Hi Indy,  The famous poet Naomi Shahib Nye wrote this wonderful story in a brief, tight economy of words, exactly the way Roy teaches in Magical Worlds. He told us the secret of concise writing was to read poetry, and Naomi Shahib Nye is a perfect example. Aroo. – Steve Rae    Wandering around the […]

“A metaphysician is one who, when you remark that twice two is four, demands to know what you mean by twice, what by two, what by makes, and what by four. For asking such questions metaphysicians are supported in oriental luxury in the universities, and respected as educated and intelligent men.” – H. L. Mencken […]

Wizard of Ads Partner Stephen Semple was invited to the U.K. to unveil the power of Storytelling at Oxford! Oxford! Did you hear me? Oxford! And then the London Stock Exchange! And then the Royal Society of Medicine! And then all the TV stations wanted interviews! Does the wizard have cool partners, or what? – […]

The Favorite Con of the Plantagenet Kings King Edward of England inherited control of Gascony in France from his mother, Eleanor of Provence. But when the 27-year-old King of France decided in 1295 not to let the King of England control part of his country, Edward asked his English nobles to raise an army so […]

David Cowan changed careers, and instead of making more money, he made none at all. In his early fifties, David found himself without a car, walking to a nearby McDonald’s where he worked at the drive-through window overnight. Rallying from misfortune — be it financial, health, a relationship gone bad, a natural disaster, or any other […]

It was long after we moved away from Tulsa that people began telling us about the breakout movie, The Outsiders, in which a number of major stars made their acting debut. (It’s sort of like The Breakfast Club, but with more violence.) When Pennie and I finally got around to renting the movie, we were […]

This photo was taken 5 seconds after the photo you saw on the previous page of Loren reclining on a white, black-and-red spotted chaise lounge, overlaid onto a 1960 Ford Station Wagon. Look in the upper left corner of this photo and you will see a reflection of Loren in the mirror, still sitting there, […]

Babies are often amused by catchy jingles on television, but for one little boy in Massachusetts, it’s all about the 1-800-GOT-JUNK? commercials written by the Wizard of Ads. Emmett Sheehan is mesmerized by the magic of 1-800-GOT-JUNK’s TV ads. “He’d hear the commercials and he’d stop whatever he was doing and just immediately stare at […]

August 1, 1968 – My mom is 19, sharing an apartment in the Marigny with a girlfriend of hers. Jimi Hendrix is going to be playing that night at Tad Gormley Stadium in City Park. But he misses his flight from Shreveport, so they’ve got to drive to New Orleans. They get to town a little bit early, […]

After being arrested for joy-riding in a stolen car in Seattle, Jimi Hendrix enlisted in the Army in May 1961, and became a paratrooper in the 101st Airborne Division, the legendary Screaming Eagles. He was honorably discharged due to an ankle injury at the end of a jump on May 31, 1962. Jimi died on Sept 18, 1970.  […]

“I have a foreboding of an America in my children’s or my grandchildren’s time — when the United States is a service and information economy; when nearly all the key manufacturing industries have slipped away to other countries; when awesome technological powers are in the hands of a very few, and no one representing the […]

I stare at the file and realize I have no options, over the last 2 years every monster assigned to Charlotte Dower has quit, every last one. Her first monster; a giant goldfish-faced humanoid named Bubba, had been with her for four years, and then she wasn’t scared of him anymore. After that it was […]

The Surgeon and The Ad Writer Every surgeon has a surgical plan before they take scalpel in hand, just as every ad writer has a message plan before they take pen in hand. But the operation that follows does not always go according to plan. What does the surgeon do when their hands are inside […]

Kesslers Diamonds is encouraging abused children with the award of a special bracelet by the nurses who take care of them. Now for the heartbreaking part: The Child Advocacy Centers @ Childrens Hospital provides medical care and counseling to more than 7,000 kids each year. And that’s just in Wisconsin, a state with only 5,852,490 people. […]

It’s rare that I push back against a guest. In this case, Scott Jeffrey Miller is a heavyweight podcaster and author. More than six million listeners tune in each week to hear his “On Leadership” podcast, produced by Franklin Covey. Scott has a lot of good insights to share. But when I asked him what the […]

If you needed more proof that a Burgundy boom is upon us, this big bottle is it. A rare methuselah of 2002 Domaine de la Romanée-Conti sold for an astonishing $398,400 at Acker’s Hong Kong auction over the weekend, setting a new world record in the process. The sale, which attracted more than $12 million […]

“Having a great narrator is like having a great friend whose company you love, whose mind you love to pick, whose running commentary totally holds your attention, who makes you laugh out loud, whose lines you always want to steal. When you have a friend like this, she can say, ‘Hey, I’ve got to drive […]

“And it rained a sickness. And it rained a fear. And it rained an odor. And it rained a murder. And it rained pale eggs of the beast. Rain fell on the towns and the fields. It fell on the tractor sheds and the labyrinth of sloughs. Rain fell on toadstools and ferns and bridges. […]

“I’ve never found anyone who could explain to me the difference between constructive criticism and just plain criticism. All criticism comes from the assumption of superior wisdom, and is by consequence insulting, even if that wasn’t your intention.”

