“Beginning this night with a song, here is David Archuleta.”

David sings “If the Savior Stood Beside Me”

“Well done! That was wonderful!”

“Beautiful, David. Thank you.”

 

David: Thank you.

“So you had some Spanish in that song. It sounded really really good. How did
your Spanish get so perfected?”

David: Well I don’t know if you’d call it perfected quite yet. I guess that’s what 
happens when you’re serving in Chile for two years.

“Did you speak Spanish before your mission?”

 David: You know,  I didn’t a whole lot. Even though my Mom is from Honduras, I wasn’t 
that fluent. I understood a good amount but nothing like now. I’m able to speak 
way more now.

“So the Spanish you learned in Chile is a little different in terms of
pronunciation?”

David: Oh yeah. Yeah. When I got back, or when I talked to my Mom,  because missionaries are able to call in twice a year,  and so when I called in for Christmas and for 
Mother’s Day, when the missionaries can, I was talking to my Mom in Spanish and 
she said “What are you saying?”, because there’s a different dialect of Spanish. 
Castiliano. It was just funny. And my Grandma, when I talked to her, she said I 
don’t understand. And she doesn’t really speak a whole lot of English. It was 
just kinda funny.

“Well it sounds good to me, though.”

“It’s just so great to have you here. Appreciate you coming. We’ve got a lot of
questions from youth all over the world. Shall we start?”

David: Sure.

“We’ve got Marin, who asked this question. I think it’s really appropriate. How has
music changed your life? I think your music has really impacted a lot of people
but how has it impacted you?”

David: How has it impacted me? Well we were just speaking a little bit about my music 
background in the Spanish chat and once again I mentioned in the Spanish one,  music just helped me understand myself better. I always had a hard time talking and
communicating. Bad communication skills and I was anti-social. People in school
knew me for the kid who didn’t talk, but the kid who was smiling all the time, I guess.
But music was a way for me to understand how I was feeling. It’s like, I feel this way;
what am I feeling? And I would start singing and oh now I get it. Now I  understand  what I’m feeling.

“At what age did you start singing? It might be kind of interesting for the
youth to know when you started to know that this is where you wanted to go with
your life.”

David: Well I mean we started Christmas caroling when I was 3 but I really wasn’t
singing then. I was wearing the Santa hats with my cousins and my siblings but 
it really started when I was six years old is when I just started just singing 
all the time all over the house. I didn’t really think of it as professional but 
I just liked doing it. I didn’t have the greatest voice but I just liked it. I 
liked how I felt when I sang and I liked listening to songs and I liked 
analyzing them. I didn’t think of it technically when I was six years old but I 
paid a lot of attention to how I felt, to how a song made me feel.

“We have a lot of questions coming in on what a mission is and how your mission
was for you. Just share some of your thoughts and feelings about your mission.”

David: Man, well to explain a mission in a nutshell…

“It might be interesting for you to explain what a missionary does on his
mission. Maybe we have some who are not familiar with what a missionary is.”

David: A missionary. Well, I don’t know if you guys have seen the… for those of you 
who…maybe some of you are not familiar with the the Mormon missionaries. 
They’re the ones who have a nametag and usually they’re riding their bikes 
around in a shirt and tie. What missionaries do is they just teach people about 
the teachings of Jesus Christ or his gospel is another way of saying it. As a 
missionary, you dedicate two years of your life and you get away from 
everything. You don’t even have internet, well I guess once a week you can talk 
to your family for an hour but other than that you don’t have internet, you 
don’t have just calling people whenever you want and you don’t have TV. 
Everything that you do 24/7 from the minute you wake up until the time you go to
bed is about serving other people.

“Was it hard to give up those things like the Internet and cell phones?”

David: You know what? I thought it’d be hard but it was such..I just felt free. I 
didn’t have anything distracting me. I could hear my own thoughts better. I’m 
more in tune with the guidance of God and his spirit. I mean as a missionary you 
try to keep this feeling with you all the time, like always. That feeling is 
called the Spirit. It comes with you when you read, when you pray, when you obey 
the commandments of God. 

