Happy new year!

May you become an even brighter light this year, for yourself, for your loved ones, for our entire community and world.  We all need it!  As you explore what this means for you, we invite you into a journey we take with our Donovan residents every year:  creating our vision board.

I was floored when, in December, I reviewed 2020.  Despite being a year that radically blindsided all of us, I achieved almost every item on my vision board!  This just shows that when it’s meant to happen, it does!  Even if it’s not the way we had originally expected.

Over the past 9 New Year’s Days spent building the annual vision boards, I’ve learned that a successful, actionable vision board sets intentions, not expectations.

Begone expectations and SMART goals!  :-)  These have their place in our lives and businesses.  And vision boards aren’t it.  With expectations, we set our eyes on an outcome, on a rigid definition of success.  Then life presents circumstances than we could not have predicted (hello covid), so we often set ourselves up for disappointment and failure.

When we set intentions, we visualize a future towards which we are called to move, without attachment to the journey or outcome. There is flexibility for the unknown.  It opens us up for creation.  It creates the space for our brilliance to show up in ways we could have never imagined.

Plus, contrary to popular belief, I have stronger results when I set intentions versus expectations. 2020 is yet another perfect demonstration!

Here is the exact document we sent into Donovan in the first days of this year, inviting the residents into our annual process of vision boarding.  Let it be an invitation for you to create yours.

As you set up this new year, be sure you’re setting intentions, not expectations.

In the last packet, the Donovan residents reflected on their journeys of liberation.  As I read their insights and reflect on my own journey, I realize that

Freedom is expensive.

In its chrysalis, it seems that the caterpillar sleeps.  And yet, inside that immobile cocoon, an unimaginable metamorphosis is taking place.  Same goes for us.  On the outside, nothing seems to be changing.  And this can create a lot of impatience and frustration.  And yet, on the inside, we are dissolving, to then rebuild into a completely new creation. 

The cost here is two-fold.  First, we dissolve. This means letting go of past ways of being, past ways of doing, past values, past identity.  Nothing is harder to release than identity.  There is a dying of self that takes place.  And it requires the courage and humility to release and allow this dying process.  With its undoing, pain, mourning and ugly cries (no later than yesterday, for me).

Second, it takes a huge amount of energy to (re)build.  And I find that the greatest amount of energy is not in the construction, but actually in getting – and staying – out of the way.  We live in such a culture of control and doing that I naturally want to take things into my own hands and make things happen.  Oh my, the energy required so that I don’t get into my own way.  Because if I build according to my beliefs, I’ll simply recreate my past.  In other words, re-become a caterpillar.  To become a butterfly – something the caterpillar knows nothing about – I must trust that it’s happening as long as I stay out of the way.

So, freedom is expensive.  AND its return is priceless.  As is evident in several residents’ writing, the peace, joy and wellbeing – in all circumstances – is worth every ounce of work to achieve this freedom.

So, as we invite you to reflect below, what is your liberation?

As we edge out 2020 and step into 2021, what do you release and leave behind?  What have you learned and in what ways have you grown that you embrace and bring with you into 2021?

We wish each of you a massively merry Christmas and the happiest of New Year’s.  May they provide the gifts of love, peace and growth that each of us deserves.  And take a moment of gratitude as you hug those you love extra tight, as the Donovan residents won’t be hugging their kids this Christmas.  We are blessed, today and every day.

On behalf of the Donovan residents, a huge THANK YOU!  Much gratitude in this month of thanksgiving. Many of you responded to the call for books.  One person ran a university-wide drive; several of you shipped books; still others offered what they had and lightened their bookcases in preparation for moves.

Thanks to you, we're bringing over 560 books to Donovan!!!!  That's enough to supply the libraries across ALL yards, including Administrative Segregation (AdSeg or the "hole")!  Books have become critical in this season of unprecedented confinement conditions in our prisons.  In our bimonthly correspondence with our inside team, several of them mention the rescue and escape their books provide AND, unknowing of the book drive, they speak of the decreasing supply of books of interest.

