Today, everyone knows a book recommendation from Oprah Winfrey can shoot a title to the top of every best-seller list. But before she was a literary Midas, before she started Oprah's Book Club, back in 1989, just a few years after "The Oprah Winfrey Show" started, Winfrey read a book that changed her life and success as an entrepreneur. The book was " 'The Seat of the Soul' by Gary Zukav," says Winfrey in a recent speech at Skidmore College. "In it, [Zukav] talks about how every action is followed by a reaction, which we all know is the third law of motion in physics," explains Winfrey. "But he also said, before there's even a thought or an action, there is an intention. "Something struck me about that," says Winfrey. "That an intention precedes every thought and every action, and the outcome of your experiences is determined by the intention."

This principle of intention is literally what saved and changed the trajectory of my living. Oprah Winfrey media mogul

Winfrey said that at the time she first read the book, she was a people pleaser – "the kind of woman who wanted to do everything people wanted me to do." Winfrey had started making some money by that point, and suddenly she had lots of "cousins" and "school friends" who needed things coming out of the woodwork. "I had problems saying no," she explains. "So this principle of intention is literally what saved and changed the trajectory of my living," says Winfrey. "I started to make my decisions on what I intended, not just on what someone else wanted me to do or what I thought would please them," she continues. She would ask, "But what do I really intend to happen from the outcome of this decision or this choice? "And so I started to apply this intentional living and intentional thinking to everything in my life," including her business. "I said to my producers, do not bring me a show or an idea unless you have a clear intention about why we're doing it." Winfrey wanted her staff to first be clear on what they wanted to tell the world with the show what they wanted the outcome to be.