Derek Sivers

Anything You Want — third edition for 2022

2022-08-25

In 2011, I got a phone call from a number I didn’t recognize.

“Hello?”

“Derek. It’s Seth Godin.”

“Wow! Hi Seth!”

“I’m starting a new publishing company, so I want you to write a book. Short, like a manifesto. Will you do it?”

“Uh, sure!”

“Great. I look forward to it.”

“Thanks!”

Over the next eleven days, I wrote the lessons I’d learned from starting, growing, and selling my company. He liked it, named it “Anything You Want”, and a few weeks later it was for sale. My first book. Simple as that.

To me, it was no big deal - just telling my tale. But a lot of small business owners said my book helped them remember their purpose, and get re-excited about their business.

Penguin bought Seth’s publishing company and re-released my book on Penguin Portfolio. But I wanted to self-publish.

I want to own the rights to my books so I can do what I want with them: give them away, let people translate them, or sell them how I like. I’m thinking long-term. I’ve got many books to come, and I want them to be a matching set. So I bought back the rights from Penguin.

I improved many chapters in “Anything You Want”, and added eight new chapters that were missing — points that people kept asking about over my last ten years of talking about this book — better explanations — better stories.

Then I gave it a new cover to match all of my other books. (White, to represent its innocent naïveté.) I recorded the new audiobook, better than before.

And now, it’s finally available, in its third and final edition, directly from me.

ANYTHING YOU WANT: 40 lessons for a new kind of entrepreneur

Get it at sivers.com.

There are only 5000 limited-edition linen hardcovers printed, so get that version while they last. Even if you already read it, consider getting this as the permanent edition.

The first copy is $19, which is $15 for the content, and $4 for the paper itself. All future copies cost only the price of the paper: $4. Paper books include all digital formats for free. As before, I’m giving all profits to charity.

book cover of Anything You Want