Trevor Blake’s book “Three Simple Steps: A Map to Success in Business and Life” is true to its intent and title: It is a relatively simple set of recommendations for how to improve one’s personal and business life while moving toward larger goals in the future. It can be helpful for real estate investors looking for an alternate perspective on how to create a path to larger real estate goals. Although not specific to real estate, it does primarily emphasize how a businessperson can use its concepts toward personal fulfillment and success. And real estate investors are business people, after all.

The flow of the book is divided into three parts, with each part of course going in depth on Blake’s recommended three steps. The three steps amount to daily habits that he feels enable a person to achieve huge things over the course of time, sometimes in unexpected ways that the universe will help create.

The narrative is frequently interspersed with the author’s own personal story and application of the principles, which is both the book’s strength and weakness. He shares an interesting and sometimes inspiring story. But, in the end, most of his recommendations are anecdotal and based on his personal experience. His primary references are the biographies of famous and successful people, where he claims that most of those people actively followed his principles in some way.

Blake’s first step, “Escaping The Quicksand”, centers around reclaiming your mentality as your own without the negative influences of people who don’t know better. He is adamant about the need to outright ignore and deflect the media that constantly deluges everyone with a negative world view that uninspires people to live standard, pre-defined, consumer lives that help feed the corporate coffers of wealthy people who are serving as global puppet masters. He tells stories of placing a “mentality shield” around himself when he was bullied or being told something could not be done, and goes on to tell how the shield let him break through to greatness on the other side. He actively encourages you to surround yourself with positivity, people who share the values and lifestyle you want, and an environment of constant support. When your environment is not aligned with that, tune it out entirely.

The second step, “Staying Out Of The Quicksand”, goes into the benefits of a short, quiet, and meditative time alone at the beginning of each day. Blake is open on how that plays out for various people and personalities. He instead emphasizes the need for temporarily slowing down and allowing for stillness within otherwise hectic, randomized lives. From these times, he claims insights may appear. Also, one’s mind becomes settled, clear, and crisp for the rest of the day.

The third step, “Beyond The Quicksand”, describes the need to set daily life “intentions” that will then manifest themselves in your priorities and results. Blake claims that this is much different that standard goal setting, though I don’t believe it’s quite as different as he makes it out to be. However, the one significant difference is similar to the Law Of Attraction, The Secret, and similar popular concepts that some may consider to be rather “woo woo” (out there and esoteric). He believes that life will lead a winding staircase toward these stated intentions merely by following the three steps, because we are all part of the universe and energy will flow toward those intended results. He uses many personal, anecdotal stories that he considers to be far more than random chance but which instead were part of the universe’s way of having guided him to his intended destinations. Even if you don’t believe the entirety of his third step, looking at it from a daily and life-level goal setting perspective is still a helpful business practice.

“Three Simple Steps” is an interesting, casual read that can provide real estate investors with some reminders about how daily lifestyle choices can positively influence both a sense of peace and better control over your investing future.