I just received an extraordinary letter from a young lady named Allison. She touched my heart. It’s one thing to receive a fan letter; it’s another to receive a letter that shares the author’s heart. This, Allison did, with such verve and vision it stopped me in my tracks.

She said to me, “I feel so blessed to be 25 and have the ability to connect with young people because they are not used to seeing a young black woman who is articulate, and most important, forward thinking. This IS the “Age of the Entrepreneur” and it’s also the age of freedom. Young adults, women, and minorities are slowly reaching an even playing field where we have no excuse but to thrive. I want to honor our brothers and sisters in the past who fought for me on slave ships and who died for me recently in Iraq. I tell you all this so I’m held accountable for my mission to change the world – one day at a time.”

I met Allison in Pheonix, Arizona at the Entrepreneurship Conference I mentioned to you in a previous manifesto. She was one of a contingent of young entrepreneurial students being taught by Peter Burns III, the magical man who recently came into my life to introduce me to his brainchild The College of Entrepreneurship of which I am now Chairman. As I meet Peter’s students, I’m forced to ask myself, what is this magic he possesses? How is it he has inspired these young people so well? What is it that he brings into the classroom with him that has moved them all to take on the entrepreneurial mission with such zeal, such religious passion, such joy?

I think I know.

Peter is the one we all know with the last name of Pan.

He resolutely refuses to grow up, and all of his young students recognize him as one of their own.

Would that their parents could catch the bug!

Can you imagine this world with people like Allison creating new ventures as magical as they are?

Can you imagine how playful, how colorful, how spirited these businesses would be?

Forget how successful!

Oh, yes, Allison, this is The Age of The Entrepreneur. And what an age it will be! It will be the age in which millions upon millions of us discover the secret joy that lives at the heart of creation. At the heart of imagination. At the heart of Walt Disney’s Imagineer.

Thank you, dear Allison. And thank your professor, Peter Burns. I know without a shadow of a doubt that we will all see the two of you, and many, many more, here in The Dreaming Room, ready to grow and explore.

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