FTC BLOG
A moment of serendipity reminds me that Spirit is in charge…
Posted on March 21, 2019, by Stephanie| Share this post | ||
Co-Founder and FTC Facilitator Bonnie Paul shares her experience on FTC’s 15th Anniversary
With the inclusion of two new prison facilities to our program schedule, a few of us gathered in what is a rare in-person meeting at the FTC office to discuss expansion plans. We have many meetings at FTC but for ease and convenience most of our meetings tend to happen online in video conferences. Not only were we meeting in person, but it just so happened that this meeting also fell on the 15th anniversary (March 20-21) of our very first Freedom to Choose workshop, held at Valley State Prison for Women in 2004.
An hour into the meeting, we heard a knock on the door (also very rare), and in walked… Kristianne! As we happily hugged our dear friend and unexpected guest (we hadn’t seen each other at the office in 2 years), we suddenly realized: this was also the 15th anniversary of the day we first met – while she was a lifer at Valley State Prison for Women!
We cried tears of gratitude for all that we have shared, and how we have all grown together over these 15 years. Kristianne, like hundreds of other men and women we’ve met, has created a beautiful life of service in the “free world.” We were stunned and touched at this beautiful unplanned reunion and how it all perfectly came together… our staff member Molly had even lit an array of candles unexpectedly… so it felt very much like Spirit brought us together for a special party to celebrate our very special anniversary…
On our 15th Anniversary, we want to share a special blessing of gratitude for the thousands of people – volunteers, donors and participants – that have been part of FTC’s success. Thank you!! 💖
We are growing – come join us and become a volunteer!
Our next Service Learning Training takes place on April 6-7, 2019 in Los Angeles. Come join the Party!
I feel that I am part of a movement
Posted on December 26, 2018, by Stephanie| Share this post |  |  |
A sharing from a FTC program participant at Valley State Prison (VSP)
Having attended The Freedom to Choose Project’s (FTC) workshops [and programs] has helped me to completely alter my thinking, actions, and manner of living. The exposure to the loving and safe environment has also affected a large portion of this prison.
The experiences that I have had during the past several years has altered my entire manner of living. I used to attend groups because it was what I knew that the parole board would expect of me when I go in front of them. Now I have an interest in improving myself for my own needs. The FTC method agrees with me on a deeply spiritual level and I relish each and every experience that I have had and will have in the future. There is not enough time available for me to express how much the project has done for me, but I will continue to participate as often as possible.
There is a community of like-minded individuals that has formed from the exposure of the FTC manner of education. We acknowledge one another and have a connection that continues to grow stronger as time passes. I feel that I am part of a movement that has the power to alter how prisons run and I will continue to share my experiences with anyone who asks. I cannot think of anyone who attends the groups regularly who has gotten in trouble for anything serious recently. The program seems to affect everyone who participates in a positive manner. I have had many conversations with the volunteers who come in to share the healing and they seem to get as much from the experience.
I would like to thank everyone who supports this worthy cause. I will continue to participate in any and all FTC related events. Thank you again.
by Matthew
FTC large workshop participant since 2014 & Mentor Support Group program1 graduate
1 FTC has a Mentor Support Group (ILTAG) Program which is held every Sunday at Valley State Prison. To volunteer at this event, please visit our News/Events Page for dates and information on how to sign up.
What Does It Mean?
Posted on December 6, 2018, by StephanieShare this post
A program participant from Valley State Prison explains the inspiration behind the name – The “Freedom To Choose” Project – and how it has shaped the way he sees and experiences life.
For many, healing and truly learning from life’s lessons involve reawakening from numbness – a survival mechanism to cope from violent experiences, where past hurts and learned behaviors can be addressed and emotions experienced with accountability and compassion.
From left to right, FTC Facilitators David Paul, Chemin Bernard and Bonnie Paul.
The Freedom to Choose Project (FTC) is based on Viktor Frankl’s theory that “between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.”
What I have discovered practicing the many skills that FTC has taught me is that I can greatly expand that “space” by listening with my heart and allowing my most natural state, which is love, influence my decision for response.
Viktor also noticed that even though each prisoner in the concentration camp experienced the same stimulus, only a few survived. This was rooted in the freedom of choice. This holds true today.
[In prison] I see success and liberation all around me and what separates me from those who still experience bondage is my unbreakable will which is at the forefront of my consciousness and strengthened by my awareness of spirit.
This movement brought by saints into the prison system is already changing the culture. An awakening is taking place, the captives are experiencing a freedom not bound by anything visible – we are feeling, we are experiencing our emotions with a new intellect and choosing to live our lives with positive intentions. And so it is!
by Drew
FTC large workshop participant since 2013 & Mentor Support Group program1 graduate
1 FTC has a Mentor Support Group (ILTAG) Program which is held every Sunday at Valley State Prison. To volunteer at this event, please visit our News/Events Page for dates and information on how to sign up.
