Happy Birthday

Happy Birthday to my friend and dear sister-in-Christ. Your continued prayers and support mean so much. My prayer for you is that your prodigals will continue to see the light. My prayer for you is that you continue to grow in the love, grace, and mercy of Jesus as you navigate your burgeoning relationships. May God bless you richly over the next year. Thank you for the ways that you bless me.

I am OK. I am Kenough

    Today marks my 4000th day of being incarcerated due to the weaponized false allegations of my son. Thankfully our yard remains stable and calm. While nothing too remarkable happened over the past 100 days to muse about, we have had to contend with the same heatwave as the rest of the northern hemisphere (1*)(*see endnotes for further explanation). Over the past one hundred days we were able to enjoy watching the third season of The Chosen, we had an opportunity to participate in a service project with Crossings Church, and we were given the chance to attend the Global Leadership Conference. We enjoyed the sweet bounty of watermelon from the OKDOC farm fields for a few weeks, and we were able to purchase Mazzio's Pizza as part of a fund-raising event. I have also started writing my first short story in a series I want to write about some of the men I have met in prison. It is tentatively titled The Bildungsroman of Monkey Island. I suppose that most significantly over the past 100 days my Higher Power presented me with an opportunity to move from my GED tutoring position into the realm of Career Technology (2) as a clerk and math tutor. This also afforded me the ability to move to a preferred housing status, which on this yard is a separate newer building, with fewer people, with more efficient air conditioning, and with men whose cleanliness, maturity, values, behaviors, and interaction styles more closely align with mine.

    Hot afternoons, a lull in my GED/clerking duties, and a few short lockdowns over the past 100 days means that I have spent a little more time reading while avoiding the summer sun. I especially enjoyed the thought provoking books The Power of Now (1999) and A New Earth (2005) by Eckhart Tolle as well as Think Like a Monk by Jay Shetty. I remember when these books first came out and Tolle made the TV circuits. He was hailed as a post-millennial genius by Oprah. I recall trying to read them at the time, but they were too ethereal, too "out there" for me to relate to, and seemingly too irrelevant to the life I was living and the young family that I was raising. I definitely did not have days, weeks, or years to set aside and contemplate my navel or the space time continuum, nor to be able to focus just on myself and my feelings. However, now that I am living in a post-covid, post-Trump, post-MAGA incarceral reality, I have some time on my hands. Most of this Day #4000 Reflection is me just processing what I have read about setting aside the ego, living in the is-ness of now, and making applications to the past 100-day period (as well as the soon to arrive 11-year anniversary of my incarceration on September First). Having experienced the disappointments of the results from my son's lies over the past 13 years, as well as my growing relationship with my Higher Power, I have a better appreciation for the knowledge that Tolle and Shetty are trying to impart: To get beyond the self, to serve others, and to be present in the here and now.     In 30, 35, or 40 years from now I do not want to be like the aging, regretful,1969 curmudgeon version of Indiana Jones wondering if my life really made a difference. I have very few regrets from my preincarceral life (though I do wish I had never crossed paths with Myrtha Mikel and not allowed my former mother-in-law so much influence in my children's lives). I have made solid moral choices during my incarceration. I also do not want to have regrets in my post incarceral life. There is no dice to roll (3) to guide my future or dial of destiny to turn to go back in time to change the circumstances of my past: so how do I move forward?
    

    Namely, I move forward by doing just that: every day I choose to place one foot in front of the other and I MOVE FORWARD! At the absolute most I only have 2205 days left of my sentence. Only 315 weeks. Only 22 more reflections to write. My freedom looms ever closer. While I hate being incarcerated, and especially still incarcerated at 54 years old, I am so thankful that I experienced the full richness of an entire lifetime prior to my Higher Power allowing this difficulty into our lives. I lived more life, engaged in more adventures, and experienced more love in my first 44 years of life than many men do in an entire lifetime. However, I feel that I am, right now, truly in the prime of my life physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually: and I am stuck in prison! I have posted before about what life was supposed to be like right now: two empty nesters on a full time 2-3 year missionary journey while waiting to be grandparents, possibly stepping into a governmental position, and maybe teaching college or being a counselor/therapist. But I have accepted what my reality entails. This prison is a mission field (although I cannot choose to pack up and go home when the experience is over), with plenty of people to reach out to. There are people I can teach. There are hurts I can listen about. There are hurting men I can listen to. I have just had to adjust my personal expectations about what the past 4000 days of the missionary journey that my Higher Power called me to entails, and just be about Their business where I am at. I need to quit focusing, worrying actually, about what the years 2043, 2053, and 2063 look like without a retirement account or 401K to fall back on. I just need to be focused on the now, because this moment is really all I have. I need to quit waiting on my "freedom" before I think that I can really do Their work, and just do Their work anyway, where I am at, right now. In Think Like a Monk Jay Shetty writes that, "real freedom is not being able to say whatever we want or pursue all our desires. Real freedom is letting go of things not wanted, letting go of the unchecked desires that lead us to unwanted ends. The key to real freedom is self-awareness [right now, where I am at]."

