Morality and Facing the Past

Morality and Facing the Past

When I first started this blog I promised to share my faults and flaws. I wanted to do this because the journey I began was sure to have struggles for me and if I share these struggles then people who are interested in there own personal development may gain some insight into how my development is going. When I was training tai chi at the retreat center my question of the meaning of life changed into the question, “Who am I?” This lead me to look at myself. I began to realize that I was wearing a mask. That in my life there were things that I was not being honest about. Some things I was dishonest to myself about, and many times I realized that I would act a certain way around certain people. I did this to be accepted or sometimes to impress a girl. I would not say I was a fraud, but I was not a sincere person. The reason for this realization was that I was surrounded by highly moral people. They valued the morality that martial arts had taught them, namely humility, respect, righteousness, trustworthiness and loyalty.

As I began to conceptualize the person that I wanted to be, I realized the value of these moralities. I wanted to be a person of integrity, which was the closest thing in our American culture to righteousness which Master Yang described as doing what you believe is right no matter what popular opinion was. This made me think about things in my life that I had to do in order to align my life with this new found moral compass. This is where ideas are easy and actions become more difficult. You see there was a secret I was keeping from everyone and if I was going to become this person 

I had conceptualized I had to deal with the consequences of some of my past actions. I told everyone at the retreat center that I was wanted by the law for an old crime I had committed and that I could no longer live there among them and pretend to be a moral person when I had this hanging over my head. So this is the reason that I left the retreat center. 

My crime was transportation of cannabis in Arizona, a state that takes very seriously that charge. Because of my prior criminal history I was facing up to 18 years in prison. I thought deeply about my options. I did not want to face these charges. I did not want to go back to prison late into my 30s with this new perspective and love for life that I had gained. But I could not progress into the man I wanted to be if I did not resolve my legal issues. This is the consequence of poor decision making. That is the truth. I have lived a hard life. My mother and family continue to shun me for 20 years. I have had moments of severe depression and during those moments I have been extremely self destructive. I want to share this because I have gotten to know many criminals during my time in prison, and if they ever stumble across this blog, I want them to have the chance at a unique perspective of a person facing their criminal past after a time of great personal development. 

I have to face this charge because I want to have a meaningful life. I realize after looking back on my adult life that I have not been the most moral person. I had spent a great deal of time entertaining conspiracy theories, and looking out into the world to find out who was responsible for the state of world affairs. What I realized in my time in the mountains was that if I wanted to change the world, the first person I should be critical of is myself. To live in a world that was more compassionate, I first had to be compassionate. To live in a world that was more honest and sincere I had to be more honest and more sincere. If I wanted to have a meaningful life then I needed to be a righteous person. Character is so important to my future. I want the foundation of my life to be built on honesty and values and since it was my quest to transform myself from this old person into this conceptualized Ed that I wanted to be, I had to make peace with my past.

I hired a lawyer and went to court. After some time of back and forth negotiations I ended up accepting a deal for 4-10 years with the judge having discretion to grant me probation. So how do I feel? This has been very hard. It is the reason I haven’t blogged for awhile. I have not committed a crime in five years, actually since I committed this crime, so I am hopeful that I do get probation in leu of prison, but I am also preparing myself for the fact that there is a possibility that I will go back to prison. That is definitely something I do not want to deal with at 38 years old. I feel anxious and I’m a little nervous about what the outcome will be. I feel regret for my poor life decisions that led me here. However I do not regret facing my past. This is a pivotal point in my life. This is one of the most important decisions I have ever made. Whatever the outcome is, I am taking the difficult steps necessary to transform myself into the person I want to be. One that is honest and represents the values that I have grown to appreciate so much.

My great hope by sharing these blogs with you, is to show step by step, my journey from a life without meaning to one with meaning. These steps are not easy. I hope that I will be shown leniency at court, but I am also preparing for the possibility that  I will go back to prison. I have even begun a to do list of things I want to do if I do go back. I want to write a book and a screenplay. There are also a few interesting meditations that I would like to do if I do go back. I guess my greatest fear is that my father is getting older and that if I do a long period of time, he may not be there when I get out. I hope that he realizes that to face this, is evidence of his success as a parent and a mentor. He is the only family member I am close to, and his unwavering patience, his ability to enforce boundaries on an unruly child, has produced the man that I am today. I hope he knows how much I appreciate those things.

If this is my last blog for awhile, then you know the outcome of my court. I just want to say a few things to anyone who may run across this blog. Every decision you make has a consequence. If you find yourself in a place where you no longer care about consequences then you need to find out how to solve that problem, because it is a problem. I left to live in the mountains, but I can see how rehab can work for some. If you’re in a position to get therapy, that is probably the best place to start. Find a support group that has values, like a church or a highly moral martial arts instructor like my jiu jitsu instructor Dan Camarillo, or my tai chi instructor Dr. Yang Jwing Ming. Sometimes life is not fair, and we do not all start on even ground. I have been shunned by my mother and my siblings for 20 years, and it was not my fault. However everything else that happened after that, is absolutely my fault. This is the most important thing that I have learned. Every so often you will come to a cross road, where you will have to make an important decision. That is your choice, so think about it carefully. Do not follow immoral people. I do not mean moral in the religious sense, but someone who will tell the truth and has good intentions. If your life has no meaning then find meaning. Go out and look for it cause there are allot of meaningful things. Be honest with yourself and be honest with others. My life is not what I wanted it to be, but it will be what I want it be because I decided to make it that way. I have that power and so do you.