Wizard of Ads Monday Morning Memo

and Get Real SkinnyThe Full Plate Diet is an incredibly cool book. And because you’re a friend of Wizard Academy, you can have a no-charge advance copy. That’s right. No charge. Nada. Zero. Zip. The publisher – Wizard Academy board member Ray Bard of Bard Press – is giving away 20,000 pre-release copies to trigger a nationwide buzz. The Full Plate Diet will be in every bookstore in America in January but you can have your advance copy today.It’s even okay to tell your friends how they can get a no-charge copy, too. I highly recommend it.FLASHBACK: A young man starts a newspaper that becomes extremely successful. He sells the company and then he dies. His last will and testament stipulates that the money – a mountain of it – is to launch a non-profit organization whose only mission will be to create a healthier, happier, slimmer America.The man’s dying wish became the Lifestyle Center of America. Its board of directors built a multi-million dollar medical facility and hired the Who’s Who list of medical research doctors in America. The chairman of the board is Dr. House. I’m not making this up.The first thing the medical marvels created was a diet that reverses Type 2 diabetes. But that didn’t fulfill their mission. The newspaper mogul’s dream was to touch every American, not just diabetics. So the Lifestyle Center contacted Corrine Taylor and mailed her some money to set up a meeting with me.My team and I spent a day talking with the Lifestyle Center people and then agreed to work with them. That was a little more than a year ago. Toward the end of the day my 290-pound media analyst, Joe Hamilton, asked, “Would the diet you talked about work for someone who isn’t diabetic?” The doctors said, “Absolutely. It’s how human beings were meant to eat.”A few days later I told Ray Bard what the doctors had said. He seemed mildly interested. And I mentioned it to a couple of my out-of-town partners.A couple of months later I was pouring a cup of coffee when Joe Hamilton walked into the room. I looked up and said, “Joe, you’re losing weight.”Joe said, “I’ve been doing what those doctors talked about and I’ve lost 35 pounds.” By the end of that year, Joe had lost 90 pounds. No exercise. And he hasn’t gained a bit of it back. (See before-and-after photos of Joe at the bottom of this page.)A couple of weeks after I saw Joe Hamilton I saw Ray Bard and he had never looked better. “Roy, I did what you said those doctors talked about and I’ve dropped 30 pounds. I'd like to meet them.”Then, at the partner meeting, one of the partners I’d told about the diet said he had done what I described and lost 20 pounds. The other partner had lost 24.The Full Plate Diet is not a deprivation diet. There’s nothing you “can’t have.” And you’ll never go hungry.I use the Monday Morning Memo to promote classes at Wizard Academy, a 501c3 nontraditional business school, but I never use the memo to sell things and I’m not selling you anything today.But you really ought to look into this diet.You can meet 3 of the doctors in a fun, online video produced by Sunpop Studios and request your no-charge advance copy of the Full Plate Diet at FullPlateDietBeta.orgNext week I’m going to tell you a true story that will blow your mind.Your mind will be blown. You’ll be walking into walls. Boy Scouts will have to hold your hand when you cross the street. After hearing this story you'll need to lay down and put a cold rag on your head.The story begins in 1519 and it involves Wizard Academy.And you.Roy H. Williams

A close friend told me last week why his wife doesn’t like me: having seen me speak before a crowd, she is convinced I lack humility. I am a boastful man, arrogant and unprincipled, merciless and cold.She’s not the first to have said these things.I see her point and I make no argument. Marketing is a high-stakes competition for the time and attention of the public. Every business asking for time and attention is in a wrestling match with every other. The same is true of public speaking. It is survival of the fittest. “And though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil. For I am the meanest son-of-a-bitch in the valley.”Yes, I definitely see her point.In 2006, one of my longtime clients told me his principal competitor had filed bankruptcy and all his assets were being auctioned. I said, “Great. I’ve been trying to break that man for years.” My client was appalled until I reminded him that it was my job to plan the battles in which good men die. “Do you really want me to adopt the attitude that there’s enough business out there for everyone? ‘Be happy with what you’ve got? Don’t push for more?’ If that’s what you want from me, just say the word and my job will get a whole lot easier.” I reminded him of a statement by General George S. Patton, “You don’t win wars by dying for your country. You win by making the other poor bastard die for his.”My client, a kind and generous man, finally understood my role as a marketing consultant and we never spoke of it again.Strangely, I’m not a natural competitor. Nobody wants me on their side in sports because I don’t care if we win or not. My daily vehicle is an 8 year-old pickup truck without electric windows and when I’m not speaking before a crowd, I wear clothes I’ve owned for more than a dozen years. Privately, I'm so boringly average as to be perfectly invisible.But yes, when someone plunks down $25,000, a whole other fellow shows up. “It's Showtime! Prepare to be amazed!”The Magical Worlds Communications Workshop begins with an investigation of duality in which we study the open contradictions of life, those equal-but-opposite realities that are the basis of all existence. “When confronted with a duality,” I tell the class, “a poor student will choose one side and disparage the other. But a brilliant student will bring both sides of the duality into close proximity and feel the electricity that passes between them.”Protons are contradicted by electrons. Inhalation is undone by exhalation. Ice and steam are both water? Really?In the third chapter of his Ecclesiastes, Solomon puts it this way:There is a time for everything,and a season for every activity under heaven:a time to be born and a time to die,a time to plant and a time to uproot,a time to kill and a time to heal,a time to tear down and a time to build,a time to weep and a time to laugh,a time to mourn and a time to dance,a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them,a time to embrace and a time to refrain,a time to search and a time to give up,a time to keep and a time to throw away,a time to tear and a time to mend,a time to be silent and a time to speak,a time to love and a time to hate,a time for war and a time for peace.What time is this? For you, I mean.My family adopted a homeless mutt when I was in the third grade. She slept in my bedroom until the day she died, 10 years later. Pearl was a mellow dog, laid-back and lazy, playful and fun; unless you acted as though you were going to hurt me. Then, in a horrible flash of fur and teeth, playful Pearl became a bloodthirsty beast that hungered only for your throat. People who witnessed this transformation were stunned. My happy little dog had the soul of a tiger. Pearl understood the difference between playtime and wartime.What time is this? For you, I mean.“In peace there's nothing so becomes a manAs modest stillness and humility;But when the blast of war blows in our ears,Then imitate the action of the tiger;Stiffen the sinews, summon up the blood…Now set the teeth and stretch the nostril wide,Hold hard the breath and bend up every spiritTo his full height.”– William Shakespeare, Henry V, Act iii. Scene 1The Jesus of Sunday school is a passive, Gandhi-like man who urges us to turn the other cheek. But the Jesus of John chapter 2 is a man of premeditated violence who “made a whip out of cords, and drove all from the temple area, both sheep and cattle; he scattered the coins of the money changers and overturned their tables.”Will you turn the other cheek today, or make a whip of cords?“There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity.”What time is this? For you, I mean.Roy H. Williams

Did you know I’ve been writing these Monday Morning Memos for 15 years now? And in all that time:1. There’s never been a Monday when I didn’t send a Memo.2. I’ve never repeated a Memo that had been previously sent.I’m going to break that second rule today because I think it’s what you need.Last week the Wizard of Ads partners gathered for 3 days of planning and training. When Paul Boomer told me he hadn’t made any progress on his book since our last meeting, I told him about the magic of the elbs.Later, as I was preparing my opening comments for the upcoming class at Wizard Academy, Checklist for Your Journey of 1,000 Miles, I realized that what the attendees would need most is the magic of the elbs.Then, when I was reading a play-by-play analysis of how America was sucked into a whirlpool of economic doubt by subprime lending, it occurred to me that nothing can reverse a whirlpool like the magic of the elbs. That sucking downward into darkness is reversed to become a fountain into the sky.