Troy's Times - June 1st, 2005
Hi Friend! IN THIS ISSUE
“It is not important How we come to the events in our lives, but how we Deal with those events”- Troy
This week’s article: As I mentioned in previous articles, my son drove the first phase of my “awakening.” When I discovered that I had this power to influence Eric in a positive direction it gave me a renewed sense of hope, a sense of purpose, a belief that the next several years would be something other than just wasted time, a sense that some good could come out of my being imprisoned. For me it would be education. Education was going to be my saving grace. My child’s hope was telling me that I was still the person who had, at one time in life, had a straight A report card. I remembered how proud I had been to bring home those report cards and how proud my parents had been of me. I remembered a teacher taking me aside when I first started to go downhill and telling me that I was too good for that. And, I looked forward and knew that when I got out of prison, an ex-con and an ex-drug addict, I was going to need all the help that I could get to function in society again. Education would be the means by which I could turn a very negative situation into a life change for the positive. The bonus was that education was something my son and I could do together. I was excited and ready to get started right away, but I soon learned that I had challenges to face before I could even open my first book. While some correctional institutions offer work programs, limited vocational programs, and very limited educational opportunities, the bottom line remains that today's institutions are based more on incarceration than they are on rehabilitation. Federal Pell grants are no longer available to either federal or state inmates, and what meager budgets most institutions are forced to work with are already overburdened with security issues, leaving little or nothing for education or rehabilitation. I have read studies stating that the re-arrest rate of individuals who come out of prison with just two years of college is at 10 percent. This compares to a rate of over 60 percent for those who walk out of the prison gates with no education whatsoever. Conservative estimates put costs to incarcerate an individual for a year at $35,000. It would cost a small fraction of that to educate that same individual, and in the long run would prove to be both a savings monetarily, and a potentially enormous benefit to society. I could make an argument that we are not doing society a favor in locking up criminals time and again without offering them any rehabilitation, education or means to rebuild and better themselves. But, I can tell you as fact, there was no way I was going to become the man I wanted to be if the only post-incarceration job skills available to me were going to be learned from the convicts I was doing time with. Education was tantamount to the life I wanted to lead. I had made my decision and I had momentum and determination, but no funding, so I turned to plan B. If Congress wasn’t going to give me a chance to improve myself while I was in prison, I would create that window of opportunity for myself. I started committing every second of my free time to my goal. Every day for six months, every free minute I had, fourteen to sixteen hours a day, day after day, I sat at my tiny little prison desk in my tiny little prison cell, filling out applications, writing essays, begging, pleading, and selling myself to every private scholarship around the country that I even remotely qualified for. I knew that I was a con. I was a felon. No one was waiting in line to take a chance on me. I knew that I would have to convince them and I knew that it was going to be hard, very hard. I got used to reading the words, “sorry”…“not qualified”…“no.” Each day at mail call I received a stack of rejection letters…until July 16th, 1997. At that point, I had been incarcerated for four and one half years. I spent those years in a cage and had grown accustomed, as well as one can, to my environment, to the daily disappointments, and to the daily pep talks that would put me back at my desk filling out applications. There was nothing special about this particular day, just going about my everyday prison routine, when a guard sticks his head in my cell. He informs me that my counselor wants to see me immediately. I shuffle down the hallway to my counselor's office and am told, "Evans sit down, I got a phone call on you today from a guy in Auburn, Alabama. He’s a scholarship committee chairman, and his association is interested in helping you with your schooling.” I couldn’t believe it. I went over the words in my head again. Yes, he had just told me that I had earned a scholarship. The size didn’t matter. In spite of all of the wrong paths I had chosen in the past, I had convinced someone, in fact a whole committee of someone’s, to believe in me. A week later I received a letter from Robert Henry, the scholarship committee chairman, and a check for one class. The letter informed me that although I did not meet one single criteria specified in qualifying for the scholarship, the committee was so impressed with what I was trying to accomplish that they were going to award me a special stipend. I took that one class and I sent the association my report card. They then sent me a check for two more classes and it snowballed from there. When I landed that first scholarship, Eric took a keen interest in the fact that his dad was going to school. He asked that I send him my graded papers. I think he wanted to see for himself that his dad was actually going to school like he was. After that Eric showed a renewed interest in his own schooling, and we began to mail our graded papers, test scores, and report cards back and forth. He would send me his papers with the little stars, the smiley faces and the teacher comments. I would send him my test scores, report cards and term papers along with the professor comments. It became a competition with us, something that we could do together, something that we