Michael Hyatt

What about you? What’s your dream?

Do you have an Everest you want to climb? Is it starting a new business? Getting your health back on track? Doubling your family income? Writing a book? Getting out of debt? Spending more time with family and friends? Mastering a difficult new sport or hobby? Learning a second language so you can experience another part of the world—or more of the one you already inhabit?

Your task is not to foresee the future, but to enable it.

—ANTOINE DE SAINT-EXUPÉRY

It isn’t where you came from; it’s where you’re going that counts.

—ELLA FITZGERALD

Dreams are as diverse as their dreamers. And I believe any dream that inspires you and enhances your life is worth pursuing. You might be pursuing several already. But we all face setbacks. It’s part of the pursuit. There’s no achievement without some friction, some resistance—maybe lots of it.

Maybe those setbacks lie in your past, informing your present experience. Maybe you’re fighting through a major setback right now.

When it comes to achieving our goals, I know a lot of us feel like that. We start out strong and make huge strides, gathering momentum as we go. Then we get derailed or fall short of our hopes. Not always—but often enough that most of us can point to a handful of setbacks or failures with disappointment and regret.

Our goals reflect many of our most important desires and aspirations—our determination to make a change and improve our lives.

Generally, we’re talking about our health, wealth, relationships, and personal development. I get that. My governing assumption in this book is that you’re a growth-minded person who wants to excel personally, professionally, relationally, intellectually, and spiritually. And that matters.

When people like you reach their full potential, the world has more happy marriages, kids have their moms and dads at night, businesses have leaders worth admiring and emulating, and you have the health and vitality necessary to fuel your dreams. Through one intentional choice at a time, you make the world around you better. That’s exactly why we need a far better plan. Aspirations such as these are too important to entrust to a faulty system.

we’re talking about the most important stuff in life. So, why leave so many hopes unfulfilled? Instead of scaling back, we need a system geared to work. We need a proven method to set and achieve our goals.

this book is designed to help you find the clarity, develop the courage, and leverage the commitment you need to accomplish your most important personal and professional goals.

I want you to consider instead what a true breakthrough year might look like for you. Imagine it’s twelve months from now, and you’ve accomplished your top goals in all of life’s domains (more on those in a moment).

Most of us have a long history of not getting what we want out of life. Perhaps we set some big goals we didn’t achieve, or the future turned out differently than we planned. Life throws curveballs. We’ve all been there. Disappointment turns to frustration, to anger, to sadness, and finally twists itself into cynicism. You might feel it rearing its head right now.