Transcript
First Serial Rights Approximately 4,940 words Cease Intense Force By Napoleon Mendieta Most people talk themselves out when it comes to stopping violence, but the only true form to cease this intense force that destroys human lives around the globe is with a thought. Thoughts are things and I'm the man who used thoughts as a way out of the violence. This idea to use my thoughts was created when I mixed a purpose, persistence, and a burning desire to build a new life. I was reminiscing about how I first arrived into the adult state prison extraordinary world. This happened about six years ago on a day like today, but let me tell you that the memories are still fresh and will probably never fade away. What started my thoughts? I'll tell you. I was very naive back then. I used the words "back then" as if it was decades ago, because it sure feel like it. I've been living almost like I'm in between two worlds, who I want to become and who I have become, somewhat like a double life separating the law abiding citizen from the wild juvenile delinquent. I no longer can tell who's who. How can I? When I've been lost almost all my life. All I can remember is that I was an adolescence who with and over time became a man inside the prison world. I was a 19 year old who started walking the prison yards with three decades on my shoulders. Someone who would live confined for the rest of my life, at least that's how I used to think back then. The only freedom I found inside this world was in my dreams. Dreams that started to create strong feelings of displeasure and belligerence as I open my eyes. Dreams that exploded with much violence into the real world. It was this violence that took over my soul as I found myself destroying families and friendships. I didn't know who I was back then, or even what I truly wanted out of life. In six long years I never even saw how these dreams were actually my downfall into self destruction pit. How could I ever see it without using my thoughts? In life all I could ever see was who I wanted to become. From a young age I had always dreamed of becoming a rich successful man who would one day walk out of this poverty. That was the dream I created in my mind, but what started as a dream became an obsession. I created a goal for myself and I needed to accomplish this goal at all cost, even if it meant using violence and causing discomfort in my own life of those around me. Sadly that was exactly what I did. The memories from the day I got off the chain bus from the county jail into the prison world haunt me in my dreams. I see myself getting off that bus over and over again but each time I'm much older. I have become trapped. I can't open my eyes without falling into the dark forces inside these walls. The thoughts of remembering how I used to look around as I made my way into this facility are alive. The thoughts of remembering how I began entering cold rooms through metal doors while clicking sounds echo all across the dark narrow hallways are very much alive. I had become lost in my own dreams. I had become lost in my own obsession. My mind floated on the reality of who I had become. In my dreams I focus on the only picture I knew, the prison lifestyle full of anger and violence. From the beginning of my years in prison my thoughts only focused on my sentence and my options of survival. In my dreams I could see how time passed me by like a strong wind causing everything and everyone around me to move in this fast forward speed that took me all the way into my future. I walk inside the prison yard in a slow motion as time presents all my downfalls before my eyes. I no longer knew when I was in a dream or when I was in reality. I sit here wondering whatever happened to the idea of who I wanted to become. Where did that go? What was the reason I was surrounded by a concrete wall and a metal bunk and door? The evening before I lost myself in these thoughts was seventeen months after I had been taken forcibly and set apart from the others. I was trapped in a prison inside a prison. I was still holding the blood of my last victim on my wheat leather boots. I was still holding the memories of how a sharp metal was going inside a human body. What separated my mind from having these thoughts was the look of nature that a small window provided me with. A window that created a work of art the day that it asked myself if I was lost, if I was okay. "I'm okay" I stated firmly. "How did it get this bad?" I close my eyes often to transfer into a new dimension, wondering if I can find the answers to my questions. Once inside I'm all alone with my dark side. "What are you really here for?" This dark voice repeated with an odd, sad tone. "What are you really here for?" "I don't know" I express with a light wind as my eyes begin to open. "I really don't know." Hours pass when I was alone with my thoughts. Thoughts that presented to me how I possess much anger inside my soul. Anger that was formed from being inside this cage. A lock down room that forced all my dreams to maybe one day make a mark in the world away. A look down cell that killed everything that I believe in. It was this cage that disconnected me from my reality, from dreams, and from the rest of humanity. What have I become? I started to see the misfortune, violence, blood and chaos that I created for myself. I see the thousands of victims who have fallen into this prison way of life. Off and on we are back at it again. This is the cycle that repeats itself over and over again. We have become wild animals in a kill