We may find it convenient to live with the illusion that circumstances or other people are responsible for the quality of our lives, but the reality is that we are responsible-response-able-for our choices.
Stephen CoveyIf you focus on principles, you empower everyone who understands those principles to act without constant monitoring, evaluating, correcting, or controlling.
Stephen CoveyIn addition to self-awareness, imagination and conscience, it is the fourth human endowment - independent will - that really makes effective self-management possible. It is the ability to make decisions and choices and to act in accordance with them. It is the ability to act rather than to be acted upon, to proactively carry out the program we have developed through the other three endowments. Empowerment comes from learning how to use this great endowment in the decisions we make every day.
Stephen CoveyIf I really want to improve my situation, I can work on the one thing over which I have control-myself. I can stop trying to shape up my wife and can work on my own weaknesses. I can focus an being a great marriage partner, a source of unconditional love and support. Hopefully, my wife will feel the power of proactive example and respond in kind. But, whether she does or doesn't, the most positive way I can influence my situation is to work on myself, on my being.
Stephen Covey