Before you came into my life
Posted on December 4, 2018, by StephanieShare this post
An expression of gratitude from a FTC program participant at Valley State Prison and an example of why punishment alone is ineffective in inspiring true change. When people have a low sense of self-worth and self-care, they have low expectations of themselves, their lives, and the role they play in the world.
FTC provides programs that teaches foundational life skills, fostering healing and transformation from the inside out.
Before you came into my life, I was lost in a dark world. No one knew the pain and suffering I carried for thirty years except you.
Nonetheless, you decided to open your heart and hold me tight into your many arms. You decided not to judge me or criticize me for the unresolved issues that were holding me back. Instead you embraced me with kindness and thoughtfulness.
You showed me love, compassion and belonging. That’s why you grew so deeply into my heart. Your intentions from the very beginning were good and pure.
I must let you know that because of you, you changed my life, attitude, and beliefs.
The dark path I took when I left home doesn’t seem lonely and depressing anymore. When I see the facilitators, David and Bonnie, I feel that my mother, who is in heaven, sent you to me. When I talk to the volunteers – Karen, Joyce, or Bernadette, more angels come, and it makes me feel like I’m already in heaven. The people from FTC are people sent from the highest good to teach, guide, and help me in my recovery. I want to personally thank you. May your higher power bless you daily.
by Alejandro
FTC large workshop participant since 2014 & Mentor Support Group program1 graduate
Alejandro has since been released from prison.
1 FTC has a Mentor Support Group (ILTAG) Program which is held every Sunday at Valley State Prison. To volunteer at this event, please visit our News/Events Page for dates and information on how to sign up.
My Prison
Posted on November 7, 2018, by StephanieShare this post
“In the environments that we come from – gangs and broken homes, dysfunctional families – there’s no compassion, not much love, it’s not encouraged – especially in our gang culture.
We have to be tough, we have to be angry, we have to be aggressive, we have to be violent. …to cope with the stress and hurt and the chaos and insanity of living a life like that. And being able to put our guard down and have that compassion was very mind-blowing.”
– Henry (formerly incarcerated) on FTC’s impact at Valley State Prison
A FTC program participant creatively shares his experience that lead him to prison (internally and externally) and his journey of self-discovery and healing.
My Prison
In the pit of darkness and despair
Fear and loneliness were my friends
I searched for the door
But it was sealed
There was only I and the monsters created by others
By those whose needs came before my innocence
So my mind designed chambers
I hid in one
Hurt, pain and anger were stored apart
I lost myself in distraction
Abandonment and pain fed anger, however
Violence and self-destruction quick on their heels
My loss compelled me to distribute pain
Others would pay the price
Set by the careless souls who tortured mine
So I moved in self-induced obscurity
Repelling any sign of kindness
Fearing further wounds
Actions led to added prisons – mental, emotional, spiritual, physical
The pit became darker, deeper, harder, colder
Isolation was safety
Rabid dog
Hurt first, hurt fast, hurt least
So I thought
Morphing incremental into what I needed to be
The moment was God
Yet, freedom was offered
By those who seemed to understand
It required unsealing the door
Surprised at finding its key in my closed fist
I let go
My soul breathed
For the first time in long, cold years
Will to be whole the sole strength to skirt weakness
Vulnerability
In awe at the power held within this action
I let go
Healing, growth, strength, clarity
Willingness to face my destiny
Pain is my gift
Understanding it, my power
My circle grows stronger
My paths materialize
Yet, shocked that some were there all along
So I now accept
What I see in the mirrored images of me
In the eyes of the close ones
I allowed for success
And discard the tape my father recorded
I now walk in the light of the truth
I now give and I take
And I trust
And I love
I now live.
– Albert
FTC large workshop participant, Valley State Prison
Elephants & Doves
Posted on October 29, 2018, by StephanieShare this post
The following art has been dedicated to The Freedom to Choose Project (FTC) by our talented participants at Valley State Prison.
Dedicated artwork by Oscar (FTC program participant since 2014)
Elephants & Doves
Deliberately I turned my face aside
But he, elephant-like, remained in the room
Even my secret spaces occupied
And with nary a sign of departing soon
Doing as beasts are bound,
He fulfilled his simple, elephantine role-
Lumbering and bumped around-
Upsetting all the furniture of my soul.
