Dennis Waitley

Waitley was born in 1933. His father was an alcoholic and his parents divorced early on, but his grandmother provided inspiration. He won a scholarship to the US Naval Academy and flew carrier jets during the Korean War. After leaving the Navy he became the fundraiser and PR person for Jonas Salk (developer of the polio vaccine) and his Institute for Biological Studies. Salk introduced Waitley to Abraham Maslow, Victor Frankl and Carl Rogers, and persuaded him to pursue further studies.

At La Jolla University, Waitley wrote a doctoral thesis on the experiences of prisoners of war in Korea and Vietnam, which helped him to design seminars for NASA astronauts. Back at the Salk Institute the author met the inspirational speaker Earl Nightingale, who with Norman Vincent Peale, became his mentor.

During the 1980s, Waitley was the psychology guru to the US Olympic team, and has worked with numerous Fortune 500 companies. His other classic, The Psychology of Winning, has been the bestselling personal development audio-tape of the last two decades, producing the spin-offs The Psychology of Winning as a Woman (with his daughters) and The Psychology of Winning for the 21st century. Other books include The Seeds of Greatness and The New Dynamics of Winning.

The author lives with wife Susan and seven children in California.