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Vernon Howard’s Higher World — New MP3 CDs
By Doug Stewart
In that wonderful old Warner Bros. classic film, “The Treasure of Sierra Madre”, Humphrey Bogart, Tim Holt and Walter Huston play prospectors who climb the rugged mountains of Mexico looking for gold. Bogart and Holt know nothing about prospecting but grizzled old Huston does. In a famous scene, Bogart and Holt argue about what gold looks like. Huston bursts out laughing and dances a jig. He tells his partners they’re so dumb they can’t see the riches they’re standing on.
Only a trained eye could see that what looked like dry and worthless soil was really unrefined gold. Huston explains that to get to the real source of wealth, they’re going to have to climb up the mountain. The same story might apply to the new series of “Dated Talks” released by New Life in the MP3 CD format. They’re called “Vernon Howard’s Higher World.”
Here is an opportunity to own all of the talks Vernon Howard gave from 1986 through 1992. Nothing new about that, you might say, because those talks have been available on audiocassettes for years. This new series in the MP3 format, however, provides students with all 638 listening hours of genuine spiritual gold, but now in a manageable and more convenient form. There are prayers, higher instructions, spiritual laws and a treasure trove of tough truths all given by Vernon for your lasting benefit. He explains how Truth solves all of the difficulties you may have with business, male-female relations, money, family and more. You’ll also come across all of the priceless stories told by Vernon as only he could. Here, indeed, are the authentic answers to life, showing you what real gold is so that you can drop the useless, false gold you’ve been carrying around all your life.
New Life Director Richard Wooldridge spent months converting old analog tapes to digital files. “It was important,” he said, “to move these wonderful recordings to a more lasting format because cassettes and cassette tape players are being phased out in the technological world. The MP3 CD format makes them much more accessible for people to use today.” This collection is the equivalent of 437 previously issued audiocassettes plus a special bonus talk, The Writer’s Class. This lecture hasn’t been available since Vernon Howard’s passing in 1992.
New Life has heard from many people who are grateful for all of the hours of instruction now available in this convenient and up-to-date format. A lot of students listen to this new series of MP3 CDs in their cars, enjoying the ease of having about 25 or more talks on each disk in their player. This is a big change from having numerous audiocassettes tumbling around in your vehicle, getting lost or damaged. One student who recently traveled by car from California to the New Life Colorado banquet said that it was a most pleasant and relaxing trip because of being able to listen to these marvelous talks nonstop. The new MP3 CDs are economical too, with an average cost per talk of $1 instead of $4 as was the case in the cassette versions. There are even greater savings if you purchase the entire collection of all 35 disks. Check with the bookstore at any class for more details. MP3s also load easily on to your personal digital device giving you even more of an opportunity to take Vernon Howard wherever you go. Get one or more of these new MP3 CDs and start digging for your spiritual gold today!
Doug Stewart has been attending New Life classes in Southern California for the past nine years. He has been in the entertainment industry for over 35 years. He has worked as a producer, director and editor and has had a long affiliation with television shows like the Oscars, the Emmys and the Screen Actors Guild Awards. “As glamorous and exciting as having a career in show business appears to be,” he says, “I was still confused about life and was not very happy. I started searching for the reasons why and found that nobody had any answers that made sense. One day I picked up a Vernon Howard book and later started going to the classes. I had found the answer to all of my questions! Now my life is so much more rewarding because of the authentic truths Vernon Howard reveals.”
Technical data on MP3 Compact Discs:
863 talks — 21.35 GB — 638 listening hours; mp3 Pro® (FhG) (*.mp3); 80 kbps, 44100 Hz, Stereo (17:6:1), CBR (Constant Bitrate)
Pagosa Springs Banquet Report July 2010
By Regina Netherton & Judith Anderson
On the weekend of July 9, 10 & 11, New Life held its annual summer Southwestern Banquet in natural settings surrounded by flowers, birds and views of Pagosa’s peaks.
We’re not going to tell you about the speakers or the entertainment or the fabulous food this time or even of our Sunday morning meeting in the New Life pergola nestled against the mountains. We follow the same schedule Vernon Howard set up years ago to provide plentiful opportunities available nowhere else to study our esoteric lessons. And though the activities are familiar, Truth is experienced only in the present moment, which makes it fresh and new.