“Hey Stupid,” I said to myself, “you need to resend that memo. It’s been 7 years and the people who read it have mostly forgotten it. This is the magic America needs today.”So here it is, repeated from October 27, 2002:Makers of miracles have magical little helpers. Is there a miracle you’d like to make?Would you like to learn the magic of the elbs?Elbs are Exponential Little Bits, tiny but relentless changes that compound to make a miracle. The power of an elb lies not in its size, but in its daily occurrence. For an elb to work its Exponential magic, the Little Bit must happen every day… every day… every day.Every day.Funny thing… When daily progress meets with progress, it doesn’t add, it multiplies. To harness the magic of Exponential Little Bits you must learn to ask yourself, “What difference have I made today?” And never go to sleep until you have done a Little Bit to move yourself closer to your goal. But you must do a Little Bit every day, no matter how tiny the thing might be.Exponential Little Bits work both ways. They can lift you up or hold you down. There is much power in the ELBs.Start with a dollar. Double it every day for just 20 days and you’ll have 2,097,150 dollars. But if you diminish each day’s total by just 10 percent (a Little Bit) before the next day’s doubling, you’ll amass only 793,564 dollars. Diminish each day’s doubling by 35 percent and you’ll have only 56,784 dollars – a holdback of 95.83 percent.There’s a line in Robert Frost’s “Mending Wall” that says, “Something there is that doesn’t love a wall, that wants it down! I could say ‘Elves’ to him, but it’s not elves exactly, and I’d rather he said it for himself.”Is there a wall between you and your miracle?I could say how to bring it down.But I’d rather you said it for yourself.Roy H. Williams

What will be your customer's memory of you?“It [the Cheshire Cat] vanished quite slowly, beginning with the end of the tail, and ending with the grin, which remained some time after the rest of it had gone.” – Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (1865)I never ask the graduates of Wizard Academy, “What could we have done differently? How might we improve?” To do so would be to ask them to search their memories for disappointing moments. These are not the images I want to cement in their minds. Instead, I ask, “What was your favorite moment during your time with us?” This causes the students to recall each of the high-impact moments during their time on campus and relive those moments in their mind. It doesn’t matter what they choose as their favorite, I just want to flood their minds with happy memories.The grin will remain after the rest of it is gone.It is important to control the Last Mental Image (LMI.) What procedures do you employ to make sure your customer has a positive LMI of their experience with you?Today the world is forming its LMI of Michael Jackson. So far, the stories and comments have centered on his impact as a performer and his contributions to music. The foibles and flaws that interested us yesterday no longer seem important. Michael Jackson is dead and the world seems a tiny bit smaller.Want to hear something bizarre? A few hours before Michael Jackson died, I woke in the night with an itch in my brain. The scratching of that itch became the subject of a rabbit hole far deeper than any I had ever created. When I finally realized the depth of the project I had begun, I said, “No one will ever click to even the halfway point. This is going to be the rabbit hole to China.”The itch in my brain made a lot more sense when I heard Michael Jackson had died.He and I were exactly the same age.Roy H. Williams

Maybe it’s because I was a young adult in the Dress-for-Success, go-go 80’s and retain vivid memories of those hollow days.Maybe it’s because Pennie and I had close friends who stepped on the landmines of “Get Rich in Real Estate With No Money Down,” “How To Make Millions Selling Soap,” and other glistening schemes promoted by effervescent conmen with perfect teeth who said, “You can do it. You’re a winner.”Maybe it’s because the positive-thinking cult believes Man is God and this disturbs me to the core of my soul.Or maybe I’m just a Grinch who doesn’t like to hear the singing of the happy Whos in Whoville. You be the judge. But the truth is that I have no goals and I’m annoyed by conversations about them. Does this shock you?