Anthony Robbins vs Steven Covey - Who Is The Better Teacher?

Well today is my birthday so I thought I'd write a little to finish a great and wonderful day. Unlike other days, everybody treats you so well on your birthday, which is why I only hoped everyday would be my birthday. But then again if that was the case, I'd grow old pretty fast. Anyway today I thought of changing the pace a little. There would be no current affairs type topics like executive salaries or police bashers but a more philosophical discussion on the teachings of the two giants in the personal improvement arena, namely Anthony Robbins and Steven Covey. Both men are synonomous with teaching life skills and have been successfully doing so for decades. Anthony Robbins started young and Steven Covey started older but as we stand today both have an enormous amount of following.

I was introduced to AR some twenty years ago, during a cold autumn night (not unlike tonight really) when I had nothing to do but watch the late nigh time slot reserved for informercials. As these time slots were the cheapest in the day, many an informercial were aired during this time. Anything from magic dusters to a million properties in 20 months (or was it the other way round) was shown during this time. Sadly to say, most of it was utter crap and a waste of money. But this AR informercial caught my eye some twenty years ago and I signed up to buy the tapes, as I wanted to learn more of what this 20 year old plus young man had to teach. He promised to 'transform' me as a person and I was all up for the idea. I got the tapes and I'm happy to conclude that I have been a fan for many years thereafter.

With Steven Covey, I had heard of him for several years through his book 7 Habits of Highly Effective People but only got intimately familiar with his teachings after I took his 5 day course a year ago. I totally related to his teachings of inner change before any real change in a persons life could occur.

Todays question if you may for those who know the teachings of these two men, is who is the better teacher? I know you say they're both good and teach well in their own way but they have fundamental differences. For example AR teaches PR skills to in a way 'manipulate' the person who you would like to align/ agree/ support you. Now in AR's own words, he had been accused of manipulation but he argues that it is not manipulation and he gives his reasons as to why. To me, it sure seems like manipulation although not in a way that it would hurt anyone, so a good kind of manipulation if you may. With SC, he teaches change from within as a primary form of change and change on the outside as the secondary form of change. That is change your inner self. Have self respect, be independant and sincere, then only change your personality for the better. Compelling examples of great individuals who lived these principles are Mother Theresa and Mahatma Ghandi.

I used to believe unreseverdly the teachings of AR until recently when I began to be sceptical of some of his teachings. Most of his teachings however, are very useful and even if they are not true science if you believe it and it helps you, then he has done his job. One example of something he taught that I had followed to the letter and failed me recently was the principle of not mixing your proteins and your carbohydrates. While his teachings were based on facts, however I believe that when it comes to the subject of healthy eating, there is no conclusive conclusion on any side of the story. So to advocate a certain teaching in this complicated area as definitive needed a bit more care. It was said that if I tried this healthy eating regime for the next few days I would see the difference in the morning, which I did not. Still not to bag AR, alot of his other teachings were very useful and till this day have helped millions of people.

The other thing that AR teaches that had gone under some scrutiny recently was the fire walking 'phenomenon'. This is where the participants who put their mind to focus could do the seemingly impossible feat of walking on fire. However, when a sceptical journalist tried to put this to the test, he deliberatley did not put his mind to it, he still managed to walk on the bed of coals without getting burned. He deliberately would not listen to the pre-fire walk prep talk and still he came off unscathed. This was further made into an episode of the 'Mythbusters' where they concluded that the bed of coals were hotter under (approx 700 deg C) than on top (approx 200 deg C) and that the walk was too fast to cause any serious damage to the skin. The mythbusters team all tried the feat with not one of them getting burned. But then I've learned from AR for too many years to just dismiss his teachings, as I said earlier, if he had made people better then more power to him and his job is done.

With SC, I had recently become a true believer that by changing from the inside first, true change can happen. One example is you need to be a truly honest person before people can think of you as honest and believe in you. There is no point being honest only when the need arises or when people are noticing. If you 'appeared' honest but weren't it was just a matter of time before people caught on, even if you hadn't caught on that they had caught on. This is how people get certain tags like 'a kind guy', 'a loving father' etc. not because they acted this way but because they truly were this way. Lasting change comes from within.

But at the end of the day, I think both men teach invaluable lessons that can be learned and applied to make our lives so much better. Whether you believe in AR or SC or both, it sure is better than being ignorant of them. What do you think?