An Army of Normal Folks - Forget the Life Hacks. These 7 Habits Actually Matter

Episode Date: October 2, 2026

In this Shop Talk, Bill and Alex take on the nine million self-help books promising to fix your life, from 4:17 a.m. ice baths to journaling and cutting carbs, and go back to the one that has stuck around for decades: Stephen Covey's The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. Bill walks through all seven, from quitting the complaining about what you can't control to learning to listen to someone without preparing a rebuttal. His case is that your calendar is a more honest statement of your priorities than your mouth. That opens a bigger conversation about being a good neighbor: why generosity is a habit and not one check, why curiosity is becoming a radical act, and why character gets built in ordinary decisions, not giant moments. Plus Alex's idea for a yearly seven-habit scorecard and why he's heading to Vegas to sharpen the saw. ARMY ACTIONS Sign up for the newsletter: https://normalfolks.org/#newsletter-cta Join or start a local service club: https://normalfolks.org/service-clubs/ Take the 10 Level Challenge, "the hero's journey for service": https://normalfolks.org/10-level-challenge/ Have an idea for a Shop Talk or a guest for the show? Write Bill anytime at [e-mail] Follow us on all socials: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/armyofnormalfolks/ TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@armyofnormalfolks Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ArmyofNormalFolks X: https://x.com/armynormalfolks LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/an-army-of-normal-folks/ — 0:00 Welcome to the Shop: 9 Million Self-Help Books 0:32 What Are Stephen Covey's 7 Habits? 1:25 How to Stop Worrying About What You Can't Control 3:03 Why Your Calendar Shows Your Real Priorities 6:24 How Small Habits Build Character 9:29 How to Avoid Burnout and Sharpen the Saw Support the show: https://www.normalfolks.us/#joinSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Hey, everybody. It's Bill Courtney with an army of normal folks. Welcome to the shop. Jesus, Louise. Welcome to the shop, Alex. Thanks, Bill. It's quite a welcome. Just wake you up. And shop talk number 123, forget the life hacks. These seven habits actually matter. That's what we're going to talk about. By the way, really horrible, sad news that I want to share with everybody. About a week ago, Prince Mongo passed away. So who's that? Yeah, I knew you were going to say that. Cashistos.

In Memphis, in the 70s, a guy named Robert Hodges changed his name to Prince Mungo and declared that he was from Zambodia. And he was the Zambodian prince and was here to make knights of all Memphians and his Zambodian princes. And he ran for mayor every year for many, many years. And one time he placed third. He was like third in the balloting. He owned Mongo's pizza shop.

He owned a number of different places all over the place. He always was barefoot when he delivered pizzas. He would do a Zambodian moon dance for you on your conference table. And believe it or not, he was incredibly philanthropic. Do you remember? Like he was successful financially? Incredible. Wasn't he?

Yeah. You got to look up Prince Mongo, Memphis. We should have a job talk on Prince Mongo. Absolutely. Yeah. All right. Do you remember the show from long, long ago, called Real People? It was a nationally syndicated show like a day.

It was like a 60 Minutes that did real people. They highlighted Prince Mongo once. Prince Mango. Oh, Prince Mango is the mom. Did he deliver an order, a pizza order to your office or house and do the dance? No, no, I was, no, I never did that. But I do know people who would order pizzas from Prince Mungo's pizza. when he delivered him, he would get up on the conference table and do his ambodeon moon dance.

And he always wore like welder glasses and a crazy hair and he never wore shoes and some kind of crazy thing. He drove an orange Volkswagen thing around everywhere. No, Prince Vago was awesome. And he did. He placed third in the mayorial balloting in Memphis. And his passing just makes Memphis a smaller place. Yeah, I can't believe never heard of Prince Vaghan. You got to Google them.

We'll talk all about him one day. We should do a shop talk of Prince Monica in honor of the Zambodian prince's life. And honestly, he's no longer with us, but Mimphians like me believe that he is not perish. He's just returned to Zambodian and his spirits. Right? Cash, I mean, he's not, he's not dead. He's just, his spirits return to his Zambodian roots. But Mungo would have blessed.

the spirits in the room. And like when he was running for mayor, if you were outside holding a sign for him, you would kneel and he would take the stick off a sign and tap you on his shoulder and bless you as a Zambodian spirit night. I think it's time to move on from Fras Monko. It was the greatest thing ever.

You go to a soon? Shopton number 123. Forget the life hacks. These are seven habits that actually matter. But first, an honor of shop top top top number 123, what happened 123 years ago? So it was 1903, and funny enough, last 123 years ago.

Yeah, yeah. You turned the math in your head. I mentioned this last episode, and it happens to be this episode. Oh, really? The teddy bear craze went wild. The teddy bear. Yeah. Yeah.