    Koans are paradoxes that require meditation to resolve. Being self-aware and living in the moment without expectations for the future seem to be opposite concepts in my mind. My natural tendency is to have plan A, plan B, and multiple contingencies options in plan C. I attribute that to my sense of self awareness, to living out the Boy Scout Motto to "Be Prepared!", and to my understanding the reality that all too frequently life throws us unexpected twists and turns. Life throws us pain. Life wounds us all (4). As I blogged about back on Father's Day, in the roughly nine months that I have been at Jess Dunn I have met some deeply wounded youngsters whom I have been able to connect with. In Think Like a Monk Shetty quotes Jean Dominique Martin as saying that "people come into your life for a reason, a season, or a lifetime." That has been very true over the past 571 weeks. I have met many men in this season of my life, most of whom will be forgotten. There are a handful whom I have met for a reason: either to help along in their sobriety, to encourage in their faith walk, or to develop an abiding friendship with as we support and lookout for each other in prison. There are a few whom I will have a friendship with forever and I am invested in their lives. I know that I have helped them grow more emotionally and psychologically fit as they have helped me grow more physically fit (5). Together we have all grown more spirituality fit. Together we have encouraged one another to Spot-Stop-and-Swap our negative thoughts. Together we have helped one another heal our wounds and calm our souls as we prepare for our eventual release and return to our loved ones. I recently watched a Pando podcast by Chris Beale of life.church.TV in a presentation titled "Waiting on a Miracle." In sharing his testimony about his son's tragic accident, he says that "The moment that we attach our expectations to [our Higher Being's] purpose, or the moment you attach how [your Higher Being] loves you to what you need [Them] to do for you, you have chosen to live life with a troubled soul." I have found that over the past 4000 days that the times when I have had a troubled soul (and there have been many times) are those times when I forget that my heart beats in the womb of the world: in, through, and with the permission of the way of The LIVING Water, for my good, and to Their glory. It is a result of the honest feedback in these deep abiding friendships that I have been able to grow through this incarceral journey when I feel that it has become depressing, nihilistic, and void of meaning.
    
    Lamentingly, in his book The Power of Now (1999), Eckhart Tolle purports that "the word 'God' has become void of meaning through thousands of years of misuse." This statement may be even more true 24 years after its original publication. He says that "the word God has become a closed concept, a mental image is created, a male someone or something". You'll notice I have yet to use that word so far in this blog. Over the past 4000 days of living with a wide variety of believers, non-believers, Muslims, Wiccans, Nordics and more, I would agree with Tolle that the word God has become empty of meaning and in fact can mean most anything. Even worse, I have seen in our chapel programs, on television, and in news reporting where too many evangelicals have weaponized that sacrosanct name to condemn any number of people who do not support their espoused holy views (6). These are supposedly Christ followers, yet they seem to be void of grace, mercy, and love. These swamp dwellers seem given to their emotional whims and are full of bile, hatred, and vitriol. I rather like Tolle's musings that "love, joy, and peace are deep states of Being....not simply emotions. This is because they arise from beyond the mind. Emotions, on the other hand, being part of the dualist mind, are subject to the laws of opposites". I think that is why I am so appalled by these two faced marshy modern-day Pharisees and more attracted to the portrayal of Jesus in The Chosen. In the series Jesus is portrayed as love, as peace, as joy. Tolle goes on to declare that "God is Being itself, not simply a being."

    In one of this year's blockbuster movies, the highly acclaimed sequel to Avatar, Tsireya shares with Lo'ak that, "the way of water has no beginning and no end. Our hearts beat in the womb of the world. The sea is your home before your birth and after your death. The sea gives and the sea takes. Water connects all things: life to death, darkness to light." I connect with her dialog in as much that I think that the Way of the Being has no beginning and no end. The Being is your home before your birth and after your death. The Being gives and the Being takes. The Being connects all things: life to death, darkness to light. The Being is the Way. The Door. The Word. The  Living Water or the "sea." The Beings' ways are higher than our ways, Their thoughts are higher than our thoughts. Life, globally, has something bigger going on than my personal problems or my feelings or my incarceration and I need to continually remind myself of that. WHEN I am able to release my ego, focus on my is-ness, and understand that what I view as "my life" is really an existence that has been created and allowed to continue in service to my Higher Power, THEN I am OK. 

