After more than 40 years many of Werner Erhard’s ideas, as well as the many people who have built something from Werner Erhard’s notion of transformation, have become a part of society’s thinking and culture across the globe. This timeline tracks the evolution of Werner Erhard's ideas.
At age 28, Werner Erhard became the youngest Vice President of Parents Magazine Cultural Institute, a division of Grace & Company (child development materials)
Werner Erhard is known as one of the pioneers and foremost leaders of the personal training industry. Having introduced the breakthrough notion of “transformation” to the general public over 35 years ago, Werner Erhard’s ideas about transformation subsequently came to be seen as a powerful, practical, and relevant resource in contemporary society. In 1971, Werner Erhard’s ideas of transformation manifested into the overwhelmingly popular est Training. The est Training was delivered to over a million people in a 10 year period.
While only about 600 people participated in est Training by the end of 1971, it was the beginning of people getting that what is, is and what isn’t, isn’t and you are responsible for your life. People took on making a difference in their lives, their community and the world.
The Holiday Project, an independent non-profit organization was created by graduates of the est training. Volunteers nationwide organize visits and gift-giving to people confined in hospitals, nursing homes, shelters, prisons, and other institutions during Christmas, Chanukah, and other holidays throughout the year. The first Holiday Project visit occurred on Christmas Day, 1973 in San Francisco, California.
Inside of making a difference a group of est graduates formed the Holiday Project. A not-for-profit organization that gave people, who participated in the project, the experience of contributing to others with both time and simple gifts.
Erhard founded Prison Possibilities, a non profit designed to enable men and women in prisons to alter their predictable futures. This organization's programs demonstrated concrete results in significantly lowering the rate of re arrest and imprisonment among those inmates who participated.
Erhard founded The Education Network, a national independent grassroots organization committed to the transformation of education in the United States. The organization provided training in a set of non-traditional conversations that helped individuals realize their commitment to education. The Education Network aimed to create immediate and lasting results in the lives of students who will then impact the future of education in their communities.
Erhard began the CareGivers Project, an independent non-profit organization designed to renew and empower caregivers who are struggling with emotional, mental, and physical stress as they provide short- and long-term care to people with terminal illnesses.
The purpose of the Werner Erhard Foundation was to encourage and support research, communication, education, and scholarly endeavors in the fields of human well-being and transformation, both individual and social.
University of Munich, Munich, Germany: The Basis for Communication
Werner Erhard, Interviewed by Michael Toms with guests Sam Keen, Lloyd Moglen and Allan Cohen on New Dimensions Radio January 11, 1975
American Management Association, Annual Personal Conference, New York, New York: “The Structures of the Mind”.
Est goes international with Werner Erhard presenting the communications workshop in London and Paris.
University of Nebraska, Lincoln, Nebraska, Human Developmental Conference: Human Unity.
"The est Standard Training" by Werner Erhard and Victor Gioscia, Ph.D., Biosciences Communication 3:104-122, 1977
From The Journal of Individual Psychology Volume 31, Number 1, May, 1975 Werner Erhard, Erhard Seminars Training, San Francisco Gilbert Guerin and Robert Shaw, University of California, Berkeley Some 22,000 people have gone through Erhard Seminars Training (est) since its inception in 1971. The training consists of two weekends, totals between so and 60 hours and includes 225 participants. The training activities are designed to provide the participants with the opportunity to look at their behavior and experience in a new way and to incorporate their discoveries into their everyday lives.
Stanford University, Department of Chemical Engineering, Stanford, California: “From Physics to Metaphysics: Systems of Knowing About Knowing”
Department of Corrections, State of California, Sacramento, California
Werner Erhard began his career presenting to Academic Institutions. In 1976 he delivered a presentation on “Communications in Organizations" at Stanford University's Graduate School of Business
"Sixteen years ago there was no Werner Erhard. Five years ago there was no est. Today Werner Erhard and est are truly an American Phenomenon."
United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), Paris, France
Erhard sponsored ten Annual Theoretical Physics Conferences that each year brought together 15 leaders in the field to work on major unresolved issues in the field.
“Some Aspects of the est Training and Transpersonal Psychology: A Conversation”, by Werner Erhard and James Fadiman, The Journal of Transpersonal Psychology, Vol. 9, No. J, 1977
You and I want our lives to matter. We want our lives to make a real difference - to be of genuine consequence in the world. We know that there is no satisfaction in merely going through the motions, even if those motions make us successful or even if we have arranged to make those motions pleasant. We want to know we have had some impact on the world. In fact, you and I want to contribute to the quality of life. We want to make the world work.
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts: “Transformation and its Implications for Systems-Oriented Research and Education.”
