#45: Lester Young - Life Sentence to Life's Mission

How do we escape from the prison of our mind?

How do we acquire the mindset to transform failure into victory and success?

What do we want our life and our legacy to be?

These and other pressing questions are addressed when a Muslim ex-con, a Catholic shrink, and an Orthodox rabbi sit down together on The Rabbi and the Shrink.  Don't miss this episode with Lester Young!

https://www.linkedin.com/in/lester-young-b1b6a0106/

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC7Y3oh7l_wqJSCPtitB9BFw

1:30 How a life sentence became a life’s mission

What do we want our life and our legacy to be?

One man, one book, made all the difference

We are all masters of our own fate

Authentic leaders inspire us to challenge ourselves

4:00 Free will: the past does not have to define us

We can’t necessarily change our circumstances but we can change ourselves

Dissociation started a process that ended with prayer

A perpetrator can honor a victim by becoming a new person

The path to reconciliation and redemption

14:00  How do we truly make amends?

The most horrific failures can be transmuted into unimaginable victories

When we can resolve our differences and errors we don’t need the justice system to do it for us

17:00 Witnessing a victim’s pain evoked empathy

Victims of pain and violence can become perpetrators

We can always grow to recognize how to reinvent ourselves and take responsibility

21:00 When you prepare yourself, providence provides the opportunity

Journaling and gratitude

Five stages of incarceration:  denial, anger, victimization, asking forgiveness, self-forgiveness

The need for prison reform:  Recriminalization vs. Decriminalization

25:00 Wisdom attracts adherents

Change yourself, change your environment

We are all living in prisons of one kind or another

29:00  We all need advocates and support

Rehabilitation begins the day you walk into prison

Addressing the collateral damage victims

Why aren’t our correctional facilities corrective?

35:30 Word of the day:  allyship

the status or role of a person who advocates and actively works for the inclusion of a marginalized or politicized group in all areas of society, not as a member of that group but in solidarity with its struggle and point of view and under its leadership:

Genuine allyship does not come with special recognition—we do not get awards for confronting issues people have to live with every day.

the relationship or status of persons, groups, or nations associating and cooperating with one another for a common cause or purpose:

Joseph went from prison to king of the world in a day

Nelson Mandela

Never lose hope -- break out of the mental prison walls and the opportunities that will appear

Transcript

Margarita Gurri: 0:03

Welcome to the Rabbi and the Shrink. This is Dr Margarita Gurri,Dr. Red Shoe, and everyone's favorite Rabbi

Yonason Goldson: 0:12

Yonason Goldson

Margarita Gurri: 0:14

And the good rabbi and I are really excited because today we have with us, Lester Young Jr. and he is a guy with so much energy and so much to give. Hello, welcome, Lester.

Lester Young Jr: 0:30

Peace and blessings. Thank you all for inviting me to be on this episode of your podcast. I really appreciate this.

Margarita Gurri: 0:35

Thank you. So do we feel we feel blessed as, as usual was a rabbi that found you he's, he's very good at finding talent. So you are on his radar, you must be doing something, right. So last year is a young man with a world of experience. He has a business called redemption path to redemption path, and the number two redemption. And his whole thing comes from his life experiences. I'll let him tell that story. But he has this idea of helping everyone find redemption. And he teaches he speaks, he does a variety of things. He's become what quite a world class leader, so I'm just gonna get right to it. Lester Young Jr. Please, would you mind telling us how you got to path to redemption?

