Long before THE SECRET, Brian Tracy was a great motivator for me.

In his book  GOALS - HOW TO GET EVERYTHING YOU WANT, he recommends writing goals in the present tense but including a deadline, creating awkward conceptualizations of this sort: “I earn an average of $5,000 a month by April 1.” You need to be persistent but flexible, full of dreams but also practical. Dependability is your most important trait but there are many others cited as important, key or critical: your ability to set goals and make plans, a sense of control, the practice of single handling, dedication, vision, visualization, e.g., “ability to visualize is perhaps the most important faculty that you possess.”

Brian Tracy’s colorful quips and cheerleading helps people think in big, exciting terms. In the first three chapters, he quotes or cites himself, sales trainer Tom Hopkins, Mark McCormack, Victor Frankl (founder of logotherapy), Aristotle, Stanford University, billionaire H. L. Hunt, motivational speaker Zig Ziglar, Alexander Graham Bell, Eleanor Roosevelt, Buddy Hackett, Gary Zukav, James Allen, Edward Banfield, peak performer Charles Garfield, and Peter Drucker - an eclectic mix of anecdotes and attributions. There’s lots of food for thought like, “How do you eat an elephant?” Answer: “One bite at a time.”

His conclusions are twenty-one steps, which follow directly from his chapter titles, beginning with “Unlock your potential,” “Take charge of your life,” “Create your own future,” and ending with “Unlock your inborn creativity,” “Do something every day,” and “Persist until you succeed.”

You can’t hit a target that you can’t see. The starting point of great success is when you sit down and decide exactly what you really want, in every area of your life. This book by Brian Tracy will show you how to do this better and faster than you ever dreamed possible.