I was asked to speak to a group of my colleagues, or as society would say a group of inmates, awhile ago and this is a reduced version of what I said: Look around you…if only you could see what I see. As I look around this dayroom I am looking upon a roomful of precious gems with priceless worth, tons of life experiences no movie could ever accurately portray, and testimonies no amount of money could afford. As I stand before you this day, I stand before a room of hopefulness not hopelessness, a room full of men with immeasurable untapped potential staring back at me.

As I walk around this institutional warehouse, I am reminded we are living amongst some of Americas great talents, yet we are the shunned, the despised, the failures, the forsaken. We are the unredeemables, the undesirables, the unforgivable, the unchangeable, the unworthy of love or a second chance at life…or are we?

Laying dormant within these walls aren’t the greatest of the previously mentioned stigmas but some of Americas greatest natural resources full of opportunity and promise. The men within these walls have embedded within them the potential to share and change the world if they are audacious enough to believe!

In the words of the incomparable Maya Angelou, “The order is large, the need immense. But you can take heart. For you know that you have already shown courage. And keep in mind, one person with good purpose, can, constitute the majority. Since life is our most precious gift, and since it is given to us to live but once, le us so live that we will not regret years of uselessness and inertia.”

I can’t speak for anyone else but I myself am sick and tired of mediocrity being the accepted status quo. I’m tired of hearing all of the could be’s, should be’s, would be’s, or has been stories. These cities too are our cities, this state is also our state, this country is also our country. Lets stop being dismissive and begin to take active roles in the things that really matter and truly have relevance.

Let us be less like thunder and more like lightening. Let us be less like thermometers and more like thermostats. Let us stop talking about what we could be doing and start doing what we need to be doing. Let us stop being influenced by the conditions around us and start becoming influential in the promotion of the conditions we desire for our women, our children, and then ourselves.

So what will it take to drive you to change? We already lost our families, lost our money, lost our material possessions, lost the friends who vowed to be there no matter what. We already lost our freedom, our rights as well as time to idleness, and in the mist of it all we lost ourselves.

You know if we do what we always did, we’ll get what we always got…so now, it’s time to change.

Ghandi said it best, “We must be the change in society that we want to see.” But I tell you to change the world, let alone our society, we must first start with ourselves. Now be honest with yourself…if you want change or desire it in your life are you willing to take ownership of it and make the necessary sacrifices?

I want to leave you with this thought…

We can’t change our minds until we change our thoughts, we can’t change our thoughts until we change our perspective, we can’t change our perspective until we change our circumstances, we can’t change our circumstances until we change our stance, we can’t change our stance until we change our position and we can’t change our position until we change our view, we can’t change our view until we move, now we can’t move if we are sleeping and if we are sleeping we are merely dreaming – so I ask you how can we make our dreams a reality? … By making change!

Cyril Walrond
DOC #309756