Unknown: 1:26

Oh, cool. Again, thank you, thank you for the invitation to have an opportunity to speak with your audience today about my personal path to redemption. And it actually started on in 1992. When I was sentenced to life in prison, I shot someone and eventually died with drug dispute. I made some very, very bad choices early on in my life that unfortunately landed me in prison and someone in your life in doing this ohm sent during after me being sentenced to life in prison, I remember finding myself in a prison like wondering, how did I get here? One and how can I find some sense of peace inside of a prison environment that you know that possibly I may possibly die inside this prison system. And never the world will only know me as less the young the one who killed someone. And I started really doing a really deep dive into that I didn't want that to be a part of who I will always be remembered as a person who killed someone. And that's it that will be written in history is less than young. I didn't want that to be because when we look at books and read books, people definitely change their lives, and they add value to the life of other individuals. So my first three years in my concentration I was a little walking in a fog basically never couldn't understand how to find it. But they were like small nuggets and things that helped me get on this path. My first experience was with chaplain and one of the chaplains at a prison. That gave me a book by James Allen as a man thinketh. So is he he asked me a very profound question, even when I think about it. Now he was like, Where do you see your life in the next five years. And my response, my immature response was, I see myself still in prison, possibly dying in prison. And he said that you are the master of your own fate, you control what happens to you by the decisions in which you make. And this is when he gave me this book by James Allen. And at this time, I was reading at a seventh grade level of education. So reading, I didn't come from a family of readers. I hated reading, I felt like reading the most boring thing that a person did. He gave me a book that I did what I would do with any book, I'll put it on the shelf and just to get about it, but his persistent and consistent asking me the questions have you read the book forced me to pick the book up and started reading it in this is where I discovered that my mind is the garden and I am the gardener of my own mind. The reason why I was sitting in prison as a result of me planting all their own seeds inside my mind that produces the action and the behavior choices that led me to prison. How do I change that I have to see myself as a gardener be guard my mind by planting the right seeds in my mind. And that's when my seed of Redemption was planted. And that's when I began this journey.

Margarita Gurri: 4:08

That's amazing.

Yonason Goldson: 4:10

Maybe we should just drop the mic right here. I mean, that's

Margarita Gurri: 4:13

I know I got goosies actually,

Yonason Goldson: 4:15

I just got it, you know it really it. It I focused in on two elements and your story, Lester. The first is is freewill is that we always have a choice to make and the worst choice in the world will be followed by more choices. And we don't have to let the past define us and we don't have to give up on ourselves. Because ultimately, we are self determining. That's the human condition. And I can't change my condition my I can't change my surroundings. I can't change my environment necessarily. He someone pointed out to me not so long ago the word responsibility comes to the word response. It's the way we respond to situations. That is the hallmark of who we are or who we will become. And there's tremendous amount of inspiration in what you just described for us

Margarita Gurri: 5:16

very much. Hey, do you know that Do you remember the chaplains name?

Unknown: 5:20

Chaplain? Scotland was his name? Yes, I can never forget that guy. Because he was one of the first ones that really challenged me. Are you still in touch with him? If he passed away? I'm not a prison. Um, but it's good to see who you become good. No, he didn't. But it's like I said, part of the part of the respect to the people who helped me get to the journey is that I honored them by at least mentioning their names, right. And that was the beginning of a long chain of mentors inside of a prison that began to help me and see I believe, like you, you're right, rabbis that for me, at 19 years old, I did not have the skill set to understand that right, I did not have the skill set, understand, because I wasn't trained and taught to understand that my response, I can change my environment. By the way, my response, I was just trained to this certain thing, and I call it the criminal thinking process, where my environment, the music, I listen to my peers, they just shaped this pessimistic, lowly person that will never accomplish anything, the only way you get accomplished to have any level of success is by criminal, our criminal criminal things, right. But when I started diving into different books that will focus on the mindset, I realized then that part of who I am, is that yes, we all self determined, self motivated as well. And our response shapes our environment, once I got control of that, then that's when my life began pivoting in a different way. And here I am today, as a result of me planting the right seeds to put me in a position not just only to be free, but to understand that my role now as a human being is to be able to help empower someone else through my story as well. And how long before

Margarita Gurri: 7:03

I mean, you were a baby, when all this happened, how long before you realize you were a mentor?