So the story happened the prior year. You know the story of the teddy bear? Yeah. So he was actually, Teddy Roosevelt was hunting in Mississippi. Have you never heard this story? In Mississippi. Yeah. Okay.

The governor invited him. Okay. He's hunting in Mississippi. And actually, was a former slave. I don't know this part of the story. Colier, who then, I guess, became an accomplished bear hunter and guide in the region.

And the governor had asked him to find a bear for the president to kill. And so he ends up getting this massive bear. We went up killing one of his dogs. It took him a long time to wrangle down this bear. And he eventually tied him to a tree and brought the president to this bear to kill him. And Teddy refused to. because it was on sportsman like, I'm not going to kill,

you know, some bear that was tied to a tree. Yeah. Yeah. I'm not interested in killing that. And so a cartoonist made a cartoon. Have you really never heard this story? Our cartoonist made,

you know, a cartoon about this scene. And it became known as Teddy's Bear. The Teddy Bear. And this cartoonist, like, actually kept making iterations of the bear was so popular,

and it grew from this massive bear. And he eventually made it in this adorable cute bear. No kidding. And then this candy shop owner in New York City. His wife made an actual stuffed teddy bear, and they wrote a letter to the president saying, hey, can we use your name on this? And it's like, sure, whatever.

Like, it's not going to matter. And it ends up becoming this massive thing. That's how the teddy bear came out. No kidding. Yeah. You're welcome, Bill. And it all started in Mississippi. It all started in Mississippi.

From a bear tied to a tree. A bear tied to a tree. Well, there you have it. That's what happened to 123 years ago. So right after we get back, forget the life hack. these seven habits actually matter right after these brief messages from our generous sponsors. This record is on. Miley is having a moment.

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And over my career, I've heard account after account of prosecutorial misconduct, story after story of injustice. But I've never heard a story quite like this. The more I kept reading that stuff, I thought, man, there's more red flags that just kept coming up over and over. We'll hypnotize them to strengthen.

in that memory. So he went into a good france. I really didn't believe any of it was real. And I was like, well, they're going to figure out this is not me. They're going to do their police job. Listen to Examine the Backfire Effect on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Shop Talk number 123. Here we go. Forget the life hacks. These seven habits actually matter. some of you, many of you probably have read the book or at least started on it. There are about 9 million self-help books telling you out to fix your life. Holy smokes. That's that in and of itself is kind of funny if you think about.

Nine million self-help books. There wouldn't need to be 9 million if you have worked. Wake up at 417 in the morning and take an ice bath. No, that's not going to help me. journal don't eat carbohydrates manifest something whatever else we're all supposed to be doing right now but one book that has really stuck around for decades is stephen covey's the seven habits for highly effective people uh which i have a couple copies and my kids have read um and you've only read half of it i really have read most of it um i've read half and then like i read the other part

parts of it on the beach. It was a beach book once. But it's actually incredible and Steve Covey's incredible and a lot of people have read it. I actually haven't read it, which is part of my curiosity doing it. Oh, really? Trying to help me learn, help you learn, help the audience learn. Well, it's good. So if you've read it, this will be a good recap for you. If you hadn't read it, this is a great commercial for it, but you need to read it because of the nine million, it's probably one of the top five. And really, it's because it's not trendy. It's a principle. And the principles are pretty well aged. Habit one, be proactive.

The translation, quit spending all your energy complaining about things you can't control. You are not going to control Washington. Certainly you can vote, and it matters, but you're not going to control the policy that's going on there. You can't control the economy, inflation and all that. You can't control your boss. Good grief. You cannot control your balls. Good luck being one of your employees.

Yeah, they can't control me. I can't control Lisa. The way it works. You can't control what somebody says about you in some of your comments. I've read. Y'all are some mean people sometimes. You remember the one when you're on Kelly Clark's in there like, that dude looks like Donald Trump?

You can't control what somebody says about you. You can control, however, what you do next. And that's agency. And agency is the beginning of contributing in the lives of us. others and your own life. Habit two. Begin with the end in mind. Love this one.

And I've actually poached it and used it. Where are you trying to go? What kind of spouse, parent, friend, neighbor, leader? What kind of human being are you trying to be? If you don't know what winning looks like, you probably spend your life keeping score with whatever everybody else tells you, that matters, money, social media followers, job titles, stuff. And one day you may discover you won a game you actually didn't want to play in.

Habit three. Put first things first. Your calendar is probably a more honest statement of your priorities than your mouth. We all say family matters. We all say community matters. Faith matters, health matters. Then look at your calendar. Where are they?

We don't need another inspirational quote about priorities. We need Tuesday at 6 p.m. to reflect them. Think win-win. We developed this idea that for me to win, somebody else has to lose. But mentoring somebody doesn't diminish you. Helping a neighbor doesn't diminish you. Connecting somebody to a job doesn't cost you your own success. Life doesn't always have to be a zero-sum game.