David: And that’s why a mission is so awesome because you feel a change happening in 
you because you’re able to do that and focus on it constantly. And you’re not 
perfect. I wasn’t perfect. It’s hard to be obedient all the time or keep your 
mind focused all the time. But I came here to focus and I want to help people 
and I want to have that feeling with me. I want to have that Spirit because that 
will change everything you do in the day.

“Something we hear a lot from returned missionaries is how much they love the
people that they serve and how that just goes with them from the mission, that
love. We have April from Chicago and she asks what have you learned from the
Chilean culture? That’s an interesting question.”

David: Yeah, oh the Chilean culture. Well I learned…wow…you know, I love Chile! 
Ahhh! It’s a lot like our home, Utah. There are mountains on both sides, at 
least in Rancagua where I was, you’re just surrounded by mountains and I just 
love that feeling; I felt protected and secure. And, the people are just really 
laid-back. They’re really easy-going and they’re pretty honest as well. And I 
liked that. They’re pretty honest on what was on their minds, what they were 
thinking and how they felt. And I liked that. But the food as well; I’m always gonna talk about food because I’m a food lovie, a foodie.

“As a matter of fact, that’s one of the questions from Canadian Archie, she asks
what are some of your favorite Chilean dishes?”

David: Well yeah, going along with Chilean culture, they eat these hot dogs. But 
they’re not your typical hot dogs. I didn’t really eat hot dogs a whole lot. I 
love these Chilean ones. They’re called completos. And the difference with them 
is….so it’s a hot dog on a bun but they put tomatoes, diced tomatoes, and then 
they put a bunch of avocado, mushed avocado and it is so good because I love 
avocados. That’s their most common thing that they eat. And of course the 
empanada. They have a lot of empanadas. They have this drink that they 
drink during the summer. If we start talking about food we’ll take the whole 
hour.

“What is an empanada?”

David: Empanada? Okay. Let me think. So it’s like a dough. It’s hard to explain in
English. They get a dough out and they fill it with…you can put cheese in them 
or you can put meat and cooked onions, carmelized onions. Or you can put 
chicken, they put corn and cheese and it’s so good. Just talking about it makes 
my mouth water. It’s so good. I like the baked kind. They either bake them or 
fry them. And they’re just good.

“Sounds like you were well-fed on your mission.”

David: Oh yeah. I gained. I had to lose it so exercise is important for me. I’m trying 
to keep the exercise going after the mission.

“One of the biggest questions that keep coming up is Mary Jean from The
Philippines asks “What are the things that motivated you to go on a mission in
the midst of a really successful music career?”

David: Yeah. Well once again I mentioned this in the Spanish one and it got me thinking 
a lot more about the whole experience. A mission is something I’ve always wanted
to do. It was never necessarily, oh I’m doing this, well forget about a mission 
see ya, ciao. It was something I always liked to do and when I got to the age I 
wondered about it. A lot of people said, well you don’t have to go on a mission. 
You’re already doing a lot of good where you’re at. You’re probably doing a lot 
more good now than if you were to leave and go to a different country, you know, 
leave the face of the earth but… and I thought well maybe this is my mission 
in my life. And you know it is part of it. You know, music is part of my mission 
in life.

David: But I was never satisfied with just not going on a mission. I felt like there 
was something I needed from that experience. I felt like there was someone there 
who was waiting for me. At the time I wasn’t sure exactly what happened. Now I 
know who those people are, their faces and experiences and just getting to know 
them. Watching them change. And me changing was just amazing.

“Those are lifetime eternal relationships, really. Ones that you bring into the
church. You touch their lives.”

“Is there one in particular you’d like to share?”