Unknown: 7:08

It took me maybe about maybe 10 years into mind prison environment, I was like in my 30s on because I was really focused on this period of time is one, as I mentioned to you early on in this is that really prepared me for the level of guilt and grief that I will experience in my incarceration, because the reality still exists, that someone died as a result of my actions. And I had to find a medium, a place where I could find peace with that. And for years, I felt like the only way I could find peace is to deflect it. So I detach my emotions and feelings from it. And I tell people, like one of the ways I helped me cope for a period is that I didn't want him to mention his name, right? I didn't want it to like even acknowledge him. When they say why you're in prison. I say, they said, I did this, because it was never about me. It was about someone else. And it helped me cope for a period of time. But as I hit this wall of grief, that was so overwhelming for me inside of prison that no one could help me. The only one that could actually help me overcome this level of grief was prayer, the power of prayer, and falling to my knees and begging God for some type of understanding. And how do I get over this people will say, hey, get high in prison, do these different activities to help you escape. I didn't want to take skate no more, right? Because I knew that my journey was going to be long in prison. And I've seen individuals who had done 20 years and the result of them escaping it, they were damaged individuals in prison. I did not want it to be damaged in prison after 20 years, I wanted to be a vibrant person that found redemption improvement that will be able to stand and give back something that someone else. So this is where I said a prayer. I remember praying one night, and God guided me to speaking not to him, but to speak to the spirit of my victim. This is where I needed to make peace with because I was like, God, forgive me, forgive me, forgive me, forgive me. But it was like a whispers like I have forgiven you. You have to seek forgiveness from the soul of the person which you have taken off this earth. And I remember crying out and asking this person, his name is Gary Gary Golding. And I say that with honor respect. Now, like I said, years ago, I never wanted to mention this person's name, because it was a way of me coping, but to honor him in the life that I took is that I have to mention his name because his name in that moment that night was the thing that shaped me to be the person I am today. Because I saw I felt like he forgave me at that moment. But then there was a promise I made to his spirit is that I will honor your life by doing the right thing. By honoring your life. I would honor it by living in a completely different way that when your family hear about meal, they see me they will never dread the fact that you are free but they will also celebrate my freedom because I've utilized it badly Humans to turn into something good. But it's going to be seeking to empower others, but also lift their brother, their uncle their son's name of honor, versus just targeting his name in a bad way. So that's where again, it was that those moments like that was a transformative moment for me in my life incarcerated, that put me in a position today, where I'm living my life to in a path to redemption, because of the conversation God told me to have with my victim, who's Gary Golding

Margarita Gurri: 10:29

and Gary's family. Yeah. Have they seen what you're doing? Yeah. And what do they think,

Unknown: 10:37

you know, the, the power of forgiveness and the power of prayer. I remember years ago in prison, I would write in my journal, letters of forgiveness to this to the family. But I never understood how this would change anything. But I just believe that one day there, God will put it in their heart that forgiveness. As the years passed, God did place in the heart of every one of the family, immediate family members of power forgiveness there. Right. So when I went up for parole, the family was not opposed to me being granted parole, the power of that. So even when I made parole, maybe a year after me being released, I went back to my hometown, where the crime was committed to speak to young people about Wow, voices. And Gary's one of his sisters was in the audience. So I'm speaking to this audience of young men about the power of choices and gun violence. And she I saw it, it was something different about this woman that was standing in the audience because she was crying. I'm like, I'm not saying nothing that deep. You know, and I'm speaking to young people. But after this talk was over, she came to me and she asked, Could you speak to me? And then she told me who she was. She could I give you a hug?

Margarita Gurri: 11:49

Oh,

Unknown: 11:50

you know, I was afraid of that, to be honest with you. I was like, it's gonna be something harmful to me. But it's going back again, that God placed in there genuine forgiveness that she hugged me. And she said, You have made my brother proud today by me. So she should be that story. And just to fast forward, even before her father, Gary's father passed away. And this is one of the things I disliked about South Carolina and most of the parole systems is that once you get out on a lifetime parole, and being on Lifetime parole, you cannot have conversation with the victims, even if the victims want you to have that conversation. This is why I'm really big on restorative justice in a lot of these states. So Gary's father, unfortunately died before we got a chance to have a conversation face to face, you know, we had to go through different mediums to have like an indirect conversation about it. But he had extended that he wanted me to, to have a sit down with him about it. He has gave me it was not about anger or anything. He just wanted to sit down and ask the question, what changed you what what happened that bring about change in your life. And I just say another point, Gary's younger brother, to this day, I am his mentor, right? I am one. This is crazy. Howard. I want to say how it happened this way God created I have messages from his brother that says that he feels that he's going through something now with his personal life. But he said, I feel like you Lester is the only person that can help me in this journey that I'm on because of where you at in your life. So it see how things happen, how God bring things into our lives, because of the inner work that you do in the power of prayer and faith. That here it is. Now I have an opportunity, by the grace of God, to now help the youngest brother of Gary, make better choices so that he doesn't travel down the path that myself and Gary travel. So that's like the power of redemption for me. I'll be the guy to do tomorrow. I feel like I'm good with that. Because I'm doing something at least giving back to his younger brother. To me.

