Ernesto's Story: Second Chances

"I grew up in an environment that fostered unkindness in my young life. My mother and stepfather were stuck in a cycle of unkind habits of addiction, criminality, character defects, and warped beliefs that reinforced the unkind habits that I adopted in my environment. I had low self-worth due to agitating and disturbing unkind habits I experienced. I developed mind-wandering habits as an avoidance mechanism; for example, thrill-seeking by breaking the rules helped me not to think of my present reality. I developed an unkind personality type. Being defiant and having an antisocial personality helped me protect the vulnerableinner me from the abuse, abandonment, neglect, and ejection I experienced in my young life. 

I additionally developed defects of character. Anger and violence placed a shield on my underlying emotions, such as powerlessness and fear. Acceptance was a method that helped me compensate for the insecure attachment I developed because of my instability in my early childhood. Kindness was not a concept I understood because I experienced pain, trauma, and hurt that led me to project that harm onto others for many years.

It was not until I ended up in solitary confinement at Pelican Bay State Prison in California that I was forced to face my unkind habits and admit that I had an unkind personality type. It was in solitary confinement that I experienced the transformative powers of kindness that the Carnine family showed me through the kindness they showed me. It was through their compassion that I began to believe love could win. My transformation of changing and weakening my unmindful-unkind cycle was able to shift. It was then that I began to be kind towards others and expand that kindness into my community inside and outside of prison.

I want to thank Doug, his wife Linda, and daughters Leah and Berkley, my wife Kathleen, my Mom, and all the kind human beings who were a part of my process of change.”