Transformation: Making Your Life Work

Part Two of a series of articles looking at Prison Reform

Transformation: Making Your Life Work

My name is John Valverde and I served 16 years in prison. During that time people helped me, supported me and I was able to transform every area of my life by facing my guilt honestly, owning my 100% responsibility for my wrong, and committing myself to being life-giving in all I did. As a result, I re-entered society 1 year ago a transformed person full of possibility and potential, but also a good deal of fear.

Albert Einstein said:
“A human being is part of the whole, called by us ‘universe,’ a part in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings, as something separate from the rest—a kind of delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a prison for us. Our task must be to free ourselves from the prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty.”

We must be compassionate to experience the truth that we are all one. How can we apply this? And how does this relate to transformation? To lead a truly transformed life and truly make your life work, you must have compassion for yourself and others. For it is not enough to make your life work—you must also assume responsibility for helping others make their lives work as well. We are all connected and our individual actions really do impact the whole.

John Heider wrote an adaptation of the Tao Te Ching that reads:

“If your life works, you influence your family. If your family works, your family influences the community. If your community works, your community influences the nation. If your nation works, your nation influences the world. If your world works, the ripple effect spreads throughout the cosmos.”

These concepts of making your life work and oneness are what transformation is all about. Just as Jesus healed the blind, we too must see with new eyes, with compassion, and see that we are all one. For it is not enough for persons to transform their lives only to return to a world that will reject them.

In December of last year I attended a 3 day self-empowerment seminar in NYC. It was the first time I stepped out of my comfort zone of family and friends since my release from prison that April. It was my intention to begin to face the world without hiding my past, because I knew the hiding was limiting my life.

On the first day, the seminar leader used several crime references like: If you don’t set boundaries for your children, you are turning them into criminals and if you don’t exercise your full potential you might as well be in prison for the rest of your life. Every such reference resulted in the chuckles, gasps, sighs of disgust and the judgment of the 170 participants. Even though no one knew me and about my past, I felt dehumanized and personally attacked. Quickly, I began to think that perhaps this was not the safest place to open up.

Then, on the morning of the second day, the seminar leader spoke about fear and how it can make a person return to prison. He said that a certain state prison system had a recidivism rate of 85% (most states are between 60 and 80 percent). He explained that was the rate at which people committed new crimes after being released from prison. 8.5 out of every 10 people were coming back to prison. This resulted in more chuckles, gasps, sighs of disgust and judgment from the audience. In an effort to address this problem, the organization running the seminar was asked to go into the prison system to find out why it was happening. Asking people who had returned to prison WHY they had returned, over and over they heard: I WAS MORE AFRAID OF PEOPLE IN SOCIETY THAN I WAS OF BEING IN PRISON. The seminar leader then made a joke. He said, “Of course! Three meals a day, a place to sleep, no bills and they even get conjugal visits from time to time.” More chuckles, gasps, sighs of disgust and judgment… And I felt like the lowest person on earth.

But it also triggered something in me to stand up and represent that there are many people in prison who have dedicated themselves to making their lives work. Call it God’s nudge, or courage, or perhaps foolishness, but I felt the need to speak. So when the seminar leader asked people to come up to the microphone to complete the sentence: I AM AFRAID OF…

I stood up. People before me finished the sentence by saying they were afraid of their boss, failure and smoking. Then I got up to the microphone and said, “I am afraid of all of you.”

“I am afraid that you will judge me, fear me, reject me and even hate me if you know my past.” I was amazed, as people started to break down in tears. It was a room full of successful professionals and they apparently also had a fear of rejection. I then shared my story of what had happened to me all those years ago and my remorse for it and asked the 170 people there to have compassion, give me a chance and help me make my life work because I did not want to live in fear of society’s judgment anymore.

I feel blessed to share that the response I received was overwhelmingly positive with people sharing their own dark pasts and fears and their desire for compassion and forgiveness. Others told me that they had often considered volunteering in a prison and that now they would. Even a former prosecutor from the Bronx asked me to help her start an organization that would help men and women recently released from prison find jobs. My life has changed completely since that day because I shared my transformation and commitment to making my life work and asked others to support me.

Because as usual, God says it best, I was inspired to put together the following adaptation from three Bible readings:
If people repent with all their heart and soul, grant them compassion, forgiveness and support. 1 Kings 8.46-53 For God has called us to love one another as God loves us and help each other bear fruit—fruit that will last. John 15.7-17 So do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds and see that we are all one. Romans 12.1-12.8

My name is John Valverde. I served 16 years in prison. I have transformed my life and am committed to making my life work. I did not reach this point alone. Please remember that we are all one and we are all called to make our lives work and help others do the same. By doing so, we can make our world work and the ripple effect will spread throughout the cosmos.