- A Journey Through Italy Let me tell you a story. Some years ago, I took my family to Italy on vacation. We toured several of the great art museums of Rome and Florence. In Florence, there is a special museum that was built to house the statue of David created by Michelangelo several hundred years ago. This is perhaps the most beautiful piece of sculpture in the world. The actual physical experience of begin in the same room with it is something that none of us has ever forgotten. The story of the creation the David is very interesting and contains a lesson for all of us. Michelangelo was commissioned by the Medicis to create a statue for the main square in Florance. The Medicis were the wealthiest and most powerful family of Italy at the time. A commission for a statue from the Medicis was not only a great honor; it was also a task that could not be refused. For two years, Michelangelo searched for a block of stone out of which he could create the kind of master the Medicis were looking for. Finally, on a side street of Florance, partially overgrown with weeds and covered with dirt, he found a huge slab of marble lying on wooden trestles. It had been hauled down from the mountains years before and had never been used. Michelangelo had walked past this street many times, but this he stopped and looked more closely. As he walked back and forth studying the block of marble, he actually envisioned the statue of David and saw it in its entirety.
- Great Success Requires Long, Hard Work The sculptor quickly arranged to have workmen haul the block of marble to his studio some distance away. He then began the long, hard job of hammering and chiseling. It took him two solid years of work to create the rough outline of the statue. He then put his hammers and chisels aside and spent two more years polishing and sandling before the statue was complete. Michelangelo was already famous as a sculptor, and the news that he was working on a major commission for the Medicis spread all over Italy. When the day came for its first public viewing, thousands of people came from all over Italy and gathered in the main square. When it was unveiled, the crowd stood gaping in awe. It was breathtaking beautiful. People cheered. Women Fainted. The audience was amazed at the incredible beauty of the enormous statue. Michelangelo was immediately recognized as the greatest sculptor of his age. Afterward, when Michelangelo was asked how he was able to create such a masterpiece, he replied by saying that he saw the David complete and perfect in the marble. All he did was to remove everything that was not the David.
- You Are a Masterpiece There are many parallels between yourself and the David. You are very much like a great masterpiece enclosed in marble as well. But the marble that envelops you, and most other people, is the marble of small, limited thinking and excessive worry about the possibilities of loss or failure, rather than an excited anticipation of the rewards of success and achievement. To realize your full potential, your greatest need is to break out of your limited thinking by dreaming big dreams and imaging unlimited possibilities. You need to remove all the negative beliefs that hold you back from becoming all you are capable of becoming. But remember, even after the David had been released from the marble, it took Michaelangelo two solid years of sanding and polishing to turn it into a masterpiece. In the same way, you also have to work on yourself, sanding and polishing, learning and practicing, for days, weeks, months, and years, to develop and bring out all the talents and abilities that lie deep inside of you.
- You can Become Unstoppable The central purpose of this book is to help you change your thinking in such a way that you become absolutely unstoppable in achieving any goal you can set for yourself. Your goal is to develop yourself to the point psychologically where you became like an irresistible force of nature. You will be like the tide coming in, or like a powerful storm that sweeps across the land. Your aim is to become so confident, courageous, strong, and resolute that you can set any goal for yourself with the firm knowledge that you can learn what you need to learn, and do what you need to do, to eventually achieve it. You will become so persistent and determined that nothing and no one can slow you down or alter your course. You will become truly unstoppable!
- Dream Big Dreams You begin the process of becoming unstoppable by dreaming big dreams. Since everything you create in your world begins with a thought, the bigger the dreams you dream, the bigger the goals you will achieve. All successful men and women are dreamers. All peak performers are what are called "blue-sky thinkers." They continually allow their minds to float freely when they think about what is possible for them. They look at the unlimited blue sky above them as the only limit to everything and anything that they could possibly be or have or do. Successful people continually practice "back from the future" thinking. They project into the future several years and imagine what their lives would look like if they had achieved all of their goals. They look back to the present, from the future, like looking from the top of a high mountain down to where they are actually standing in the valley, in the present. They then look at the path that they would have to take to get to where they want to be in the future. By the law of correspondence, whatever you can Clearly see on the inside, you will eventually experience on the outside. You should therefore visualize your goals with as much clarity and vividness as possible. Visualize yourself the same feeling that you would have if you had already achieved your goals. Visualize your goals frequently. Replay a picture of your goals, as if you had already realized it, on the screen of your mind as many times a day as you possibly can. Visualize your goals for as long as you possibly can, preferably just before falling asleep each night. Repeat these exercises of visualization-vividness, intensity, frequency, and duration-until your goals become absolutely clear, living, breathing, exciting, clear pictures in your mind. The more skilled you became at moving from the dream through the goal to the visualization, the more motivated and determined you will be. The more clarity you develop, the more courage and confidence you will have, and the more unstoppable you will become.