David: There are so many. People that you get to meet on your mission. People who are 
members of your church, then people who aren’t members of the church, strangers 
you get to meet and become friends with and grow to love and you just serve. And 
it’s just so crazy. You’re on the street and you want to help people. And it’s 
like you know what? This is what my time is for. I came here to help people. You
don’t have a phone, you don’t have internet, you’re not seeing what movie your 
friends are going to see that night. Nothing. What are people saying on my 
Twitter? No. Everything is about what can I do for someone. And you get to do 
that. Constantly. And you just watch people’s reactions and you just feel 
different doing that. But then getting to teach people, teach them principles 
that can help change their lives or can help them.

David: What I loved…there’s a quote, if you know who said this. Maybe it was one of 
the presidents of the church who said the gospel of Jesus Christ helps bad 
people become good and helps good people become better. And so a lot of times 
people were like, why do we need to talk to you? Tell me how you can help me?

David: We’re not here to tell everybody’s a sinner and repent but this will help your 
life. It will improve it. We met a lot of great people, but it helps good people 
become better. And I met some of the most pretty awesome-ist people. There was 
one family that I absolutely loved. They are just great. They were really close 
with their kids as a family together but they felt like something was missing. 
Just getting to teach them and see the change happen. Inviting them to do things 
like try living this commandment, try following this principle, come to church 
or try praying as a family every day and see what it does. Helping them get 
closer to who Jesus Christ was. And it’s just wow. I don’t know. I think you 
have to go on a mission to know what I’m talking about.

“You have to experience it. But the joy of service comes through. You can
just feel it. It’s something that so many people don’t understand, just how much
happiness can come when we serve. You have to experience it to really
understand.”

“Every mission has it’s highs and lows. We have a question from Trenton. It
doesn’t say where he’s from. He asks what were the biggest struggles you faced
on your mission? And how were you able to overcome and grow from such trials?
Did you ever experience homesickness?”

David: Yeah that’s something that…at the beginning you miss home. I was like I’m not 
with my siblings, I don’t know what’s going on, what they’re doing. I missed my 
Mom.

“Culture shock.”

David: The culture shock. (laughs) But then you just remember, why was I willing to 
come here in the first place? Why did I leave all that? Why? Well I came here to 
serve the Lord. I came here because I don’t know if necessarily that he needed 
me but I know that I needed it. I know that I did. He knew that I needed him.

“The great thing about missions is that it’s for both things. It’s for you and
your conversion and for those who you will reach and teach.”

“There’s a great missionary hymn called “Called to Serve” that missionaries love
to sing. Is that something that you would consider singing tonight?”

David: Okay. Yeah my pleasure.
Thank you.

David sings “Called To Serve”

“That was great. I have heard that song sung a lot but I never heard it sung
like that.”

“When you sang it with the other missionaries, did they stop and go, is that
David Archuleta?”

David: (laughs) I don’t know; I didn’t pay attention really.

“That brings up a good question. Did people recognize you when you got to
Chile?”

David: In Chile? You know what, they didn’t a whole lot which was nice so I was able to 
get the door slammed in my face all the time. I don’t know. I was still able to, 
I don’t know, you get people yelling all kinds of things at you. But you get to 
see if people are sincerely interested. There were times also when people knew who I was.

And it caught their attention.  What are you doing here in Chile? What’s your get up? It was really neat as well. It was a great tool. I mean not just who I was but music as well.

David: What was really nice was because most people didn’t know who I was,just getting 
someone to listen without any expectation, without just like oooh David 
Archuleta is singing to me. It was just, let me see what you’re going to sing to 
me. I don’t know who you are, I’m just walking down the street, or you’re 
standing at my door, this is kind of interesting. And then being able to sing a 
song. A lot of times people would even, you know, they wouldn’t be interested. 
You’re just a bunch of religions people on my doorstep trying to convince me 
of something else now. But when you’re able to…at least listen to our song.

“You used your music as a door approach it sounds like. Good for you; it’s very
creative.”

David: Yes.

“I’d be interested to know what was the reaction when you started singing
because obviously you don’t have our kinds of singing voices.”

