We can’t be positive all the time but taking on an optimistic mindset is still worthwhile. Life rewards people who delay gratification and grind away at tasks. Without an optimistic mindset, you’re bound to give up early and often. You need to believe that the journey is worthwhile. It takes more than just thinking positive to adopt an optimistic mindset. It involves avoiding excessive negativity (like what can often be found on the evening news) and surrounding yourself with other optimists.

Win-win lets you identify humanity for others because when you become familiar with people who also have goals like you, it helps you understand them better. Modern lifestyles, forced to process volumes of information almost non-stop, encourage "cerebral congestion," a condition attributed to data overflow and the brain being constantly on alert. The area of the brain coordinating our voluntary movements works with the brain's frontal lobe to determine the proper actions to take in each situation. Some decisions are instantaneous. Consider the choices one has when meeting a bear in the woods like staying still and silent, running away, running toward the bear hoping to scare him away and climbing a tree. Our brains make such decisions subconsciously based on past experiences, the environment and our physical fitness. In Covey’s terms, the Fourth Habit helps make deposits in the emotional bank account of the person you are dealing with. Embracing Change:A positive mindset enables individuals to embrace change and see it as a chance for growth and progress. Successful people are adaptable and view change as an opportunity to evolve and excel in new environments. Champions are different than most of us. They dream, they plan and they make decisions on an everyday basis that drive them towards their goal. This book can steer you on the path to living your life in this way. It will illuminate a path that may have never been lit before for you to go down in your life. It will help you to become the best version of yourself and to achieve success in a way that you haven’t before.

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Only a man that knows what it is like to be defeated can reach down to the bottom of his soul and come up with the extra ounce of power it takes to win when the match is even.” – Muhammad Ali Repeat this cycle until the act becomes a habit, second nature, an automatic response to any situation. First, that moment of silence has other participants thinking, “You didn’t spend the time I was speaking thinking about your response, you spent it really listening”. That builds trust. Covey worked with the organization to reform the system to reflect a Win/Win paradigm and create a habit 4: think win/win scenario: They developed individual performance agreements that reflected the work and goals of each employee or team, and the following year the company presented awards to about 800 employees out of the 1,000 who attended the annual meeting. These awards recognized associates who met personal and team goals, and as a result everyone was able to celebrate and encourage each other more genuinely because each person’s achievement had been her own, not as a result of someone else’s shortcomings. Stephen Covey’s win/win paradigm proved successful. The Think win-win resolution can be challenging and may seem impossible sometimes. It is the habit of highly effective people to engage in longer dialogues, even when it seems like you have reached the endpoint. Real maturity is listening to others carefully to comprehend their goals and perspective. It then follows by expressing your point of view. The end goal is to solve problems that neither party could have done on their own. 2. The Win-Lose: I Beat You

An Abundance Mentality reassures you that there is plenty — of success, money, and happiness — for everyone. You can only see the possibility of both people winning if you believe that one person’s success doesn’t come at the expense of the other person’s success.If we are simply OK with being rewarded for doing virtually nothing, we imprint mediocrity into our DNA. And when this happens, we become mediocre in our relationships, in our work, with our kids and friends, in our financial life and take it to the grave with us. The benefits of having an open mind is that you will be open to people helping you course correct. As you can be one turn away from getting yourself on the right road to massive success. But with pride in the way, you may spend your entire life on the wrong road, just one turn away but never doing so.

Winning isn’t as important as doing well individually. You can’t take teamwork to the front office to negotiate.” – Ken Kandreaux Once you’ve established Win/Win relationships, you can create Win/Win agreements. Establishing an effective Win/Win agreement entails the five steps we discussed in stewardship delegation. Born out of the ancient Greek philosophy of stoicism, negative visualization involves picturing yourself losing what you have. While that doesn’t sound positive, it’s a useful exercise. For example, imagine your car vanished out of the driveway and you weren’t able to replace it. Really imagine how that would affect your life. Next time you jump in your car, you’ll be grateful to have it. How is this a successful habit? You’ll begin to treat where you are in life as a gift. Your problems will be of small consequence because you’ll be so grateful for all the things going right. 3. Choosing love Prudent Money Management:Successful people live within their means, avoid unnecessary debt, and make informed financial decisions. Financial discipline involves prioritizing needs over wants and being mindful of expenditures.Either a Win/Lose or Lose/Win paradigm will bring a short-term win to one party, but the losing side will develop negative feelings that harm the relationship in the long term. In a business dealing, if I get a win in this negotiation, you may walk away and decide you don’t want to work with me in the future. That becomes a loss for me too. Think some positive thoughts about yourself. Eg. “I’m going to achieve my goal”. “I am a powerful, confident person”. There are always new, grander challenges to confront and a true winner will embrace each one.” – Mia Hamm In fact, even in 1984 this phrase seemed a little to smarmy, and the author himself comments on this fact in this quote: When you’re trying to find a Win/Win solution with a person who has a Win/Lose paradigm, focus on the relationship: Make deposits in the Emotional Bank Account, show that you respect and appreciate the other person and her perspective. Don’t be reactive, but rather try to truly listen to and understand the other person. This process is itself a major deposit in the Emotional Bank Account, and eventually the other person may recognize that you genuinely want a Win/Win solution. Agreements