08/12/2026
This is a Spark that I think made everthing in my life happen. Without her pouring into me I am positive I would have never graduated from high school, went into the military, developed the different companies that I have and the One Spark Foundation would have never been born.
The next time you are asking God to direct you in what He wants you to do, I would start by serving others with love and kindness.
I am a testiment to what can happen when someone invests their time into someone.
Love David A2J
Please take the timee to really listen to the words on this song, and they will show you the power you have to change someone's world.
The Teacher Who Lit the First Spark
There are certain people who enter your life and change its direction forever. For me, that person was a teacher named Penny Wood.
I truly believe I would never have graduated from high school without her. At a time when my world seemed dark and dismal, Penny was a bright and constant star. She saw something in me that I could not yet see in myself. Instead of giving up on me, she poured her time, love, and kindness into me.
I remember being kicked out of speech class. It would have been easy for someone to write me off as another difficult young man who simply wasn’t going to make it. Penny didn’t do that. She tutored me and helped me do what I needed to do to get through school.
But she didn’t stop at helping me graduate.
Penny wanted to take me and enroll me in college—but before she could do that, she had to get the board’s approval.
That meant she had to do more than quietly encourage me. She had to stand up for me. She had to go before people with the authority to say yes or no and convince them that I was worth the opportunity.
When I didn’t have the words, the confidence, or the standing to advocate for myself, Penny became my advocate. She put her own name and reputation behind a young man whose future was far from certain. She saw potential where others may have seen only problems, and she was willing to ask the board to see it too.
She received their approval, took me, and enrolled me in college.
With those actions, she set my future in motion. I couldn’t fully understand what she was doing for me at the time. Looking back now, I can see that she was helping move me toward the person I was meant to become.
I also remember watching the way Penny cared for all the kids around her. There were times when I would quietly tell myself, “I wish she were my mother.”
She wasn’t my mother, but during those years, she became something very close to one. She became my surrogate mother. She gave me encouragement when I was discouraged, direction when I was lost, and hope when I couldn’t find any for myself. She offered the kind of steady presence every young person needs—the assurance that somebody sees you, somebody believes in you, and somebody cares what happens to you.
What I want people to understand is that it didn’t take money to change my life. It didn’t require a grand program, extraordinary resources, or some dramatic gesture. Penny changed my life by giving me something both simple and priceless:
Her time.
She invested in me.
Every one of us has an opportunity to make that same kind of investment in someone else. It may be a student, an employee, a neighbor, a child, or a young person who simply needs somebody to believe in them. We may never know, in that moment, what dividends the investment will pay over the course of a lifetime.
Penny could not have known how far her investment in me would travel.
Today, One Spark reaches people in 167 countries. Through it, we have helped more than one million people. The businesses I own, the work I have done, the people we have served, and the lives that have been changed might never have come to fruition without her.
Think about that for a moment.
More than one million people have been touched because one teacher decided to pour her time, love, and kindness into one struggling young man—and because she was willing to stand before a board and ask them to give him a chance.
Penny never asked me for anything in return. She didn’t help me because she expected recognition, repayment, or applause. She simply did what she believed needed to be done. She recognized that she had an opportunity to change a young man’s life, and she had the compassion, foresight, and courage to act on it.
That is the extraordinary power of a teacher.
Sometimes, a teacher does far more than help a student pass a class or earn a diploma. Sometimes, a teacher becomes an advocate when a student has no voice. Sometimes, a teacher walks into a room, stands before a board, and fights for a future that the student cannot yet imagine.
Sometimes, a teacher plants a seed that grows into businesses, opportunities, and a worldwide movement. Sometimes, the love poured into one struggling student multiplies until it reaches more than a million people around the world.
Penny Wood was the first spark in my life.
She believed in me before I knew how to believe in myself. She helped me graduate, fought to secure the board’s approval, took me to college, and opened the door to a future I could not yet imagine. She became the motherly presence I needed during a time when I needed it most.
Everything I have built, everyone we have helped, and every spark we have ignited began with one teacher who cared enough to invest her time—and risk believing—in a young man’s life.
Her name was Penny Wood.
Her investment changed my life, and the dividends of that investment are still being paid around the world today.
