With a backdrop of poverty and depression, individual violence in our communities comes from a fire within that doesn’t burn out. People carrying the weight of compounding trauma are like walking embers waiting to ignite. The only differences are the sizes of the flames that follow ignition, and depending on the individual the flames can grow to a full-on blaze.

The Real

When someone tells us “I feel like my world is on fire,” we listen.

Experience teaches us that many violent situations are preventable. We walk alongside those whose biggest obstacle is the person in the mirror. Therefore, half the battle we face as a team at 914United is helping people get out of their own way. We face an enemy we know all too well: Violence, which is like a vibration humming through our streets before it turns into the roar of Parade Drums. 

Our work with the community is volatile, so we expect the unintended consequences of the environmental pressures our people face. Our team of credible messengers on the ground build relationships that matter, which puts us in a position to help break the cycles of violence that plague our families and friends, who have built up generations of experiences that normalize cruelty.

The Moment

Summer days in the hood are met with trepidation. People stuck in the perpetual cycle of hardship have nothing to do. The agitation of the heat only adds to bad moods and tempers flare for over trivial situations. Famous Hip-hop artist and millionaire mogul 50 Cent once said, “It’s hot out this bitch, that’s a good enough reason.”

On one of those hot days we had a special workshop scheduled. It was the first time that we were bringing together a group of multi-generational, justice-impacted individuals, to discuss the meaning of “freedom.” Which is a term that has taken on trivial meaning in neighborhoods where people often feel trapped. The participants’ ages ranged from 16 to 67 years of age, all combined for a few hundred years of carceral experiences.

Earlier in the day, one of our team members made his rounds in the city streets by picking up some of the younger group participants. As he was on his way back to the office he witnessed a verbal altercation in one of the rougher neighborhoods between a guy he knew and his baby’s mother. The scene was escalating rapidly as threats were being thrown around, and from experience the people around could tell things were only going to get worse. 

The young man involved was getting animated in a way that reflected him having  just been released from prison a few months back. His hand movements and other gestures showed that he was fully aware of his surroundings and ready to get physical if he had too. He knew his baby’s mother did not make idle threats, with family members also stuck in a cycle of violence and incarceration nearby. This incident was definitely going to spiral out of control, until our team member’s quick thinking prompted him to move in. He got out of the car, grabbed the guy by the arm, not taking his time to explain, deescalating the moment with action as he pulled his friend back into the car with him.

The Mission

Back at the office, the group mingles a bit before the workshop begins but there is no doubt the energy in the room has shifted with the arrival of a man whose body language speaks volumes about his state of mind. Experience in the penal legal system teaches people to recognize tension, which is met with silence and replaced with an acute hyper awareness. It is a built-in spidey sense for survival, which after years of incarceration, the men in the room do not take for granted. 

When the group finally sits together in a circle, the oldest member of the group, half deaf, who looks like a vintage Vietnam war veteran, breaks the ice by sharing his story first with the confidence of a man who has walked through the fire and has come back scarred, with the mental scars to prove it. 

“The scars that never fully heal.”

 As he reflects on the decades spent in prison as he looks into the eyes of the young men in the room. No doubt seeing himself in their youth, when he lived that carefree reckless life which led to so many bad decisions growing up. Captivated by his story we understood that the ice had been broken, so we signaled the facilitators to take over.

The conversation is then eventually guided to the concept of freedom, which can mean so many things to so many different people. But in this room it took on a distinct meaning. It was more than a definition, it was trauma, it was painful, and it was a personality. Something within your reach but knowingly, an abstract thing that could slip right through your fingers in seconds if you are not careful. 

The  conversation got deeper as it intensified, and when the group participation finally went around a few times the focus fell on the tension in the room. It was like a spotlight being turned on in a dark space with empty chairs, with one person sitting in the center, feeling the heat on the back of his neck. He was the caretaker of his own peace, so he had to put the fire out, hence, deciding right there and then to let vulnerability in and bear the emotions stirring up the anger inside of him free.

“I feel like my world is on fire!” He looked at us all as if seeing us for the first time. He wasn’t in the prison yard anymore, where half of the people in the room would’ve walked away to avoid getting caught up, and the other half would’ve been willing to get caught up with him. 

Except this time we were all present. Listening. Caring for what he had to say.

“I was arguing with my baby’s mom because she doesn’t want to let me see my daughter. She threatened to get her people to hurt me?!”

“I just came home a few months ago and she thinks I care about going back!” 

We let him vent for a while until we were able to give him some feedback. He needed someone to listen. Experiences were shared afterwards, advice was suggested, and the three oldest men in the room, who shared more than 9 decades, poured into him what freedom should mean to him moving forward. 

• Communication
• Patience
• Understanding

“Stay free, or it’s your daughter growing up without a father or a grandfather, or an uncle. And if things get really hairy it could be without both parents and then what?…”

The Outcome

When we build community with groups like this the script is often written on the spot with the lens of individual reality. The facilitators guide the conversation, and the stories that are shared can have an impact on any one or more people in the room. 

The young man visibly relaxed, like he was able to breathe for the first time since he arrived. We listened. He listened. And in the end was able to break bread with like-minded individuals, a sacred gesture for incarcerated individuals, who understand all too well what it feels like to watch the world around you burn. 

Solutions don’t come easily but they can be found with communication. As a result, he was able to practice patience making it home to work on a plan that could help him better understand his situation, find a way to compromise, and respect an approach that will keep his freedom intact for his daughter’s sake. 

Our team member reported to us a few days later that he saw him out with his daughter spending time together. He was grateful to the group. It was an unintended intervention, which at the least saved him from doing something he would later regret, keeping someone out of the hospital or the morgue, and at most rescued his most revered relationship, strengthening his family bonds. Hence the hidden realities of our work.

“Holding on to anger is like grasping a hot coal with the intent of throwing it at someone else; you are the one who gets burned” – Buddha