If you take everything that's been said or written on human achievement, analyze and study it long enough, you'll be left with two vital factors. Two factors that every person needs to live a successful and happy life.

Do you know what the two factors are? The first is a goal; the second is creative thinking. This is why anyone can be successful; these two factors are there for the asking for every human being. They're free and they can lead us to the life we want. Sure, this is an oversimplification, but after everything else has been taken away, these two factors are all anyone needs for success.

First the goal; you decide what it is you want. Once this is established, the mind comes into play. For example, if a child wants to fly an airplane, he simply turns to his imagination, and away he goes. His goal is to fly, and in an instant he's doing it.

If he still has that goal as an adult, his mind draws him to learn. Soon, he's flying with an instructor; later, without one. If his goal is to build a better plane, well, that's tougher, but well within the ball park. He can do that too. He can become an aeronautical engineer and work on a new generation of airplanes.

It is the misunderstanding of the importance of these two factors that keeps millions living far below their true potential for living. If a person has a goal and doesn't understand the importance of creative thinking, the importance of his or her mind, the goal becomes and daydream, a harmless fantasy.

There is a place for daydreams and fantasy in our lives, and we all indulge in them, but we need to understand that with just these two factors, goal setting and creative thinking, there are few things that we can seriously consider that we cannot achieve. The important thing is to be able to distinguish between what is achievable and what is fantasy.

So, whether it's finding the right person to marry or the right job, or achieving a particular position in life, or earning a certain income, or owning a particular home, or playing golf in the middle eighties, whatever it may be, the odds are overwhelmingly in our favor if we stick with our goal and bring the full power of our mind to bear.

We have only to give it all we have to give, for a sufficient length of time, for it to be ours; really ours, not in fantasy, but in truth, in fact.

You can have anything you want in this life, within reason. The problem is, most people don't know what they really want. They never really decide on a goal, or, at least seldom do and then stay with it until it's achieved.