One new addition after the break of Friday evening’s class was a duet by Lynne and Bruce (a pair a’ docs) of one of Vernon’s favorite songs, “Let the Rest of the World Go By,” with strong, pure harmony in sharp contrast to the screeching and screaming that the world now calls music. And something else brand new at the book tables were all 35 volumes of the recently recorded dated talks (from l986 thru l992) on MP3 Compact Disc. Listening to these make the talks seem very fresh and alive. You feel as if you’re hearing them for the first time; even if we were there personally, we missed so much! Talks for the weekend were based on the MP3 CD “Let a Higher Spirit Guide You.”
We’d like to convey something much more than just the facts or words, difficult to describe unless you were there and open to the higher energies, which came thru especially in some of the talks. We were being lifted out of our usual mundane, pretentious and heavy lives to experience new and higher levels of being.
As one student said, “The banquet atmosphere is so energizing. This is the first place I’ve been where people are honest with me. It makes you realize that it is possible to actually do what truth talks about — to begin to see things as they actually are.”
So these teachings are not about believing anything but a means for finding our True Self, our essence. Banquets help most of all to value what Vernon Howard left us by applying it to our lives. Work with what we’ve been given, and find a way to attend banquets, where we can really discover true spiritual wisdom, not to believe or to parrot the words, but to experience the higher life for ourselves.
New MP3 Compact Discs — These are NOT downloadable from our website
 The Vernon Howard’s Higher World project is now complete and all 35 volumes are presently available. All of Vernon Howard’s dated talks have been transferred from cassette tape to MP3 CD. The set includes 863 talks dating from January 3, 1986 to July 14, 1992. Also included is a special bonus talk entitled The Writer’s Class. These lectures have been digitally re-mastered and converted to an MP3 format. All of the content is exactly the same as it was originally recorded.
A wide variety of inner-life topics are covered, all the way from a clear explanation of the human predicament to how we can personally acquire the heavenly riches that await any sincere student. Vernon Howard goes into every malady known to man and how we can discover the authentic cure. It is the most marvelous message ever given to mankind.
There are hundreds of precious truths and rewards in each talk. Genuine help is available and any earnest person can find it. The path to enlightenment actually exists and these principles will lead you there.
Volumes 1 thru 34 retail at $30 each and Volume 35 sells for $20, which is about one-third the cost of buying them on cassette tape. If you buy 5 or more of the series at one time you can get them for $25 each. If you purchase the whole series you can save even more money. All 35 Volumes can be bought for $780. A super deal! Order today.
Volumes 1 thru 35 are now available. These are NOT downloadable from our website. For those who want to buy the MP3 Compact Disc to download onto an iPod or your computer here is the format that the talks have been saved in — mp3 Pro® (FhG) (*.mp3); 80 kbps, 44100 Hz, Stereo (17:6:1), CBR (Constant Bitrate).
Here’s another bit of information you will find useful. You can fast forward or rewind any talk. If you want to go back and hear something over again, hold down and keep holding the search/forward or back track button and it will act just like the fast forward or rewind button does on a cassette tape player. It also works the same way on your remote control if you have one.
Effective as of July 1, 2010 we will begin the phase out process of cassette tapes. Once we have sold out of our present inventory that will be it. The cassettes are presently on sale for 50% off their normal price. This includes all the titled cassette tapes, the dated tapes, the cassette tape sets and the cassette tape albums. Order today!
Christmas 2009 Banquet Report
A fresh snowfall in the mountains around Strawberry, Arizona was the setting for our traditional New Life Christmas banquet. What really made it special is, as Vernon Howard put it, "Great energy is awakened when earnest men and women meet for the purpose of inner enlightenment."
Activities began with a class on Wednesday evening, which was lead by Dr. Bruce Tracy. The subject was the revealing quote from Cosmic Command #1639: "It's a world of pathetic people going thru the agonizing motions of trying to appear real." Bruce encouraged us when afraid to follow the right urge to face the fear and "go right back into the tunnel of horrors" (the world).
Preparations on Wednesday and Thursday (Christmas Eve) found the ladies, including some from California and Colorado, in the kitchen preparing turkey with all the trimmings, while the men spruced up Howard Hall's floors and the roads. Students volunteering for work find that something happens in this atmosphere of working together that the world knows nothing of. One benefit is that negative features hidden in our nature can come to our consciousness where the light can begin to dissolve them.
On Christmas morning attendees began arriving for a pre-class breakfast while dawn was still breaking, and were welcomed by the warmth of glowing fireplaces and the aromas of hot coffee brewing and turkeys roasting, together with fresh fruit and chili cheese omelets.
