Product of my Environment

JUNE 2024 | 3RD ISSUE

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VISION STATEMENT Incarcerated youth writing to clear their conscience and express their feelings that are hard to speak. They will explain what they have been through, where they came from, and how they would like to change their mindset. They want to share their voices with an audience of their kind, and to let people know that change is okay and they are not alone.

Table of Contents Not For Normal Eyes Page 1

Never Pages 2

Hard Times Pages 3-4

Fast Money Pages 5-6

Realization Pages 7-8

What They Don’t Know Pages 9-10

Falling Victim Pages 11-12

Off The Porch Pages 13-16

Amazing Grace Pages 17-18

Ghetto Child Pages 20-21

Tales of a Gangsta Page 22

Dear Readers, This issue of Chained Minds to Changed Minds, called “Product of My Environment” is about struggles people go through growing up in poverty such as abuse, addiction, heartbreak, street violence, and envy. We are going to show people how we grew up. Almost every kid from poverty has had to go through these things that made us who we are today. These are our stories.

In the poem “Not For Normal Eyes,“ the writer wants you to be able to visualize his environment and be able to see the world in his point of view. It’s a sudden change for people who have never witnessed the effect of no love or care for others.

In “Never,” the writer expresses himself in the form of lyrics from a song he wrote, but it is not just a song. It’s a walkthrough of past events from his life. He is letting people know he comes from a world of pain.

In the story “Hard Times,” the writer expresses that he has had a hard lifestyle to the point where his expression and exterior are just as hard as his life has been, but even then he lets it be known he is really a scared little boy in a grown man’s body.

In the narrative “Fast Money,” the writer shows how from the start he has faced nothing but neglect, abuse, and pain which has caused him to have a desire for fast money.

In his essay “Realization,” the writer explains that life is like chess and we are all pawns trying to make our way to the end of the board to find success.

In “What They Don’t Know,” the writer presents a memory that has unexpected turns, zero help, and no safety. He wants people to understand that you have to want change physically and mentally, and things are earned not just given.

In the poem “Falling Victim,” the poet shares a lifestyle that makes society look at people like they are not human. He lets it be known life is not fair and betrayal is everywhere.

In his narrative “Off the Porch,” the writer tells a story that has heartbreak and tragedy right from the jump. From age 4 he has been pushed to the edge, just to fall into a pit of sorrow and suffering. This story is a true product of his environment and not something someone could just make up.

In the essay “Amazing Grace,” the writer lets it be known that God has taken away the pain that was inflicted on him by his environment. He believed that it was his destiny to be like his father, that was until he found an amazing grace.

In the poem “Ghetto Child,” the writer explains the neglect, envy, and hatred that the world has had to offer him his whole life as a child all the way up to his adult life. He is a ghetto child among “civilization,” seeking someone who could relate or at least give him an answer to his problems in life.

Last but not least, in this short essay “Tales of a Gangsta,” the writer shares a memory of his childhood along with the trials and tribulations he’s had to face growing up in a harsh environment, an environment he became dedicated to.

We truly hope you enjoy the writing in this issue.

Sincerely, Chained Minds to Changed Minds Assistant Editor

Not for Normal Eyes I am a product of my environment.

I bleed the same as any person, I cry the same as any person, I even quit the same as any person.

What makes me different from most people?

I slave on a corner with no retirement, I fight when I am angry, I carry guns for my safety, I have no love for randoms, I feel empty.

All I wanted was the world to accept me, But I feel like God blessed everyone except me, So now I chase women and use drugs That are not of my prescription.

My life is an everyday mission.

To you is probably another dimension, But it’s a beautiful struggle.

It teaches the poor how to make money double, And it taught me how to deal with trouble: From gun violence to bloody knuckles I seen and done it all.

As a youngin’ all I wanted to do was ball, But all the hate and envy made this young man fall.

As I sat in a cell, I wondered everyday, who could I call?

Thinking to myself, I can’t just quit I need to stand tall.

Life was cutting through me, yet the blade was dull It’s easy to take another person’s soul; It’s the consequences that hurt when they take a toll.

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NEVER You ain’t never been where I been No you ain’t never seen what I seen No you ain’t never been where I been No you ain’t never seen what I seen, No you ain’t never been in booking with nobody to call You ain’t never seen somebody get faced and fall You ain’t never had to put your back against the wall You ain’t never banged a gang and gave it your all.

No you ain’t never!