    Keenly, in a preview of this Day #4000 Reflection that I posted back on Father's Day, I wrote that, "I am just realizing, or maybe I am just ready to admit, that I am OK. I am OK with receiving commutation, or six more years in prison. I am OK with never having either of my children back in my life, or if Brandon mans up, tells the truth, and reestablishes a relationship with me. I am OK if my parents transition to the next phase of our collective existence prior to my release, or if we get a few more years of freedom together. I am OK if I never have an emotional or physical relationship with a future life partner again, or if I fall in love again. I am OK if I do not get to experience being a parent or grandparent again, or if my Higher Power restores that dream and I get to be a patriarch. I will be sad if the negative side of the events I mentioned happens, but I will be OK. I have known that I will be OK for a long time now, years actually, but have hesitated to admit it, writing it down, and publishing it, because giving those thoughts the object permanence of ink on paper means that those thoughts become too real."     Eventually, upon further reflection, I realize that in that keen preview of this post I have assigned negative traits to one of these choices (listed above) over the other. If I truly believe that my Higher Power is in control and that They are directing my steps, then I should be OK, should choose to be OK, with whatever They have in store for me. And I should be OK with it, free of evaluation, assessment, or judgement. In A New Earth (2005) Eckhart Tolle says that "life will give you whatever experience is most helpful for the evolution of your consciousness. How do you know that this is the experience you need? Because this is the experience you are having at this moment." My job then is to discern why I have been allowed to continue to be incarcerated: to discover what my continued role is and to choose to be OK with that role. Unfortunately, as much as I try to be in the moment, to be present in today, in the role I have been assigned, letting go of yesterday, and being open (without expectation) of whatever the next moment, the next hour, the next day, or the next year may bring, I still struggle with letting go of my children. As much as my own children's rejection and abandonment have hurt me, and it has hurt me deeply, they are part of me, and I am a part of them. We are eternally linked. Completely severing those heart strings is unfathomably difficult if not impossible. This is the one area of my life that I do not think I will ever be OK with, without some form of reconciliation. Unlike Job, I could never be satisfied with new children to replace the old, regardless of how many more my Higher Power may fill my quiver with. Regrettably, I am just human, and I have to contend with the daily clarion that cries out "I want my children back! I want my life back!"
    

    Alas, I want my children back! I want my life back! It has been a hard lesson to learn, in fact it is a lesson I continually have to revisit, but I have a better understanding of Jesus' admonition that you have to be willing to walk away from the family, the job, and the finances that you were accustomed to: to create a new family, and to be a useful servant (Jeremiah 29:4-14). Jesus is recorded in Matthew 10:37-39 and Luke 14:26 as saying that anyone who loves their father or mother more than me is not worthy of me. Anyone who loves their son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Whoever finds their life will lose it, and whoever loses their life for my sake will find it. Jesus goes on to say in Matthew 19:29 and Mark 10:29 that everyone who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or wife or children or employment for my sake will receive a hundred times as much and will inherit eternal life. Matthew 12:46-50, Mark 3:32-36, and Luke 8:19-21 indicate that while Jesus was talking to the crowd his biological mother and half-brothers stood outside, wanting to speak to him. Someone told him, "Your mother and brothers are standing outside, wanting to speak to you." He replied to them, "Who is my mother and my brothers?" Pointing to his disciples, he said, "Here are my mother and my brothers. For whoever does the will of my Father is my brother and sister and mother." I would have failed that test. This is where my "idolatry" got the best of me as I placed my children and my role as father/husband on a separate but equal hierarchy with My Higher Power's status as Lord and King. Fleshing out this struggle between just being a seeker/believer and being an active follower/disciple is one of the reasons that I appreciate so much that the folks who wrote the script for episodes seven and eight of season three of The Chosen added the plotline of Peter and Eden's miscarriage. The script writers intuit how difficult this choice was for Simon Peter, as well as the other eleven of the chosen disciples, to put their duty to the long-awaited Messiah first and foremost. To watch them have to reconcile their spirit man's desire to follow Rabbi Jesus with their soul man's desire to have "normal" familial relationships, marriages, and children means that I am not alone with my fluctuating feelings: it means that I am normal and OK. To watch the personal anguish, frustration, and even anger that Peter had towards Jesus for allowing his pain-body to struggle in such as highly personal way (a thorn in his flesh?), as his wife suffers a miscarriage and their unborn child dies, was oddly reaffirming: it means that I am normal and OK.     Meditating on the Word and speaking positive affirmations, I continually tell myself that I am OK. I have been content for some time now to rebuild a "family" from the people that I am forced to live with. I have accepted an avuncular, big brother, "old-timer", "OG" role in prison. My Higher Power has arranged for me to cross paths with a few millennials whom I have practically adopted, to mentor and to support in their transition to fuller sobriety. And just when I truly feel OK with the "family" I am rebuilding, I emotionally relapse. During one of the live broadcasts of Crossings Church during the past 100 days they were relating the events of the summer, to include student and youth camp. I sat there relapsing, listening and feeling rather reticent, sorrowful even, over the fact that I was not at camp with my own kids this summer. Then I had to remind myself that my "children", aged 30 and 26, are adults (7), have been adults for a very long time, and would not have gone to camp for many, many years. However, if not for the lies of Myrtha Mikel and my son, I could have directed a camp or at least been able to volunteer as a chaperone had I wanted to. Now those opportunities to serve in that capacity may be lost to me forever.
    

