180 Degrees of Redirection*

A Brief Look At Our Potential For Change

"Is it 360 degrees, or is a 180 degree change the actual reality?"

*Learned and adapted from 12 step principles.

When we look at our available angles of change, we learn that it is possible to reintegrate into society successfully. When we commit to learning how and activate these angles in our life we become a new person. The moment we begin to force change we begin to change into who we were before. That means thinking the same thoughts living the same way we allow who we were to become who we are. Frustration and our inability to definitely control outcomes in our efforts to change can be the reason we begin to struggle and fail.

We must realize that control comes from the changes we make and the way we utilize the things we learned as we began to live differently. Accepting that we are in a state of distress that will only get better over time is the only way to succeed.

We cannot expect to re-enter society and be stable and successful in one day. We have to accept that when we left society we were broken people and that people in society didn't get where they are in one day. Society did not stop just because we were in prison. Society kept moving we had stopped. We must understand that for us Society had stopped long before we were incarcerated.

In accepting that we will be able to realize what we had told society through our everyday actions. I do not want to be a part of your Society; I want my own. I want to run and rule my own life, yet in knowing this it must be clear to us that we didn't know how to run our own lives and could not run a society. We have to accept that we were living in an alternate reality and that alternate reality was a false reality that we created in our own mind because we did not know how to get along in society. We lived on our own terms and by standards that society did not and still does not accept.

We were rebels and in order to live in a society that has a standard we must live up to that standard. Rebellion leads to war and society showed us that we can anytime we choose become prisoners to that war. We must decide before we leave prison whether we want to be prisoners or live by societies standards. We also must act on that decision the moment we step out of prison or into a place where people are committed to changing the way they live.

Now that we know a little (not everything) we must do to re- enter society with a chance at success let's look at the principles we must incorporate into our lives to make this possible.