Stanford House Staff Officers’ Association, Stanford University School of Medicine: “Paradigms of Transformation and Well Being"
Third Annual Convention of Instructors, Amherst, Massachusetts
American Dietetic Association, 60th Annual Meeting, Los Angeles, California
This film by John Denver's Windstar Foundation, by Keith Blume, was the key educational piece used by The Hunger Project from 1978-1980. Narrated by John Denver, the film features interviews with Gerald Ford, Hubert Humphrey, Donella Meadows, Annie Denver, land-reform expert Roy Prosterman and numerous others.
Written by Werner Erhard, 1977 You and I want our lives to matter. We want our lives to make a real difference - to be of genuine consequence in the world. We know that there is no satisfaction in merely going through the motions, even if those motions make us successful or even if we have arranged to make those motions pleasant. We want to know we have had some impact on the world. In fact, you and I want to contribute to the quality of life. We want to make the world work. When you look at making the world work, you are confronted by, and cannot pass over, the fact that each year 15 million of us die as a consequence of starvation. This unparalleled failure for humanity enables us to see that the world's unworkability is located in the very condition in which we live our lives. Thus, it is not people "out there" who are starving; people are starving "here" - in the space in which you and I live. You and I are working to make our lives work in the same condition that results in hunger and starvation.
Invited Lecture at National Health Federation, Pasadena, California
Werner Erhard is honored as a Knight of Grace by the Sovereign Order of the Hospitallers of Saint John of Jerusalem (Denmark) .
Young Presidents’ Organization Annual Meeting, San Francisco, California
Werner Erhard and Ramakrishna Bajaj built a charitable trust that established clinics to vaccinate children and educate mothers on how to protect infants from intestinal diseases.
“est: Communication in a Context of Compassion”, by Werner Erhard and Victor Gioscia, Ph.D., The Journal of Current Psychiatric Therapies, 1978
City College Lecture Series on the Politics of World Hunger, Santa Barbara, California: “The Ending of Hunger and Starvation within Two Decades”
California Dental Association Annual Meeting, San Francisco, California
Werner Erhard introducing John Denver at a Hunger Project Presentation in 1978. John Denver sings his newly written song, "I Want to Live." In the source document for The Hunger Project, Werner Erhard wrote, "You and I want our lives to matter. We want our lives to make a real difference - to be of genuine consequence in the world. We know that there is no satisfaction in merely going through the motions, even if those motions make us successful or even if we have arranged to make those motions pleasant. We want to know we have had some impact on the world. In fact, you and I want to contribute to the quality of life. We want to make the world work."
The Werner Erhard Foundation Integrated, worked with and supported numerous voluntary organizations to avert famine in Cambodia and Ethiopia, respond to earthquakes in Mexico, and combat the effects of flooding in Bangladesh.
A Visit With His Holiness The Dalai Lama On October 19, 1979, the eve of his departure back to India following a historic 49-day visit to the United States, His Holiness the Fourteenth Dalai Lama met in conversation with Werner Erhard at the First and Second Church in Boston. This evening presentation of The Werner Erhard Foundation before an audience of about 300 guests was an outgrowth of Werner's initial meeting with the Dalai Lama, the acknowledged "Pontiff of Buddhism," three years earlier. They first met in Dharmsala, India, the residence of His Holiness since 1959, when the Chinese occupied his Tibetan homeland.
MOTHER EARTH NEWS, March/April 1978 "The Hunger Project was initiated in the spring of 1977, and it presently has an enrollment of over 70,000 individuals in 29 different countries (est graduates and non-graduates alike). Simply put, the purpose of The Hunger Project is to bring about the end of starvation within 20 years. Erhard is confident that The Project will achieve its goal, and he makes a convincing argument to support his optimism.
Erhard spearheaded the Breakthrough Foundation, an independent non-profit organization dedicated to creating new direction in the lives young people through the Youth at Risk Program. The project won national acclaim for its outstanding results in turning around the lives of young people who were severely at risk for drug abuse, unemployment, and violent crime.
Four-day workshop for professors and professionals, San Diego, California. Participants: “Making a Difference”.
In Leonard Susskind's book, “Black Hole War” Susskind describes his debate with Stephen Hawking during the Werner Erhard Foundation Annual Physics Conference in January 1981
What is a fact is that the collective experiences of over 1,400,000 human beings who have gone through either the est training or the Forum series, and each of their particular contributions that have resulted from these experiences have certainly had an impact on America and the world.
Werner Erhard discusses EST at a research seminar sponsored by the Center for the Study of New Religious Movements, Graduate Theological Union. The research seminar included 17 other participants, who asked questions and commented on the speakers' remarks. Click "Find Out More" to hear an audio recording of this discussion.
Oxford University Union, Oxford, England: “The Nature of Transformation”
Advertising Club of India and Public Relations Society of India: “Communication in Action”
Lecture at Bombay Management Association, Bombay, India
Werner Erhard's Influence: Individuals Making a Difference Worldwide... Click to play video
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