Stephen Covey Quotes

We all have many opportunities, but limited capacity to pursue them. Make choices, focus your time and energy, so that you can submit your share of masterpieces to the greater good.

Perhaps the very best question that you can memorize and repeat, over and over, is, 'what is the most valuable use of my time right now?'

You have to ruthlessly prioritize.

Cecil's dispatch of business was extraordinary, his maxim being, "The shortest way to do many things is to do only one thing at once."

Put first things first and we get second things thrown in: put second things first & we lose both first and second things.

You rarely have time for everything you want in this life, so you need to make choices. And hopefully your choices can come from a deep sense of who you are.

When you make a to-do list, you should also make a to-not-do list. Warren Buffet was asked about the secret to success, and he said that it was saying no to almost everything. Some of those little tasks won't matter as long as you get the big tasks done.

I like to shoot a lot of choices. I like a lot of stuff - and so I push to go faster, to shrink the time between the takes so that the takes are what you're spending all your time on.

The word ‘no’ is a great time-saver. Say no to anything that is not the highest and best use of your time.

Be able to meet any deadline, even if your work is done less well than it would be if you had all the time you would have preferred.

I do have to pick my priorities. Nobody can do everything.

If you want to make good use of your time, you've got to know what's most important and then give it all you've got.

I either delegate something, I dump it, or I deal with it.

I've honed in on three questions that I ask myself when I'm evaluating where to spend my time. Is this something that I'm passionate about, is it purposeful, and will I have impact? And if I can't answer 'yes' to all three questions, then I have to sit back and ask, 'Is it really that important?'

My time is really important to me, and where I put it has to be of tremendous value.

You can make more money - you can buy a new body - but you can't buy time. If you are wasting it, make different choices. Don't wait.

You can't waste time and you can't save time; you can only choose what you do at any given moment.

I want to work, but I certainly am not going to be clawing at empty things when I can completely fill up my bucket with them - the other is a waste of my time.

I love having ten times as much stuff to do as I can possibly find time to do. That way, I can pick the one-tenth that I want to do most. But if I only have enough to just occupy all my time, I'm stuck doing all of whatever stuff it happens to be.

No two things differ more than hurry and despatch. Hurry is the mark of a weak mind; despatch of a strong one.

Learn to differentiate between what is truly important and what can be dealt with at another time.

Slowing down doesn't mean accomplishing less; it means cutting out counterproductive distractions and the perception of being rushed.

Your ability to select your most important task at each moment, and then to get started on that task and to get it done both quickly and well, will probably have more of an impact on your success than any other quality or skill you can develop.

He that pursues two hares at once, does not catch one and lets the other go.

Time given to thought is the greatest time saver of all.