“Goal,” in my experience, is a favorite word of people who talk and dream and dream and talk. And then they get together to “network” with other talkers. There’s always a lot of noise in these meetings but it’s unlikely than anything of consequence is going to happen. People who chatter about goals are rarely willing to die on that mountain.I have no goals. But I do have plans.A plan puts you in motion toward a destination. The destination you choose is irrelevant. It is (1.) motion, (2.) determination and (3.) commitment that separate destination-reaching explorers from goal-setting chipmunks.Count the cost, explorer. “Am I willing to die on this mountain?”There are laws against discharging firearms. They’re loud and noisy and someone might get hurt. But discharging a firearm isn’t the same as “shooting with intent to kill.”“Intent.” That’s the word. Plans have intent. Goals do not.A goal without a plan is wishful thinking.A plan without action is self-delusion.Wizard Academy helps people get where they’re trying to go. We teach people of action. We have little time for drifters who just want to talk and dream and sigh.Do you remember the 3 questions I asked you to answer in a recent Monday Morning Memo about my friend, David Rehr?1. What are you trying to make happen?2. How will you measure success? 3. What’s the first thing you need to do to get started?I asked 43,000 readers to send me their answers to these questions. Doubtless, everyone who read the memo thought about doing it. But only 0.7 percent – 307 people – actually pulled the trigger and rode the bullet.Here’s where that bullet will take them:Thursday, July 9th at Wizard Academy, a 1-day workshop.Checklist for Your Journey of 1,000 Miles:Things You’ll Need Along the Way.This 1-day workshop is $750 and a bargain at that price.The 307 riders of the bullet whose names appear on this list will be allowed to register for only $50 (approximately what it costs the academy – per person – to cater lunch and dinner.) Normally we’d be magnanimous and pick up the tab for everyone, but tower construction has squeezed the bank account dry. Sorry about that.Twenty-six hundred years ago Lao-Tzu said, “A journey of a thousand miles must begin with a single step.”Take that first step. Be in Austin on July 9th as we create the Checklist for Your Journey of 1000 Miles. It's going to be a challenging, disturbing, inspiring, life-changing day.Are you coming or not?Roy H. Williams

How to Get Customers to Give You Their Time.Portals create intrigue in paintings, photographs, literature and movies. Architects use them to lengthen the time we spend in landmark stores and theme parks. Portals say, “Come on in. Stay awhile.”Dr. Nick Grant, a close friend, was examining a group of photographs in my Accidental Magic collection when he said, “Oh! You’re a portal person. I should have known.”“A what?”Pointing with his finger to each of the portals in the photographs, he explained, “Portals in art help us move from one state of consciousness to another.” Dr. Grant, I should mention, is a clinical psychologist.And thus my study of portals began.Doorways, windows, tunnels, bridges and stairs are portals. Each of these whispers a promise of change, “Things beyond here are different than where you are.”I’m teaching you about portals and partial reveals because customers prefer to spend their time in places where there’s more to explore, the lure of discovery, a promise of adventure.Do you offer these things? In your store, your offices, your landscaping?Go to the mall and you’ll see that most of the stores have no entry portal, no doorway. They stand wide open, naked, with nothing hidden or obscured. This makes it easy for you to wander into them and just as easy to wander out. Stores without doors see a lot of traffic with low curiosity and no commitment.A door creates a threshold barrier, but once you’ve passed through it you’re insulated from the world you left outside. Customers spend more time in stores with doors.An open portal offers a partial reveal. Notice the image at the top of this page. If the window were closed it would still be a portal though it would no longer offer a partial reveal.A partial reveal is a glimpse, an enticement, a tease. Occasionally it’s offered through an open portal, but more often through a space between impediments. The more partial reveals you display, the longer the customer stays in your store.Curiosity is stimulated by a partial reveal. If this were not true, there would be no long skirts with slits up the side and men would not buy their wives negligees.A full reveal delivers the promise of the partial reveal. You catch a glimpse – the partial reveal – and are drawn toward the carefully crafted full reveal. BAM! Your world is rocked.Water, music, and spirals are soft portals – shadow portals – but we’ll leave any further discussion of these for the upcoming class on Enticement: Visual Cues and the 