Margarita Gurri: 13:58

That sounds biblical.

Yonason Goldson: 13:59

I'm gonna go there's so many so many ways. I'd love to go right now. Oh, yeah. You know, and I've never seen you get emotional like this during an interview. I've never gotten emotional. This. This is really quite powerful. But you know, the the holiest day of the year for Jews is Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement. He and the sages say that if I've sinned against you. Don't go to God. I can't ask God to forgive me for what I did to you. He it's, it's meaningless. The first thing we have to do is to try to appease the people against whom we've trespassed. And, you know, and you're showing something that is so deep and so spiritual, that Providence directs us in ways that are often very unpleasant. It's a combination of fate and choice. You made the choice to do what you did, but the circumstances were orchestrated for you, and then to come full circle to where you can actually use that failure and turn it into something beneficial and not just beneficial to the world, but beneficial to the family against whom you acted. I mean, this is what redemption is really all about. And when you when you say that the South Carolina prevents families in their victims and perpetrators for meeting I'm sure that was well intentioned, yeah, protecting victims. But it becomes self defeating. And we just had a stroke in the news recently here in St. Louis, a police officer had reached for her Taser and pulled her gun and shot someone who and not didn't kill the person. But they brought these two people together, the officer and the person had been shot, they brought them together. And they and they discussed what happened. And the person who was shot chose not to press charges against the officer because they made their peace with one another. And when we can when we can resolve our problems, then the justice system doesn't need to try to fix things for us because we've fixed our lives on our own.

Margarita Gurri: 16:28

Well, Lester, all I can say is I know that Chaplain Scotland is so proud of you. Yeah, this much I know is true.

Yonason Goldson: 16:40

You told us. I heard you tell a story last year about it. You were you're exposed to a mother, whose son had been had been killed. And the impact that had on you.

Unknown: 16:54

Yeah, yeah, I was saying that. Going back into that story that Friday night, I didn't mention but actually was watching a show called Dateline on TV, in saw mother on Dateline screaming with this anguish that her son got killed, you know, very similar to the crime that I committed. And during this, it was about that three year period for me where I was now trying to process grief. You know, and I tell people that my grief was several, I lost my mother at age of 16 years old, which put me in a downward spiral, they made a lot of bad choices. I never process that. So if it's from 16, until 19, when I committed the crime, I was doing everything to escape that pain, right? So now here it is, I'm incarcerated. Now I have the process of guilt that I felt like my mom died mad at me because we had a disagreement the night before she died. I tortured myself for many years, before and during my incarceration. And on top of that, now, I'm dealing with the fact that Gary, the guy I shot and killed is no longer on this earth and dealing with that and the shame of killing someone. And then the shame that comes to my family. So I was processing a lot. So as I said, in that three year period of my incarceration, this is when I hit that wall, and watching Dateline one night hearing a mother cry, for the first time, my ears are no longer numb to that that cry. And I immediately connected that cry to Gary's family. In the courtroom, when I was sentenced for killing their brother, I did not initially hear the cry because I was so numb. But three years later, I heard that same anguish of a mother who lost her son, I immediately thought about Gary's family. And that, again, was the beginning of my heart, changing from a level of cold heartedness to a heart of empathy and sympathy, and also compassion to say, hey, what I have done this, and I have to find a way to change that. Because what I did at 19 years old is no justification for that no matter how I try to rationalize, I was completely wrong in that situation. Even my, my response in the courtroom was wrong. What I mean by that, I chose not to even apologize to the family. During the trial, I sat there in a very arrogant, egotistic way, just standing sitting there not even thinking about the impact that this family is going to have to learn how to live without their brother ever again. So again, three years when I heard that mother, my ears My spirit, my spirituality was at a higher level, when I was able to hear it more. And that that caused me to break down and that began that process for me to say, You know what, God forgive me, but God was like, No, you don't ask me you asked this person give you give you and that's what that whole journey for me.