No you ain’t never!

No you ain’t never!

You ain’t never in the field so stop all the pump fake I was to the neck trying to put food up on my plate I can’t show no love that’s all a part of the game I just want to get rich and move my family out the way I was 15 outside walking through the rain Normal people could never fit my shoes or never feel my pain Since I lost my brother things ain’t never been the same People telling on they partner no we could never be same I would take twenty-one years with a L before I ever say a name But where is everybody since I have been sitting in this cage?

Nah matter of fact I don’t want nobody’s love keep them lies away Twelve had me looking at four walls trying to break But what they don’t understand is I have a heart of a lion not a snake I come from the environment where things really get reckless You ain’t never been where I been No you ain’t never seen what I seen No you ain’t never been where I been No you ain’t never seen what I seen

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Hard Times This place is so hard. You always got to have a hard expression on your face because any sign of weakness and you will be the next person being bullied. When you have a mask on for so long, it’s basically glued there. You got to put on a show for people and be someone you are not, just so people don’t think you are weak.

It is hard to express yourself when you’ve shut yourself out from everyone because you feel they will not listen, or because when you do express yourself they don’t help with your problems, even after they said they would.

Sometimes you get people with serious charges who have already been here for a couple years, and still have a lot more years to go, who actually want to try and better themselves. It is hard when you are limited to the things you do because you don’t want to find out what the consequences are. In here, when you do something wrong, they look at you like you’re a kid, being childish, but we are kids, so I don’t understand how anyone can be mad when we do kid things. What we are in here for makes some think we are older than we actually are, but we’re not. Most of us are barely older than 16 and still scared of the dark. But who cares about that when you killed someone, right?

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What they do not understand, or even try and think about, is how this place changes us and not for the better, but for the worse. What the people that run this place do not seem to understand is they are basically putting kids in a cell for the bigger part of the day. Do you understand what that does to people? It messes with our minds in the worst kind of way. They think that if you get some years in here, that you are going to change and be who they think you should be, but what they don’t think about is how we are not getting better, but we are getting worse by the day.

To be honest this place brings the worst in us, not the better.

They don’t sit and think how this can change us on the outs. Like for example if you’re the type of person that is so used to having to be a macho man because you do not want to show weakness in front of others, but you don’t have that on and off switch, so you don’t know how to turn off who you were inside of the cell. So when you get out you are going to be the same person you were in here, and that might get you locked back up.

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Fast Money When I was younger my mom had me around a lot of people that were not good for me to be around. I was abused by family and people I didn’t know. She told me to stop lying and that it wasn’t okay for me to say stuff like that because I could get people in big trouble, but the whole time I was trying to tell the truth. I was constantly having to do things that I was not okay with. I had to cry myself to sleep and tell myself that it was going to be okay when I knew it wasn’t, but at the time who would be there to tell me that? When I was so young where could I go?

After a year and a half, I went to my grandmas and stayed the night and then told her what was going on and she told me that I didn’t have to go back and live with them, but I did have to get my stuff from over there, so I went back and stayed with my mom for a week. Then I told her I wanted to move in with my grandma, and my mom told me to pack my bags and don’t let the door hit me in my ass. I was shipped off to live with my grandma.

Four years later, when I turned 12, I tried to move back in with my mom because I was missing my brothers and sister, but that didn’t go so well. I was dropped off at my mom’s doorstep, and there was a lot going on. I didn’t even get to unpack my bags before I got into one of the biggest arguments with my mom over something that could have been talked out. Then, there I was back on the street. I called my grandma for help, but she had already told me that if she dropped me off at my mom’s not to call her, so she didn’t answer.

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So there I was, looking for a place to live, and I couldn’t find anywhere to go except a park. I was at the park for like two days, and then I ran into a man named S____. Once I met him, he was showing me how to get a bag, and I was falling in love with the fast money. Money here, money there, money everywhere. I was all in for whatever I had to do to get the money to keep me living right. At the age of thirteen, I was riding around Fresno in a 2013 BMW and a full pocket of money, but that’s when I started to be continuously locked up for all types of different crimes, until I was finally locked up for something that almost caused me to spend the rest of my life in a cell.

All the times I was hurt led up to where I am today.

