Interviewer: What happened in your life that made you begin looking for answers elsewhere
David: It began with the fact that when I was a child, I was never encouraged to develop or to do anything. If you’re told you’re dumb every day of your life, sooner or later you’re going to believe it.
     That’s why I say finding these classes was the best thing that ever happened to me. The truth revealed to me that the people who told me such lies were sound asleep; they didn’t know the damage they were causing; and the same things had probably happened to them. They were just passing on their own little boxes of junk.

Interviewer: So at a certain point you began searching for authentic answers to the pain everyone experiences in life?
David: We’re all searching for something. I know I was. Every human being has experienced at least a faint hint that something is radically wrong. Most people try to forget about it, throw in the towel, and go on with their lives. A very few rare individuals want to learn more about what’s wrong, and that’s what leads them to a special place like a Vernon Howard class. In reality, you don’t need to look any further than your very first class. You really sense there’s something different there, and hopefully you stay.
     I am flabbergasted as to why this Work is still so unknown to so many people. It has been disseminated literally to all corners of the earth. At least 8 million people out there have heard about this. So, where are they? Do they know more than Vernon Howard? Do they know more than truth itself? People should flood to this, but they don’t.
     We are here on earth to learn. But people don’t know that. People are so confused and don’t know where they’re going. When they come to a New Life class, they have a chance to learn how to really approach life.
     Even if you do great things in life, like find a cure for cancer or develop a solar-powered car, you still need to have great concern for your soul. That’s what takes you into eternity.
     We’re not here on this planet by some random chance. We’re here for a reason. The reason is to learn lessons. Sure, we can appreciate science and its discoveries. But what we’re after is connection with our essence. I mean, who wants to spend his life studying how many molecules are in a banana? (laughs) Who cares? That’s not important. Letting truth save your soul is what’s important.

Interviewer: What did you see in yourself or in the world that made you turn toward the truth?
David: I always wanted to believe that people were basically good. I find now that it just isn’t the case. Truth reveals to us that people are not good; people are sound asleep and will do horrible things to get what they think they want out of life. If given a chance, they will do absolutely anything.
     But there are rare examples of genuine decency in this world which can give you preliminary lessons in the spiritual life.
     Once I was traveling with business partners through Texas. We were driving along in the middle of nowhere when suddenly the engine coughed and sputtered; we ran out of gas. We sat along that road for an hour before anyone appeared.
     An older man drove up in a beat-up pickup truck and asked: “You need help?” We told him we’d run out of gas, and he said, “Fine, I’ll be right back.” He drove 12 miles to the nearest town, filled a 5-gallon gas can, and drove it back to us. As the others poured the gas into our tank, I told the man I wanted to pay him for his time. But he wouldn’t take a penny, not even for the gas he’d bought. He paid for that himself.
     He had nothing to gain by helping us. He just did it.
     We will never see each other again. But I remember him to this day, and I remember what he did. His simple example of decency was inspiring and perhaps that experience had something to do with eventually leading me to the classes.

Interviewer: What makes New Life/Vernon Howard different?
David: One thing is, when you walk into that room, no one’s trying to sell you anything. Nobody’s trying to fool you. It’s just the unadulterated truth. No one tries to butter you up. It’s honesty on parade. Other students take you at face value. The idea is, “If you like it, fine. If you don’t, leave and go off into oblivion.”

Interviewer: How has your life changed since coming to these classes?
David: When I blow up in anger now, at least I can catch myself. I say, “Get back to sanity now.” And when I make a mistake now, that’s okay. Before, I used to beat myself up mercilessly.
     Also, I don’t use bad language anymore. If you stub your toe on a cold morning, something inside you wants to come up and express itself. (laughs) But I see it coming up now, and I watch myself. Curse words truly are cursed.
     I still feel foolish at times. I still berate myself for some silly thing I do, but life overall is getting much better. I know now that every day is a recommitment to work on myself and to learn more about life.

Interviewer: What do you like about the New Life banquets?
David: The food! (laughs) The New Life women — boy, can they cook! The quiche they make, the breakfast treats and lunches. The food is outstanding. They just don’t hear enough about how much they’re appreciated.
     Banquets are so much fun. We get up there and dance around like kids. It really makes you feel young again, like you don’t have a care in the world. And the music’s right. We listen to good pleasant melodic music. It’s really a lot of clean, honest fun. You’re not going to find that out in the world, no way.
     At the banquets, I like the camaraderie. It’s a great chance to work on yourself. Oh, sure, on occasion someone may irritate you. But I try to remember it’s ME who needs to change, not the other person. Real change is difficult but oh is it worth it.
     [When it’s time to cleanup] I’ll help mop the floor. I may not like to do it, but I do it because I know it’s good work for me.

