an activity trap

It's incredibly easy to get caught up in an activity trap, in the busy-ness of life, to work harder and harder at climbing the ladder of success only to discover it's leaning against the wrong wall. It is possible to be very busy - very busy - without being very effective.

Stephen R. Covey 

The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People: Powerful Lessons in Personal Change. Simon and Schuster. p.98

a gate of change

No one can persuade another to change. Each of us guards a gate of change that can only be opened from the inside. We cannot open the gate of another, either by argument or by emotional appeal.

Marilyn Ferguson 

As quoted in The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People: Powerful Lessons in Personal Change by Stephen R. Covey. Simon and Schuster. p.60

management/leadership and ladders

In the words of both Peter Drucker and Warren Bennis, "Management is doing things right; leadership is doing the right things." Management is efficiency in climbing the ladder of success; leadership determines whether the ladder is leaning against the right wall.

Stephen R. Covey 

The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People: Powerful Lessons in Personal Change. Simon and Schuster. p.101

out there

Anytime we think the problem is "out there," that thought is the problem. We empower what's out there to control us. The change paradigm is "outside-in" - what's out there has to change before we can change.

Stephen R. Covey 

The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People: Powerful Lessons in Personal Change. Simon and Schuster. p.89

by the close study of books

…With war threatening, [Nathanael Greene] turned his mind to “the military art.” Having ample means to buy whatever books he needed, he acquired a number of costly military treatises few could afford. It was a day and age that saw no reason why one could not learn whatever was required – learn virtually anything – by the close study of books, and he was a prime example of such faith. Resolved to become a “fighting Quaker,” he made himself as knowledgeable on tactics, military science, and leadership as any man in the colony.

David G. McCullough

1776. Simon & Schuster, 2005. p.23