You don't know the limits of your own strength until you push past them. You don't how far you can go until you can't go any further. That's true for everyone. The only way to know what's ahead is to put it all behind you. One thing I know is that, ultimately, the only thing I can control are my thoughts; so I make them strong, make them certain, and make them count. When I have nothing left, when nothing I do goes right, I know that I'll be by my side. Nobody can take that away from me; nobody can take you away from you. I have audacious goals, dreams, and ambitions, but they weren't always as they are. Through growth and personal development, my desires stemmed from the roots of my thoughts. I will become the person I need to be to create the success, freedom, and quality of life that I truly want.Throughout this book, we'll be discussing abstract concepts of mine and how they came to be. Some ideas came from within me through my experiences, most came from other peoples experiences. Facts tell, stories sell; so the saying goes. Truth be told, I wish I could say that this book was a one and done type deal, where as one day I decided to type this up and the next day it was finished. This is not the case. For a long period of time, I kept trying to create the "perfect" book. This is a misnomer, as there's no such thing as the perfect book. Through this time, I've decided that I'd rather have a published book than a perfect one.I'm an avid reader; I take inspiration not only from my own mind, but also from the minds of others through their literature. Throughout will be scattered noteworthy quotes from individuals much wiser than I, who conveyed their thoughts into words much better than I could.George S. Clason, known for his best selling book The Richest Man in Babylon, once said, "Our acts can be no wiser than our thoughts, our thinking can be no wiser than our understanding." I understand that who I am today isn't who I'll always be, but only the beginning of who I'll become. To do the things that I want to do, to be the person I want to be, I must first see a truth of life greater than my own, and pick from it the seeds that will grow into the trees of whose fruits I'd like to bear. This truth is one of many I've accepted and pass on to you.I've heard it once said that life happens for you, not to you. I'm not one for believing that everything happens for a reason, but that's not the same as everything having a reason for happening; usually, when people refer to the former saying, they are referencing a divine master plan. I disagree. Sometimes, bad shit happens and there's no real reason for it. I mean there is a reason, i.e you're now living in a shelter because you couldn't pay your rent. Your inability to afford the rental price is the reason why you have no home, but for most people, they learn no lessons from this.It's not through the experience that you gain wisdom, but the lessons that you learn from the experience.Things happen, you give it a reason. Let that reason give you the opportunity to grow into something more beautiful than ever imagined.One truth is that, paraphrased and heard from the fast growing social media marketing consultant Sam Ovens, "you're not the highest version of you that you can imagine, you're the lowest version of you that you can accept." Don't accept the hardships of life as permanent. Don't accept the bullshit rhetoric that has been passed down to you. I write this book as a once poor, temporarily homeless as a boy, single mother raised man. In this book, I will give you my story, as well as the story of others. With this, I will do my best to guide you on a mental journey so that you can truly see how I came to be. I will be the best me and in doing so, I want to inspire you to be the best you. Life can be hard, this is true, but the hardships of life doesn't define you, you do.You define you, let me show you how.