Self-help books.  Biology and physics books.  Spirituality and wellbeing.  Bibles and daily devotionals.  Meditation and cooking.  Spy novels and mysteries.  Self-discovery and breathing books.  Mystical and inner transformation.  History books.  Political analyses.  Non-fiction and fiction.  Law and legal books. You name it, it's in these boxes.

As we near this country's most significant holiday, we wish you joy, thanksgiving, health and yummy meals with family.  As some of you may choose to spend Thanksgiving with less family members this year, we offer you what we tell the guys every year:  They are with us at our Thanksgiving tables.  We take a moment to celebrate their lives, their choices, their brilliance and their transformations.  May you bring your distant family members and those dear in a similar manner that matters to you.

Mariette had a significant a-ha during her 3-month Peace Fellowship that transforms her view of leadership:  moving away from focusing on strictly fixing a problem to, instead, creating the brilliant future and taking the steps towards it.  It turns out this approach is called "Positive Peace" in peace studies and leads to more sustainable and more powerful results.  If you want to start listening after the intros, here's the shortcut.

Showing appreciation one sign at a time by Zacharia Arteaga

Bold emphasis added.  All other emphasis, smiley faces, added capitals, etc. are original.

Nearly a month ago, I started to get burdened with what the news was showing.  A lot of protests, which I’m not against; but the ones done ungraciously and aggressively burdened me.

Burdened, I realized something needed to be done.  Something needed to either direct the flow of our demand on changing the police and racism and all the hate issues… Or something needed to create a new flow…

I’d soon discover it would be the latter in which I would be ambitiously taking head on.

I fought and fought internally… I decided “I’m going to do it.”

With segregated building, we went out for yard.  During this pandemic, I’ve been facilitating on our night yards, a night of worship.  When we come out altogether and fellowship, sing and group-style reflect through questions.

I used this opportunity to inform everybody [of my idea] and ask for support.  Rather than a protest, let’s gather with handmade signs in front of the program office and the gate and tell all the staff, medical, psych’s, C.O.’s, etc. “Thank you…You are Worthy!...You are Loved!...Don’t give up on us.”

I was laughed at that night… It hurt…. I individually ask our TEDx family, relaying our charismatic intent of sowing seeds of change!  I was heavily doubted, laughed by a few and told by one how “unbiblical” I was being.

Only my cellie – who’s part of our TEDx family – helped me.  By even then I think he felt obligated.   I’m kidding, he was totally free.

I scheduled it to happen in two weeks…. Surprisingly, I got a lot of support, and necessary conversations from people I least expected.  I eventually gathered a strong ten people…. Counting my cellie and I, twelve.

I was burdened with doubt but, for some reason [his brilliance!], I just kept moving.  I kept declaring over my heart, making louder my belief than the very doubt within me.

It was nearing shift change [when the highest number of staff and C.O.s are on the yard], we prayed and immediately caught the first nurse walking out.  I yelled “Thank you!” holding up my sign.  And then we all just came alive!  My cellie knocked on all the medical building windows, getting everyone’s attention.  We witnessed all the staff passing [outside the gate from] their [respective] yards stopping in disbelief as we went Crazy! Ha!

We witnessed nurses stop and tear up, C.O.s stop and tear up.  [The Captain] came out and took photos of us.  All the while, I maintained the grease in our gears.  While our sign holders were shouting praise and speaking faith over own prison, I was building them up as they’d weaken and exhausted.  It’s not every day you stand for two and a half hours straight, telling the prison staff “You are love and thank you.”

Oh!  By the way, if you build it, they will come!  We eventually go to nearly 40 people shouting praise to all the staff.  And, of those forty, were many of the people that doubted.  It was beautiful!!

It wasn’t their fault for doubting.  Instead, it was my responsibility to show them it’s okay to believe….  It’s okay to be bold.

