This year has been a turning point in my life. For most of last decade, I pursued what I expected from life. From grad school, to building a startup from 3 to 50+ employees, to joining Facebook.
The combination of the amount of reading I’ve done this year & the time to reflect over the past year (thanks to 80% gross margins on $B revenue, I’m not waking up every other night to an outage or a customer call from Australia anymore!) on the privilege that surrounds me (I learnt phrases like “fuck you money” ಠ_ಠ), I decided that I need to do what what life expects from me*.
The New Jim Crow, combined with a few other books, made a lasting impression on me. After reading them, I understood that the cards are stacked against prisoners trying to re-enter society. I realized I understood very little about the specific challenges that a prisoner faces. I remember discussing this with our book club, and the common sentiment was frustration at not knowing what could be done. There were no obvious points of leverage, no silver bullets. For me, it was clear that the best way to learn what was going on & to have an impact was to roll up my sleeves.
After a few months of research, today I start my volunteer orientation with the California Reentry Program that works out of San Quentin state prison to help prisoners re-enter society. To the best of my understanding, most of the work involves conducting research on behalf of prisoners, and providing them guidance based on this research. It also includes teaching them some skills such as resume building, interviewing – things we take for granted.
I’ll be lying if I said I’m not nervous. I’m not nervous about going to prison & working with prisoners (even though the handbook has pages after pages of rules & restrictions, which is a stark contrast after spending most of my life trying to break rules). I’m nervous about what impact this will have on me. Will I be able to handle coming face to face with people who are trying to take a second shot at life? Will I be able to continue doing this over next several months or years, or will I stop? As with all things I’ve done, we’ll find out. One thing is for sure – I haven’t felt this motivated, yet powerless about anything in life. Here’s to doing what I think life expects from me!
* – A phrase I borrow from Victor Frankl.
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