    Often, I also emotionally relapse when I think about, and then miss, summer camp and VBS and teaching and Boy Scouting because for me, these were opportunities to serve my community. Providing, as well as receiving, acts of service is my primary love language (8) and the giftedness bestowed upon me by my Higher Power. At Crabtree I found an outlet to serve the men I lived with in my canteen position, but more importantly by facilitating a weekly Addicts at the Cross recovery group. At Granite I helped facilitate a Celebrate Recovery® on the Inside weekly small group. Both of these opportunities helped give my incarceral time some purpose. That has been harder to come by at Jess Dunn, although the need is just as great. However, on Thursday, July 13th, the Crossing Church partnered with Feed the Hungry and the OKDOC to allow about 150 of us to go to an FDA approved site to participate in a Pack-a-Thon event where we assembled, bagged, and sealed over 40,000 meals to be sent to Bangladesh. It was a very encouraging time of service and felt like I was doing something "normal (9)" for once. In Think Like a Monk Shetty quotes Gauranga Das, saying we should "plant trees under whose shade you do not plan to sit." He proposes that the highest purpose of our lives is to live in service and that selflessness heals the self. I think before you are able to do that, to extend that part of yourself, you first have to accept the circumstances of whoever and whenever and wherever the Higher Power has you situated.     Noteworthy in A New Earth (2005) Eckhart Tolle writes that "accepting means you allow yourself to feel whatever it is you are feeling at the moment. It is part of the is-ness of the Now. You can't argue with what is. (Well, you can, but if you do, you suffer) ....'Be ye perfect' means be whole....be what you already are - with or without the pain-body." This concept is perfectly displayed in yet another summer blockbuster, The Barbie Movie. Barbie is suffering her own existential crisis. Circumstances unfold that cause her to gain weight, shed a tear, and even contemplate death. Eventually, she slips out of her fashionable high heel shoes, her feet touch the ground, and suddenly she is thrust into a new reality. Boy, do I know that feeling. 4000 days ago, I was presented with brand new shiny silver bracelets, and my entire reality changed. I sat in Cell X of pod J11 in D.L. Moss and cried and snotted and contemplated death in an unhealthy way. I definitely was having my own existential crisis. In two weeks, I will have been incarcerated for eleven years. That is 1/5 of my total life: 1/3 of my adult life. So, when I do get out (and my release IS happening sooner than you think), I have to wonder, like Barbie, which life, pre- or post- awakening, pre- or post- incarceral, is the real life? Anyone who really knows me, knows that I am a genealogy buff. I have traced my ancestry back 20+ generations on most every branch. I understand my personal history and the stock that I come from. I acknowledge that I was raised in a Barbie dream world: raised naively in a well-intentioned protective bubble. Similarly, my parents were raised in a Barbie world, burst only by the Vietnam era. The ongoing conservative MAGA movement is all about the false narrative portrayed on television of the utopian 1950's Barbie World Americana. But that is not reality, was never reality, except for a few white privileged Beaver Cleaver-ish families, and then only for a very brief time. My folks were raised in a drug and alcohol-free environment, as was I, as were my children. Kimberly and I did not even allow them to be around cigarette smoke or consume energy drinks (though they knew they existed). I grew up not knowing anything about drugs, alcohol, what we now call LGBTQ issues, or HIV/AIDS until well into high school. Sadly, my parents never talked about politics, religion, or spiritual matters to include our common faith in Jesus. They definitely never made us cognizant of how drugs or alcohol actually effect families. The only things we were told by our parents was that drugs, beer, and sex were a one-way ticket to hell. This message was reinforced almost weekly in our fire and brimstone church of Christ upbringing. I was blissfully unaware of how addiction and abuse impacted families. I was naively unaware of how addiction and abuse impacted families. Kimberly and I raised our kids with more awareness of the world in which they lived, so that they could be aware of when their friends were struggling: no topic was off the table. However, even then I truly had no idea how widespread and pervasive the fallout from addiction and the associated abuses that accompany addictions were until my time in prison. Even as an educator who tried to be aware of family dynamics and diversity, I now realize there was a lot I was naive about, despite my efforts to be at the forefront of child advocacy. It was not until I was able to hear the similarities in testimony after testimony after testimony of fellow incarcerates that I realized the stranglehold that Satan has over humanity, especially over families, through addiction and addiction related physical, financial, psychological, and sexual abuse (10).
    