Embarrassed by this domestic horror
And scared he’d frighten them
I folded myself into a corner
Inviting no guests in
Then I found myself one day
In a gym amid some curious spectacle
Wondering if I should stay
I sat down and I waited, scared and skeptical
Purple people spoke of Freedom to Choose
And besieged me with love, acceptance and space
Figuring I had little else to lose
I opened creaking doors to this strange new grace
Love that I realised reflected my own
Filled and healed dark places with light
I watered with tears these seeds that were sewn
And through them gained new, loving sight
When I looked at myself
Through the lens of such love
That elephant of mine
Became a little dove
by Parker
FTC large workshop participant since 2013 & Mentor Support Group program1 graduate
1 FTC has a Mentor Support Group (ILTAG) Program which is held every Sunday at Valley State Prison. To volunteer at this event, please visit our News/Events Page for dates and information on how to sign up.
My Purpose in Life
Posted on October 22, 2018, by StephanieBy Michael Lattimore
In my very first experience with The Freedom to Choose Project (FTC), I truly understood what ‘Change from the Inside’ meant. I thought I was going inside a prison to bring hope and inspiration to others. I discovered that I was also truly serving myself by sharing the human experience of saying to another, “I am a human with feelings and life challenges just like you.”
FTC has allowed me to make good on a childhood promise I made to myself many years ago – that when I grew up, I would be a part of bringing peace and love to this world.
I witnessed a tremendous amount of violence growing up on Chicago’s Southside during the 60’s. I survived several major riots, the Vietnam war, gang warfare and even more in the urban street environment.
Being a witness to mankind’s inhumanity to man so early in life, I became aware that there was inside of us a great Light, revealed through our eyes, and designed to awaken all of us to Love as the healing balm.
In FTC I have rediscovered how to tap into my inner Light and to see this same Goodness in others. I’ve been able to practice the power of listening and honoring the value of another human life. Most fulfilling to me is the fact that I have uncovered my own purpose and mission in life to make a difference in the life of another by bringing light and love into the world in a very special way.
Not many people on the planet can say that they have found the meaning of their life. The Freedom to Choose Project has helped me to find mine.
Michael Lattimore, FTC Board Member & Facilitator
(FTC volunteer since 2009)
Who Am I?
Posted on October 8, 2018, by StephanieA participant shares his experience at our recent Pathways to Freedom workshop.
“I love the work that FTC does, for myself personally, and for the greater inmate population, and also for those amazing people who devote their time to coming into prisons and bringing their love. My life has been changed forever from the experiences I have had, relationships I have formed, and wisdom that I have learned. I am indebted to the organization and people involved. Thank you so much.
This workshop was interesting because it focused on issues that I believe were on the minds of many people, including myself. Most specifically, was the issue of race and its relationship to identity and judgment. For myself, there was always a feeling that when I was participating in FTC that I was getting certain aspects of my experiences out and into processing, but that there were certain other parts that I felt like I needed to get out, but I couldn’t find the space to express because that space had not been yet opened up within the community. The last thing that I would ever want to do is be disruptive or make other participants feel uncomfortable, and so to a certain degree, I kept those things to myself. However, when dialoguing about the FTC experience with other inmates and volunteers, the issue of diversity kept coming up; diversity in the spectrum of volunteers that were represented at events, diversity in opinions and experiences, and diversity in the subjects that we were tackling in our meetings.
At this last event, Stanley’s sharing about identity was a case in point for me about how diversity can open up new insights and pathways. He talked about how before he had gained consciousness about who or what he was as a person, there was an understanding that his body and skin were already communicating with the outer world and that he was being identified based on that. There was an awareness there of having an identity that is not based on your own creation, but based on choice that is rooted in survival. I began to think about how my identity as an inmate is based on these same principles – that even if I decided that I didn’t want to be identified as a prisoner, that there would be batons, handcuffs and ultimately bullets to remind me that I couldn’t identify with being anything else. There was a realization in that moment that I have to choose this identity, or be subjected to violence, and possibly death, much in the same way that I must choose to identify with being a racialized subject in order to preserve my body. What that brought forward for me in that moment was that much of this work that we do in FTC starts with the question of “who am I?”, and that for many of us, that question is so difficult, so complicated, so fraught with contradictions. For many of us it unearths the most terrible traumas, reveals uncomfortable truths.
Stanley Bernard, FTC Facilitator (FTC Volunteer since 2007)
I was also pleasantly surprised to see the reaction to Stanley’s testimony in the sharing section of the program, which I believe was collectively very emotional and powerful – a reckoning that we can all connect with humanity and love, even though our experiences may be divergent. One of the most important pieces of my experience in this program is the aspect of renewal; this idea that every Sunday1 I can return to the source, engage in an exchange of ideas with my fellow brothers and sisters in a space created by love, understanding, and acceptance, and create new traditions, create new pathways, leaving with an understanding that those new traditions reverberate, have ripple effects, and change the world, not an abstract, but in perceptible ways.”
– A.C., Valley State Prison Large Workshop Participant – September, 2018 & ILTAG graduate
1 FTC has a Mentor Support Group (ILTAG) Program which is held every Sunday at Valley State Prison. To volunteer at this event, please visit our News/Events Page for dates and information on how to sign up.