or be killed world. We have built a desire to thrust the soul that can never be filled to its capacity. This is the anger that will never end. At this point in life all there is left is death. I look up in the sky from this segregated room only to find the clouds in a state of disorder. When was the last time I looked up at the sky? I wonder, it is really a beautiful view. Only this cloudy enchanted land. All I can do now is smile. I breathe a sigh of relief as the sun touches my skin. I smile in life even when I pretend I don't see the embarrassment on the others eyes. All my mornings are long as I observe the suffering in everyone souls. So much sadness make me wonder, where did all my dreams of who I wanted to be go? Where is this success I always wanted? This anger continues to be molded inside my body, mind and soul. It takes over my dreams. Can't say I'm pleased but I submit without resistance. No complaints, no criticism. I restrain this anger inside of me without a way out. I have no opening, or hollow place to take charge and control of who I have become. I let this emotion dominate and influence all my next moves. The result is always abuse and physical injuries. The feelings of joy, sorrow, and even love cease to exist in my life. I walk in this road of life not knowing where I'm going or even why I'm walking there. The success I had once dreamed of is no longer with me. Where did this dream go? I have no idea. Perhaps when the world stops looking at me as a human it all ceased to exist. The arguments that I create with anger continue. The world shoves my name as if it was a threat. They are the ones who created a threat when they gave me the tagline "convicted felon." Has humanity betrayed their own heart with so much hatred. Stopping the profoundly feeling of love. Has humanity betrayed humanity when they stopped listening to their hearts throwing it all away for the ones who interpret wrongly how success is reached. This anger is taking control over me. My mind shouts "what are you really here for?" I sit here in the dark room reminiscing on my past. Looking at myself being taken over by this so call violence. Anger that I can only take out on my victims. Time and time again it all repeats itself. All I can do it look at the sky because I could never cry. Where did my dreams go? I picture a kid in my dreams who's wanting a future just like any other child does when he's asked a question, "what do you want to be when you grow up?" I see a kid in my dreams who's imagination runs wild without any limits. I look at this kid in my dreams becoming a man with much wealth. I watch how this kid lives in his dream house, drives a nice car, and has a beautiful woman by his side. What I face are only dreams. What a poor naive childhood of dreams. Where did my dreams go? Perhaps they got lost and forgotten. Perhaps they became neglected with all this prohibited actions. Perhaps they are the cause and effect of this automatic act of self destruction. I have continued to survive life in prison all these years but at what cost? Where is the correction they promise to show me? I don't have the qualities to change my life around to a successful path. I'm lacking the education to know and completely understand how this is all obtained. I have no life skills, all I know is violence. All I know is danger. All I know is death, but no one is truly helping me on how to correct these errors I made in life. Where is this violence coming from? All the assaults, burglaries, the drugs being sold and used. All the extortion, fights, and all the murders, where are they all coming from? Can they be crimes that took over our lives? All I know and understand are the results of [obsence?] knowledge turn into these crimes, but why? Are we creating these crimes to obtain wealth and walk out of this poverty? Are we creating these crimes as a result of not knowing how to succeed in the real world full of careers and millionaires? What have I become? What did I create? I myself am lost, my soul is neglected. I sit here alone wondering where did it all start to go wrong. When did I destroy my dreams? I have walked alone inside this danger I created for myself for far too long. I no longer care for an answer on why I'm here. What I'm searching for now is a solution to this problem. I wait calmly hoping on the day that it can all change. I have hopes on sharing my frustration with the others but I think they would never understand. No one ever truly understands this pain. We have all become lost in our dreams, but no one really seems to care. "Lock them up and throw away the key" they say. I have walked back and forth for many hours evaluating my past, thinking, where did I start to go wrong? Where did my dreams of making a mark in the world go? I have walked inside maximum security trying to come to an understanding on how did I ever get here. All my childhood dreams been always about becoming a successful man but I never understood how. How does success start? How did all this self destruction begin? Was it because I lack the education. Is the financial education the key to destroying what introduced me to the crimes that have injured many including myself. Why am I here for? Was it because I wanted success? What I didn't see before my years in prison was clear to me today, but was it too late? This love and dream obsession for wealth was no the root of my problems. My actual problem and the only reason there is so many people in prison today is because we all lack the understanding on how wealth is obtained. Clearly