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Realization Growing up where I’m from, we are just pawns in this life trying to earn our way up to a knight or a king. There was a time where I wanted to give up on everything. I started gangbanging at the age of 12. I grew up not knowing the true meaning of life. I’ve experienced more hardship than most adults have in their lifetime. There are people out there that expect me to have no future and have already given up on me. Personally, I see things differently: murder, court cases, incarceration, school, and through it all, family. I’m still here, and I’m not going anywhere.

It wasn’t easy growing up in the streets of Fresno, especially for a Hispanic male from a violent generation. I was born in Fresno, California in 2004. My mother was an addict and my father was incarcerated. I don’t remember the last conversation I had with my father. He is a gang member and has been locked up most of my life. He is still locked up to this day. The rest of my family were also gang members or on drugs.

When I was less than a year old, my mother had nowhere to go. She ended up giving me to my cousins who are now my parents. Around 3 years old my mother ended up taking me back, but she got worse again, and I ended up going back and forth the rest of my childhood. I went through and witnessed abuse going back to my mother’s house. Growing up I learned to live with it and adapt so I wouldn’t have to leave my mom or my other siblings. My cousins had no idea of the abuse, but they were aware of my mom’s addiction. They had no choice but to give me back though because they never had custody.

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I grew up around gang members, tweakers, and drug dealers. I ended up falling into the same category around 12 years old. I started gangbanging and started selling weed at 13. I never did drugs besides weed because my mother and other family members showed me how bad those other drugs can ruin you. So I hated tweakers my whole life. I started getting deep in the gang life around 1314, carrying guns, fighting, and dropping out of school. It kept getting deeper and deeper from there.

One day I ended up getting a female very special to me pregnant. I settled down for awhile, but then I ended up going back into the gang life because I felt like that’s all I knew or that’s all I was meant for based on everything that I’d been through. I never realized how I was just taking my blessings for granted and how I was blind to the fact that I was meant for more until it was too late.

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What They Don’t Know People only know me by the bad, never the good. My first memory was being taken away from my parents and being put into the system. They said they took me away from my parents because they said I was in bad environment, but they threw me in worse one. Of all the foster homes I’ve been in, there was not one of them I could call a safe haven.

Eight years later, when I was thirteen, they moved me back with my mother. Growing up with ten siblings and a single mother was a struggle. As a middle child, I was entitled to no attention and had to fend for myself. I started messing up in school, running away, selling weed, and even stealing from the mall for clothes for myself and my younger siblings.

Going into the streets was as easy as saying the ABC’s.

Surviving in them was the hard part. Moving house to house with nowhere to go besides a park bench or a stolen car to sleep in was challenging, and then my life took an unexpected turn. My mom passed away and the bills started to pile up, and at the same time I needed to support my baby. This led me to going out and committing crimes to support my family and landed me in jail.

After being incarcerated for 704 days, I had one of my last court dates. The judge said all good things about me: how great I’ve been in the programs and how much I’ve changed while being incarcerated.

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The District Attorney couldn’t even say bad things about me, and they recommended 87 days off. When probation spoke, I was thinking the worst. They said that every time they go into the pod all the kids curse me out and are very disrespectful, but when I talk to this young man he is very respectful and always greets me and asks me how I am doing. The judge decided he wanted me to get my high school diploma before he released me into the real world, so he gave me the max time I could get off: 6 months.

So with an early release date and a baby to support out there, I ask myself “Are you physically and mentally ready to get out?”

My answer would be no, honestly I’m not.

Those programs that they said would help us are only teaching us how to control our feelings and tell us how to make the right choices and outcomes. But what about when I get out? How is all that stuff supposed to help me get a job, an apartment, a car or help me support my 4-year-old daughter? I’ll be starting at zero, with no clothes, no money, no support, or even an address to call mine. There’s no one besides me, myself, and I to tell myself to keep pushing and that it will it be okay.

They paint a good picture that they are going to be there for you when you get out, but where are they at? This is what they don’t know about the system.

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Falling Victim So many stories that made a person change the way he thought.

So many beliefs and standards they said were wrong Because the consequences and actions were up against the odds.

The lifestyle that a human, just like you, are bred in, Once carried the hearts of gold that turned into the hearts of stone.

Society looks at us like we are not human, But word from mouth, just trapped little boys that fell victim to their environment.

So many with talent took to the streets, where we thought And felt like that’s where love was.

Take a minute and let it sink in.

Only if the shoe was on the other foot You probably wouldn’t want to have the tables turn.

When everything is said and done, can you define what love is?

Because them streets never been it.

You know it, but somehow there you go, Running back doing only god knows what.