Helping Each Other to Heal
Posted on October 1, 2018, by StephanieA volunteer shares her experience at our recent Pathways to Freedom workshop.
I want to express my gratitude and appreciation for the incredible and heart opening workshop you devised for the VSP weekend. I applaud you for your courage and willingness to discuss the subjects of racism and diversity which are real areas of challenge for our society, even for our conscious communities. As all of the facilitators stood in front of us and shared your own stories and experiences, I felt sense of opening and courage that was really profound. I grew up in environments where I did not see many people look like me or understand my cultural experiences, but I knew we are all the same. I love this work so much because it gets to the truth of who we really are and invites us to embrace our divine humanity with love and acceptance.
In my trios, I observed men with sometimes rigid bodies and distant stares light up with bright and focused eyes and beautiful smiles after the exercises. The awe I felt seeing them transform before my eyes was heart opening. On several occasions, some men told me that they wouldn’t have even considered sitting down talking to another race and how different they felt after the exercises. I, too, shared their enlightenment as I became aware of my own judgments of things I thought were small and opportunities for releasing false beliefs with compassion and forgiveness.
I’ve been to several Freedom to Choose workshops in the past and they’ve been wonderful. This one touched my heart deeply and the joy I saw on the inmates faces was out of this world.
Thanks again for your willingness to bring a challenging subject out into the open with love and kindness for individual and communal healing.
Merry Parrish (FTC Volunteer since 2012)
Mind and Supermind Class with Drs. David and Bonnie Paul: How Selfless Service Can Transform You and the World.
Posted on May 9, 2018, by StephanieBy Arlene Stepputat
“I found the Mind and Supermind lecture presented by Drs. Bonnie and David Paul to be especially meaningful. This was due both to hearing about the amazing work they do in prisons, and to the listening exercise they led us through. I learned something significant and very helpful about myself in doing the exercise. The other participants I talked with all had similarly revealing experiences. It was a most worthwhile evening!” – Spencer Sherman, Mind and Supermind Moderator
More than 60 people gathered on April 2nd 2018 to hear Mind and Supermind speakers, Drs. David and Bonnie Paul. The evening was billed as “How Selfless Service Can Transform You and the World.”
Bonnie and David took front and center with their usual warmth, welcome and humor. There they presented the work of FTC which included a video testimony from one of the original women inmates who attended the first FTC project at Valley State Prison when it was a women’s facility.
They engaged the audience in both the practical theory of the work – referring to Viktor Frankl as well as the neuroscience to illustrate how and why change is possible for any of us. David also discussed why service is good for your physical health and cited recent medical research that validates this idea.
As someone who has been with the program for many years, I have repeatedly watched “strangers” become connected through the experiential exercises used in FTC’s workshops. When David and Bonnie introduced the evening’s exercise with the handout Finding Your Freedom to Choose, the room buzzed in the tentative but soon intimate sharing within each exercise group.
FTC’s Pathways to Freedom workshop at Valley State Prison
Large group sharing was brief but filled with familiar comments as people realized that we all have more in common than we have differences. The idea of actually being listened to with someone seeing your loving essence was a revelation to many. One person shared that she didn’t realize that she would actually learn something in each role of the experiential exercise and that raised her awareness about engagement with people over all.
I had invited many friends to attend and spoke with two of them a few days later about their experience of the evening. Dana, an RN and long-time friend involved with social justice including a local project for tattoo removal for gang members shared, “it wasn’t long enough. There were so many golden nuggets coming from David and Bonnie I couldn’t write fast enough. The experience from the experiential exercise was very good. I wish it had been 3 hours.”
Victoria, a colleague at work, has a son who has been involved with a court case for the last year or so. He’s only 17 but will likely be sentenced as an adult. She has been confiding in me because she feels the stigma many families experience when a child or sibling or spouse is incarcerated. She came at my urging since her son will soon be sentenced to his prison term.
Victoria said this about the evening. “I was so impressed with the video of Jo, the inmate. I also felt comfortable opening up to a stranger which surprised me. I learned a lot from the others in my exercise group in a short time. We are all normal. We all go through stuff.” Then a little tearfully she added, “There are really amazing people out there with good hearts.”
For me the Freedom to Choose Project is about the loving and also a reminder that the wisdom and caring for another human being is inside each one of us. In my experience, selfless service does indeed change the world, the world inside me and all around me.
Mind and Supermind Classes are presented by Santa Barbara City College (SBCC) as part of their School for Extended Learning. Mind and Supermind has a long history in Santa Barbara of bringing cutting edge and conscious learning to the community. Past presenters have included the likes of Deepak Chopra, Byron Katie and most recently Jack Canfield.
Arlene Stepputat (FTC volunteer since 2005)
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