David: Well half of the time I would sing…like a lot of times I would sing on my own 
but a lot of times I would sing with my companion because he had the same 
purpose I did. It’s not like well I sing better so I’m gonna let people feel the 
Spirit, not you. It wasn’t like that. If we’re both dedicated to this and we 
both believed what it was saying, they would feel the Spirit.
David: A lot of times, especially in the beginning of my mission, I didn’t know what to 
say. I didn’t speak Spanish and on top of that I wasn’t good at 
talking/teaching. It’s like, listen to the song because it says what we’re here 
for. And to see people and to see their faces change and then they’d invite us 
in. They always talked about the feeling they felt. It was neat to see that. It 
was not with any…it was not with any biased opinion to know that they felt 
something, they felt the Spirit and they understood our purpose even better.

“That’s great; music is so powerful. We have a question from a young woman in
Brazil, Delini. If you weren’t a singer what would you be?”

David: Hmmm. (laughs) Wow, you know, that’s a good question Delini. You know,  I

think something that I’ve been interested, I love watching people. I love observing 
them. That’s partly why I loved the mission so much. You get to meet people to 
see how they are, their lifestyles, their culture, their beliefs, their problems 
and to see the way their decisions and beliefs changes the way they live. Their 
lifestyle and what they look forward to in the future or why they are the way 
they are; that’s always been something that has fascinated me. I love things 
like that. I’ve thought about learning more about psychology or sociology.

“People watchers…It doesn’t pay a whole lot.”

“But it certainly influences your music. You observe and respond.”

David: I guess I didn’t think about it that way. I think with music and especially, I’ve 
always said a lot of times singers have to be interpreters. They have to be able 
to put themselves in someone else’s shoes. And it’s not just music that did that 
for me. I’ve always liked that. Ever since I was little I always wanted to 
understand other people; and maybe it’s had some kind of an effect on my music. 
It definitely had an effect on me on my mission and why I wanted to go on a 
mission but to be able to say, you know what I understand, and this is what 
helped me and I know it will help you. And it was cool to be able to combine 
that on the mission.

“Which is why it is so important for a missionary to really seek to understand
the people they meet and to determine what those needs are and interpret and be
responsive to those needs. Great missionaries do that. You’re a great
missionary.”

David: I don’t know. I learned a lot, that’s for sure. Thank you.

“This was an interesting question from Macarena in Ecuador. She asked the
question how do you keep your life in harmony with The Lord, even though you’re
surrounded by a lot of worldly influences like fame, money and popularity.”

David: We had this question come up in Spanish chat too. It’s a great question. What I 
said before in the Spanish chat. Well I don’t know if I remember what I said, 
but the question was?

“How can you be in the world you’re in because it’s a tough environment
sometimes I guess and how do you keep your life in harmony with the Lord?”

David: You know it’s so interesting because there are a lot of…especially in the 
entertainment industry, life in general. I speak to my sister and see what’s 
going on in the high school, in the junior high. in my work. A lot of people try 
to tell you this is going to make you happy, this is what is going to make you 
feel good and sometimes you believe them. Sometimes you do. Making a lot of 
money is what’s going to make you feel good. Or you know you’re successful when 
everyone knows your name or when everybody recognizes you. People are screaming 
your name. Sometimes you believe them. Well maybe that’s what success is. But 
after going through it, it’s like well okay that was cool. I got an adrenalin 
rush but why do I not feel better about myself? Why do I not feel successful and 
it’s like you look for it and it’s missing and that happened to me.

David: I remember just after doing American Idol and having the first album come out 
and all of that. Everyone was telling me this is what happiness is. Aren’t you 
on cloud nine? You must just be so happy right now. I guess I’m happy but at the 
same time I was missing something because everyone was telling me to look in 
here and if you do this you will feel better. I just didn’t. What’s wrong, it’s 
not working. Why don’t I feel good and I started getting depressed. I started 
feeling down and I kept trying to convince myself that everyone was right when I 
knew they weren’t.