    Kenning that my release from prison is imminent I remain vigilant and prepared for what is to come. Which world am I going to step out into? After the past eleven years I cannot deny the pain, heartache, and warped futures that familial drug, alcohol, and physical/sexual/emotional abuse have wrought upon my fellow incarcerates when they were just youngsters! I can no longer turn a naive blind eye to the wounded around me. My Barbie dream world is burst! The bright neon pinks, blues, and yellows of happier times have been replaced by the drab greys, dingy white, and danger/alert orange of incarceration (10). How do I exit this experience and make a difference given the knowledge I now have? The veil is torn. It cannot be resewn. As much as I thought I was aware of the difficulties that some of my former students walked into my school with, I had no idea how much worse their neglect and abuse actually was. I will never again be able to look at a student sitting at a desk, or family sitting together on a pew, without wondering what might really be going on behind the scenes (11). How do I leave this place, how do I leave this experience, and make an actual tangibles difference for future students, educators, faith seekers and pew sitters? Do I write a book? Teach a college class? Podcast? Tour the country offering my testimony at Celebrate Recovery® meetings? At the conclusion of the summer blockbuster, when Barbie meets her creator, she had to decide what to do with the new experiences and knowledge that she had acquired. Similarly, I have to decide what to do with the new experiences and knowledge I have acquired. Do I remain in denial and try to recreate the world I stepped out of, or do I bravely move forward into the real, actual and factual world. I cannot go back in time. I have no dial of destiny to transport me back to 2009(12), so how do I move forward? I lean into the way of water: the Living Water. I set aside my ego, I focus on what I can do today, and I make myself available to serve and ease the burdens of others, in the hope that tomorrow will be a better than today. I remind myself that I am OK. I remind myself that I am Kenough.

Endnotes:

(1) One of the burdens of summer is putting up with oppressive heat. During the first eight years of my incarceration there was no air-conditioning at Crabtree. It was miserable in the summer. When I was moved to Cushing in 2020, during Covid lockdown, the one thing that made the move welcomed was having A/C. When Cushing shut down and I went to Lawton for the sizzling summer of 2021 I would often find myself shivering due to the arctic blast in our cell. Granite had a brand-new A/C unit that kept our small rooms frosty during the oppressive heat of 2022. Unfortunately, here at Jess Dunn I am on a unit with a very old, very inefficient A/C unit that is inadequate to perform its job, when it does work. The world is experiencing its hottest temperatures ever in the summer of 2023 and I am on the third floor of a building with a very inefficient air-conditioning unit, with windows that do not seal, living with Meth heads that keep opening their windows because they believe a 99 degree whisper of a breeze is somehow cooler than A/C that only cools the unit down to the mid-eighties (and of course they do not have a personal fan because they keep selling it off the buy their Meth). It is inhumane to be warehoused in chattel runs that are over 100 degrees for several hours at a time. As if the heat were not enough, there are more flies inside of our unit than I remember being buzzed by while canoeing the Boundary Waters of Canada. Then, as if deathly heat and swarming flies were not enough, I have to endure all of the smoke from the cigarette, marijuana, K2, and THC wax that is exhaled around the clock. Hell could not be much worse than having to breathe toxic secondhand smoke all night long because security will not enforce the no smoking policies.

(2) Career Tech was my first professional job the summer after I graduated high school and Vo-tech in 1987. When the dental assistant instructor had to take an emergency leave of absence I was invited to fill in and facilitate the summer program for prospective middle school students. It was then that I realized my true calling. Read Legacy part 1 on 1-24-22 and Legacy part 2 on 3-12-22.

(3) I wrote on Thursday, June 23, 2013 Day #300 that there is no need to flip a coin, draw straws, lay a fleece, carry a rabbits foot, cross your fingers, use a Ouija board, eenie-meenie-miney-moe-catch-a-tiger-by-the-toe, consult the Urim and Thummin, or roll the dice to know how to act, react, or make a decision. Now that we have the indwelling of the Holy Spirit to guide us, there is no reason to be using games of chance to make decisions. The Word, Holy Spirit and prayer are sufficient for discerning our Higher Power's will for us today. They have a plan: a perfect will for our lives, and a permissive will that allow for us to choose to align ourselves with Their perfect will, or to choose to go our own way. In texting language my DOC #663423 spells out NO DICE. I corelate these words to Proverbs 16:33.

(4) In Think Like a Monk Shetty quotes Iyanla Vanzant saying, "until you heal the wounds of your past, you will continue to bleed. You can bandage the bleeding with food, with alcohol, with drugs, with work, with cigarettes, with sex; but eventually it will all ooze through and stain your life. You must find the strength to open the wounds, stick your hands inside, pull out the core of the pain that is holding you in your past, the memories, and make peace with them." Shetty added that "once you've unpacked your own bags and you've healed yourself (mostly), then you come to relationships ready to give. You won't be looking to them to solve your problems or fill a hole. Nobody completes you. You are not half. You don't have to be perfect, but you have to come to a place of giving. Instead of draining anyone else, you're nourishing them." I find great satisfaction in helping nourish the men that Being has had cross my path over the past 4000 days.

