--- title: "David Schmidt of LifeWave: Why True Leadership Requires Embracing an Attitude of Service Over Being Served" url: "https://authoritymag.co/articles/david-schmidt-of-lifewave-why-true-leadership-requires-embracing-an-attitude-of-service-over-bei" publisher: "Authority Magazine" author: "Authority Magazine Editorial Staff" authorUrl: "https://authoritymag.co/authors/authority-magazine-editorial-staff" interviewee: "David Schmidt" company: "LifeWave" category: "Business" datePublished: "2026-03-01T01:25:17.214Z" dateModified: "2026-11-12T17:04:31.408Z" tags: "Business" --- # David Schmidt of LifeWave: Why True Leadership Requires Embracing an Attitude of Service Over Being Served *The Founder and CEO of LifeWave shares how enduring near-bankruptcy, practicing persistence, and leading through service shaped his multi-decade inventing career.* > I would walk for hours on a Sunday and pray to God to show me a path forward because I believed that LifeWave was the path that I was intended to walk in life. --- E*very leader’s journey is shaped by pivotal moments, but sometimes a single decision can alter the entire trajectory. What is that one choice that redefined your path and changed everything for your leadership journey? How did it impact your approach, vision, and success?* *As a part of this series, we had the pleasure of interviewing David Schmidt.* *David Schmidt is the Founder and CEO of LifeWave, as well as the inventor behind its groundbreaking phototherapy technology. With over 30 years of experience in product development, he holds 94 patents worldwide, including more than 70 in regenerative science and technology. Before founding LifeWave, David led multiple ventures, including Advanced Applications Group, which developed energy systems for the U.S. Navy and General Dynamics. His research into using light to support stamina and regeneration naturally led to the development of LifeWave’s globally recognized wellness solutions. A visionary inventor and entrepreneur, David speaks widely on regenerative medicine, human performance, and the science of longevity.* --- T**hank you so much for joining us in this interview series. Before we dive into our discussion, our readers would love to “get to know you” a bit better. Can you share with us the backstory about what brought you to your specific career path?** From an early age, I wanted to be an inventor. At about the age of eight, my parents took me to the laboratory of Thomas Edison in New Jersey, and from that moment, I knew I wanted to be an inventor. However, I did not know how that was actually going to happen. Over the course of my work career, I pursued entrepreneurial endeavors, and then in the mid to late 1990s, I had the opportunity to perform work for the United States Navy through various government contractors. This work involved developing survival equipment and gave me the opportunity to get paid to invent. During the course of this work, I was invited to be part of a design team for the Navy’s next-generation mini-sub program where I created ways to improve the survivability of the crew. This eventually led to the development of initial LifeWave technology, which I took to market in 2002. **Can you share the most interesting story that happened to you since you started your career?** When you’re an entrepreneur and you’re taking on the marketing of new technology, there are certainly many interesting stories and events that happen over the course of a career. In fact, It’s difficult to choose one that stands out over another. However, I can share a story of what happened to LifeWave in October of 2006. At that time, the company was the victim of a credit card fraud scheme, and we nearly went out of business. By December of that year, there was no money to make payroll, so I emptied my personal bank account to pay our employees so they could enjoy their Christmas. But I had no idea how the company was going to survive past that single paycheck. Fortunately, sales were enough to barely cover expenses the next month, but it was evident that at any moment, we could be facing bankruptcy. I would walk for hours on a Sunday and pray to God to show me a path forward because I believed that LifeWave was the path that I was intended to walk in life. But I simply did not know how to keep the company going since money was so tight, so I prayed for guidance. Then, in March of 2007, I came home on a Friday to find that there was a letter from the IRS. I opened the letter thinking that this was bad news, only to discover that this was a refund check for $163,000; we had overpaid on our taxes the prior year! This money allowed the company to survive through 2007. Then, as we headed into 2008, we picked up new brand partners and began to grow. Miraculously, we grew so quickly from that point that company sales doubled each year for the next three years doubled. This is always a reminder to me that we need to keep a strong relationship with God, especially in difficult times. **What do you think makes your company stand out? Can you share a story?** LifeWave is composed of remarkable people who genuinely want to offer a new technology capable of reducing human suffering, especially in the area of natural pain relief. When you speak with LifeWave Brand Partner Leaders, they are focused on solving problems — helping people reduce discomfort, improve their energy, or just helping a friend get a better night’s sleep with our products. There have been so many occasions where I’ve seen this for myself at LifeWave meetings across the world. For example, I was in the Philippines with LifeWave Brand Partner, Roy Surjono, and we were conducting a seminar in Manila for the head of a local hospital who had significant knee discomfort in both knees from playing basketball in his youth. He offered to participate in a demonstration of our technology. Within minutes of applying our patches, his knee discomfort was completely gone. We then had a line of professionals wanting to experience this for themselves. After that, we continued demonstrating the technology with great success for the next 30 minutes. **Which three character traits do you think were most instrumental to your success? Can you please share a story or example for each?