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7 Habits of Highly Effective Teens

Habit 1 BE PROACTIVE

I am the force. Take responsibility for your life.

Being proactive is more than taking initiative. It is accepting responsibility for our own behavior (past, present, and future) and making choices based on principles and values rather than on moods or circumstances. Proactive people are agents of change and choose not to be victims, to be reactive, or to blame others. They take an Inside-Outside Approach to creating changes.

Habit 2 BEGIN WITH THE END IN MIND

Control your own destiny or Someone Else Will.

Define your mission and goals in life.

All things are created twice – first mentally, second physically. Individuals, families, teams, and organizations shape their own future by creating a mental vision and purpose for any project. They don’t just live day to day without a clear purpose in mind. They mentally identify and commit themselves to the principles, values, relationships, and purposes that matter most to them.

Habit 3 PUT FIRST THINGS FIRST

Will and Won’t Power

Prioritize, and do the most important things first.

Putting first things first is the second or physical creation. It is organizing and executing around mental creation (your purpose, vision, values, and most important priorities.) The main thing is to keep the main thing the main thing.

Habit 4 THINK WIN-WIN

The stuff that life is made of have an everyone-can-win attitude.

Thinking win-win is a frame of mind and heart that seeks mutual benefit and is based on mutual respect in all interactions. It’s not about thinking selfishly (win-lose) or like a martyr (lose-win). In our work and family life, members think interdependently -- in terms of “we,” not “me.” Thinking win-win encourages conflict resolution and helps individuals seek mutually beneficial solutions. It’s sharing information, power, recognition, and rewards.

Habit 5 SEEK FIRST TO UNDERSTAND, THEN TO BE UNDERSTOOD

You Have Two Ears and one Mouth. Listen to people sincerely.

When we listen with the intent to understand others, rather than with the intent to reply, we begin true communication and relationship building. Seeking to understand takes kindness; seeking to be understood takes courage. Effectiveness lies in balancing the two.

Habit 6 SYNERGIZE

The “High” Way - Work together to achieve more.

Synergy is about producing a third alternative – not my way, not your way, but a third way that is better than either of us would have come up with individually. Synergistic teams and families thrive on individual strengths. They go for creative cooperation.

Habit 7 SHARPEN THE SAW

It’s “Me Time”
Renew yourself regularly.

Sharpening the saw is about constantly renewing ourselves in the four basic areas of life: physical, social/emotional, mental, and spiritual. It’s the habit that increases our capacity to live all the other habits
source: http://www.iusd.org/chs/Handbook%20Files/HB_Seven_Habits_of_Highly_Efffective_Teens8.pdf

Open Architecture

This morning, I had a small chat with my friend. We talked about open-source and open-architecture. In fact, our discussion left me some things to think over. I am thinking about the 'openness' in the software development. Needless to say, the rapid widespread of internet is strongly affected by the 'Open-Architecture'. Since there are different machines, architectures, protocols, which are trying to communicate each other over the internet, it is very important to have open-architecture which can make communication easy.

In fact, Roy T. Fielding (I don't think I need to introduce who that guy is) proposed something like open-architecture, and luckily I bumped into that good stuff.
Open Architecture.  It is pretty much interesting.

Beauty and Harmony

What is beauty? Does beauty exist only in the eyes of the beholder? Is there any common measure all beholders can agree upon?

I think there does exist a common opinion to decide what is beautiful or not. Art is, in fact, to seek (or probably create) beauty in everything (either in nature or in artifacts) around us. Maybe beauty is more objective than what we believe.

Whatever harmonious is beautiful, I believe. Beauty and harmony are strongly intertwined with each other. When things combine and exist harmoniously, they become beautiful. Actually, obvious or not, beauty does exist in everything around us: in the sky, in the world, in the water, in a math equation, in a painting, in music, in a girl, in a bird, in a phone, in a curry dish and what not.

Beauty is, maybe or maybe not, related to the its functional existence; however it is strongly related to its harmonious existence. Although they may contain the same ingredients, there is a world of difference between a mediocre dish and a delightful dish. It all depends on how harmoniously we can combine different things.

Engineering, although it is also another methodology to combine different things, is different from Art. Unlike Art, the primary focus of Engineering has been functional existence of different things. However, 'Mother Nature' shows us that there is a co-existence between functionality and harmony. Through bio-mimicry, there will be, sooner or later, more engineering arts to create functional harmonious existences.

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