12 Languages of the Mind I’ll be teaching August 18-19. We'll study in depth all the things I've written to you about in the past 4 Monday Morning Memos.Come and you’ll see multiple examples of how a series of partial reveals – created by multiple piercings of the horizontal plane through the careful placement of display artifacts – will elevate interest in your store, office, home, garden or artwork. You’ll also see dozens of examples of how illumination affects the customer’s perception of value. Then we'll look at the foundation of all these effects – the 12 languages of the mind.Don’t worry, once you’ve seen some examples you’ll realize this stuff isn’t nearly so complicated as it sounds.The only way you can attend this class is to purchase a portal for the Tower. Yes, it’s time for us to pay for the doors and windows and Wizard Academy needs your help. This class should be at least $2,500 but it's not. You can fund a window for as little as $400 or put your name on a fabulous feature door for as much as $7,000. Take a look.It’s going to be another unforgettable class. (If you can't come to the class but would still like to fund a door or window, you will forever be remembered as a leader of your people. Thanks.)Roy H. Williams

I write today with some hesitation, the same hesitation I felt 2 weeks ago when I wrote about the romance of shadows and the piercing of horizontal planes. You may recall that I asked, “Was this stuff interesting for you or did it go over your head?”Three hundred and ninety-one responded with variations of “More! More!” and only 2 said they didn’t quite get it. If the 391 spoke for the 42,712 subscribers they would statistically represent, you’re going to enjoy today’s memo. If by some sad chance of luck or fate those 391 represented only themselves, I offer you this apology in advance:“What crazies we writers areour heads full of language like buckets of minnowsstanding in the moonlight on a dock.”– from Ray, by Hayden CarruthThere is an objective reality but we are ill equipped to experience it. You and I live in private, perceptual realities.“Our perception does not identify the outside world as it really is, but the way that we are allowed to recognize it, as a consequence of transformations performed by our senses. We experience electromagnetic waves, not as waves, but as images and colors. We experience vibrating objects, not as vibrations, but as sounds. We experience chemical compounds dissolved in air or water, not as chemicals, but as specific smells and tastes. Colors, sounds, smells and tastes are products of our minds, built from sensory experiences. They do not exist, as such, outside our brain. Actually, the universe is colorless, odorless, insipid and silent. Although you and I share the same biological architecture and function, perhaps what I perceive as a distinct color and smell is not exactly equal to the color and smell you perceive. We may give the same name to similar perceptions, but we cannot know how they relate to the reality of the outside world. Perhaps we never will.”– Dr. Jorge Martins de OliveiraA yarmulke covers the sensory association area, that part of the brain that gathers and tabulates sensory data collected from the sensory receptors in the ears, eyes, muscles and skin.Associative memories are added to this information equation as it flows toward Broca’s area of the brain where the predictable information is subtracted. Information that’s new, surprising or different flows beyond Broca’s area into conscious awareness – imagination – where the central executive of Working Memory searches for relevance. Only after the central executive gives the information the thumbs up is it forwarded to the prefrontal cortex – located just behind your forehead – for a decision about whether or not to take action.No, I didn’t make any of this up. I read it in the writings of Alan Baddeley, Susan Gathercole, Ricardo Gattass, Silvia Helena Cardoso, Burkhard Maess, Steven Pinker and Jorge Martins de Oliveira, cognitive neuroscientists, all.This next part, however, is all mine and yes I might be crazy or just plain wrong.But I don’t think so.There are 12 languages of the mind that supply the constituent components of concrete, analytical thought. It is these 12 languages that enable our perceptual realities.A signal received in one language of the mind can reinforce, or contradict, a signal received in another. Signal reinforcement deepens perception. Signal contradiction elevates interest. 1. Shape – angles send a different message than curves. 2. Numbers – a language of relativity. Many or few? 3. Phonemes – sounds represented by letters of the alphabet. 