** The three character traits that I would point to as having contributed the most to my success would be 1) faith, 2) patience, and 3) persistence. Faith: What I have found through experience is that when I start and end my day with prayer and giving thanks for all of the gifts that I have been blessed with in my life, the challenges that I have faced can be more easily overcome. Patience & Persistence: Since my primary profession is being an inventor, when you are working on and developing a new technology, it requires an incredible amount of patience and persistence. Very often, developing new technology is a multi-year process. In the case of our top-selling product, which is X39, this was more than ten years in development. Fortunately, the skills of patience and persistence also apply to business. In order to overcome challenges in business, as well as pursue large, impactful projects, these qualities are mandatory. As an example, we embarked on a multi-year, multi million-dollar project to develop an extremely innovative welcome center at our headquarters in Utah. There were many challenges along the way. For example, we’d spent a lot of time and money building a section of the Welcome Center as a large, interactive tunnel, only to discover after it was built that we had no way to get it up to the fifth floor in our building where the Welcome Center would be. We thought we may have to completely disassemble the tunnel, then reassemble it indoors which wasn’t feasible. After a lot of research and negotiation, we finally found a solution that involved removing an outside wall of the building and hoisting the tunnel into the building with a construction crane. I have found over the years that problems always have solutions, but often it takes a bit of prayer, innovation, patience, and persistence to get the job done. **What was the pivotal decision that transformed your approach to leadership, and what prompted you to make it?** From my perspective, leaders are people that serve, as opposed to being served. It is the responsibility of a leader to show their organization what the mission and vision for the company is, and the best way to accomplish this is by adopting an attitude of service to others. What prompted me to adopt this way of thinking was seeing how, back in 2005, our IceWave® product was rapidly relieving discomfort for our customers. Naturally, most people that I encountered were very skeptical that a product that only worked with light could achieve results when it comes to pain relief. So, I quickly learned that I needed to be the one to prove it. So, I began demonstrating to anyone that needed it. I ended up doing thousands of demonstrations as a result. This created a group of brand partner resellers that saw the vision and repeated what I was doing. They, in turn, went out and provided relief to others around the world. We very rapidly developed a company culture of service to others and improving quality of life as our core mission. **How did this single choice impact your personal growth and your view on what it means to lead?** You start to view the world through the eyes of others. What that means is that when you work with someone who’s suffering and in pain, you look to see the world through their perspective and the difficulties and challenges that they face because of their suffering. This allows you to have empathy and then be a vehicle for providing a solution to help that person. In turn, you get to feel an enormous sense of gratitude and reward because you know that you’ve made a difference in that person’s life, and by helping enough people, you can change the world one life at a time. **What were some of the immediate and long-term effects of this decision on your team or organization?** Most companies are focused on earning money and making a profit, and this, of course, is fine because companies have to make a profit in order to stay in business and provide their service or product. However, when the mission and vision of the company are more focused on serving humanity, providing relief, and improving overall wellness as opposed to just making money alone, the heart and soul of the business attracts people outside the community. It becomes a cultural and community experience. So, one of the long-term effects of focusing on servicing the needs of others is that people join our company and community because they want to be a part of this movement; it’s not just about earning money. **How did you handle any uncertainty or doubt while making this critical choice?** Honestly, I didn’t have uncertainty or doubt because the whole process was extraordinarily organic, and it always felt like the correct path to pursue. **What lessons did you learn from this decision that you continue to apply in your leadership today?** We approach every interaction with our brand partners and community with gratitude. We recognize the hard work and efforts that they put in to improve the quality of life of others. We use our conventions and other events as a way of saying thank you for everything that our brand partners do for the company. This has created an enormous shift in the way that we approach our events, especially over the last two years. So, for example, we look at creating events that are experiences that they will remember for the rest of their lives. So, in addition to having the typical product and business training, we offer evenings filled with memorable entertainment and celebration to say thank you. At our 20th anniversary event, we had performances by the original Blues Brothers, Gwen Stefani, and Maroon 5. And in 2025, we had private concerts with The Doobie Brothers, Jacob Collier, and Elton John. It was really incredible being able to have three Grammy Award winners at our conference, and I believe our brand partners were able to feel our appreciation and gratitude because of it. **What are your “Five Things You Need to be a Transformational Leader”? If you can, please share a story or an example for each.** **1. You must have a relationship with God; a daily life of prayer and meditation. Put God’s will before your own.** **2. Love for humanity. If you are not working from a place of love for others, your motivations for doing something will not be in line with the greatest good.** **3. Mindset; belief that you can accomplish anything given enough time, planning, and resources.** **4. Patience.** **5. Persistence.** **If you could start a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be?** Five years ago, I started a company called Thunderstrike Aviation, Inc. The objective was to design and build an entirely new way to power drones to bring medical supplies and our patch products to those in need, working with organizations like the Red Cross. The unexpected outcome of this project was the development of a unique 20KW home power-generation unit. This unit will offer clean, abundant electrical power on a level never seen before. I know that offering the world an abundant source of clean energy will do a tremendous amount of good and I can’t wait to see the impact on the lives we serve. **How can our readers further follow your work online?** On our social media channels (see below) as well as at [www.LifeWave.com.](http://www.LifeWave.com.) [https://www.facebook.com/LifeWaveHealth](https://www.facebook.com/LifeWaveHealth) [https://www.instagram.com/lifewavecorporate/](https://www.instagram.com/lifewavecorporate/) [https://www.linkedin.com/company/lifewave-corporate/](https://www.linkedin.com/company/lifewave-corporate/) [https://www.youtube.com/user/LifeWaveVideos](https://www.youtube.com/user/LifeWaveVideos) **Thank you for sharing these insights!** --- Source: https://authoritymag.co/articles/david-schmidt-of-lifewave-why-true-leadership-requires-embracing-an-attitude-of-service-over-bei (Authority Magazine, Business). Interviewee answers are first-person statements of the guest. 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