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I met Matthew Sisnero through his book over a decade ago. He had just been asked for money for his son by his mother. Without only a thought or two Matthew pulled out his sawed-off shotgun, headed for a local store and robbed the place. He had done it before--no big deal. But this time he'd had to stop at a different place, his timing went wrong and he was caught... He was soon on his way to jail...
Somewhere along this brief ride, Matthew Sisnero was touched. Perhaps it was that the woman with whom he'd had his son had chosen to pick him out of a lineup and identify him... This confused him since she knew he would do anything for his son. He'd done it before, so why change her response? Perhaps it was a brief memory of what his mother always had said to him--something he hated each time she said it--that it was his own choices that would result in his future. We who are reading never know. I hope someday that Matthew might write a prequel to his book of those younger years to complete the very unique picture that he's shared with us in this book. We can assume from what is said that his father was not in the picture and that Matthew had strong negative feelings about him... This seemed to be very plain as he makes a new statement once he is imprisoned.
Because of how and what he'd done, his case went into federal court--given the type of weapon--and we learn, at least I did, just how cruelly those within the federal prison systems are to those inside. If there ever was a time when rehabilitation was part of the program for prisons, it certainly is gone now...
For almost immediately Matthew was horribly assaulted...
I was willing to take that chance, and I took it, and I lost. I can’t be mad at anybody else. I’m the only one who did that. But I’ve learned a lot through all these last 10 calendars I’ve flipped through. I’m figuring out who I think I am. I’m figuring out my needs, wants, and boundaries. And I’m learning how to express the expectations I have to others. Now, I’m not suggesting by any means that you go to prison to figure yourself out. I’m not suggesting that at all. There’s a lot I’ve gone through that I didn’t deserve. I didn’t want to get beaten up, I didn’t want to be sexually assaulted, and I didn’t want to be humiliated or watch one of my friends get murdered throughout these years. My punishment was only supposed to be taken out of society so I couldn’t affect it the way I did anymore. All that extra stuff was somebody else who wanted to continue living their life of violence and other crimes, and I just happened to be the recipient. I don’t know what attracted them to me. I don’t even think I’ve ever voiced any of this to anybody until now. But this is my truth. I got scared to publish this because of the fear of how it could affect my loved ones. For some reason, I looked like a victim to these people, and they chose to do what they did. I hear people say they would do this and do that if somebody did anything to them, and all that sounds good, but I was too scared to fight. I was too scared to move. I just wanted it over with. When I was sexually assaulted, I couldn’t believe what was happening. I didn’t want to die, though. I just remember it hurting so bad that I fainted when he entered me. I’ve never felt pain like that before in my life. I remember my celly there when I was waking up. I’m not even sure how long I was out for. My celly was asking me if I was okay and trying to help me to the bed, and it took me a good 20 minutes to regain my focus. I just remember crying the rest of that night. I was embarrassed. I was scared to leave my cell because I thought everyone knew. My celly couldn’t believe what I was telling him. I could’ve had the guy killed, but I didn’t, and honestly, I couldn’t make any rational decision for a few days after. I cried a lot, and I cried silently. Especially after getting off the phone and lying to my people, saying I was doing good. I just didn’t want anybody to know. From that day forward, I was scared of men. And I still am. I’m not a fighter, and by not retaliating against anyone, it gave an unfortunate message that either I liked what was happening, or I wouldn’t do anything about what was happening, or any future situations that could happen. And I say all this to say that through these experiences I’ve been through, I’ve gained positive qualities and values that I now project toward others. I understand that I can’t control what other people do or how other people conduct themselves. But I can control how I personally choose to live my life and the type of ripple effect I spread.