David: That’s when I started realizing, you know what? I am forgetting the things that 
always made me happy, like my family, remembering who I was, that God was there. 
He had a plan for me. I was His son and if living a certain way, the way He 
asked me to, makes you feel good. And I started doing that again and during that 
time I didn’t consider myself inactive but I wasn’t going to church because 
people said you don’t have time to go to church. And some people said God will 
understand that you can’t go to church. But after a few months, I didn’t realize 
how it was affecting me. After that I started. I made a New Year’s resolution; I 
need to get my things in order here, going to church and spending more time with 
my family, even though I had to fly on the weekends back home and it wasn’t 
convenient exactly, but in the end it was because it was my family. I needed to 
be with them. I needed to be with my sisters. We’re still all young.

“What a powerful message to the youth to hear.”

“And the mission really helps show that contrast of life in the world and life
when you’re pursuing the things God wants you to do.”

David: What I realized, actually the pianist here, Kendra, she was actually the first
keyboardist in the first band I had. She was the only LDS member I had on the 
road with me and she said would you like to go to Church? I said we can’t go to 
church, we’re busy today. And she said well I found a church that starts at 9. 
You’re not closed and confined until noon. What if we just went to a Sacrament 
meeting and I thought oh. Before people told me that I couldn’t. I realized that 
I had more of a say than I thought I did. And I went. I started going to church 
every week and we were traveling all over the place but we were going to church.

“What difference did that make in your life?”

David: It was huge because it just made me realize I can still be myself, who I want to 
be and still keep the things that matter to me, with me. It didn’t matter to me 
what other people said. And even before that I was afraid of telling people I’m 
a Mormon. They’re going to think I’m a weirdo. But I still went to church and 
read my scriptures. I didn’t even tell people my religion, my beliefs. And that 
completely changed now. Now I just don’t care. That’s why we’re doing this. I 
don’t mind. But it made such an impact on me. It made me realize I don’t have to 
change my priorities. I don’t have to change them for anybody.

“David, this question just came in from Jackson. He’s in Utah. He writes David I
am here with my priest quorum, listening. What do you wish you had done to
prepare for your mission?”

“Oh in connection with that, this is a good one. Somebody named Lemhigh, if you
could go back to the past and tell yourself some advice, what would you say?”

David: Well to Lemhigh and to the Priest Quorum and to Jackson, I would have liked 
probably to have studied Preach My Gospel more which is like a missionary 
handbook. It tells you how to prepare and what you need to know to be a 
missionary. And you realize, well I don’t have all the scriptures, I don’t have 
the Bible and The Book of Mormon memorized. I’m not going to be able to teach 
people. But you don’t have to. You just have to be willing to dedicate yourself 
and to learn, to know a good enough amount but to be teachable. You have to be 
teachable on the mission and Preach My Gospel prepares you, teaches you how to 
be teachable. Does that make sense? You’re going to be studying that every day 
on your mission so you might as well start now. I mean Chapter 10, Teaching 
Skills, I think, that one was a huge help to me.

David: And you know, another thing I said in the Spanish one, because there was a 
similar question to this…is aside from the things that you’re always told to 
do, if you’re reading your scriptures daily, if you’re praying and keeping in 
touch with God daily, if you’re going to church and paying attention and seeing 
how you can serve there, you are preparing for your mission.
David: And another thing that I mentioned was something that helped me so much was 
being able to go to the Temple. That was such a huge help to me. You are there 
with no distractions. You are just there with The Lord in the House of The Lord and you can hear Him so clearly. But in the Temple it’s different. It’s clear. You can ask Him questions. Heavenly Father, what can I do to better prepare and you receive that guidance. That was something huge to me. And learning what the atonement was of Jesus Christ which is His sacrifice, when He died for us, when He suffered for our sins in the Garden of Gethsemane,  realizing how to apply repentance.

“I think we need another song.”

David: I think I get long-winded talking sometimes.

“No you’re doing great.”

David sings “I Need Thee Ever Hour”

“Wonderful.”

“Absolutely beautiful.”

David: Thank you.

“Here’s a question that just came in. It’s from Ali from Wisconsin, asks, even
though I’m not LDS, I’m Lutheran, you truly inspire me with your faith and
ambition. Thank you for that. There are many people with a shared faith and
ambition in different religions. What message of the gospel do you think is
universal to everyone you’ve met?”