We can create more value together where everybody wins. Habit five. Seek first to understand then to be understood. Very important. Seek first to understand and then be understood. Rather than proclaiming everything on your own and not listening to what other people have to say, America could use a whole lot more of this one. Listen.

Not while you're preparing a rebuttal. Just listen, hear somebody, feel them, understand them, empathize with them. Try asking somebody you disagree with. How did you come to believe that? I'm curious. I'm interested. I'm not here to beat you up for what you believe. I just want to understand why you believe it. You do not have to agree with the answer, but you might learn something about the person giving it. Curiosity is, becoming a radical act, before you start telling everybody who you are and what you believe, why don't you just listen to what somebody else has to say? It might actually change who you are and what you believe just a little bit. Habits fixed. Synergize. That's a corporate

signing word that basically means different people working together can produce something none of them could produce alone. Synergy. A football team is a 11 quarterbacks. A community doesn't need 500 people with the same one skill. We need teachers, plumbers, pastors, business owners, stay-at-home moms, college students, retirees, mechanics, accountants. Everybody brings something. And when we bring those different gifts together, we can accomplish things that none of us as individuals could do alone. Habit 7. sharpen the saw take care of the

instrument the saw is you you can't just use a saw into the blade dulls and falls apart because then you can never cut anything again what that means is rest learn exercise read

pray and think spend time of people you love you can't pour indefinitely from an empty cup Burnout doesn't make you more useful. In fact, it's the opposite. It just makes you burned out. The bigger point, here's what I like most about these seven habits. None of them require you to be extraordinary. They're just practices. You choose to practice them because so much of a meaningful life is determined by talent.

is determined by title of the book, habits. You don't become a good neighbor because you had one gigantic heroic moment. You come a good neighbor because you repeatedly behave like a good neighbor. You don't become generous because you wrote one check. You develop a habit of generosity. I dare say one $500 check is less meaningful than $2025. You don't become a mentor because you gave somebody one piece of advice. You become a mentor because you keep showing up day in and day out.

And that's true of almost everything worthwhile. So don't try to change your entire life tomorrow. Just pick one of these seven habits. And then go on to those next one. Maybe you need to spend less time complaining about what you can't control and more time acting on what you can. Maybe your calendar needs to be a better reflection of what you say matters. Maybe there's someone you've been arguing with whom you need to actually shut up and listen to and understand. Maybe you're exhausted and need to sharpen the stall.

Pick one. Practice it for a week, seven days. Character usually isn't built in giant moments. It's built through ordinary decisions repeated long enough over and over again that they become routine and who you are. That's true in my business. It's true in families. It's true in service. And it's true in communities. You probably don't need seven new life hacks. You might just need a few good habits and the discipline to actually live them consistently every day. Yeah, that's a great summation of the book. But more importantly, it is such good advice. Every one of those habits

is great advice for how to live a life. But as it pertains to our show and being a member of the Army of normal folks, there's not a single thing there that doesn't make you a better member of the Army. While you were talking, it made me think, I mean, this is like a really interesting scorecard that you could look at every year, every quarter, every month. Like, how am I doing on these seven things? It's just so powerful and simplicity.

And there are people on his calendar point, two, who will literally do an analysis of their calendar each year. How much did I spend on this with business? How much did I spend on sales, like particular parts of your business that you said you're going to do or not? How much was managing people? So, I mean, that is something interesting to think about. Like, do a calendar analysis at the end of the year and are my priorities in order? The one that resonates with me, which that's cool. But the one that resonates with me is sharp in the saw.

That's why you're going to Vegas this weekend. Yeah, it is. But so many people are like, oh, I'm doing this, I'm doing this, I'm doing this, I'm so tired. I'm doing this. I'm so tired. If you're not taking the time to make sure you're prepared to take on all you have going on, you end up not being any good at all the things you are trying to be good at. You're burned out. You don't have full energy.

you're probably crabby you're probably not a lot of fun to be around and um i do think in this very fast-paced social media led media-driven go go go go go go world we're in um that uh oftentimes we don't take time to sharpen the saw and you can't be any good to anybody else if you're not first good to yourself so it's like the phrase uh you got to put on your own oxygen mess first before you go out so many of theirs. That's right. That's right. I've heard people of Christianity say also you can't give what you don't have.

Sure. You have to have it yourself first if you're going to then give it to anybody else. It's true. Pretty good stuff. So that shop talk number 123, I highly suggest if you do not have Stephen Covey's book, you get it and read it and think through it and ask yourself how it can possibly affect you in your life with your family and your business. and your work life, but also your community.

And to join the ranks of the Army of normal folks and employ those habits and your communal actions. Can't do anything but help. That's it. That's it. Chop Talk number 123. If you enjoyed this episode, rate it, review it. Do something on social that says...

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