Before I tell you what will change and what won’t, we’re going to take 53 seconds to listen to a poem written by Robert Frost in 1926.

It’s called “Once By the Pacific,” and it was written exactly 100 years ago.

The shattered water made a misty din.
Great waves looked over others coming in,
And thought of doing something to the shore
That water never did to land before.
The clouds were low and hairy in the skies,
Like locks blown forward in the gleam of eyes.
You could not tell, and yet it looked as if
The shore was lucky in being backed by cliff,
The cliff in being backed by continent;
It looked as if a night of dark intent
Was coming, and not only a night, an age.
Someone had better be prepared for rage.
There would be more than ocean-water broken
Before God’s last “Put out the Light” was spoken.

We are living in a time of change. We can hear the roar of the surging surf as technology and politics pound against the rocks along the shore.

“What will happen next?”
“How should we prepare?”
“What will be the next big thing and how can I ride that wave?”

Calm down, little brother. You are watching and listening to the pounding spray of the water. Turn around and look at the stability of the land behind you.

It remains unmoved.

Robert Frost described a fearful scene of uncertainty, but did you notice that after he said the water, “thought of doing something to the shore that water never did to land before,” he said, “The shore was lucky in being backed by cliff, The cliff in being backed by continent.”

The cliff is the resilience of humanity, and the continent is human nature.

These are the things that will never change.

Study history and you will see the resilience of humanity carried forward in every nation, millennia after millennia. Read the Bible from Genesis to Revelation and you will see that human nature remains forever unchanged.

Jeff Bezos understood this.

Fourteen years ago, he said:

“I very frequently get the question: ‘What’s going to change in the next 10 years?’ And that is a very interesting question; it’s a very common one. I almost never get the question: ‘What’s not going to change in the next 10 years?’ And I submit to you that that second question is actually the more important of the two — because you can build a business strategy around the things that are stable in time. … In our retail business, we know that customers want low prices, and I know that’s going to be true 10 years from now. They want fast delivery; they want vast selection.”

“It’s impossible to imagine a future 10 years from now where a customer comes up and says, ‘Jeff I love Amazon; I just wish the prices were a little higher,’ or ‘I love Amazon; I just wish you’d deliver a little more slowly.’ Impossible. And so the effort we put into those things, spinning those things up, we know the energy we put into it today will still be paying off dividends for our customers 10 years from now. When you have something that you know is true, even over the long term, you can afford to put a lot of energy into it.”

Don’t worry about the future, little brother. Big sister, don’t fret.

When you have something that you know is true, you can afford to put a lot of energy into it.

The resilience of humanity, and the continuance of human nature will forever be unchanged.

Roy H. Williams

Eight-year-old Ari Kimmelfeld packed two suitcases when he went to summer camp. One suitcase was full of clothes. The other one was full of snacks to sell to his fellow campers. Ari Kimmelfeld made $300.

Flash Forward: Now 27 years old, Ari has never stopped selling.

In 2024 he launched an online marketplace to broker the sale of used Peloton equipment. Today his business is connecting buyers and sellers of every other kind of bulky, awkward fitness equipment, along with furniture, appliances, golf carts, and boats

“Entrepreneurs don’t need to invent better products to succeed,” says roving reporter Rotbart. “Sometimes, they just need to invent better ways to buy and sell existing products.” A rollicking interview is waiting for you at MondayMorningRadio.com

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