Interviewer: What is one of the favorite things you have heard Vernon Howard say?
David: I remember him saying, “I can read you like a book, what you’re thinking, where you are inside yourself.” And I know he did. I like it when he says, “You’re not good, you’re not bad, you’re nothing, and that nothingness is everything.”

Interviewer: Which parts of the teachings appeal especially to you?
David: The teachings expose me for what I really am. I don’t like to see myself for what I am, but that’s the way it is. We’re monsters, just plain and simple.
     I like the fact he’s trying to show us how important it is to try to be conscious of the moment. That sounds so simple. But if you walk through a doorway, and you tell yourself, “I know I am walking through this doorway,” you may do it. But even then you won’t be conscious about it. This is one of the hardest parts of the Work. You think you’re being conscious, but you’re really not.

Interviewer: What can you recommend to other people who want to know what life is all about?
David: You’re not going to find the answer by buying an airline ticket to Katmandu. (laughs) If you want to know the answer to life, come to a Vernon Howard class. You’ll learn everything you need to know. You’ll learn how to handle everything life throws at you.
     At first, these classes can be intimidating. You’re going to hear things that directly contradict what you’ve learned in the world; for example, “Competition is good,” “Getting excited over a ball game is fine,” “You have a right to fight for your rights,” “It’s okay to attack your enemy,” and, “Winning isn’t everything; it’s the only thing.”
     These are worldly ideas and beliefs, and they’re wrong. They’ve got to go.
     What we’re supposed to be doing in life is learning what life is all about. Sure, material things are nice to have, but they don’t solve your problems. Truth says, “Don’t let your possessions possess you.” When you die, all the things you own are passed over to someone else anyway. The only way to solve problems is with truth. We learn all about truth at these Vernon Howard classes.

Interviewer: Any final comment for anyone who wants to live a better life?
David: I can say from myself New Life classes work. The answers to life are available. No religion or membership in any kind of club is going to do it for you. Even a nice relationship won’t solve all your problems. The only way out of your own personal hell is to do this Work. These classes show us how. I suggest you see for yourself.

Interviewer: So from the beginning you sensed there was something different (about Vernon’s teachings)?
Richard: Yes. Definitely. You could feel it. I first went to see him in 1975 in Boulder City, Nevada. I went to my first class, and felt something very different about it. I was shaking in my boots, so to speak. There was a trembling, but at the same time something else was there, too, that was supporting me. I could feel the energy, the power of what was in the room. It was very different from anything I had ever experienced before.
     I knew from the very first time I walked into class and heard Vernon Howard speak his first words, that this was different. I knew from myself it was different from anything else. I knew in my heart that this was it.

Interviewer: You knew that this was what you’d been looking for?
Richard: Yes. He knew what I was feeling, what I was thinking, where I’d made my mistakes. He knew this of everyone. After listening to Vernon for awhile, you begin to realize that he knew something you didn’t know.
     He didn’t want anything from me. He never hurt me. I was corrected quite a bit. There was no compromise. And it was for my own good. It wasn’t out of trying to take advantage of you or trying to hurt you. I hadn’t known any other in my lifetime.
     Almost everyone is out for themselves, everyone wants something from you, and everyone wants to take advantage of you. And there are people running around in this world who have no conscience whatsoever. When Vernon Howard tells us that people are absolutely insane, they are! We have to see that for ourselves and the further we go in this work the more we see that it’s true.

Interviewer: So even though Vernon was tough on you at times, you sensed the rightness of what was occurring?
Richard: Yes. You are not going to grow by having someone tell you how nice you are.

Interviewer: What do you see as a major stumbling block?
Richard: One of our problems is that we think we know. One of the first things I heard in class was, “You don’t know anything at all.” Until you work at it, you don’t really know that you don’t have a clue as to what is going on in this world. You don’t realize the extent of evil. You don’t realize that Truth exists, that something a million miles above the way you now presently live exists and that there is something that can take care of you, that can actually begin to help you understand things that you’ve never understood before. You see, people operate from a very limited level of understanding, from a lack of real spiritual knowledge.
     When we first come to this work, we take everything and perceive it from the mind, instead of living the state which these ideas represent. More than just the intellect must become involved in your spiritual investigation. Vernon Howard himself explained how he never stopped working on himself. There was more for him to learn all the time. So there’s not an end to the learning process. It’s a constant thing. And that’s what begins to make your life exciting. You’re learning more every day. With this work, you begin to see that there’s just so much more to living, a million more things to experience and to enjoy in life than you ever imagined. Even though this is a very sick planet, there is true life and real happiness available for the individual who works hard enough for it.

