Ivan and Alvina are in their early 20s.Ivan was born and raised in Bulgaria. Alvina, in Siberia.

When Alvina sees Ivan playing keyboards in a café on the Black Sea, they become pen pals. And then they fall in love. And then they get married. They dream of moving to the west.

Canada says it will accept them as immigrants if they will learn to speak French.

Self-taught piano players in cafés don’t make enough money to pay for dreams, so Ivan and Alvina sleep in their car so they can pay a tutor to teach them French. They spend long hours every day for a year learning and practicing their nouvelle langue étrange. There is no money for anything else.

Ivan and Alvina step onto Canadian soil with bright eyes, big smiles and 4 thousand dollars; exactly enough money to pay the first and last month’s rent to live in a landlord’s unfinished basement. There is no money left for food or transportation.

But they have each other and they’re living their dream. This is the west! So Ivan and Alvina never quit smiling, never quit laughing, never quit feeling grateful.

Ivan gets a job as a construction laborer for an older man who can’t always pay Ivan all he is owed. But he is an honest man, so he pays the balance of Ivan’s unpaid wages by giving him tools. After many months of working for this man, Ivan has the knowledge, the tools, and the man’s blessing to go into business for himself.

Ivan and Alvina arrived in Canada exactly 11 years ago. Last year their business did more than 20 million dollars. It appears they will do 30 million next year. Neither of them is 40 years old.

I share their story to encourage you, and to tease Ivan and Alvina a little. None of this delightful true story appears on the About Us page of their website. Not a word of it. Not even their names.

Do you remember what I wrote to you in last week’s Monday Morning Memo?

“Inspirational stories are never about accumulation. They’re about sacrifice. What have you sacrificed and why? Are you willing to tell that story?”

Here are some final thoughts for you to ponder:

1. Never quit smiling, never quit laughing, never quit feeling grateful.
2. You will never reach your destination if you stop and throw stones at every dog that barks.
3. The only safe thing is to take a chance.

Oh! I forgot to mention 2 tiny details in this wonderful story of poetic, home-made destiny.

Ivan and Alvina finish unfinished basements.

And they’ve never needed to speak a word of French since the day they arrived in Canada.

Have a great week.

Roy H. Williams