I saw those doubters so happy, shouting praise and holding signs alongside us.  Even got in the pictures!    I dismissed the “in your face” attitude.”  Hallelujah….  I saw what my brilliance was made to be about…. That day more so than I ever had before.  I’m to help people believe… again.

I do not like pain, but I discover in pain, there’s ignition for passion.  I definitely do not want to thank anyone for doubting in me or not saying anything at all, which sometimes hurts just as much as saying the wrong thing… But, the spiral of my own insecurities [this] took me down showed me the real fight… The real change…

I want my brilliance to take me deeper in this real fight.  The fight to believe that change is possible.  And it can be done through you and me.

Sometimes, things don’t happen as we wish.  (Sound familiar, lately? ;-) ) We were hoping to share the first-person account of an inspiring story from Donovan.  We’re still waiting for approval so, for now, an abbreviated second-person account will have to do.  Because let’s face it.  We’re not going to let a “not yet” rain on any parade of celebration and honoring of the light that shines brightly in darkness.  Here it is…

One of our team members, who observed the depression and challenged mindset of many residents around him and within himself, decided to bring light into their now-even-more-confined environment.  At first, he struggled rallying implementation partners.  But the few who were in created the needed signs: “You are loved!”, “You are worthy!”, “Thank you for not forgetting us” to name a few.

On the selected day, at shift change – which maximized the number of correctional and medical staff coming and going on the yard – this small group of prison residents stood their designated distance away, held their signs up high and started shouting gratitude to all staff that walked out of or onto the yard.  At first, people didn’t know what to think.  They soon realized the prison residents were recognizing their – the staff’s – hard work to manage the delicate balance of the changing tides of Covid.

The raucous attracted more prison residents and the small group of gratitude givers grew to 40 residents!  (Knowing that social distancing limits the residents on the yard to only a small fraction of yard residents.)  The authors describing the event spoke of how touched the staff seemed to be.  The yard leadership came out to take photos.  The residents also noticed other Custody and staff walking beyond their yard gate to whom they shouted their gratitude.

One of those staff walking beyond the yard gate was the person to whom I sent this story for approval.  This person replied with, paraphrasing, “I remember that day!  It was great to see.”

We hope this second-hand account inspires almost as much as the first-hand ones.  The prison residents are regular examples of how they turn dark, even violent, situations into times of spreading more light, more dignity, more respect, more love.

May this inspiration move you into exploring what small or big way you can bring joy, gratitude or peace into a situation.

We heard back from our inside team!  Last week, we received the residents' responses to the first packet of materials that we sent into Donovan on July 15th.  The excitement about hearing from us, that we read in their letters, reflected our excitement of reaching out to them.  One letter started with "Hello to my second family!"  All expressed great joy in being reconnected.

This season has been rough inside prison with confinement, no visits, no visitors, no programs, the fear of Covid....  And yet, in the letters we received, we heard resilience, determination and positivity.  Two residents shared a deeply uplifting story - about how they brought light to Custody and staff - that we had hoped to share with you here but we're still waiting on administrative approval for public release.  We'll send it when it's approved!

One resident quoted James Allen with "Circumstances do not make the man, they reveal him."  This quote and the residents' stories reflect one of the foundational principles of our Circles inside Donovan:  Every situation can be seen for its challenges and its opportunities.  Which lens are you using?

It's easy to see the doom and gloom; we're fed this day in and day out.  With a little time and practice, it does become just as easy to see the gifts and opportunities.  One story pops to mind.  A good friend thanks God for having caught Covid.  While no one in their right mind would wish Covid on themselves, it turns out that, thanks to Covid, he was able to be at his wife's bedside as she took her last breath.  His wife died of Covid.  And since this friend had also been admitted to the hospital with Covid, he was able to be by her side.  As some of you may unfortunately know, if he had not been sick AND admitted, his wife would have died alone.  For both of them, Covid was a gift.

How has Covid been a gift in your life?  We'd love to know and so would the Donovan residents with whom we'll share your stories.