outlook.
The Tango Notebook knows the 7 Habits will boost your willpower and keep your tango addiction going strong, healthy, and smart. We will start to elaborate on the Habits by dedicating one blog post per week to one habit to explain how it can keep you on track with your Tango goals whether you’re a beginner or veteran dancer. For those already familiar with the book, start thinking about how you can apply the 7 Habits to Tango dancing and come back to compare thoughts.
Fun Fact: Did you know Stephen Covey’s hair dresser is Mr Clean?!
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{ 6 tango-induced comments… read them, love them, and add your 2 cents! }
I look forward to these posts! I’ve read his books and while I flinch at the words paradigm and synergy – there’s definitely value to what he’s written.
Nice……
That “plateau” is for many I talked too (incl. myself) a cyclical thing. Homer Ladas explains it very well with teh three stages of the tango cycle: student – ego- apathy. It is a matter of reducing ego and apathy as much as possible. My students phases are shorter, my ego phases last a couple of hours and my apahty phases are getting longer…. Maybe there is then an even larger cycle….
I find myself “cycling” in and out of phases myself, but I’ve never heard labels for them like you mentioned. Can you elaborate some more… I’d like to think about that for a split second
Great comment!
I have heard of this book but never read it. Looking forward to finding out how it applies to tango. What does synergize mean?
Synergy is when the sum of all parts create a better, bigger, more efficient effect than individual parts could produce on their own.
I’d read the book years ago – it’s EXCELLENT!