all the school years could never teach me about the real life and give all students the financial education they need to survive. Perhaps this is the reason why so many successful man have dropped out of school. They see no need for it. All the education I obtained over the years in school could never relate to the real world. The world of finance. Yes they taught me how to read, write and do all type of math problems but not how to create goals, how to find a career, how to save money, how to invest money, how to use my skills to help others. How does someone start to learn the real skill of life? How does someone begin to create success and accomplish their dreams? From the instant I understood what school didn't teach me I viewed myself as a different individual. I started reading books that showed me how the real life is. I read books about wealth. I read books like autobiography, biography, business, do it yourself, economics, personal finance, references, self-help and many other subjects. I read books even when society didn't give me any attention of concern for my background, less my dreams. I started to understand this violence and this anger, but mental feeling still display towards the way we are treated. Where are the mentor? Where is the guidance we need? Where is this person who can believe in me? Where is this person who can encourage me? Where is this person who can support me with my dreams? Where is this person who can take my life to the next level? This anger takes control because no one truly takes action into making an impact into the incarcerated community. Why is it that no one truly takes action into helping or having an interest in a development of a prisoner? "How can I fix this, What can I actually do?" I ask myself as I sit in the bunk in complete silence. I wait here for a solution not knowing if I have the skills to take a step forward. This moment of my life deserves a journal like any big idea. I had my family and friends (together) order me one. As it gets here to my hands, I wait. Once in my possession I pick it up and begin putting the ink to its pages. I have no idea how to tell a story but words take form and come into existence. I have no idea how to write a personal essay but words take form and come into existence. Was I born to write? Was this what my life been waiting for? "Who will ever read your writing?" "How will you ever get it in print?" "You don't even have the skills!" "You don't even know what you are doing!" My mind laughed as different voices start talking in my head. All this negativity inside of me, all this rage is not letting me open the new door to the different life style. "who are you, and what have you done to the positive me who used to have dreams and goals?" I say out loud talking to no one but myself. "I won't let you stop me" I say as I drive into the perfect intersection of my passion and dreams. I delete the old me with the formula that will work wonders for me. I delete the old me full of rage and anger. I delete the old me who goes knocking into the misfortune of an idea of success. I delete the one who I had become and I restore to life the one I used to dream of becoming. A new me walks the yards but I continue to smell something uneasy in the air. I can feel the tension in the wind. I continue to see how sharp homemade shanks are cut and used to penetrate other prisoners skins. I ask myself, how many victims are going to become a part of this destruction? I put the pen into the journal creating words inside its pages. Words that become my most important endeavor. What a work of art. The only work of art that makes my voice worth something. I put the pen to paper because it creates value to my name. I continue to put pen to paper because it had a purpose and goal. Can this be, indeed, the reason I write? Can this be the only reason I write what I know, what I see, What I understand. Perhaps it is but my most important reason I write is to aid and guide others who like me were once lost and naive. I write for them, I write to give them a reason to live. Like all deeply rooted practices, I learn how to write at a young age. From the first day I pick a pencil up I used my writing for school work, but today I pick a pen up to write, to create. Writing is my only way of communication. When I pick a pen up I express myself. I write what I have to say and what lives inside my thoughts. Writing, then only form to cease this hate that live inside these walls. Writing words down on paper has introduced me to new people, new cultures, I have visited other worlds all by traveling inside a number ten size white envelope. There are indeed times when I can't continue. When I'm overwhelmed. When my body wants to give up and return to the fast life style. I have come a long way to stop now. I know that there is much more I need to learn and work on but I'll continue to push forward. "What is everything I must do to win?" "Write, even when nobody responds" my mind reacts to the thought. Writing words is my new home. My new form of expression. When I write I do it because it sets me free. When I write I have no time limit. No opening time and definitely no closing time. When I write I have freedom. When I write this prison world stops to exist. When I write it's because I have discovered who I am and how to cease this violence I was once trapped in. I continue to write learning about myself through every word. I start to understand my old patterns, my old habits. Now I see all of my creations have come alive. I can see how