How to Get What You Want – a short primer for ambitious people

Congrats Jason!

Thanks for this book, I enjoyed reading the beta version.

Hey hawkice - thanks for the feedback. I did aim to write something that was both generally applicable, but also included specific tactics and relevant case studies. We'll see if I succeeded.

Agree that chapter count is a little odd, and that's why I also included a small preview (if you click the cover, you'll get an overlay with 4 of the chapters). Also the six "Selected Chapter" hopefully also hint at the contents of the book.

Hope you enjoy it!

"In 1954, Roger Bannister set a world record, running one mile in 3:59.4. The 4 minute mile had become a white whale, with medical experts arguing that the human body wasn’t capable of completing it. Prior to Bannister, the previous one mile record had stood at 4:01 for nine years. Less than a year later, someone else ran a sub 4 minute mile. Today, hundreds of American runners, and likely thousands around the world have achieved this feat."

This is often noted as a mental breakthrough, but what isn't told about this story is that Bannister had the advantage of a better running surface and pacemakers. Those that broke the 4-min mile after Bannister did it because they too took advantage of a better running surface and pacemakers.

http://sportsscientists.com/2014/12/2-hour-marathon-4-min-mi... "The difference that track surface makes is enormous – biomechanists estimate that modern synthetic tracks are worth 1.5% compared to the cinder tracks that Bannister and Landy ran on (some cinder being better than others, of course). And that’s why, as my friend David Esptein so elegantly presented at TED, of the 1,034 men who have broken 4-min for the mile since 1954, only 530 would remain if you applied that “correction factor” that predicts that synthetic tracks are worth about 1.5% per lap compared to the cinder tracks of the 1950. It means only 10 men per decade have joined the club since Bannister created it, and that should give you some context to this argument that “Four minutes used to be impossible, and now it is easy”."

I used to struggle with is this too. So I started with the basics. Stay alive; breathe; eat, drink, sleep; get laid (with someone else in the room); stay fit; get rich; be happy.

That was my first list, and I just added concrete goals to each as time went on. Eat now includes a constraint (never again will I eat what I don't like) with a goal (healthy, balanced). Sex was easy and I now have a son. That in turn changed other goals. I keep refining. When I don't know I don't push it. It will come.