“I think it was the very first painting where it’s title is the background. Think about that. There’s a town there, there’s a Cypress tree, there’s a church steeple. It could have been called The Cypress Tree. It could have been called Sleepy Village. It could have been called Rolling Hills. But no, it’s called […]

“The mortality rate for young men in society is six times what it is for young women, from violence and from accidents, just the stupid stuff that young men do; jumping off of things they shouldn’t jump off of, lighting things on fire they shouldn’t light on fire, I mean, you know what I’m talking […]

“An eight-year-old boy had a younger sister who was dying of leukemia, and he was told that without a blood transfusion she would die. His parents explained to him that his blood was probably compatible with hers, and if so, he could be the blood donor. They asked him if they could test his blood. […]

In America, generosity implies an openhanded sharing of material resources. A restaurant can serve generous portions. A donor can be generous with their money.A friend can be generous with their pickup truck, their lawnmower, or their cabin at the lake. While some people are generous with their money; others are generous with their time. They […]

A man in his 70s made an investment and his partner cheated him out of his share. After arguing for more than a decade, the man, now 88 years old, hired a young female lawyer who had become disillusioned with big law firms and decided to practice solo. She argued the old man’s case in […]

Buy Mr. Jenkins Told Me… by Jonathan Bancroft with Roy H. Williams

Good morning Indy~ When I noticed a drawing of a windmill, curiosity about why windmills have four arms instead of three flashed across my mind… Then I thought that depending upon the orientation of the arms, this design may allow a hovering action (a spinning top) instead of merely capturing wind to propel a pump. Or maybe […]

Did you ever wonder why some people are terrified of clowns? “Once I was lucky enough to take a class with the great clown teacher Giovanni Fusetti and one of the things that he talked about was the ancient idea of a hero. In the Greek myths, humans were subject to massive and unknown forces […]

Welcome to the musical diversity of the Top 5 Songs for 1970…

 Read Terry Bisson’s“They’re Made Out of Meat” at MIT.edu BITTERSWEET MUSIC: “We see the suffering and the horror of our lives, the vulnerability and the mortality of everything that we love and cherish… But there is another part of us that maintains faith and strives forward.”

“If you are going to succeed in this real world, you cannot act on assumptions. Assumptions disappear. You cannot act on the predicted fulfillment of some causal chain. The path coefficients that would fulfill that prediction are subject to too many random variations and mutations.” “Just as cause has come unhinged from effect, experience has […]

Dulcinea del Toboso at 78 years old, by Greta Warren-Hill on eBay.

Jordan B. Peterson, speaking to Roland Griffiths, beginning at (01:03:02):  Now, I want to talk about the good and evil background a bit, because it pertains to this rewriting of the narrative. So I look at stories like the story of Cain and Abel, which is a very ancient story. And it’s clearly a story […]

Rob Cornilles was given the task of selling season tickets to the Los Angeles Clippers, which at the time was the most forlorn franchise in the NBA. Who wanted to go to a Clippers game, when L.A. also had the Lakers? But Rob figured out how to attract sports fans so incredibly well that he […]

“CANCER has kicked down the walls of my life. I cannot be certain I will walk my son to his elementary school someday or subject his love interests to cheerful scrutiny. I struggle to buy books for academic projects I fear I can’t finish for a perfect job I may be unable to keep. I […]

“One of my parents’ deepest fears, I suspect, is that society would not properly value me as a musician, that I wouldn’t be appreciated. I had very good grades in high school, I was good in science and math, and they imagined that as a doctor or a research chemist or an engineer, I might […]

“You never forget three people: the person who helped you in trouble, the person who left you in trouble, the person who put you in trouble.” – Randy Phillips, Life Austin, April 29, 2018

Prepare yourself for this little story cartoon by reading this quote I snagged from the wizard’s Random Quotes database. He always says it on day one of the Magical Worlds workshop. – Indy “Our perception does not identify the outside world as it really is, but the way that we are allowed to recognize it, […]

