He Made Me Do It!

After reading The 7 Habits of Highly Effective Teens by Sean Covey and The Young Traveler's Gift by Andy Andrews, I have found nine areas where typical teens are different from productive young adults. In these nine posts, I'll be explaining them and asking you to decide where you are right now and where you would like to be in the future.

Teenagers are reactive. Young adults are proactive. This is described by Sean Covey as Habit 1: be proactive (The 7 Habits of Highly Effective Teens, 48) and by Andy Andrews as “the buck stops here” which is the first decision for success (The Young Traveler's Gift, 34). This habit and decision are about realizing that you are in charge of you. If you ever say, “I can't...” or “They made me...” or “I have to...” then that's reactive speaking. Reactive is the opposite of proactive (Covey 48). Teenagers are reactive and justify their actions based on the actions of others. But productive young adults understand that they have the power to decide how they act and nobody makes them do anything. Andrews also says “I am a person of action” (68). Because they are proactive, young adults are leaders. They don't wait around to be told what to do. They take a stand and make up for what their team cannot do. “An army of sheep led by a lion would defeat an army of lions led by a sheep!” (69).

• So what about you? Can you think of an example to a time you have been proactive? Can you think of a time when you were reactive? Do you tend to be proactive and take accountability for your decisions or are you justifying your actions on the actions of those around you?

Coming up...Do I know where I'm going?

Sources:

Andrews, Andy. The Young Traveler's Gift. Nashville, Tenn.: Tommy Nelson, 2004. Print.

Covey, Sean, and Inc OverDrive. The 7 Habits of Highly Effective Teens. S.I.: Touchstone, 2014. Print.