4. Color – often combined with shape and radiance. 5. Proximity – near/far, large/small, left/right, up/down, etc. 6. Music – any sound that isn't a phoneme. 7. Radiance – energy sent outward or sucked inward. 8. Motion – fast/slow 9. Symbols – messages with secondary meaning.10. Taste – tongues do it.11. Feel – skin and muscles do it.12. Smell – noses do it.Each of these 12 has a shadow language that supplies the components of emotional, philosophical, abstract thought. But that’s another matter for another day.Control the signals and you control the perceptions.Control the perceptions and you control the conclusions.Control the conclusions and persuasion is accomplished.Next week’s memo will be easier to understand and infinitely more useful to most of you. We’re going to talk about how Portals, Reveals, and Partial Reveals can be used to take people where you want them to go.And now it is time for meto go.Roy H. Williams

How Will You Measure Success?June 1, 2009ListenAThe keeper of my calendar told me a few weeks ago that David Rehr had called to schedule a day with me in Austin. I scratched my head and wondered why.David served as a congessonal aide on Capitol Hill when he was young, then he took a broken-down trade group, The National Beer Wholesalers Association, and turned it into one of the most powerful lobbies in Washington.So dramatic was his sucess that the National Association of Broadcasters, the trade group for every radio and television station in America, asked David to come and take the helm in 2005.On May 6, 2009, shortly after scheduling his appointment with me, David Rehr resigned as President and CEO of the NAB. Then he showed up at Wizard Academy, right on schedule. We had never met or corresponded. I was curious what he knew of me and why he had come.“Roy,” he said, “a lot of people really like you and a lot of people really don’t but I usually agree with what I read in your books and magazine columns.” Curiosity made me ask what David had been told by the people who dislike me. Most of the stories he'd heard were true. Guilty as charged. Thirty years as a consultant give me deep respect for an observation made by Mark Twain, “I can teach anybody how to get what they want out of life. The problem is that I can't find anybody who can tell me what they want.”“David, what do you plan to do with the rest of your life?” I never suspected he might have an answer.“I want to be President of the United States Chamber of Commerce.” The clarity of that answer told me: 1. how David Rehr became successful.2. that he and I were going to be friends.3. why he'll someday be President of the United States Chamber of Commerce.We spent the rest of the day discussing David’s ideas for stimulating the economy of the United States and then I got him to agree to teach a class at Wizard Academy.David Rehr was able to state his goal in a single sentence of just 12 words.Can you?1. What are you trying to make happen?2. How will you measure success? 3. What’s the first thing you need to do to get started?I'd like you to answer each question using no more than 12 words per answer. This means the email you send me cannot exceed 36 total words, plus your name and contact information.Yes, there will be prizes.The biggest prizes will be the ones received by every participant: clarity of thought and purpose. There will be other prizes sent by my office.All Participants will receive advance notice of David Rehr's class as soon as dates and a course description are available. This gives you first shot at the 14 rooms in Engelbrecht House.Craft your 36 words. Send them to Tamara@WizardAcademy.org. Don't put it off. Do it now.You're at a turning point.Which way will you turn?Roy H. Williams

Romance of Shadows, Curiosity of Vertical Planes Illumination and Proximity are 2 of the 12 languages of the mind.Your feelings about an item are affected by the way it’s illuminated.Feelings of romance, intimacy, prestige and adventure are triggered by the hot spots and shadows of a campfire, a fireplace or a candle in a dimly lit room. Hot spots and shadows send signals that are rich, textured and varied. Upscale retail stores and restaurants, museums and cathedrals are filled with hot spots and shadows.Feelings of drudgery, routine, commodity and bureaucracy are triggered by the homogenized light that fills every corner of a room equally. Discount stores and cafeterias, elementary schools and post offices are filled with homogenized light. Homogenized light is the same all over. No hot spots. No shadows.Feng Shui – the ancient Chinese practice of