Walk Like a Giant, Sell Like a Madman

2.2. Keeping It Realistic ... or Not

Most experts in goal setting stress that you set realistic goals—goals that stretch you without breaking you. The trouble with that advice is in defining the word realistic. When I set a goal to sell 300 homes a year, nobody in the industry considered that realistic. I set the goal, which forced me to figure out ways to make it realistic.

Of course, setting yourself up for chronic failure is never a good idea. You can end up being a tremendous success and feeling lousy about it. However, only you really know what you are capable of achieving, and sometimes you don't even know that until the day when you achieve the impossible.