Brian Tracy shares his favorite quote: "you can learn anything you need to learn to achieve any goal you can set for yourself." He uses Bill Gates, Warren Buffett, and Michael Dell as examples of people who mastered specific skills through deliberate practice to reach each new goal, starting from his own path out of poverty through learning sales.
"You can learn anything you need to learn to achieve any goal you can set for yourself."
22 industries.
People always ask me for a piece of advice or a favorite quote or some kind of thought that they can use to be more successful with. And I have read thousands of books, including hundreds of quote books, as I put quotes on my website every day in three or four categories. So it's really hard to select a single quote. However, in thinking about this, I have come up with the answer. My favorite quote is actually from myself and it says, can learn anything you need to learn to achieve any goal you can set for yourself. Now let me explain to you why I love that quote. Because if I was called to run out onto a stage in front of 5,000 people and all I had was one minute to convey one piece of information, I would say this is. It is no matter what your goals or your hopes or your dreams, no matter what your problems in the past or your current situation, you can learn everything you need to learn to achieve any goal that you set for yourself. You see, everybody who's in the top 10% started in the bottom 10%. Everybody who's doing well was once doing poorly. Everyone who is at the top of your field at one time did not even know that your field existed and could not even spell it properly. But then they got into the field, they got excited about it and they began learning. They began reading and listening to audio programs and taking courses and then practice, practice, practice. And over time they became excellent. You see, all of us start off with very little in life. In fact, most people start off with no money at all. If you look at the richest people in America. Bill Gates, yes, came from a good family, but started his business from scratch. Warren Buffett started with a couple of thousand dollars he saved up from his paper route. You know, Michael Dell, Larry Ellison, the Waltons, they all started off with nothing and became fabulously wealthy. And how did they do it? Is they set it as a goal and then they learn everything they needed to learn to achieve any goal they can set for themselves. Now here's an important all success skills are learnable. All business skills are learnable. All sales skills are learnable. All money making skills are all learnable. Everybody who has them today at one time did not have them. Leadership skills are all learnable skills. When I started off in life, I had nothing. I was working, cold calling door to door, frustrated, living basically from sale to sale, living in a small room in a rooming house, holes in my shoes. I even lost weight because I couldn't eat on a regular basis. And then one day I went to a top salesman and I said, what are you doing differently from me? And he said, well, show me your presentation and I'll critique it. And I said, well, I don't have a presentation. Could you show me yours? And so he showed me his sales presentation and I thought I'd died and gone to heaven. And so I went out and I began to sell the way he taught me. And my sales went up after that. I began to read books on selling and listen to audio programs on selling and take seminars on selling and learn what the very highest paid salespeople were doing. And then I did it over and over until I learned it and my sales went up 1, 2, 3, 5 times, 10 times. It was to me, life's greatest miracle. I have been in now in 22 different industries that I've been successful in every industry. I have generated millions and tens of millions of dollars in sales and profit in a variety of industries worldwide. And in every case, I started knowing nothing. And then I asked myself, what do I need to learn to be successful in this field? And I put my head down and I began to study it. Now, in the last couple of years, they have come across some research that shows that the reason people get from the bottom to the top is summarized in two words. The words are deliberate practice. And this is how you use it. You look around you at your life today and you ask, what one skill, if you are absolutely excellent at it, would help you the most to achieve your most important goal? If you don't know the answer to this question, you must find it out. Go to your boss. Ask your friends and co workers. Once when I was young, I asked my customers, my good friends, and they told me what I needed to become better at whatever the one skill. Don't try to learn a hundred skills, whatever the one skill. Focus single mindedly on that one skill day and night until you master it. And once you've mastered that skill, which you will, then you ask again, now what one skill will help me the most to achieve my most important goal? And you focus on that skill. You make a plan and you set priorities and you begin working on it. And in no time at all, you will excel by doing this, by asking the question, what do I need to learn to move ahead in my career? By setting it as a goal and working at it every day, you will learn everything you need to learn to achieve any goal you can set for yourself.