Hurting with a sharp pain in your heart, leaking, trying to repair Only for it to bleed a little more because life is hard and it was never fair.

When life gives you lemons, you make lemon juice.

But when life gives you an unfair hand you make the best of it.

But only if you knew how hard that really is.

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Traumatized and so messed up in the head, You become mentally unstable and confused from betrayal.

Feeling everybody has an angle, but it’s not even your fault.

Push away the ones who say they love you the most Because it’s hard to trust it.

Feeling like your going off into the deep end where it’s never shallow.

So much that is unseen, so much that is unsaid.

I call it the unspoken, so I’m going to say some things that are not said.

So much is glamorized like if its propaganda.

If I was never captured by 12 would I be dead?

But honestly I don’t care.

I never cared, so if I die then it is what it is.

We are called many things, but an equal was never one of them.

A hood star who we looked up to, my idol, A killer who still caught a slug that put him six feet under, Falling victim to these streets, singing R.I.Ps. Never scared of another’s gangster because he bleeds the same.

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Off the Porch Growing up, we all have our norms that we grow accustomed to. Catching the bus, yearly section 8 inspections, the colors I wasn't supposed to wear, waiting in line for Christmas presents at the donation center, and probation house checks were just some of the norms I grew accustomed to as a child. I was due to fall into the system since I was a baby.

One of my earliest memories took place when I was four years old. It was Easter Sunday and my father woke my brother and me up to go to the store. We got dressed and jumped in his cream-colored Cadillac and drove to the store. As we pulled into the parking spot, I saw my father take the keys out and for some reason raise his hands up. Seconds later, we were swarmed by S.W.A.T. with assault rifles from all sides, like it was a movie, but it was more like a nightmare.

After that, my father was facing twenty-five to life in their prison system, so they accomplished step one of their plan: take my father and the main source of income to my household.

Not only does incarcerating people affect the individual, but their kids as well, because now the next generation is being raised with no father figures, which play a vital role in a child's development. You can kind of see how this is all tangled up can't you?

Now I was left with a struggling mother and siblings. I was the oldest, so a lot was expected. Growing up poor was the root of most of my problems, but as a kid it was normal. I never knew how poor we really were because I never had a lot of money in the first place. I was used to the bare minimum, generic everything, waiting every first of the month for a welfare check to grocery shop, watering down milk for cereal.

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My first time being suspended was in third grade. I was at recess and some kid pushed my little brother, who was two years younger than me, and I just remember running up to him and punching him. My little brother got up and started fighting with me and in couple of seconds we were pulled apart and sent to the principal's office. The principal suspended us for a week and sent us home. When we got home, our mom yelled our ears off, and spanked us, but little did she know at the time, it was the first of many fights and suspensions, and over time she would give up on us. In our communities this is a common thing that happens. After America strips the father figure of the household with one of their many systems, it sets their kids up for failure. No father figure leads to a loss of income, and a lack of discipline and structure, which then leads the kids to search for it somewhere else, often falling into the footsteps of their fathers. All the while, the prison gets money for each person, money that they could use to invest in resources that would prevent them from prison, but that's not our America.

Maybe violence was in my genetic makeup, or maybe it was passed on throughout generations, because growing up it was the only way we were taught to solve problems, until I grew older and learned how to use my words to de-escalate situations. My father was facing life in prison for a murder, my mother did some years as a teen for an attempted murder, and by the time I was fifteen, most of the people around me committed some serious act of violence, but we were so desensitized to it all from watching it, hearing it, and experiencing it every day. America made the ghetto a game; they took our communities and stuck us all together in an area to let us kill each other. Look at the movies, the media promotion of rap music, glorifying gangs and drugs to our communities, constantly desensitizing them so when it occurs we are assuming it to be normal There was a week in 2018 where violence had become embedded. By this time, I was barely attending school.

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My mom gave up on me and felt like she lost us, and that was normal to us and for our community. I was hanging around the neighborhood with friends all day and night, only coming home to change my clothes, if I had any clean ones. At the time, I was fourteen and my brother was twelve. It was late at night, and we decided to go car checking, a term we used to break into people's cars and steal belongings. We went to the other side of the tracks and went through their apartment parking lot checking cars. After about four or five cars, we had only come up with a couple dollars and some half smoked blunts. Then we hit a good one. My brother reached under the seat and pulled out a Glock 23 .40 caliber handgun. We felt like we just struck gold. We had our own gun now. We had older friends in the neighborhood who had some guns, but we never had our own. It was a disaster waiting to happen.

