The 7 habits of Highly Effective People
Habit 1: Be Proactive
"Habit 1 is the key to unlocking all the other habits and that's why it comes first. It says, "I am the captain of my life. I can choose my attitude. I'm responsible for my own happiness or unhappiness. I am in the driver's seat of my destiny, not just a passenger."
                                                                                 

"Stop waiting for things to happen. Go out and make them happen."

I do what I want when I want too. I do things for me. 

Habit 2: Begin with the End in Mind

"Control your own destiny or someone else will."

Habit 3: Put First Things First

"Organize and execute around priorities."

Organize your thoughts and ideas. Put the most important things first in order to improve your life and see positive changes starting to occur. 

"Once you have a clear picture of your priorities that is values, goals, and high leverage activities organize around them."

Only in that way will you start seeing results that will slowly make you reach your goal. And in that moment, when you have reached your goal will you realize that it was necessary for you to put your priorities first. For example, the two marshmallow experiment. Little kids are put into a room with a marshmallow and are promised that if they wait for the adult to come back they will receive another marshmallow. Some kids put the thought of another marshmallow in their head that stops them from eating it. It's their priority to obtain another marshmallow. 

Habit 4: Think Win-Win

"Think win-win or no deal."

"You have to know you can win. You have to think you can win. You have to feel you can win."

This quote is well related to basketball. In basketball, when I have games before every game i think to myself that we got this win. Starting off with a well set positive mind helps a lot. Because we want to win, even if we lose we win. We played a good game enough to make us feel as if we win. Although getting that W is important what is the most important thing is how we played. If we know we played good and did what we were supposed to improve on then who cares. We win because we win. 

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

"Diagnose before you prescribe."

"Most people do not listen with the intent to understand; they listen with the intent to reply."

-Stephen R. Covey

Listening is when you actually pay attention to what a person is saying. You make that connection to the point where you try understanding what it is the person is saying or going through. 

Habit 6: Synergize

"'The whole is greater than the sum of its parts (1+1=3)"

1+1>2

Synergize is the habit of creative cooperation. It is teamwork, open-mindedness, and the adventure of finding new solutions to old problems.  Put together, we are worth more. when two or more people or organizations combine their efforts, they can accomplish more together than if you added their accomplishments achieved separately.

Habit 7: Sharpen the Saw

Four dimension of self-renewal: Physical, Mental, Spiritual, Social/Emotional

"Give me six hours to chop down a tree and I will spend the first four sharpening the ax."

The saw is a sort of representation of ourselves. In this case when it is mentioned "I will spend the first four sharpening the ax," it is saying to prepare ourselves. We must prepare ourselves physically, mentally, spiritually, socially, and emotionally. the most we can in order to do tasks. No matter how big the tasks are, we have to pay attention to ourselves and spend enough time to ourselves for our good.  

Reflection: 

I believe these 7 habits actually do make a person more effective. We must set our goals to know what way we wish to head. We must put our priorities straight to do what is more important first. Always have a positive mind set and win-win. Even when you don't win you win. Making sure you actually listen when a person is talking is important and finally, preparing ourselves for what actions we plan to do. 

                                   Three Fundamental Techniques in
                                             Handling People
technique #1:
Don't criticize, condemn or complain
"If you want to gather honey, don't kick over the beehive."
In order to do things correctly do it wisely. Risk it but don't risk things too much. If you get overly excited it can cause for negative consequences in this case being the bees escaping the beehive and attacking you. For example, if one wants to get better at basketball they can't expect for it to happen at that instant. Neither can they get mad that the results they want aren't appearing as fast. Feeling mad about it can make them get frustrated and mess up their foot work, causing an injury. Who are you to be judging another person. You never the consequences so just bite your tongue. If you have nothing good to say then don't say anything at all.

Technique #2

Give honest and sincere appreciation

"The secret in dealing with people"

people do things for a reason. When they do things for your best and good intentions we should always give an honest appreciation. Why? Because maybe it took that person so much guts to tell you that or maybe they mentally debated whether to tell you or not. In other circumstances what ever you had done deserved a sincere appreciation. Maybe you didn't want to do what you did but something told you to do so. Having someone give you an honest appreciation can mean alot to you. 

"Appreciation can make a day, even change a life. your willingness to put it into words is all that is necessary." 

-Margaret Cousins

Technique #3

Arouse in the other person an eager want

"He who can do this has the whole world with him. He who cannot, walks a lonely way."

Make people want you. Business wise, if you show a good resume, a good personality and everything they're looking for they're going to want you to work for them. Make people have that feeling to want you. It can benefit you in various ways. For example, if you have been working in a certain place for a while now and are one of their best workers, if they see you have had ideas of leaving they'll do anything in their hands to keep you with them. Businesses are all competitive and will do whatever is possible in order to keep their best workers with them. If you can't get people to want you, they don't have much of a benefit. 

Final Reflection:

Be a good person in every aspect. The type of good person that businesses and people want in their life. Make sure to try your best and not speak bad of everybody, because you, yourself have many flaws. Nobody is perfect and neither are you, so who are you to judge them? Always make sure to thank people in the most honest way so that they know you appreciate it. And make sure to use your qualities against them. Use the qualities you have in order for businesses to want you more and for example give you a raise in order for you to stay in their company. 

My Christmas Break
               I spent my Christmas break at basketball practice most of the time. Other than that my usual routine of chores and sleeping. I finally caught up with my sister watching friends. And of course, did my homework for APUSH and AP English. I went to the theaters for the my birthday with my friends to watch Creed. Creed was a really really good movie with Michael B. Jordan and Sylvester Stallone. Throughout the ending of break I had a basketball tournament and met plenty of new people and really good teams. Many people from different high schools attended and many games got very intense. There was a game in specific last Thursday that went on for 6 quarters because the teams kept scoring and became intense. Because our school was hosting the tournament we had to be at school by 8am until the latest 9pm. We took shifts either selling snacks, charging at the entrance, or helping at the table. In the table there was 3 things you could've been doing but only if you knew how to. for example, the scoreboard, the stop clock, or the book. I mastered the scoreboard so most of the time when Varsity girls didn't want to do it, I was the one in charge.