Wrapped in patriotism and punctuated with religious sound bites, Oklahoma’s “Get Motivated” seminar was definitely entertaining. The all-star lineup of motivational speakers visibly stimulated thousands of attendees—some to loud outbursts, some to palpable joy. But despite the pyrotechnics, thumping rock music and can-do atmosphere, one vital dimension for real success was conspicuously missing.

And it was the most important key!

“You may have attended business seminars before, but you’ve never seen anything like this,” wrote the Philadelphia Inquirer about one “Get Motivated” seminar. “Secrets, formulas and wisdom. A gust of inspiration and a brush with celebrity. There’s something for everyone.” The Washington Post called it “the Super Bowl of Success.”

“This is a day of clapping until your hands burn and leaping to your feet for one standing ovation after another,” wrote Selling Power magazine. “Only the best of the best stand up on stage …. Access to a rare combination of experience and wisdom. And the audience wins!”

Colin Powell, Steve Forbes, Joe Montana and Zig Ziglar each imparted words of wisdom, as did Rudy Giuliani and former First Lady Laura Bush. By world standards, these speakers were the successful of the successful.

And collectively, there is no doubt that much of what they imparted, if followed, would lead to a certain level of success—even great wealth.

Speakers mentioned things that could be boiled down into these six principles: setting the right goal, getting the right education, living healthfully, driving yourself; being resourceful and persevering. To Hall of Fame quarterback Joe Montana, the most important factors were preparation, work ethic and trust.

Yet overall, there was one main theme overshadowing and permeating all the rest: If you want success, you must look to yourself.

The solution for overcoming and getting what you want, whether on a personal or national level, is for people to dig deep inside themselves for their inner strength. If you just take action now; if you work a little harder; if you work smarter; you can solve your problems. Nothing is beyond you. Impossible is not a word.

If a former drug addict like myself can become a success, so can you, recounted bestselling author Tamara Lowe. The key to success is in our genes, it is our motivational dna, she says. This is important to understand, according to Lowe, because as her book points out, “the quality of your life is largely determined by your motivation …. The success or failures of your relationships, finances, health, personal goals and professional endeavors are all shaped by Motivational dna.”

“Washington, D.C., is not the answer to our problems,” says Lowe. “you are the answer, people are the answer.”

You can do it!

But is that true? It doesn’t matter how much resolve or determination we muster up. It doesn’t matter how much knowledge we discover, or what technological marvels we invent. Six thousand years of history has irrefutably proven that mankind is incapable of solving its problems. In fact, mankind’s problems keep getting worse.

Look at the world around you: escalating crime, violence, drug culture, broken families, immorality, poverty, homelessness, war. We live in a world where, under the guise of “equality,” homosexuals can adopt and indoctrinate children. People hijack and turn airplanes into missiles. And the same technology that brings abundant energy to thousands of people can be used as a weapon of mass destruction to kill them.

Why doesn’t all our knowledge, plus this can-do spirit, solve our problems? Why do so many people go through life chasing wealth, and even gaining it—only to end up depressed and unhappy? Why do so many find real success hard to define, let alone apprehend?

The answer is that mankind is missing the vital key to true success.

“People will ignore all their lives any idea of divine guidance and help—yet if one should find himself on a foodless and waterless raft after a shipwreck in mid-ocean, it is remarkable how quickly he would begin to believe there really is a living God!” wrote Herbert W. Armstrong, in his booklet The Seven Laws of Success. “In last-resort desperation most people will cry out to Him whom they have ignored, disobeyed and set at naught all their lives.

“Wouldn’t it seem axiomatic that, if there is a compassionate beneficent Creator standing ready and willing to give us emergency help as a last resort, it would have been more sensible to have sought His guidance and help all along? Yet some have acquired wealth, lived luxuriously, and then, suddenly losing all, turned finally to God in their economic distress. Others have committed suicide. Few, it seems, will ever rely on their Maker and life-Sustainer until they feel helpless and in desperate need. Even then the motive too often is selfish.”

The all-important key to true success is to rely on God!

We must employ the above six principles of success, but they will add up to a sum of unhappiness without this vital seventh principle. Bring God into the equation, into your social life, into your business, into your family, and learn what true success means.

We can and must have goals, be educated, healthy, driven, resourceful and determined, but if we don’t have that missing ingredient for success—God showing us what to strive for, what to set our hearts upon, how to get along with Him and with others, how to conduct business—we will never find lasting success. You will reach the end of the road and be left wondering what the rat race was all about and whether any of it was worth it.

If you feel that you are lacking purpose in life, know that there is a reason that God created you!

Mankind was created for a purpose. You are part of God’s plan. If you seek true success in business and life, if you seek lasting happiness, begin by reading The Seven Laws of Success, which shows why you must have God in your life in a practical way. Then, to find the answers to the most important questions of life, read Mystery of the Ages. These books will change you like no motivational conference ever could.