We were raised to react to every problem with violence and now we had a firearm, and it didn't take long for something to happen. We were hanging out with some friends who picked us up. My brother had the gun tucked into the shorts he was wearing under his pants, and we were just cruising around the outskirts drinking and listening to music. The car started to run out of gas so we had to stop. When we pulled into the gas pump at a gas station, and as we got out to go to the store we saw an older Mexican man wearing some gang attire, but I wasn't really worried because he looked old and he wasn't really worried about us. I talked to my friend for a few seconds, and I was about to open the door to the store when I heard my brother get into a verbal exchange with the older man at the pump. I hadn’t even realized my brother had stayed behind as we were walking. In less than a couple of seconds, my brother pulled out the gun we stole and got into a squat shooter position as if he had done it a million times before. He must

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have seen it on TV and tried to imitate it. He just started shooting, hitting everywhere towards the man's car. We ran and all jumped into the car, driving off as fast as possible. The crazy thing is, no one was worried. We were all laughing, making jokes like it was normal, talking about how he could have blown up the cars if he hit the gas, not even worried if the man was hit. We were acting how we thought we were supposed to.

As a kid, I didn't comprehend that my actions held consequences. I was just doing what I saw. I saw it on TV, heard it in the music, saw it with my family, saw it outside, and saw it at home. America made it so there was no escaping the violence. Every action comes with an equal consequence, I didn't fully comprehend how true that was as a kid. We went home thinking everything was good. The gun was long gone to the streets and they gave back a different gun in exchange. A night later, one of our friends was shot in the arm while taking out the trash. I put two and two together and it was obvious what had happened. It was a violent week that introduced me to an even more violent lifestyle.

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Amazing Grace How amazing is God’s grace? A question I have yet to discover. As a youth, I didn’t know who or what God was.

Experiencing trauma diminished any connection with God, and I never understood why I had to suffer like this. It never occurred to me that trauma would continue to follow me as the years went by.

The truth is, I believed these experiences of suffering were normal for the time being and would soon fade away. If youth only knew what were to lie ahead, if youth only knew.

Much of my childhood was a blur, and all I can recall are the traumatic incidents that occurred. These events held me hostage in my mind, so I learned to leave them where they belonged. My father was away, and no other figure took his place. Since I had no guidance in my youth, I failed to learn to express myself, and a void developed. From the stories of my family, all I knew was to not be like my dad, for he constantly made mistakes. As I aged, I learned to forgive him and seek him endlessly. I knew he wasn’t a bad guy or a bad father. He just made horrible decisions, and in effect, we were the ones suffering.

For the sake of my growing void, I gave myself shoes to wear. I had convinced myself that it was my destiny to be like dad. After all, I was a Jr., and in my eyes, he was a misunderstood hero. I had brainwashed myself to take on this identity, and with it came its tribulations. In the first, I recall times of loneliness and disassociation from society. I assumed my father chose to be alone because that’s where peace was, so naturally I acquired this and made loneliness my comfort zone. I tried to expand my boundaries and tried the gimmick of love—only to quickly have my heart shattered, strengthening the voice of my father counseling me: Love doesn’t exist. I had built a façade off what I envisioned my father as, and without knowing it, I too, was hurting my loved ones and myself.

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As life went on, his words became forged in my heart. I started to believe everything under the sun was meaningless. So constantly, I would manipulate others for my selfish needs, kill off softly those that mattered most, and carelessly let go of any self-respect I had left for myself, mistaking lust for love. Now that I had crossed the thin line between love and hate, I became the epitome of destruction. I was left senseless. When I discovered this, I felt jaded, not knowing what was left for me to do. I decided to do the one thing I only knew and broke away from everyone and everything that was still holding on: those that still loved me and those that wanted to help. I had assumed they wouldn’t understand me because I didn’t understand me. To me, they were demons, distracting me by pointing out my flaws and preventing me from evolving.

So once again, I established loneliness as a comfort zone and found peace, momentarily. I started to develop demonic dreams and feared sleeping alone. I came crawling back to the girl who loved me most—my gift from God, Magdalena. I poured out my soul and confessed all my wrongdoings. She had revealed to me the toxins and constant manipulation I had blindly put her through throughout the years. You see, I would let out the effect of all my B.S. on those who loved me most, rather than confessing the hell on Earth I was experiencing. Hurt people do hurt people in various ways, and without my knowledge, I, as a whole, became that dark side of my father. In my own way, I reacted, redid, and relived those traumatic experiences of my youth. Except this time, it wasn’t at my expense, but one of the ones I needed the most.