~~~~
In here, if you don’t discipline yourself, somebody else is gonna do it for you, and quick. It’s crazy how the process works too, because the more you get in trouble, the more they take away your ability to experience things. In the free world, when you get in trouble, they take you away from experience and put you in jail. In jail, if you get in trouble, they send you to solitary confinement. If you get in trouble in solitary confinement, they take even more experience away from you. They can take so much that the only things you experience are your bowel movements and most of your senses. And as you act right, you earn more experience back. The C.O.s will even wear masks and not respond to you so you can’t even experience human expressions. Being so close to going home, I’ve been doing my best to make a plan and use my time wisely. I see a lot of guys create problems for themselves by doing drugs and wasting their time. One of my best friends, T.J., lost his life from running up a debt, having the homies pay it, and then doing it again after being warned what would happen if he couldn’t pay it. Not sure how many times he was stabbed, but after the C.O.s did their round, they found him lying dead on the concrete in his cell. I didn’t hear him scream or make a sound. Some people scream for their families, even though they know they obviously can’t hear them. They scream anyway though. Everybody reacts to knife wounds differently. I couldn’t imagine leaving prison dealing with drug withdrawals. Fuck that. I feel cleaner, healthier, and my integrity is intact because I’m not spending my family’s money on stupid shit. It sucks trying to make friends in here. People leave, go home, get transferred, get murdered, go to the SHU, or you end up leaving and leaving everyone behind. That’s what I’m about to do. Being so close to leaving, I’m focused solely on my release plan. That’s it. My goal was not to get too close to anybody and not make friends in here. It’s going to suck leaving Joe behind. I hate saying goodbye. I’m sad even writing about it, but it’s inevitable. I have to leave, and they have to stay. So I make plans and daydream because I want to succeed. I feel like I’ve learned a lot, and I want to prove that to myself. I want my mom to see it. I have to see what I’m capable of. We all have a choice. We can sit around and hope our lives change, or we can make a plan and take a chance. I think about all the graveyards full of ideas that were never tried. Those ideas died with the people who had them. Some of them could have changed the world. Even if my ideas don’t change the whole world, they’ll change my world, and maybe someone else’s. I can’t be scared to try. I can’t be scared to fail. Failure is just life moving us in a different direction. I had to learn to listen to my heart and my conscience and follow my gut. It’s crazy to look back at all the trouble I’ve been in. But I’ve come a long way. It’s too bad it took this for me to wake up. My family isn’t used to this side of me. I’m nervous about how they’re going to see me. But no matter what, I have to do what I have to do. Following my convictions and gut feelings is tough sometimes, but I’ve been focused on what my heart is telling me and what’s right for my life, no matter how people feel about it. When people say you reap what you sow, it’s real. I’ve learned that it is tough to do good in a bad environment. It really is. It is almost like you gotta do good in a good environment or do bad in a bad environment to get the results you’re looking for. In prison, as I sit here and write these sentences, most people around me are doing bad things in a bad environment, so they’re pretty much reaping exactly what they’re choosing. Me, I’m trying to do good things in a bad environment, so I’m not reaping the results I’m wanting. But I still do the best I can, because I know when I get out that I will hopefully start to reap the rewards that I’m wanting to reap. It’s definitely tough, though… People look at me funny for “trying.” But I want a better life for myself, so I plan and write down my ideas that are in my head so that when I do get out, these ideas can come to fruition. It’s tough because even some of my loved ones doubt me. I also did that to myself—I’ve created that doubt. This isn’t my first robbery either. Back in 2000, I robbed a store, and as I’m robbing it, a customer walked in, so I robbed him too and received 48 months for each—48 for the store and 48 for the customer. I was only about 19 years old, and it was my first felony as an adult. So I got everything over my head with 10 years’ probation. I ended up getting in trouble, so I did 2001 in jail, got in trouble again, and did 2002 in jail. I stayed out of jail in 2003, violated again, and did the years 2004–2005–2006. The point in me saying all this is to say that I understand why my people didn’t trust me. I understand why they doubt. I’ve never been to the Feds, though. And I’ve never done this much time in one stretch. This is definitely an eye-opener. I’ve been through a lot. I’ve done a lot of changing. I’ve programmed numerous times, and I’ve also created programs and mentored other inmates to try to help them see something different in themselves and that change is possible. When I say mentoring other inmates, I don’t mean just any inmates. I mean specifically high-security inmates, and really some of the most violent ones too. Even though my people don’t know this, or maybe even believe this, I’ve dedicated my entire sentence to seeing how smart I could become, how much change I could make, and really paying forward my life and the experience I’ve had throughout this time. I had to have a desire to change, though, and I needed to really want something different for myself. Change doesn’t have to be super hard. Don’t get it confused, though, because change sometimes isn’t easy. But the process doesn’t have to be complex. The way I’m doing it is: Envision how I want my life to look. Write down that vision so I can read about it. Write down the steps that are necessary—everything that I can think of, no matter how small a step or how extreme a step. Figure it out.
