Be Proactive, Not Reactive

Last year in school, we learned about the 7 Habits (based on “The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People” by Franklin Covey) and how we could use them each day.

Habit #1: Be Proactive

Being proactive means that you’re in charge of you and your actions.

• Instead of reacting to problem, you can look ahead and take action to help solve the problem.
• Instead of waiting for something to happen, you can choose to make something happen with your actions.
• Instead doing good things only when people are watching, you can choose to do good things all the time.

It is important to know that nobody else can control you and you can’t control everything, but you can control what you do and how you act.

An easy way to learn how Habit 1 can apply to your life, is to use the Circle of Control exercise.

To do this, get a piece of paper and draw a circle. Then another circle around it.

• In the smaller, inner circle, write all the things you can control. For example: your attitude, reactions, words, grades, and what you wear. (Just to list a few.)
• In the bigger, outer circle, write the things you can’t control. For example: the weather, other people, volcanoes, earthquakes, floods, and prices of things you want. (Just to list a few.)

This helps really helps you understand where to focus your energy.

Here’s a quote I found from the Leader In Me website:

The proactive approach to a mistake is to acknowledge it instantly, correct and learn from it.

Stephen Covey

This quote is true to this habit because being proactive is also about taking responsibility for your actions or mistakes.

As an example: If you’re working on a group project for school, and a mistake is made, you may let it go because it was someone else’s part of the project or you may be tempted to blame it on someone else. But that’s is NOT being proactive.

Instead, you could point out the mistake and suggest a solution or take care of fixing yourself as part of the team. That IS being proactive because you chose to take action and not just react.

That pretty much wraps up being proactive!

Remember to think before you act in any situation and take action to get things done.