David: Thank you, first of all, Ali. I think there are a couple of things, the biggest 
thing I think everybody wants to feel and looks for is they want to feel loved. 
Everybody wants to feel like there is a reason that they’re here. And people, I 
think, once they come to know God or even just feeling loved, they want to give 
it back. The more you feel loved the more you want to love other people.  And to 
get to know people and see them missing that, and looking for it, and them 
finding it, being able to be there to help them along and finding that through 
the gospel of Jesus Christ, through His teachings, and them gaining the desire 
to love other people more because they’re finding themselves, they’re loving 
themselves better, was something I saw in everybody. Everybody was looking for
that.

“I think that is one of the sweetest experiences of a mission you can get on a
mission feeling love.”

“This young man from Brazil, Vanisius, asks how has this mission experience
changed your relationship with God?

David: Wow. (laughs)

“That’s a good question isn’t it?”

David: Yeah, Ooh my mission. I would imagine if other people have served they probably 
have felt this way too. I thought I was close to God. I tried to be close to 
Him. Being on a mission and not thinking about yourself, focusing on serving 
other people, is what brought me closer to God than anything else. And making 
the time to study, really study the scriptures, realizing how important that was 
and realizing that I needed the Spirit to be with me in order to be a better 
missionary and realizing the things I needed to change to do that. I thought 
that by coming to the mission, by being obedient and giving this time, it would 
be enough. I would become closer to God automatically, like a factory with those 
little belts.

David: But I realized even doing that, even doing all I could it still wasn’t enough if 
I didn’t have the help of the Lord with me. That’s when I really humbled myself 
and realized how much I needed him. That even doing my best, doing all I could, 
that I was still going to be imperfect. I was still gonna mess up a lot and I needed him. And when you’re learning what the atonement was of Jesus Christ which is His sacrifice, when He died for us, when He suffered for our sins in the Garden of Gethsemane, realizing how to apply repentance.

David: Being honest with myself, being honest, admitting the things I was doing wrong 
so that I could change them and realizing how much I needed that help of the 
Savior to treat myself better, love myself better, love other people more and be 
closer to God. That is something invaluable that I would never ever trade in my 
life and I’m so grateful I went on a mission because I did not understand that 
until I went there and got rid of all those distractions and all my priorities 
that I had. It changed on my mission.

“Well that was beautiful. Thank you for sharing that.”

“You learn a lot of patience with yourself and others. One of the interesting
aspects of going on a mission is that you have a companion. You have a companion
24/7. So this question from Sam, he lives in Nevada is about that. He asks, I
stayed home from a trip to watch this and asks, what were your companions like?”

David: My companions. Sam. Well, Sam, I cannot complain about my companions. I had six from the U.S., the United States and I had seven from Latin America. They were 
all just great, from my first companion, him being a go-getter and just being 
adventurous. Gadamahama from Argentina. He was my trainer, and he was just full 
of energy and good with people. I was so anti-social. I was not good with 
people. I was just, you know what? I don’t know how he does it but he helped me
learn how to really love people. Be yourself. And two companions that were a 
little more difficult as well. I’m not gonna lie. I had some pretty hard companions and I got in arguments with them. I’ve always tried to be a peacemaker all my life.

David: There was this one companion I had, it was just hard. We just argued. But he was 
one of the best companions I had because even though we fought the most, there 
was probably not one I was closer to because when you get in arguments, when you 
get mad, you can’t just go away and avoid it. He’s right there next to you when 
you wake up the next day, he is right there. So you have to learn how to figure 
out and resolve what are those called in English?

“Differences?”

David: Differences, yeah, and arguments.

“Sorry to interrupt. I think this is from my grandaughter. She wants to know if
you have a girlfriend?”

