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Monday, October 08, 2007
Living with your crime
Sometimes when I speak of going inside Folsom Prison, people on the outside have a hard time with the fact that I am moving, laughing, sharing and meditating with murderers, rapists, drug dealers and car thefts. And also those who are in on parole technicalities and a few who have been falsely accused. For the most part I do not know their crimes, (and they do not want me to know). Up until now it has been easier that way; easier for me to know each one as just as I find them that day in the chapel. I don’t ask. It’s my business to teach meditation not to pry into their pasts.
Occasionally, their crime or sentence, directly or indirectly, arises during a conversation. Or I have a chance to read something they have written which speaks about the road they have taken. One man, who I see quite regularly, has “lost count of how many people he killed.” Whether this statement was for shock value or for real, I still don’t know.
Outsiders will ask, “How do they live with themselves?”
Some of the men inside lock it away, or bury it all under a tale of self justification or self victimization. Most keep silent, preferring not to speak of their past with people like me. Some learn to tell their story in different ways as they shift perspectives during the journey of their personal and spiritual transformation.
Two men have spoken directly with me about this over the 9 years I have been going inside. Their approach spoke of years of self reflection and healing, and as I have journeyed with them their actions have been in alignment with their words.
Their philosophy goes something like this:
A life for a life. My friend/enemy/victim/wife no longer has a life. My actions took away his life from him and took him away from all his family and friends; it took away the contributions he would have made in the world. That’s a permanent-no-going-back fact. I am still alive. I owe/dedicate/offer my life energy in return for the loss; it’s all I have to give and is still not enough. I dedicate my life to service; however I can find the opportunities, right here in prison. May I contribute to the worlds betterment times two – to honor him and to make honorable my own life.
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