Yonason Goldson: 19:45

And well, that really resonated with me and I want to do to tell that story because we've we've mentioned a number of times, that, that the E and ethics stands for empathy, II and that when when we cut ourselves off from feeling what others feel, then we can rationalize anything, we justify anything, we won't hold ourselves accountable. And you have that breakthrough, to actually feel the impact of what you've done. And that is that was so integral to your own personal redemption. That developing a mindset where we recognize and we take responsibility for the act, the impact our actions have on others, is critical to being ethical and really essential and being a human being.

Margarita Gurri: 20:34

We. So I have a question now about how you do this, because a lot of people have insights, and that yet they don't have the impact, or that spark to to help so many people. I want to understand about your transformation or so for the spark to share that. And then how you came up with some of your topics like the the five stages of growth, the four stages of imprisonment, or whatever. So we wouldn't mind speaking to that transformation,

Unknown: 21:04

though, might again to when you when you put yourself in a position to receive from God and everything else God puts you in position to receive. And here it is, I was this is 1996. I remember this is 1996. I was going through fasting and praying going to a Tomi process. After the encounter that spiritual encounter with Gary spirit and making amends with him. The next phase of that was me now beginning the cleansing process. And I don't know how it happened, but it happened. So I'm watching Oprah, Oprah Winfrey Show one day, and she had this show about gratitude, about the power of gratitude, transform your life. And she spoke about journaling. And I watched that entire show. And as soon as that show was over, I was convinced that one going back again, to what you said, right, by my response, I could no longer change my physical environment, the only only way I could change is my response and how I see it. And how I was going to be able to see it differently is start writing down the things that I'm grateful for, in spite of my circumstances. So after that Oprah Show, I ran to the prison canteen, and I got these notebooks and I have some room here. And I started journaling. Every morning, I wake up, I write down five things I'm grateful for every night, I will find five things and I'm grateful for inside of prison. Right. And that began to create this layer. What I found were the five stages of my incarceration, the first stage of my incarceration, I mentioned, my first three years was what self the now I live in denial of my crime, my action. And then within that first three years, I was an angry young man, I was angry. And the anger was, I justified it for the external, but there was a lot of brokenness in would be that I need to heal from in the third, which is called the big base. And I saw myself for the first three years of my incarceration of victim. And that's where I got like, oh, wow, this is different. This is something that's gone within a lot of the men that I spoke to in prison, they were one, they were denial about the crimes or actions, the core beliefs or behaviors that affected their life, they was always angry at the prison environment and not knowing that it was not the environment, it was themselves. And they all saw themselves as a victim, versus taking complete ownership for the decisions. So once I made that connection, I began to see also, were in prison, there were two levels of prison, there's a re criminalization level in prison, where individuals sit in prison idle, and they learn the ways of committing crime through talking to individuals, reading books, whatever watching certain TV shows, you learn new ways of committing crime, but there was a decriminalization, which I believe is five to 3% individuals incarcerated really travel this path. And this is where they begin to address their mindset, their behavior choices and their response. And they shift into the last two stages of that, which is forgiveness. This is where a lot of my work started is doing that no personal work of forgiveness, it's easy to ask God, but one of the hardest things that I had to do was to ask the victim to forgive me, the person at home to forgive me. And to understand that I had to move on from that also asking the family who are on to forgive me at forgiving those who harmed me. And lastly, learning to forgive myself, because I had to go back to the 16 year old lesson to to help him believe that it's okay because I abandoned a 16 year old less than you understand that I abandoned him and I needed to help him heal so that the adult less there could be able to stand on the most stronger footing. And all of that was through just a process of journaling. Watching that one Oprah Show and in another show from there speaking about journaling, that's when I understood the power of transforming my life, or the five stages of incarceration started from that one Oprah Show. And that's when I started looking at and I realized I had what I call now my book called The Five states and incarceration, because I started seeing and not only myself, but in the lives of other men that were inside of the prison along with.

