In The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, Habit 2 is Begin with the End in Mind. By this, Stephen Covey literally means the end of your life. He tells you to imagine your funeral and notice who is there and what they say about you. In other words, think about the people you’ve impacted in your life and the legacy you have left behind. This exercise is intended to make you think about how you’re living your life, the way you’re affecting the people close to you, where you’re going, and whether or not those things are in line with how you want to live.
Although I regularly use this habit, I rarely think so far ahead. I mostly use it during difficult seasons of life (such as the one I’ve been going through lately) to figure out where I want to be when that season ends and the next one begins. I think something along the lines of “Ok, once all these emotions I’m feeling settle down, my thoughts stop racing, and I’m in a calmer state of mind, how do I want this situation to be resolved and what can I do to make that happen?” It’s easy to make bad decisions when my emotions are running high and I’m thinking a lot of negative thoughts. Thinking ahead to my desired outcome helps me take a step back, zoom out, and work from a higher perspective so that I don’t make permanent decisions that I’ll later regret based on my temporary emotions.
Keeping that higher perspective in mind by thinking about what I ultimately want out of a given situation allows me to make decisions that my past self would want me to make, my present self can accept, and my future self can be grateful that I made. It’s a way to cut through the emotions and thoughts as well as the feeling of being trapped in a situation I dislike and it lets me look ahead to a better future. Once I have that future in mind, then I can come up with a plan to get there and begin executing that plan step by step until I’ve arrived at my destination.
Habit 2 has done so much good for me as of late and I’m glad I remembered it when I needed it. I hope this has also been helpful for you. The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People is full of incredibly useful stuff like this. It’s my favorite self-improvement book and I’ve gotten more out of it than any other self-improvement book I’ve ever read. If you haven’t already checked it out, I highly recommend you do so.