From Prison to Purpose: Transforming My Lowest Point into My Greatest Gift

When I was arrested, my life was over.

When I pleaded guilty, my life was over.

When I was barred from my career, my life was over.

When the gavel came down, punctuating my prison sentence, my life was over.

When my ex-wife told me she was leaving me inside the prison visiting room, my life was over.

So many moments when I believed my life was over. I believed it with the same conviction when I say my eyes are brown.

The moments were sad, terrifying, filled with shame, and certainly life-altering, but as the author Cheri Huber wrote,

“Nothing has ever happened to us that we haven’t survived.”

Each one of those moments, with their sadness, fear, and shame, knocked me on my ass, but as Mickey told Rocky,

“I didn’t hear no bell!”

Life will knock us down; it’s an inevitable component of our shared human experience.

Sometimes, the knocks are minor, and sometimes, they’re life-altering, so much so that life becomes neatly divided into before the knock and after the knock.