When I meet folks for the first time, after we've chatted awhile and the ice has been broken, they always have a ton of questions they're impatient to get answered. And you can bet there'll always one that's top of the list. You can read it on their faces even before their lips move:

"How in the heck did a kid from the ghetto manage to transform his life? And if he can live the dream, how many more kids could too, if they only knew how?

So how am I different, and how different am I?

Great questions, and now we've got to know each other a little better - - I think it's time to explain...

For a start, I don't claim to have an academic background. I've no "isms" in my title. The only letters after my name tell you that I represent the third generation of Burrel Wilks (and proud of it!)

No, my qualifications are stronger than any formal diploma can bestow: grounded in real life and real experience. You see, I had the most exceptional education a man can receive - - the kind of education money simply can't buy.

Let me explain...

Born on Chicago's notorious West Side, I was automatically enrolled in one heck of a school, the school of America's toughest inner city streets.

These streets are the University of Life and Death; the class of Winners and Losers. The lessons taught in this schoolroom are priceless. But even though the cost of failure is so high, few graduate. The one or two percent who do, are the smartest, savviest, most motivated individuals you'll find anywhere on this planet!

It's true, I'm not classroom educated. In fact, I was a terror in the classroom, a teacher's worst nightmare. A skinny, cocky little kid who extorted the other kids, the teachers, even the headmaster.

In the schoolyard I was both bully and businessman. From the age of six, I hustled and gambled my way to more pocket money than most kids--or grown men for that matter--could hope to see in a decade or two.

At eleven-years-old, I had girls on my arm, money in my pocket and power at my feet.

Definitely not the kind of background you might imagine would qualify anyone to be handing out advice on how to "be the best you can be."

The only lessons I attended were lunchtime and arithmetic. I sure as hell never took English, Geometry or Science.

But I did learn about life, influence and power.

I learned to read people better than books. I was bilingual, translating body language and unspoken words just as precisely as a second language. Looking into a face, it would take me only a split second to read the history lesson written in those eyes.

I learned strategy and business as I navigated my way through the minefield that was my world. I came to understand the power of politics and the politics of power. I could read situations like maps. I learned people management and motivation.

Not bad for an uneducated kid, eh?

And of course, there was my father. I learned self-discipline, accountability, and hard work--even martial arts--from this powerful, authoritarian man. And that's not to mention the hard-core lessons in economics he drummed into me from the moment I could sit on his shoulders and accompany him on the rounds of his small business fiefdom.

My leadership skills were refined further during the time I hung out with other chiefs, and the hours I spent in the company of Giants. I counted Tony Accardo, infamous head of the Chicago Outfit, as a mentor and friend; I met Frank Sinatra, and was as comfortable in the company of billionaires as I was with the kids from my block or the chief of a rival gang.

All in all it was one heck of an education.

But it was the challenges I faced as I extracted myself from the quagmire that is the streets, that taught me the toughest lesson of all.

I came to understand that each of us is alone, and though we may have folks who look out for us, and love us, our true strength comes from our minds and characters, not from the gangs we run with. I believe in personal accountability, but I also believe in limitless possibility...

And this is the story I share with so many youngsters today - - - so they don't have to make the same mistakes I did.

Read my life story in my memoirs "Tattoos On My Soul: From The Ghetto To The Top Of The World"... I believe this story of transformation and celebration will impact many lives positively--maybe even yours.

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