David:  I don’t currently have a girlfriend but you know, especially on the mission 
we’re teaching about families and how they can be together forever and watch how 
happy they are you can’t help but want that. So I’m definitely getting to know 
people. Before my mission, I was so self-conscious and I was so focused on work
and so self-conscious. I probably went on one date one a year. A date a year. 
But that’s kind of dumb. A family is one of the most important things, greatest 
things you can have in your life.

“Here’s a follow up question.What would you say are the most important qualities
you look for in a future wife?”

David: Yeah. Well. I actually wrote a song about this because everyone was saying you 
need a love song, you need a love song. I don’t want to talk about shawty all of 
that kind of stuff. The song is called My Kind of Perfect. And so I’m definitely 
you know…the song says I’ll keep searching for my kind of perfect. It doesn’t 
say I’m waiting for my kind of perfect, sitting back and doing nothing. You 
know, you have to go search for that person. I learned that God will respond 
when you act. But going back to the list…

“You’ve been a little bit vague there.”

David: I’ve actually made a list of things and obviously, I don’t know if it’s cheesy
but I think it’s okay. I think someone needs to love the Lord.

“That’s not cheesy at all.”

David: OK. And I honestly, I hope that they would love, obviously it’s like a given, 
they need to love the Lord more than they love me. Then they will have their 
priorities set. If they can do that then we can make the same kinds of goals 
together and in our family. I feel like that lines a lot of things up. Someone 
who is confident, sure of themselves, carries themselves well, someone who is 
fun to be with, who can make me laugh. I think that’s important too.

“How about a singer?”

David: It doesn’t matter, it really doesn’t. They have to be supportive of what I do, I 
guess. I mean someone who hates my music, that would be pretty hard but if it’s 
someone who is obsessed with me, that’s kind of weird too, you know.

David: I think someone who loves the Lord; someone who’s…something I would say a lot, 
someone who’s…even before the mission I would say, I said in a fireside one 
time, someone who has virtue. You can look at them and tell, that’s someone who
gets what virtue is. And what is virtue? When I think of virtue, someone who…I 
think of the Temple when I think of virtue, like something clean and pure. 
Someone who strives to live their life that way. It makes all the difference. 
You can feel something different with them. You learn from them. I don’t know, 
it’s cool.

“That’s a great answer.”

“Izzy on Twitter says the youth in my ward are watching and want to know when
was the first time you were able to recognize the Spirit?”

David: Well I don’t have the greatest memory but because I would talk a lot about music 
I do remember how the Spirit would influence me and realizing when a song would 
make you feel closer, feel better, closer to God and when a song wouldn’t. It 
would make you feel kind of gross inside, kinda dirty and just lacking of feeling.

David: I remember when I was six years old, songs doing that to me. And some things 
prompting me to do things. I was six years old but that doesn’t mean that…you 
can still feel something good. I didn’t know it at the time but when I got 
older, especially when I was probably, was a teenager I think, you have a whole 
lot of emotions going through you when you’re a teenager when you’re trying to 
find yourself. When I hit twelve and thirteen I was just going through a whole 
lot of emotions but even more when I started realizing how big of a difference 
it made in music, in my friends, people I was around.

David: There was a time I didn’t surround myself with the greatest people. They didn’t 
do the greatest things but as I got older, like sixteen, I started realizing how 
everything impacted the way you felt. Basically now that I realize whether you 
have the Spirit with you or not, from the conversations you’ll have, from a 
movie, being willing to get up. One time I was with my sister. People were 
telling me what a funny movie it was but we were watching it and we just looked 
at each other and we both realized that we felt something not with us. We didn’t 
feel good. She was like, should we leave and I said yeah let’s go. Even though 
we paid for it we both left and felt good afterwards. Every little thing makes a 
difference from who you choose to surround yourself with to the songs you listen 
to, to what you’re thinking about. I know it’s hard to control your thoughts and 
sometimes our thoughts just come when something you don’t know just comes across 
but do your best to hum your favorite tune or something. It makes such a 
difference.

“This has been delightful.”

David: Thank you.
It’s a privilege to be here with you two as well.

David sings “The Spirit of God.”