(5) from Think Like A Monk p. 76 Am I planting seeds or weeds by working on my fitness goals? Are my efforts self-motivated to be fit and healthy in my mid 50's and beyond or are my efforts to reenter the world with a "revenge body"? External goals cannot fill internal voids. No external labels or accomplishments can give me true confidence. I have to find it in myself. (6) I wrote "I've [heard from] our chapel [volunteers], on television, and news reporting where too many evangelicals have weaponized that sacrosanct name to condemn any number of people who don't support their views. These are supposedly Christ followers, yet they seem to be void of grace, mercy, and love. These swamp dwellers seem given to their emotional whims and are full of bile, hatred, and vitriol." From where I sit, from what I read, and the podcasts I listen to it appears that extreme right-wing conservatives have drank the same marsh water, in the name of God, and are pissing around the same stump. I do not have to wonder why poll after poll shows that church attendance is diminishing and millennials and zoomers identify as nonreligious. How are we possibly supposed to reach out to the hurting, the addicts, the drag queens, or the LGBTQIA+ community with the love of Christ while condemning them as lesser than fellow creations of that same great Being. GenXers, Millinials, and Zoomers just don't think like the Silents, Boomers, and MAGA adherents. Take the DeSantist anti-drag movement.... they are obviously ignorant of the clothing/fashion history and the historical eras that our Founding Fathers of our spiritual faith as well as of our nation found themselves living in. Jesus and the disciples didn't wear 501's. They wore skirts and shives. Our nations forefathers wore hosiery, garter belts, high heels, pantaloons, bodices, fancy wigs, strong perfumes, and makeup to include lipstick. Ron "desanctimonious" DeSantis would have them banned and run out of the country had they been alive today and wearing those clothes in his state: in his America. (7) I sometimes find myself forgetting that my children are adults. By the time I was the ages that they are now I was married, had two children, and owned and flipped my first house. When my mind wanders like that, I worry that over the past 11 years that I have become institutionalized and that I am not fully present in 2023. I can't afford to get stuck back in 2009 when my son betrayed us, or in 2013 when I was ripped away from my daughter, my wife, and my life. I must be vigilant to remain relevant and up to date because I am all too soon returning to the real world outside of these fences. (8) read Gary Chapman's Five Love Languages or Gary Thomas' Sacred Pathways. (9) It is nice to feel normal. Serving others makes me feel normal. I have worked with Habitat for Humanity® in Thunder Bay, Canada, in New Orleans, LA, in Oklahoma City and in Durrant. I've created adobe brick and then used those bricks to build a clinic for the dump dwellers in Piedras Negras, Mexico. I've back packed medical supplies into remote villages of the former Sandinista strongholds in the Nicaraguan and Honduran mountains. My wife, children, and I spent two summers working with underground home churches in Guangzhou, China teaching English. I have feed the homeless under bridges and in soup kitchens. I have done bedbug abatement, painted houses, and cleaned up after hurricanes and tornadoes. Our few hours working with Feed the Hungry was every bit as fulfilling and it felt humanizing and normal to be serving in such a small but significant way. (10) read Reflection Day # 200 (from 3,800 days ago) posted March 3, 2013 "A Dozen Shades of Grace. A Dozen Shades of Grey."

(11) This should bring double shame on my son for his "running away" and eventual perjury. He is a Karen, vengefully crying wolf, to his own financial advantage. I hope and pray that now that he is 30 that he is becoming more and more aware of the idyllic life he had prior to his lies, is suffering the consequences of his lies, and that his eyes are opened up to what actual and factual abuse looks like. Shame, shame, shame, on him. (12) I often wonder, if I could travel back in time, at what point in the past could a different decision had been made to change my current circumstances? MAYBE turning the dial back to the summer of 2009 and turning down the administrative role at Skelly? That would have precluded me ever meeting Myrtha. MAYBE turning the dial back to October 2009 and being more vocal when Myrtha was attempting her power move? MAYBE turning the dial back to any point in raising my son curtailing Brandon's deepening relationship with his grandmother, especially after she let him crash her car through her garage wall when he was just 14. MAYBE turning the dial back to 2008 when I first noticed that the screen on Brandon's bedroom window kept falling off, eventually developing a bend in it, and the only explanation that occurred to me while I was replacing it was that the winds whipping off of the golf course were making it fall. Had I known in 2008 that he was sneaking out at midnight to have sex with his girlfriend (hell, had we even known Kelsey Spears was his girlfriend), as well as smoke marijuana with her, then we could have avoided this part of our life. MAYBE turning the dial back to 2007 and not deciding to take in an exchange student, causing Brandon a little jealously? MAYBE turning the dial back to my eleven- or twelve-year-old self and not looking at my uncle's porn magazines, which might have avoided or delayed my undesirable internet use that ADA Sara McAmis then used to try to make me look like a heathen in front of the jury. MAYBE turning the dial back to 1993 when I felt the Lord tell me to set things right with Kimberly......if I had ignored the Lord's prodding......but I dismiss that thought quickly because I love(d) her. I love my son. That alternate timeline choice would never have brought my daughter into existence, and my life would not have been as rich without the three of them. My life, my family, was idyllic until Brandon's perjury was used to prop up the lies of Myrtha Mikel and Bella Mendoza (the lies that they admitted to at trial resulting in the acquittals of the original weaponized false allegations). MAYBE turning the dial back to August 2012 and being less trusting of my attorney and insisting that Kimberly and Monica be called to the stand as witnesses, despite McAmis' plans to excoriate my wife. #Think_like_a_monk