Margarita Gurri: 25:08

Wow, that's powerful. So then how did you get to the point of being a public speaker? How did you make that happen? Or how did that manifest

Unknown: 25:16

again, I, because I was different. I was the guy that went to prison at seven with some great level education, who hated reading became now reading books. Right, I started reading books, and people just started in the prison environment, I started getting self appointed to stop being a speaker. You know, I'm God's like, Hey, you got something to share you different from all of us, tell us something. So I remember just standing on the prison yard hosting classes in the prison yard, in classes consistent learning five words a day, um, you you have an obligation to learn five words a week, which was easy, making sure that you stay disciplined and writing your five gratitudes down in the morning and I in changing your behavior. It started from just standing in the corner of a prison yard teaching a class to now sitting inside of a prison chapel, teaching three to 400 guys inside of a prison about what we're talking about right now, in the five stages of incarceration, how do you find redemption inside a prison? How do you develop a level of empathy, a level of emotional intelligence in prison, so that you can transform your prison by your response to the prison by seeing it as an opportunity for growth versus a place of punishment, and doom. But it's an opportunity for you to become a better person

Yonason Goldson: 26:30

stepping forward into opportunity into responsibility. You know, it's truly heroic. And I think that it's, it's an inspiration for all of us. Because, you know, in one form or another, a lot of us are living in prison. Prisons, we create in our own minds, prisons, of our own circumstances, of our disadvantages of our of our homes of our psychological or physical issues. I mean, we all have limitations that in Judaism, we say a list of blessings every morning to be grateful. And one of them is that God bless her, you got to freeze the bound or freeze the imprisoned. And it's not just talking about people who are incarcerated, it's talking about all of us, we all have our limitations. And there's a way out for all of us. And the courage and the sense of responsibility that you've articulated here. It's a message that goes to an audience. That's universal, not just not just inmates, not just former inmates, it's there's something for us all to learn from your story last year, and thank you.

Margarita Gurri: 27:48

I think it's amazing, I think you would do well speaking with just about any group, I know, I've had the privilege of working with some very gifted global athletes who have disgraced themselves. And they have have, they could have used you. Because the idea of the grace with which you address your responsibility, and you walked into your own sense of power, many of these people never accept responsibility they blame people are overreacting is not my fault. Even the ones who are never in jail, never really caught just a suspicion, they never accept responsibility. And what I see you doing is giving this amazing demonstration. You know, we call that in the Middle Ages, call it confession by demonstration. You're showing people how to live beautifully. Because we all have things that we do wrong on the regular really? And how do you move forward? I think it's just amazing. So then my next question is then around what's next? You're a guy who does not stand still. What's your next adventure, sir?

Unknown: 28:58

I mean, upside of jumping out of the plane and going I can. I'm looking at going into 2022 is really just honing more into my craft my niche in creating these various syllabus, that for the five stages of incarceration, the five stages of growth, but also creating more than a reentry component, to help those that are currently inside of a prison be prepared in a realistic way. Because as I work with a population of individuals who are transitioning out of prison, they walk out of prison still with this unreal, ality of what the world is right. And when they walk out of prison, it's almost like they're trying to make up for lost time, their walk out at 41 years old, but they're still thinking as a 19 year old to really give some real context to that, that your success is going to be based upon. One that your rehabilitation must start the day you walk into prison. So my goal would be is to love to be able to get all of my books in the hands of those who are the first day they walk into prison and give them a handbook, not about the rules and regulation of prison. But the rules and regulations and how you find redemption inside of a prison system is based again, your response, something I wasn't given, I wasn't given a book outside of the first book I was given from the chaplain or as a man thinketh. But when it comes from someone with the lived experience, how did another person from serving life in prison survive prison, not by learning how to create a prison knife, like not learning how to fight infringement, how to find that when that no personal war with yourself, that would be my next goal is to be able to provide those resources for those individuals in the Department of Juvenile Justice, as well as adult prisons so that they can be able to have a more wholesome life moving forward inside of prison and don't hit that wall of grief and guilt. That even may cause them to commit suicide because it was sort of a one for them.

Margarita Gurri: 30:49

But I have a request for you. Okay. My first teaching job for college was at Leavenworth federal penitentiary. And I learned from these gentlemen so much. And the one thing they were trying, that was a time and they were doing Scared Straight programs and stuff like that. So some of them were working on and picking my brain. And we were working a little bit together, I was a small part of it. I was a mini advisor, just in the back right there. We're trying to find a way to help the families, siblings, children, and Senkos, mommy, Poppy, all of that stuff, everybody. So that the experience would be a growth experience for everyone. And then when they came back, they would have a better reentry. But also then everyone would be forget the word in English. Oh, yeah. lifted up, they would be lifted up. Are you can I ask you to do some programs for the those people the the people all around the experience?