Director Richard Wooldridge, from the Colorado group, and California leader, Terry Roach, long time students of Vernon Howard, were speakers for the Christmas morning class where the spiritual banquet was again spread. Richard gave us this aim: instead of going into fear, choose awareness. And he added that rather than reacting to wrong behavior on the part of other people, leave it with them. The talks presented plenty of inner work for the ensuing activities as well as for the trip home and beyond.
Our favorite turkey dinner followed, where effort was made to eat consciously while enjoying the delicious banquet spread. Entertainment and dancing followed which kept the atmosphere light and pure. What a pleasure to hear again pretty, harmonious songs like "Christmas in Kilarney" and to dance to fun, old-fashioned music, including polkas. Wholesome jokes tickled our funny bones, such as the unforgettable "chess nuts boasting in an open foyer" (you had to be there).
Additional classes were held on Saturday and Sunday mornings, where it was noted that if we will take 100% responsibility for our lives, and refuse to blame anything outside of us for what happens, we will finally come to a place in which something higher will take care of us completely. Moe Janosec reminded us to be very alert to what we see and hear, and recalled Vernon Howard's caution: "Question every idea given you since birth."
Those who came with a right spirit left with a genuine feeling of excitement for new insights gained and with a powerful sense of gratitude for these life-saving teachings.
Strawberry Banquet Report September 2009
Talks: “Continue in spite of everything.”
Wednesday evening was an excellent beginning for our studies. Talks centered on “What You Can Do for Yourself” from 1500 Ways to Escape the Human Jungle. Bill said we need to be stunned because our lazy parts “want to be stupid and dull”; we need to reawaken our curiosity for learning, and to focus on the true aim, to save our soul.
Using The Original World talk (transcription) as a reference, Saturday morning speakers explored the false sense of self we re-create from past experience and work very hard to keep alive. It is this impostor which we need to get free of in order to be genuine. Director Richard Wooldridge, noting psychologists’ ridiculous ‘syndromes,’ called our slavery to annoyance part of the Deep Sleep Syndrome. We were roundly and soundly scolded for our laziness in wanting someone else to do the work for us. “Shame on you, shame on me!” Many speakers alluded to our slavery to the world’s demands, our constant looking for the right job, car, house, man or woman, and being too identified with the physical (as Vernon once described New Life students). Richard said whatever you do in the world, that’s not why you’re here!
Sunday speakers talked about authentic strength and exposing weakness, such as our vanity, being offended when corrected and our “fearful dependency in the prison camp of life”. Dr. Bruce said our complaints are futile because we’re living the life we’ve chosen. It was stressed that we need not continue to be weak and can be strong right now!
Plenty of chances were available in the classes and throughout the banquet activities to break out, and speakers reminded us of these ways in which we can free ourselves: to not hide out; to abandon the self- centered prison and if you ‘fall in the mud’, keep walking (or dancing); to be enthusiastic and not dull; to be pleasant and not crabby and to “refuse any longer to prove how great you are”. It was all there for the student with an open mind to discover new freshness and power from within.
Marvels of the Meal and Acts:
The Mexican dinner was most delicious, offering a choice of beef and chicken for tacos, along with many delectables like homemade salsa, fresh sautéed jalapeños and Colorado peaches, together with irresistible desserts. We never starve for either physical or spiritual food at our banquets.
Entertainment, for body, mind and spirit, was improved with new microphones, helping us to better enjoy the singing and good-humored jokes. And the Pretties continue to delight us with their dances in spite of the wide distance between where they live, making practice time scarce.
The End and Beginning:
As dancing and entertainment activities drew to a close on Saturday, there was reluctance to end the festivities. But more than enough fresh energy had been created from the uplifting day to forge enthusiastically ahead with the cleanup and later propel us to a lovely, relaxing work party that night. The efficiency and promptness taught by Vernon Howard was very evident during the cleanup and evening work party.
Putting labels on the beautiful new Fall/Winter newsletter and preparing it for mailing was a very calming experience. Our newsletter prep was completed Saturday night and readied for mailing on Monday. Self-work continued for those who wished by observing wasteful motions or mindless blabbing. We then welcomed our rest as we cut the thought-ropes tying us to the past. This work is so healthy and fun and life-giving. Those who actively participated and stayed till the end of the entertainment, cleanup and work party learned they had more strength by making this extra effort. A newcomer observed that “New Lifers are so energetic.” Truth is irrepressible, giving boundless energy as we get ourselves out of the way to be ‘raised from the dead’.