Interviewer: So you would say that your understanding of what Vernon Howard taught has deepened?
Richard: Yes, from the first time I attended class in 1975 until now, I definitely know a lot more than I did then. But, there’s still a lot more to learn. Truth has a way of supplying the answers for you. When you don’t understand something and you simply sit back and stop trying so hard, stop trying to figure it out, the answer will come to you. I do have more understanding, but you must never assume that that’s it. There’s a lot more to it. That’s one of the traps we fall into. Another trap is imagination; we go into imagination that we’ve become some kind of a spiritual giant. There’s never complacency if you’re really on the true spiritual path. That’s what eternal life is, the constant learning of something more so that when you leave this life, you’ll have something that will last beyond this life. Because you’re alive, there’s a new energy there, there’s something happening that’s not of this world.

Interviewer: How do Vernon’s teachings differ from other so-called spiritual teachings?
Richard: Organized religion is a trap. It’s all meant to keep you where you are, and we have to see that. It’s boring, it’s rigid, there’s no life to it. Religious authorities tell you that you must go through someone in order to reach God. That’s the way it’s set up — there’s an intermediary that must be used. But in these teachings, what we learn is that you and I can go directly to God. That’s how it was intended to be. We don’t have to go through anyone. That’s tremendous! Because you don’t have to be at the mercy of other people who can lie, mislead or deceive you and who will even take your money! That’s what is so great about this work. I can go directly to God Himself.
     And then we even have to go beyond that. What we have to see is that there is no division between you and God. Now don’t misconstrue this, but there is only one thing, there’s not you and God. You were meant to experience the higher directly from heaven itself, from Truth itself — to reap the benefits of having something higher in your life. That’s what you were meant to have. But you must work hard to actually see that for yourself, because you’ve been taught by organized religion that this is blasphemous. That you must get down and worship this higher entity. That’s ludicrous! Even Vernon Howard wouldn’t allow himself to be set up on a pedestal to be worshiped, even though he understood what life was all about. He was approachable. He was down-to-earth. He was practical. This other entity is not approachable. It’s like a distant heaven that will be there only after you die. But it won’t be. It can never be there for you in the future. Heaven and hell is right now.

Interviewer: So when we are disappointed with our present way of living, that is a good time to approach these teachings?
Richard: Oh, most certainly! We’re beginning to challenge the way we live … maybe all these ideas I have about life are not right. Maybe they are all wrong, and there’s something missing in my life. If I’m honest I know there’s pain and heartache there. I get into trouble with other people and I’m in trouble with myself. These teachings begin to explain everything about life, so that you can start to get free of the pain, so that you’re no longer hurting anymore. The pain is a hoax that can be seen through.

Interviewer: What benefits have you personally experienced as a result of applying these teachings to your own life?
Richard: One of the great things about this work is that you begin to live from yourself. You’re no longer living from borrowed ideas from your parents or from teachers or from so-called experts or from friends. The world doesn’t want you to think for or from yourself. What happens is that we take on all these ideas and beliefs that are completely unnecessary. You can truly begin to live from yourself. You can be 100% dependent on something else inside of you that comes from heaven itself. Not from your neurotic self, but from Truth itself, so that there’s no longer any conflict there at all.
    The more intensely you apply these spiritual principles, the longer you work on yourself, the better off you’re going to be. The bad habits and wrong ideas just fall away naturally. Maybe you spend a lot of time watching television. So now, because of your higher interest, you don’t watch as much television. There was no thinking process involved in it, it happened naturally. And you begin to see that you’d rather work on something for Truth, or on yourself — you may watch a Vernon Howard DVD, you may listen to a tape, you may read a book. You may spend time on that, and you don’t even think about watching television.