could share. As we talked on the phone weekly we would rib each other when one wouldn't do so well on a test or assignment. My education became a way for me to stay connected with my son, to share something with him, to be a part of his life. I wasn't tossing a baseball back and forth with my boy, but I was doing something with him. You know what I’m saying? I was doing something with my son. My continuing education and the fact that I was attempting to turn my life around, combined with the positive strides I was making toward becoming a new person, had an effect on others as well. Those on the outside that were following my progress, many of them family and friends who had given up on me long before, suddenly began to ask how I was doing. I was able to start laying a foundation of trust with them again. My fellow inmates began to notice what I was doing and took an interest. Before I knew it, I had become a prison role model. In fact, the same three inmates who had threatened me with shanks previously visited me, but this time, instead of carrying weapons, they came with a request to help them do the same thing I was doing. Those three gang members who rolled in on me, the gang members who came there to take my life if I wasn't willing to sling their drugs, now looked to me to save them. I had turned my life around one hundred and eighty degrees. I went from a worthless drug addict to a father to my child, a son to my parents, a model of success to a scholarship program, and a role model to my fellow inmates who were starting to choose education over dead time. I had given myself the best present that I could have received. I used hope to reclaim my self-worth. Then I put my self-worth out to the world until I convinced a scholarship committee to see potential. From potential, I built a full scholarship program and a relationship with my son. From my accomplishments I taught my parents and loved ones to listen to the hope in their hearts rather than the pessimism of experience. And from there, my worth branched out to people who would never have known who I was, including you reading this book, if I had not believed in myself first. Did you know that Americans have spent billions of dollars on the diet and addiction industries, many of them without any success? The reason for that is that the industries target people who have trouble taking that first step of believing in themselves. In fact, many of the buyers are people who have fallen into a spiral of despair and self-loathing and are using an impulse purchase of a product to pull them back out. In the time it takes to read a credit card number over the phone, they can instantly feel better about having taken a first step. The problem is that it is the wrong first step. The one and only first step that will make you successful is believing in yourself. Try it. You’ll be amazed at how quickly self-worth and self-confidence
spread. Take that mantra that you told yourself in the mirror earlier,
change it from “I could be” to “I am” and put
it out to the world. Start believing it yourself and acting on it. Commit
to it with determination and show people by your actions that you can
be the person that you want to be. If the path is difficult, want it more.
As my father would say, nothing in life that is really worth having is
ever easy. Use the hope, confront your fear of change, be determined,
claim your worth out loud and put one foot in front of the other until
you reach your goal. If you are scared, give yourself a small goal at
first. Remember, my first success was only enough money for one class.
The end result was two college degrees. I guarantee that once you’ve
tasted a little success, you’ll learn to crave it and it will come
to you more naturally.
A
letter from a recent client - Click to download and read! Please note that my opinions in all sections are just that- my opinions. Feel free to disagree with them, argue them or dismiss them. As a professional speaker and author, I find that from time to time I offend or upset people. To this I say that I better be offending some people, otherwise I am not doing my job. By making people look at things they are not always comfortable looking at, I expect to ruffle some feathers and welcome your feedback at any time) Featured product for this issue! MY FIRST PUBLISHED BOOK- " From Desperation to Dedication: Lessons You Can Bank On"…Click
here to order
Download a free chapter of my book, The Preface is available here - Click to begin! If you live in or near one of the following cities where Troy will be speaking over the next few months, please contact The Evans Groups for details on an opportunity that does not come around often- see Troy present for free!
Sign up for my affiliate program and earn money while you sleep! Click here for details! Commission for booking me - I offer a commission of 10%-20% ($650.00-$1,300.00) for anyone who refers me for speaking engagements and/or bulk product sales. Please contact The Evans Group for details. Subscriber opinions and impressions of this electronic newsletter: I invite subscribers to write me with their questions as well and I will answer them in the next issue. Also readers, I invite you to send in profiles of yourself and how you have used the information from my electronic newsletter, products or speech in your personal and/or professional lives. Once a month I will feature one individual for all others to read about!
Note: You are free to reprint any portion of this electronic newsletter as long as the portion remains complete and unaltered, and the “About the Author” section is included. About the Author- Troy Evans is a professional speaker and author who resides in Phoenix, AZ with his wife Pam and his dog Archibald. Troy travels the country delivering keynote presentations, and since his release from prison has taken the corporate and association platforms by storm. Overcoming adversity, adapting to change and pushing yourself to realize your full potential- other speaker’s talk about these issues, Troy has walked them.
|
| |||||||
         | |||||||