After enjoying another Sunday meal together, visitors packed up and started on the trip home. But driving home was another opportunity to work, as Vernon Howard points out in “Driving Home” in There is a Way Out — to either lower our level and that of our companions or to raise it with even more observation and insights into human nature. The Work of course never ends, so we can always climb higher and see more. There’s always more evil in the world and egotism in us to see through and rise above. As Bill recalled Vernon saying, “Whenever I see Vernon, I boot him out.” We can do the same with our old nature. And a banquet is a superior place to do it.
Pagosa Springs Banquet Report July 2009
By Regina Netherton & Judith Anderson
Refreshing! That’s what it was. Where else can you go to truly refresh the spirit and sense the presence of something higher penetrating one’s being while enjoying powerful spiritual talks, good food and fun entertainment?
We’re talking about the New Life July 2009 banquet weekend in beautiful Pagosa Springs, Colorado, where a group of us from all over the west gathered for our annual Colorado banquet. One newcomer hailed from the Pacific Northwest while another was originally from as far away as Iran.
On Friday night talks and snacks were provided at the Pagosa Lakes Clubhouse, where Moe Janosec began the class by noting that every banquet weekend is a celebration of Truth. He reminded us that God is trying to get through every second, but we of ourselves are blocking the healing message. Moe reminded us that New Life is “a safe place to reveal myself to myself.” He said, as Vernon before him, “Take the leap and God goes with you.” Dave Hearst mentioned that he had no idea what people were talking about when first coming to these classes, but with persistence, things gradually became clearer. This is the actual state of everyone when first meeting with truth teachings, so persistence is essential.
On Saturday, New Life director Richard Wooldridge asserted in his talk that our most important task in life is to wake up. There is another world above the level of thought, but we are asleep to it. You could have heard a pin drop when Richard forcefully told everyone to fight to wake up. Disturbing to our dream state? Of course, but absolutely necessary as an urgent reminder of our true purpose here on earth. He said to fight to drop thought and to just know where we are all day long. It is crucial that we fight to stay awake where God, Truth, Reality can reach us. Genuine contact with the higher cannot occur as long as we are immersed in the prison of our own mental movies and daydreams.
An enlightening Vernon Howard tidbit from Richard’s talk was made available at the book table on Sunday morning, which in part said: Q: What determines the intensity of my desire to get out? A: Your intensity of desire to get out is determined by how much you reject the false pleasure of pain.
The barbeque meal, the lighthearted dancing and the fun entertainment that followed the Saturday class fulfilled their purpose of helping us to defy any psychological heaviness and to fully enjoy the energized atmosphere.
 Sunday greeted us as a beautiful and perfect morning, and after a welcome breakfast in the New Life house out in the country, old and young alike climbed up the Happy Trail to a brand new garden pergola, built by local New Life students, amid the blue spruce and fresh mountain air. Class was held in the pergola, an attractive wooden arbor with a roof of trellis work which filters the sun. The beauty of the setting in itself was worth the climb up there, but more importantly by this time in the weekend, everyone felt and sensed beyond a doubt that he/she was in a right place spiritually, far away from the clamor and demands of daily life. And the old mechanical self had been corralled to one degree or another, if only temporarily, making room for higher impressions, which with a welcoming spirit can truly begin to heal our souls. Even nature itself seemed attuned to the unique atmosphere as we were serenaded with a delightful chorus of birdsong all during Sunday’s talks.
Continuing to use the MP3 The Secret of Spiritual Awakening as a basis for talks, Bill Brown likened everyone to being a spiritual teenager, a rebel without a ‘pause’. He said that’s because our attitude (mostly unconscious) is this: “Don’t tell me anything. I already know everything.” One theme of the morning’s talks was that “God will take care of you. Why don’t you let him?”
Other weekend speakers also helped to motivate and inspire our aim to wake up. In his Saturday talk, Dr. Bruce Tracy mentioned he was a ‘recovering fundamentalist’; then in a more serious vein, Bruce too affirmed that God will live our lives for us if we will let him.
Altogether the weekend left us with the increased urge of wanting more of these healing vibrations and to reach a higher place within ourselves and within the universe. Vernon Howard set these banquet weekends up many years ago to help us to grow spiritually. Dr. Bruce Tracy goes into this in detail in his article starting on page 2.
(The photo to the right is of Craig Martz speaking to the class in the pergola on Sunday at the New Life property. It seats about 30 people comfortably.)
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