Damon West
WSJ Bestselling Author & Keynote Speaker
Damon West, M.S. Criminal Justice, is a college professor, internationally known keynote speaker and Wall Street Journal best-selling author of The Coffee Bean: A simple Lesson to Create Positive Change, which Forbes’ listed in the “Top Twenty Books You Need to Read to Crush 2020.”
His autobiography, The Change Agent: How a Former College QB Sentenced to Life in Prison Transformed His World, vividly tells how he transformed the pot of boiling water that is a Texas maximum-security prison into a pot of coffee.
At 20 years old, he was a Division 1 starting quarterback at the University of North Texas, when he suffered a career ending injury. He turned to hard core drugs to cope with disappointments of life. After graduation, he worked in the United States Congress, was a national fundraiser on a U.S. Presidential campaign and eventually trained to be a stockbroker for United Bank of Switzerland (UBS). One day at UBS, he was introduced to methamphetamines; he became instantly hooked—and the lives of so many innocent people would forever be changed by the choices he made in order to feed his insatiable meth habit.
After a fateful discussion during his incarceration with a seasoned convict, Damon had a spiritual awakening. He learned that, like a coffee bean changing with the application of heat and pressure, he was capable of changing the environment around him. Armed with a program of recovery, a renewed faith, and a miraculous second chance at life, Damon emerged from over seven years of prison a changed man. His story of redemption, grit and determination continues to inspire audiences today.
Today, Damon lives a life of recovery and service, sharing his story all over the world. Of all the hats Damon wears, however, the two most important to him are being a husband to Kendell and a stepfather to Clara.