Interviewer: So by having something higher to do with your life, your relationships with other people go much more smoothly?
Richard: Yes! Spiritually, psychologically we can get to the point where we’re no longer dependent upon any other human being for anything. We can be completely independent. That doesn’t mean we become hermits and seal ourselves off from the rest of the world. It simply means that we go into a relationship on the terms of Truth itself, not on the terms of my demanding nature or that of the other person.
    One big trap we fall for is the idea that “You owe me something.” The world tells you that you owe it something. Or another human being tells you that you owe him something. Look at the burden this causes in us. The further we go in this work, the more we’ll see that we don’t owe anybody anything. Your life belongs to God. It doesn’t belong to that church, that organization, or another human being. And even if you’re married, you don’t belong to the other person. Look at the problems that causes in a relationship, the attitude that you belong to somebody. If there’s any sanity at all, there’s no belonging. I’ve been married for . . . how many years now? (laughter) I’ll find out how long it’s been! Seriously now, my life belongs to God! My wife, Lynne, her life is dedicated to waking up. So then things work out great. There’s a lot more to the relationship than just the superficial.

Interviewer: Can an individual experience real change by working with these ideas?
Richard: Yes, definitely! We have to see where we’re not in control of our life — that lower emotions are in control of us. Say, for instance, someone asks me to do something. I don’t really want to do it, but I go along with it because I don’t want them to not like me anymore. I want to be thought of as a nice person, a cooperative person. I have this image. Instead of doing what my heart tells me to do, which is to say “no” in this instance, I do it and resent it. You can tell when another person wants to use you, when they want something from you (in a wrong way). One of the things we can learn to do in this work is to say “No!” That’s a very difficult thing for a lot of us to do, to say “no.” We want to fit in, we want to be a part of something, we want people to think well of us. So we’re going to have to make a choice. Do we want something higher or do we want to stay as we are?

Interviewer: Can you give us something helpful to remember as we walk on the spiritual path?
Richard: We must always be working on ourselves at all times, in all situations. Every time we fall asleep (spiritually), negativity and wrongness have the chance to enter our psychic system. It’s interesting to watch this. You can see this over a period of time — a week, a month, a year, five years. You can start to develop the ability to watch yourself over extended periods of time so that you begin to see the consequences, the result of some decision or choice that you’ve made. This work is all about choices. Every time I choose to work on myself, something good happens. I feel something enter my life that’s of a higher quality. I feel better. But every time I fall asleep and I give into laziness for example, or fear, I have a resulting bad feeling and pay the price.
     People think they have to be positive and upbeat and to have a bubbly personality and that will get them through life. It will get them what they want or think they want from life. But it’s all phony, an act, and deep down inside there is an aching pain. Everything can be all right, but not in the way we think it can. Not through getting rewards from this world for instance. Not from getting the million dollars, or from getting that perfect job. None of that’s going to make a bit of difference in the long run in how you feel. It’s what you do with your life internally, and that’s to bring Truth into the equation. To begin to ask God to help you. And then to actually do the work projects. To begin to see that everything Vernon Howard says is true. Everything! And you have to see this for yourself. The whole point of the exercises is to see ourselves as we really are, not as we’re pretending to be.
     One of the greatest rewards in applying the work principles is that you’ll find new sources of energy to go through your day with. You’ll look forward to getting up in the morning. You can start to see for yourself that the world is sound asleep. The more you embrace Truth, the more you’ll get up in the morning and will have something real to do with your life. Something really constructive to do with my life, rather than trying to find something to do with my life. That’s what the world does. It invents something. If I get up in the morning and say, “What can I work on today?” or “What can I find out about myself today?” or “What can I see in the world today that I didn’t see yesterday?” then I’m like an explorer. As we’re doing this interview, we’re sitting in a beautiful setting with mountains all around, and there’s an excitement when you explore, when you see new sights and find new things to discover. There’s a natural right part of us that enjoys doing that. It’s the same on the spiritual journey. We were meant to go out and explore our internal universe and the outward universe to see what is really going on.
     There’s a certain excitement that you get when you begin to work for Truth. You’re working for yourself, you’re working for your own salvation. You see, the only way you can really fulfill yourself is through self-fulfillment, and it’s to work for yourself. You were meant to be a strong, intelligent and bright human being. You weren’t meant to be dependent upon other people for anything at all. You were meant to stand alone. That’s when you’ll really feel something. No one else can find out the Truth for you. Even Vernon Howard couldn’t find it for you. He can, an awakened man can, point you in the right direction, but no one else can do it for you. You have to do the work for yourself. So that’s really great news! That’s really wonderful to know, because then you have all the answers at your doorstep, right there for you to discover if you’ll go to work.