Unknown: 31:49

Yeah, I actually do like classes on virtual classes on Tuesday night on coaching classes. I'm good, especially for family. Um, and also my YouTube channel, I have like tips to how do you help your loved one acclimate back and

Margarita Gurri: 32:04

I've seen your YouTube channel is really good. So

Unknown: 32:06

it's really just helping families understand that it's not going to be like imprisoned as a three hour visit, that you sit down and talk to your loved one. And after that, you leave and they may come back another six months and have another three hour visit. It's important that a family member yes that you want to see your loved one grow and you want to grow in this process. But know that your loved one is not going to be the same person on that three hour visit when they walk out of prison. So I share we help families better understand what that readjustments going to look like for them, you know, how do you actually best serve your loved one after incarceration? And knowing that is going to require some space and when required conversations like this? So yes, I'll definitely continue to build on that today.

Margarita Gurri: 32:44

And are you speaking to the individuals who design and run prisons as well?

Unknown: 32:49

I'm working on it. I'm working on it. It's to be honest with you, direct you, it's like our society. When talking about the outliners, those who have survived prison and and wanting to give back to prison, it's almost like people are not really they kind of leery about it. Like I tell people here in South Carolina, I Senator 22 years in prison here, we look at it in the business model, right? I did 22 years in prison and we add up the cost of prison pay per year is maybe 40 to $50,000 a year, right? I did 22 years, and we're gonna round it off to a million and a half right that taxpayers invested in me to keep me housing. But for some, I was able to find redemption, understand some stuff that the wardens are under those don't understand and how to help people bring about transformation, right? I walked out of prison. I've been out of here and I got been out of prison. Now seven years received the pardon and all of this stuff in just seven years. Right? You would think that the individual who would call positive negative deviant behavior, the positive deviant behavior, someone who lives in the same environment, create another positive way out of that, you would think that a prison system would say hey, we want to create a board a council board, or for incarcerated people who survive prison to help us address but unfortunately, it's not set up that way. Because some of the mindsets of our in the people in that authority position. Don't see it. That bothers me that bothers me agree. You

Margarita Gurri: 34:26

know, it bothers me too, because these guys were working on something that I thought was brilliant, you know, there's conferences and conventions. Well, they have them for every every group, including people who run and manage and design prisons. I could see you being the keynote speaker or if you know, to any of those groups and and do some breakout sessions and spark some of this amazing idea that you have about redemption I, I have faith that they can they can be transformed, with some of your little positive Mojo

Unknown: 35:00

So it's just a matter of getting it's like this getting the right rooms, right? It's about how do you get in the right rooms, make the right connections with it, and begin to build from there. I think that once I get in the right room,

Margarita Gurri: 35:12

we've got a Muslim, a Catholic and a Jew, and we're gonna all pray on this. So I think we've got it covered. I can only imagine that the good things will happen. And even if you're not the one that does it, maybe someone who's like you touched will end up doing that. I'm just blown away. Wow, Rabbi, is this a good time for the word of the day?

Yonason Goldson: 35:34

Oh, I think it is. There's providential providentially, I came upon a word as dictionary cars word of the day, so I'm borrowing it from them. And the word is Ally, ship. Ally ship, we know what an ally is an ally as a partner or a collaborator. So Ally ship is the status or role of a person who advocates and actively works for the inclusion of a marginalized, or politicized group in all areas of society, not as a member of that group, but in solidarity with its struggle and point of view, and under its leadership. And I think that that is just a perfect word for our discussion today. Because we should all be allies. In in this mission. You know, we in in, in Jewish synagogues, we divide the Torah into portions. And we read a portion each week, and we go through the entire tour every year. And right now we're reading the narrative about Joseph. Joseph was in prison for a crime he did not commit. It was 12 years in prison. And his situation looked hopeless. And then in one day, he goes from being a prisoner, to being king of the world. And, you know, our inclinations and well, you know, that's one of those Bible stories that doesn't happen in real life. No, let me remind you about a gentleman by the name of Nelson Mandela. And Lester Young. Nelson Mandela was 27 years in prison and came out became president of a country changed the country changed the attitude of the world. And Lester, you took your experiences, and the and the what what all these stories have in common is that those who were incarcerated, did not give in to the hopelessness, the pointlessness, the frustration, the denial, the anger, they didn't allow themselves to be recruitment alized. But they took advantage of the opportunity to become decriminalized. And that requires a sense of ally ship, I have to feel there, other people in the world are going to let me break out, we're going to let me redefine myself, that the world will not imprison me. But that ultimately, I'm mastering my own fate. And I may not be able to break out of the walls, but I can break out of the mental walls, the attitudinal walls. And if we if we become allies in that mission, then we really can't change the world.