Happy Birthday

 Dear Daughter,

I love you. I miss you. Happy 26th birthday. Prayerfully, next year, we can celebrate in person.

Happy Birthday

 Happy Birthday. God bless you for the way you bless me.

#GLS23

 I was thrilled to be able to attend the 2023 Global Leadership Summit over the past two days. The Crossing Church facilitated the opportunity for us to watch the live worldwide broadcast. Each inmate had to pay a small, but affordable fee, and it was well worth it. Over the sixteen-hour event we heard from fifteen encouraging and positive speakers on current trends in leadership and how to be effective leaders in a post-covid environment. The Crossings Church catered the event blessing us with Mazzios Pizza and Chic-fila, as well as coffee, lemonade, and snacks.

Coincidentally, after living on Unit B2 for 8 months I moved to Unit D on Wednesday evening before the summit began on Thursday morning. This two-day event was a good way to spend some final extended quality time with my workout crew and my nephson/little brother, CMcD, and Justin before he transfers to a work center. While on the same yard, being on a different unit is effectively like moving to another state. Unfortunately, the closeness and comradery built while living inside the tight proximity of a particular unit are effectively severed when you switch units. Being able to enjoy this summit together, and the special meals, allowed us to celebrate our friendship while encouraging each other to become better leaders in our families, in our vocations, and in our communities. In addition to participating in #GLS23 and celebrating some significant relationships, the other most important part of the past two-day event was being validated and humanized by the ministry team from Crossings Church. In the eleven years that I have been incarcerated, with the exception of two truly compassionate Christian ladies, I have felt like I am little more to the OKDOC than a nameless tally mark on someone's chattle spreadsheet. However, these people from Crossings Church walk out their talk, put their money where their mouth is, and actually see our humanity and validate our existence. We were able to listen to 15 speakers, each of whom presented personal stories and philosophies about leadership. I've tried to narrow down their presentation to what I thought was their main theme or most significant quote (more for my own personal future reference than anything). Craig Groeschel began the summit by declaring that Empathy + Transparency + Consistency = Trust. He challenged us to "lead from faith not fear." He added that "you may think that people may be offended by your weakness, but that your weaknesses really build connections and trust." He proposed that to build trust we should talk less and listen more. He finished by saying that "You may be disappointed if you trust too much, but you will be limiting your leadership [and relationships] if you don't trust enough."