everything and everyone comes and goes as fast as yesterday. I have wrote a new future for myself. I now see the men in the mirror looking at me directly in the eyes and telling me the things I never thought I would one day hear. "Good job" He said "I'm proud of you." From the time past inside these walls I have come to care about this place because it's what I have to call home. It's inside this place that I build a pattern for myself and the others who want to follow me. I no longer look to build destruction but to build a change for all of us. The elders move forward trying to put their old life behind them but the young are lost and clueless. They have created prison as a paradise. Who will ever change these kids thoughts? Prison, the streets university? I have been living inside these cold walls for a very long time and the only thing its ever shown me was to write. Writing that became my final stage in life. I no longer care to write for money or wealth. I write because I have fun writing and when I do it, it sets me free. Because I am a free man. For long hours I sit inside this human cage hoping for a change. I have strong expectations that all the prisoners nationwide can find their own successful path. Perhaps they have found this life in their thoughts. Perhaps I see in the future many artist, songwriters, producers, actors, paralegals, business owners, the list is endless. What I do see today are many sharp and smart individuals. What I don't see is someone giving them a hand with accomplishing their dreams. When will humanity see that prisoners actually matter? I continue to write because it's what sets me free but most of all because I love it. I continue to share my words because without them no one will ever know what prisoners desire. "Stop this violence that is deeply taking over out lives." I say in a prayer. "Give us a mentor, give us a teacher that can guide us into a new path. A path where we prisoners can smile together in unity as we wave violence goodbye." We all first came into contact with crimes on a dark day in our lives but the violence abhor our soul. We became accustomed to it. Living in this dark world long enough to embrace the self-destruction that influenced the rest of our kind. Prisoners, the words used for thugs, criminals, menaces to society. Is this all part of the political movement of the governments lies? What ever happened to being brothers and sisters? To taking care of family? What ever happened to being neighbors? To helping one another? I shake my head and sadly wonder, when did it all go to hell? Why aren't we helping each other? "I could not longer restrain myself to this modern slavery." I thought. I needed directions, not a system that only publish a systematic key of lock them up and throw away the key. I was in need of air. I need to break these chains that only hold people down. No one was here to help, clearly we only have one option "help ourselves." Because of this thought is the reason I write today. "There are no limitations to the mind except those we Acknowledge." Author Napoleon Hill quoted in his most famous influential book Think and grow rich. His words would stay with me for the rest of my days. It was in his words where I found the word wall and incarcerated was only an excuse. There are no limitations for who I can become. It is probably a goof thing that I'm all alone. All the years of my life I have been lost without a clue what success is about but I found a reason to live when I was in the dark. It's now the day that I completely understood Jesus the son of God's words when he was all alone in the desert. It's now that I understand the Buddha and all the great minds in history that found themselves when they were all alone in dark shadows of their life. Perhaps this is what we all need. Or maybe someone can mentor us and show us that without finding ourselves no one will. The fact that hundreds have found a way out of violence with only a thought is real. But yet there are still millions who are lost. They continue to stroll along this narrow road looking for a way out, stretching their hand out waiting and hoping someone will help them get up from the ground. Nothing is build overnight. Everything needs dedication, plans, and workers. Maybe we all are seeking aid, but I found myself alone and I will continue to search for an answer alone. This premature burial need to stop. The destruction of living such life is real. No ones likes it or prefer it, but nothing changes. What can we do? Everyone is to a point of no return. Death, is the only thing that keep us alive. We need to change life in prison. Only we prisoners can creating success for prisoners. They say when we reach death, our souls are transported to the promise land full of happiness and love. But in prison, our souls are transported to a world where the metal edge of a cut metal because our obsession of power. Is this what society calls correction? I make an apology to you my reader. Perhaps I'm writing with much anger. But I am after one simple truth of action: To cease intense force not with words but with a thought. A thought that can teach us and show us a different side of life. It doesn't matter the kind of violence we been expose to my fellow prisoners, because it do not have to define your character of who you want to become. End violence, what are you writing for? ### Napoleon Mendieta is a poet, essayist, author and information provider for prisoners under his brand cell-made "for prisoners by prisoners." He can be reached at: P.O. Box [redacted]