Unknown: 38:22

That's heavy man. i When you mentioned Joseph in Nelson Mandela, those are like two pictures, mental pictures of people that I kept here, right? One, I always saw myself not as Joseph, what I was like, there was a part of it. Like Joseph had this ability to interpret dreams, you know. And from the Islamic perspective, I don't know what it says actually in the Torah. But it was saying that someone came into the environment. And Joseph was able to translate the dreams for them, right. And they, they left. And then the king had this troublesome dream, and the only one that could actually solve this dream was a man that was in prison. So I often tell individuals that I'm preparing myself. That way, if there's anything in our community, that may be a troublesome one day, that I want to be in a position in prison that if I will never get a parole, I will at least have a remedy to a problem that the governor of Southland may need and it may be only with me, and I will use that story we can say this is how we have to live our life and Nelson Mandela showed me how fortitude could get you through a level of incarceration. So I looked at those Joseph A man with purpose God showed them a vision when he was a young person that out and I mean, I got out but he was eventually put in a position to manifest that vision. Nelson Mandela did the same way. So those were two individuals that I would always I always looking to even to this day, when it comes down to fortitude and persevering through life challenges so great that you use those two examples.

Yonason Goldson: 39:57

I'm glad your friend did that way because the whole lesson that you really articulated is that whatever circumstance we find ourselves in, is an opportunity. And that Joseph would never become king of Egypt. If he hadn't been in prison, Nelson Mandela wouldn't have gained the national stature had he not been imprisoned. And whenever we find ourselves in, in situations where we feel trapped, we feel hemmed in, we feel held back. If we can reframe and say this is preparation time, for the moment when I'm released from the wrong moment, when when I can actually take this experience and turn it into something that I wouldn't have been able to do. Had I not had to go through this experience. And you are a living, breathing example of that. And so lots to be very grateful, and inspired to have had you on we'll help we'll come back and join us again.

Margarita Gurri: 40:58

Absolutely.

Yonason Goldson: 40:59

It's been a real pleasure and inspiration. And Doctor, do you have a last word for us?

Margarita Gurri: 41:05

The last word is, again, thank you, Lester Young, I think that what you're doing is helping us with the basics of ethics, which is part of ethics is what do I do, it's going to make the world a better place. And the only way that that happens is by doing good things, and doing things that are not so good, even terrible. Because if we're going to be living these things happen, what we deal with it is the basis of a stronger foundation, and articulation of our own ethics, individually, and families and groups, nations, the world, etc. And so I suggest that everyone do what Lester did, and what the rabbi and I do all the time, is to realize, where is it that I need to forgive myself? Or ask forgiveness of someone else? Or God? And what's the lesson in it? Have I become arrogant? Have I become so depressed that I just think that it doesn't matter? Have I forgotten how important I am in the world that, that everyone needs everyone to contribute? So I'm asking for that. And then Sue has a wonderful comment for you, Lester, great messaging. Amazing what a turnaround. Thanks so much, keep spreading the word. And Sue is not someone who goes on and on. So from Sue, that's an amazing compliment.

Unknown: 42:24

Thank you. Thank you. Thanks.

Margarita Gurri: 42:26

We are blessed indeed to have you. If the rabbi and I can help you we're certainly always will keep you in our prayers. But if we can help you in any more concrete way, please do let us know I'm I'm eager to be of service and support you in your mission. Whichever way you can. Appreciate that. I think you'd be great. Well, everyone This has been the rabbi in the shrink with Lester Young Jr. helping us with the idea of redemption and personal power that comes from accountability with grace and forgiveness. With moving forward. Everyone take care. Thanks for joining us on The rabbi in the

Unknown: 43:06

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