arranging rooms and furnishings to create specific moods and feelings – is built upon an intuitive understanding of the language of Proximity.The arrangement of furniture and fixtures within a room can pull you along a specific path as surely as if you were walking within a labyrinth.A boring store has 3 horizontal planes. The bottom one is the floor. The top one is the ceiling. The center one in a clothing store is the top of the clothes racks. In a large jewelry store, it's the tops of the showcases. In Best Buy, the tops of the shelves.To make a big room feel interesting and intimate, all you have to do is pierce that center, horizontal plane with a series of vertical planes rising to varying heights. If your view is partially obscured by three tall pots standing 9 feet tall, you'll feel drawn to take a look at what’s behind them. But if you can see everything from a single vantage point, the brain says, “Nothing here to see.”By the way, these techniques work just as well in homes and offices as they do in retail stores.Was this stuff interesting for you or did it go over your head? Send a quick email to Tamara@WizardAcademy.org and let her know.I confess we took only a shallow look into a deep subject today, but if enough people thought today’s memo was beneficial, we’ll schedule a class and a field trip to investigate detailed examples of how the careful placement of selected fixtures can cause customers to visit you more often and spend longer amounts of time.We’ll also look at how shadows can change the mood of a room and increase the perceived value of inventory. We might even investigate the language of color and how visual portals can be used to move people from one state of consciousness to another.But now I’m rambling.Wizard Academy is a new kind of business school. We study what gifted people do when they’re feeling inspired so that we can reverse engineer their unconscious methods.What are you trying to make happen? Let us help you.Come to Wizard Academy.Roy H. Williams

The Tinkerbell Effect describes things that exist only because people believe in them. Remember Tinkerbell, the fairy in Peter Pan who is revived from near death by the belief of the audience?[Tinkerbell has drunk the poison meant for Peter Pan.]PETER PAN: Her light is growing faint, and if it goes out, that means she is dead! Her voice is so low I can scarcely tell what she is saying. She says—she says she thinks she could get well again if children believed in fairies! [He rises and throws out his arms to the audience.] Do you believe in fairies? Say quick that you believe! If you believe, clap your hands!And all over the world, children clapped with all their might.The Tinkerbell Effect is responsible for the rule of law. If enough of us quit believing in it, the rule of law would cease to exist. Likewise, the value of money. A dollar has value only because we believe it does. Without our belief, dollars would be scraps of paper.Much of who and what we are is owed to the Tinkerbell Effect.Tinkerbell would be proud of Tommy.Tommy is a young man who sees possibilities. Few people understand him. His home is littered with his strange inventions.When Tommy is 28, he writes a letter to his friend, Robert Skipwith, about The History and Adventures of the renowned Don Quixote de la Mancha, a book that has captured his imagination.In that book, Alonso Quixano sees beauty where others see only dust and grime. Then, like a little boy tying a bath towel around his neck and pretending to be Superman, Alsonso dresses himself as a knight and pretends to be Don Quixote, setting out to right all the wrongs of his day.Tommy, too, becomes a sort of Don Quixote, seeing always a world that could be, should be, ought to be. His fascination with Don Quixote will continue throughout his life and he will mention Quixote in dozens of letters to his friends. Finally, when Tommy is 78 years old and looking back across the years, he writes to Benjamin Waterhouse, “Don Quixote undertook to redress the bodily wrongs of the world…”Inspired by Quixote, Tommy likewise undertook to redress the wrongs of the world.It was a single, glittering statement for which there was no evidence in all the world: 32 year-old Tommy, that incurable dreamer, flung the Tinkerbell Effect hundreds of years into the future and across millions of lives with 14 words full of pixie dust, “We Hold these Truths to be Self-evident, that All Men are Created Equal…”And a nation sprang into existence.Do you have an impossible dream? Come to Wizard Academy. The Cognoscenti will believe it with you and together, we'll make it happen.Roy H. Williams