~~~~
Whatever Matthew had done in his earlier life was forgotten. It was almost as if he had the first night there remembered what his mother had said, and he finally knew that she was right. He immediately knew that he had to make the right choices to be able to live through the 13 years he was aiming for... Perhaps based upon what happened, he instinctively chose to not become a member of one of the gang there, with leaders and others who already knew the game that was to be played. Instead he chose to be a loner who chose, to prepare for his future once he was out. Surprisingly for me, to enjoyed reading. Philosophy and personal achievement books. In fact, the major part of the book was a storyline that I was not prepared for. You see, right from the beginning it seemed like we were meeting Matthew--not the Matt that we would have guessed we would be meeting after reading about his taking a sawed-off rifle and heading to a store to steal money...
Was this the Matthew of his early life we never met? Or had he been touched in some way that day when he was caught and placed in jail? And the book does not say that's what happened...so I kept on reading...
Another surprise, he became buddies with some of the roughest men in that location, but he learned that each of them were family men and loved their families, even though they had chosen a life of crime somewhere along the way. Readers begin to wonder, especially during this time of extreme unrest in the United States, whether all of these types of lifestyles were forced on people, and, never, really, chosen...
Matthew mentions in the book that those to whom he wrote had given him feedback that he wrote wonderful letters. Here, too, readers will see and ponder. This young man was obvious intelligent, and already had an ability to write, even though much reading that he had started and learned from in prison added to his skills. He commented that there was little editing of the book. It was then I realized that he was writing a daily journal, or as often as he chose to write, and that, sometime he repeated a topic, but not in such a way as to be repetitive. Rather he was on a particular topic that he might have been reading about and writing about at that time. Pay attention to this part of the book because there will be a specific split later on... It was almost as if he was being guided to choose what to read and to spend time, indeed, planning for the future. It was time well spent and, by the time, those many years went by, it is difficult to even consider that he was not, instead, spending time away at college...
Until he left the structure of the prison life, where he had chosen not to spent time drugging, lifting weights, and other non-beneficial activities, but rather to look and plan for the future...
Matthew was ultimately scheduled into a half-way house. He had even landed a management job and was successfully working--for a while...
You See, Matthew's mothers told him just one part of her life as a Christian... She'd explained that he would be asked to choose, but, maybe, at those times, he would turn away and not listen. Because Matthew never learned that nobody can make it on our own... We might try, and work to be prepared, just as Matthew had done during his incarceration, but in this world, it is not enough... Matthew had been touched through his early life, but, you see, there had been no real contact to provide the necessary strength...
Matthew was pulled back into easy access to drugs--those drugs which gave him a high he'd never wanted to give up. Yet he knew it was not really what he needed... He knew God as part of His Life, but he'd never met my best friend--and perhaps yours...
This is a story that is m0re than readable--inspirational. It is a story that just may be the exact one that will touch you. Each of our lives is so different. There is no one story that will respond to you. I found myself pondering much about the book and how it was written. Then realized that, even though familiar, it was NOT my story but that of Matthew Sisnero. He had a path that has been chosen for him... And as I wrote to him about getting his book, his words were something like "And it begins..." It is indeed his story to share...
You have a story, a relationship, a life, that is to be found, a story that only you can find for yourself. Nobody else can replace your life's story. But, Sisnero's story is very unique. Because he lived a life that had been guided by one sentence: Your future is made by the choices you make today. If you remember only that one sentence, it will be a start. But that is only a Start. Your future, perhaps, needs to be guided at first, to learn about the possibilities, the tragedies that might affect you greatly, but which can also be overcome and forgotten in your new future which starts everyday... And Matthew Sisnero found my Friend...
This book may be your first step in the right direction.
GABixlerReviews
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