Erin Myer said that (re: Chuck Hastings) "Freedom is a path towards accountability, and that you have to give freedom to get responsibility." Condoleeza Rice had two significant points that stuck with me. 1. You have to own your past, but you cannot be prisoner to it. 2. When you call yourself a victim, you have given control to someone else. Erwin McManus claimed that "all limitations within you are created by you," and that "the facts always reinforce the past not the future." Pat Gelsinger (speaking of his own experiences) said that God takes 11 years to kill your dreams, rebuild your character, and give you new dreams. This really got my attention because my eleventh year of incarceration will be completed on September 1, 2023. Oh God, let the retooling phase be over and let's move on to some new dreams. Dallas Jenkins, the creator of The Chosen, had one of my favorite quotes saying that as a business leader, a producer, a director and an artist he took Jesus and the disciples out of their stained glass windows and humanized them. He said that his leadership style is not to complain but to communicate. What a powerful image that is to me. What artful language: he took Jesus and the disciples out of their stained-glass windows and humanized them. Taking those images of painted silicate, as well as of typeface on paper, and breathing life, breathing humanity, into the storyboards of the Gospel narrative is changing the perception of Jesus for so many people. Albert Tate reflected what I've read in Jay Shetty's Think Like a Monk that we should "trust in the manna for the day (being in the is-ness of now)." His challenge was to not underestimate the power of just showing up - just don't quit. James Clear began Friday morning saying that, "1% (One percent) improvements are the pathway to exceptional levels of performance. Excellence is not about radical change but about accruing small improvements overtime. You don't rise to the level of your goals; you fall to the level of your systems (systems being the collection of daily habits that you follow)." Henry Cloud stated that, "we trust someone when they understand us." He went on to outline that understanding + motive + ability + character + your track record = trust. Liz Bohannon encouraged us to Pluck Up, pluck being defined as spirited and determined courage. She went on to tug at my heart saying that loneliness is all too common and that your loneliness is not an accusation of your unworthiness. Loneliness is a signal that there is something else going on that needs some attention. Jamie Kern Lima said that self-worth is the deeply eternal knowing that you are worthy of love exactly as you are. She went on to say that when you people please for others you wind up betraying yourself. Ryan Leak was humorous, but also pulled at my heartstrings. He said that "success is often determined by the circle we grew up in. That chasing failure took him further than chasing success." He went on to give a list of all of the monetary achievements that many people list as ways to measure their success. As he listed off cars, houses, jewelry, being titans of industry, having fame and fortune, my eyes rolled. I was so disappointed. That is nothing I aspire too.......but then he went on to say that his #1 indicator for himself is being in a loving speaking relationship with his children, and I couldn't help but well up. That's all I ever dreamed of. It is all I want. It is the one thing I am being denied. So, I'm left wondering how in the world I measure my own success today, and in the future. Anyone who knows me, or has read this blog, knows that fatherhood was my highest aspiration and my kryptonite. All I want is a restored relationship with my children.

Cynt Marshall was funny. She listed lessons learned from 15 jobs: take a risk, make a difference, do the right thing (versus doing things right), and love people. She encouraged us to "Be all IN with intent, integrity, insight, inspiration, and inclusion." She said, "just because you are right dies not mean I am wrong. You just haven't seen life from my side." The last speaker, Patrick Lencioni, listed three critical virtues of a leader: wisdom, humility, courage. In wrapping up the #GLS23 Craig Groeschel did a toss away to his son who said that we should always have someone pouring into our lives, we should be accountable to somebody, and we should be pouring into someone else's life. The past 24 hours have been very impactful. The past 24 hours have felt so "normal" as these were the types of events I would attend as an educator. It made me long for the days I was a nationwide speaker for curriculum for GROUP publishing's Children's Ministry Magazine LIVE. At certain times during breaks in the presentations we were asked if we had anything that we wanted to share with the other attendees. After we returned from lunch I shared the following: "I think that one of the most impactful statements was delivered by Crossings Church minister Lindsey Jackson. She said that 'you are a reflection of the aggregation of the five people whom you associate with the most'." I went on to explain to my fellow brothers-in-orange that I've been incarcerated 3990 days, or 11 years. I was at Crabtree for 8 years working as a lead canteen orderly and had some developed a couple of dependable relationships. When covid hit in March 2020 I was sent to Cushing for two months. When Cushing closed, I was sent to Lawton for a year. Then I went to Granite for a few months until I was minimum eligible. During those two and a half years, between covid lockdowns, statewide lockdowns, and knowing I was moving to a minimum yard soon I never developed any friendships. I said, "When I arrived here at Jess Dunn, I was lonely, was enveloped in a great sadness, and was probably depressed. I cried out to the Lord for a friend. His answer was to cross my path with 3 guys who remind me of Craig Groeschel's formula for building trust." Groeschel's formula was transparency + consistency + empathy = trust. I then went on to tell the attendees that my weakness is in the area of transparency: I usually keep my shields up, because if you don't get to know me then you can't reject me, and I hate rejection. I then went on to publicly acknowledge the three guys that the Lord answered my prayer with. I said, " I want to thank Seth (Claybrook) for modeling what transparency looks like and encouraging me to share more. I want to thank Justin (Davis) for modeling consistency. He never misses a meal. He never misses a day of school. He never misses a workout and encourages me to push myself to do just one more. He never misses an opportunity to play Scrabble. I want to thank Chris (McDonald) because he has reminded me of the importance of active listening and validating life experiences. God bless each of you for helping me grow physically, mentally, and spiritually to be a better leader in my family and in my community. " Finally, I addressed the Crossings ministry team telling them that, "In the eleven years that I have been incarcerated that I have felt like I am little more to the state of Oklahoma and to the OKDOC than a nameless tally mark on someone's chattle spreadsheet. However, Crossings Church walks out their talk, puts their money where their mouth is, and actually see our humanity and validate our existence. Thank you." Despite being nervous about sharing so specifically about what I was learning and feeling over the past two days, including the emotions involved in the decision to change the parameters of our friendship by moving units, I felt that this somehow gave our relationship some closure.