I’ve been spending too much time at the Riesen House Saloon in Gold Hill. It’s a drinking spot for out-of-luck miners and a few political hacks who come up from Carson City. One of those guys is Orion, who wears fancy boots and an oversized cowboy hat and claims he’s the big boss of the […]

Roving reporter Rotbart was shown a lot of love from the media during the past two weeks, including coverage in The Wall Street Journal, FORTUNE, and NPR, along with more than a dozen other news outlets. A faculty member at Wizard Academy who coaches business owners on how to get free publicity, Rotbart did exactly […]

When Covid first hit America and advertisers everywhere were cancelling their ads, Robert and Lori Ramsey stayed on the air. Their ads were short memories of hard times in the past, with an encouraging word for the future. Here are three of those ads, followed by a 60-second ad in the same style. #1 ROBERT: During […]

RICHIE: I come from a family of jewelers. My grandfather was a jeweler. He taught my dad and uncles jewelry. My dad died in a car crash when I was three years old, so my Uncle Joe taught me. I was at UCF and he asked if I wanted to apprentice with him for the summer. […]

BRIAN ALTER: Morris Jacobs immigrated to America as a boy. He came through Galveston, started out selling newspapers. He worked hard, and earned enough to open a little jewelry store in Texas City, but his store was destroyed in the great hurricane of 1915. He salvaged just enough to pay his debts. Morris always paid his […]

Alert rabbit-holer Bryan Kennedy sent us this link to an amazing story-cartoon. It’s worth the 3-minutes. Trust me. – Indy If you want to prepare yourself for this little story cartoon, read this quote I snagged from the wizard’s random quotes database. He always goes to it on day one of the Magical Worlds workshop: […]

Announcer: Brad Lawrence, owner of Gold Casters Fine Jewelry. Brad: When I opened the store, I had no money. We didn’t have the money for inventory. I brought wax models from school to use to cast into projects for customers. Hence the name Gold Casters. Things were so tight at times, I remember the backside of my […]

I was a ten year-old boy holding a flashlight for my Dad while he worked on an air conditioner for a customer. His name was Duncan Goodrich. He didn’t talk much. But there’s a certain kind of magic that happens when a son holds a flashlight for his father. I held it steady and quiet […]

Tom Heflin was a railroad conductor. His wife had a sister. That sister had two little boys. One day she took those boys on a train to Winslow, Arizona to spend a few days with them. Tom took those boys out into the desert to collect rocks. One of the little boys grew up to […]

SEAN: Standing at the engagement ring counter, I felt like Oliver Twist asking for another bowl of porridge.YOUNG SEAN: “Please sir, may I see that one?”SARAH: Sean Jones, owner of Spence Diamonds.SEAN: The jeweler looked me over, then reluctantly unlocked the showcase and told me the price of the engagement ring.SARAH: What happened next?SEAN: I swallowed hard. No way could I […]

My Dad was a house painter. He taught me to sand and scrape paint old paint until my fingers were aching and raw.  But I wanted to make him proud, so I always worked hard. I’ll never forget the day we opened up our brown bags at lunchtime and he said, “Son. I’m proud of […]

TIM SCHMIDT: I was looking at my brand-new baby boy and thinking about the kinds of things that happen to people when they’re least expecting it. I knew it was my job to keep him safe. And I knew I was unprepared for that job. Trained as an engineer, I went in search of intelligent handgun […]

Five years before Teddy Roosevelt led the Rough Riders, Simon Schiffman stepped off the train to stretch his legs. He saw a little jewelry store for sale, bought it, and the train went on without him. Simon kept the fine quality jewelry but he put the lower-quality stuff on the sidewalk with a sign that said, […]

Beyond Features and Benefits Elmore Leonard began as an ad writer and then became a multiple best-selling novelist. He wrote 45 novels, 18 of which were made into movies, and his final work became the TV series Justified. (See the clips below. – Indy) Here are three of Elmore Leonard’s Ten Rules of Writing: 1. Never […]

“Nations, like individuals, tell stories in order to understand what they are, where they come from, and what they want to be. National narratives, like personal ones, are prone to sentimentality, grievance, pride, shame, self-blindness. There is never just one – they compete and constantly change. The most durable narratives are not the ones that […]

“Mr. LeSage, sir, I’ve got a tender new script about a sensitive young subway guard that just stinks of courage and integrity. And I know, sir, that next to scripts that are Tender and Poignant, you love scripts that have Courage and Integrity. This one, sir, as I say, stinks of both. It’s full of […]