I’ve been studying AI audio so that I can complete a couple of personal projects.

The first project is an audiobook containing 18 chapters that span 75 fascinating minutes. Your MondayMorningMemo on December 22nd will contain the following invitation:

The tribe encircling the campfire is about to listen to a group of old men tell “The Story of the Long Ago.” You can listen, too, if you like.

That invitation will be coming your way on December 22nd.

The other project that I will be launching in January or February is an ongoing weekly series called “The Great Writer Series.”

My goal is simple: I want to reawaken the world to the power of well-told stories. That’s it. I have no other agenda. I just want people to remember what great writing sounds like.

Today I’ve got 3 different samples for you. Each is about 2 minutes long. Click the hyperlinks if you want to hear my people read to you.

This first one is an obscure poem by Robert Frost called, “The Bearer of Evil Tidings.”

I have asked Amir Amani to read it.

The bearer of evil tidings,

When he was halfway there,

Remembered that evil tidings

Were a dangerous thing to bear.

So when he came to the parting

Where one road led to the throne

And one went off to the mountains

And into the wild unknown,

He took the one to the mountains.

He ran through the Vale of Cashmere,

He ran through the rhododendrons

Till he came to the land of Pamir.

And there in a precipice valley

A girl of his age he met

Took him home to her bower,

Or he might be running yet.

She taught him her tribe’s religion:

How ages and ages since

A princess en route to China

To marry a Persian prince

Had been found with child; and her army

Had come to a troubled halt.

And though a god was the father

And nobody else at fault,

It had seemed discreet to remain there

And neither go on nor back.

So they stayed and declared a village

There in the land of the Yak.

And the child that came of the princess

Established a royal line,

And his mandates were given heed to

Because he was born divine.

And that was why there were people

On one Himalayan shelf;

And the bearer of evil tidings

Decided to stay there himself.

At least he had this in common

With the race he chose to adopt:

They had both of them had their reasons

For stopping where they had stopped.

As for evil tidings,

Belshazzar’s overthrow,

Why hurry to tell Belshazzar

What soon enough he would know?

Amor Towles will be our second example. He has given us literary wonders like “A Gentleman in Moscow” and “The Lincoln Highway.” This excerpt is from page 302 of his novel, “Table for Two.”

Big Bob Bigelow will read it to us.

Eve could not pinpoint when her dislike for lists began, but it must have been around the time she was twelve. It was in the basement of St. Mary’s, where she and the rest of the sixth graders were charged with memorizing the Ten Commandments.

“Thou shalt not this.” 


“Thou shalt not that.” 


“And thou shalt not the other thing.”

Then there was the list painted on the sign at the country club pool to remind the children there would be…

“No Running.” 


“No Diving.” 


“No Splashing.”

But most important was her mother’s ever-expanding list of what a young lady should not do. Like put her elbows on the table, or speak with her mouth full, or slug her...

A society grows great when old people plant trees under whose shade they will never sit.

Trees that live long do not grow quickly.

It requires patience to grow a tree that will endure.

The root word of patience is the Latin verb “pati.” It means “to suffer” or “to endure.”

The best time to plant a tree was twenty years ago.

The second-best time is today.

A person with a purpose is a person on a mission.

A person on a mission is a person with a passion.

Passion is another strange word. It does not mean what you think it does.

The English word “passion” comes directly from the Latin noun “passio” which means “suffering.” If you have “compassion” for someone, it means that you are “suffering with them.” Every Easter we hear about “The Passion of the Christ.”

Patience and passion share the same Latin root. Pati is the noun. Passio is the verb. And they both mean suffering.

A person with a passion has a vision of the future for which they are willing to suffer.

The builder of a brand is the planter of a tree: a visionary missionary.

And their principal tool is storytelling.

Stories build personalities.

Stories build people.

Storytelling is world-building.

Stories build cultures.

Stories build brands that endure.

Be careful what you say.

A word of affirmation is a spark that can become a flame that will illuminate a person’s path into the future. A word of discord, disdain, or disharmony can quench that vital spark.

We carry the power of light and darkness in our tongues.

Be careful what you say.

You can build a brand with your stories.

You can build people, too.

Say the right things and you can build a life.

You can speak happiness.

You can build happiness.

Say the right things and you can live happiness.

Speak it. Build it.

Say it. Live it.

Roy H. Williams

PS “It is true that we are weak and sick and ugly and quarrelsome but if that is all we ever were, we would millenniums ago have disappeared from the face of the earth.”

– John Steinbeck

Eveline Shen is an operating-systems programmer — not for computers, but for people.

Eveline helps leaders rewire the limiting patterns that hold them back — including perfectionism, people-pleasing, and self-sacrifice — and replace them with what she calls “courageous” actions. Her clients are primarily organizations advocating for social change, many of whom instinctively view business leaders and entrepreneurs not as partners, but as adversaries. But as Eveline explains to roving reporter Rotbart, everyone wins when they make a more deliberate effort to communicate with, understand, and learn from one another. It’s MondayMorningRadio.com

You can hear Roy read today’s MMMemo by clicking the “listen” link at the top of the page. Or you can hear it wailed by a tribal elder who is teaching the tribe around a campfire. Just click the play bar below. Crazy? Absolutely. – Indy Beagle

It is easy to understand a person who is driven by their passions.

Your passions take you to your happy place.

I have friends who have a passion for sporting events on television. Others have a passion for gambling, and the paripatetic have a passion for traveling to all the far-flung places on this spinning rock we live upon.

People who have a passion for achievement live to make things different.

Planning and research puts a candle to the wick of some people. They go without sleep and burn bright throughout the night as they gather, collate, and organize information that will set the future on fire.

Your scars are the memories of bitter experiences.

The pain is gone, but the benefits of those experiences remain. Your scars help you see danger on the horizon.

Your scars are the diplomas of lessons you will never forget.

It is good to have scars.

But wounds… wounds are different.

The pain remains and it triggers you to act in ways that everyone notices but no one understands. Sometimes not even you.

I have known men whose only passion was to seduce every woman they encountered. Those men like to believe that they are “in love with falling in love.” But when you have known them long enough you will see a knife wound in their chest that has never healed. Way back in the long ago, they had a wife who began sleeping with another man. And ever since that day, they have been trying to become that man.

The pain of a wound is a powerful thing. It shouts, “Never again! Never again! Never again!”

I don’t believe that any of those men have ever figured out why they feel driven to become the living embodiment of the imaginary Don Juan, and I have never felt that it was my place to tell them.

Every person is formed by their passions, scars, and wounds. Even imaginary people.

All of the famous characters in literature were created from their passions, scars, and wounds.

Novelists, playwrights, and screenwriters know this. Ad writers do not. This is why most advertising is dull, dead, and untwitching.

When an ad writer is guided by the ambitions, demands, and expectations of their clients, you can expect to hear the glorious trumpets of a ringing call to action. “Come! Come now! Give me your money! Hurry! Hurry! I want your money Today! Today! Today! Act now! Don’t delay!”

We are not enchanted by these ads.

Did it ever occur to you that every successful brand is a character that lives in the mind of the customer?

A successful brand is driven by its passions, scars, and wounds.

Passion: Why does this brand exist? What is it chasing? What love does it represent?

Scars: What does it know? What has it learned? Why can I trust this brand?

Wounds: What is this brand trying to erase from the earth?

To what does it shout, “Never again! Never again! Never again!”

Roy H. Williams