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At this point in my life, I needed a savior; I needed to be rescued from the depths of my sorrows. I’ll never forget Magdalena’s words as she wiped my tears: You’re not your father; you don’t have to be like him; you’re your own person.

A simple sentence that I never knew I needed to hear. She cured me of my blindness and gave me permission to feel. As I continued to weep with Magdalena in my room, I knew I needed a change in my life, but still, my conscience wouldn’t allow my spirit to do so. I was still fabricating lies to myself that I’m already so far gone, a lost cause with relationships broken beyond repair. I felt as if I would be seen as the boy who cried wolf if I now decided to better myself. Just as quickly as I had received hope for salvation, I had it taken from me. But before I had turned back to the valley of death, God’s amazing grace approached me once again and set me free from my sin.

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Ghetto Child Even if I were to change, Would they still judge me by my sins?

Because there’s a lot, I’ll admit it.

They stay judging me, cause I did what I had to do, But not everybody understands how it feels-How it feels like you can’t breathe, How it feels at night, beckoning for a rewind.

But don’t get me wrong; I don’t regret a thing I did under the sun or moon.

I’m a good person at heart, but far from it.

My mom and dad been gone a while through my life, Not physically, but mentally gone off drugs.

I became well to know because it was a hard knock life, But that was my hustle, and it got me from sixth grade All the way until my arrest.

At twelve I was out there in them Fresno streets I call home, But Ima let you know: Them streets don’t love nobody.

Late nights on that block It was hard for me to love somebody.

Loyalty is what I lacked, Because I spent a lot of time Watching my back.

Even the closest ones to you Would stab you in your back.

There’s no love if there’s no loyalty And there’s no loyalty if there’s no trust, And Ima stand on that most definitely.

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But look at where I stand: I’m boxed in by four walls feeling lesser than a man, And I ain’t planned for anybody to understand, But if you do, you felt this too, I would say you’re not alone.

This lifestyle I live Makes the wealthy feel uncomfortable.

They don’t sympathize Because they never been Where a ghetto child has been.

A ghetto child?

Yes, I’m talking about a child that saw life’s ills On this planet that’s called earth, Among civilizations that make him who he is.

He acts a certain way, He might be smarter than the average person, People say he’s a criminal, but I find that funny Because I’m him and I call that survival.

A skinhead read me my rights after stripping me of my dignity Happy to see another young man Wearing silver chains like an accessory.

But Ima say it like this: it’s just another thug’s destiny.

Death or in prison is our motto From yours truly, A Ghetto Child

Tales of a Gangsta Once I was seven years old my momma told me go make yourself some friends or you’ll be lonely —Lukas Graham You ever heard a song that hits home every time you hear it?

Well, that song by Lukas Graham is mine. Let me tell you why: When I was about seven my mom used to tell me go outside with the neighborhood kids. The reason she used to do this was because my brothers used to make me cry, so I would leave them alone and my mom wasn’t tryna hear all that so she would kick me out. When I would go outside, I would fight the other kids and make them cry so their parents would tell my mom and my mom would tell my brothers and my brothers would “DP” me (which means discipline, by the way). But what they didn’t realize was all I wanted was their attention.

The more I acted out, the more they realized that they weren’t going to break me, so they got set on making me. And that was where it all started.

When they originally started bringing me around the homies, I don’t think they saw the dedication in me, and they for sure didn’t know that once I got started there was no stopping me.

When I was about twelve or thirteen I started to go around the block on my own. And that was when I didn’t wanna be like my older brothers or anything like my pops, I wanted to be better than them in the most murderous way possible.

I started to make a name for myself in Fresno by terrorizing the streets. At first my older brothers were proud of me, but when they heard I had money on my head, they realized that I was a dedicated person and I go hard at everything I do. That was when one of my older brothers, who is also my big homie, told me I needed to calm down. I responded: I am just getting started.

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A b o u t th e

4TH ISSUE

The 4th issue of Chained Minds to Changed Minds is called “Unspoken Stories.” This issue is about things that impacted us and structured our beliefs as people, whether we watched it, were a part of it, or were the cause of it. It’s like a certain type of trauma that stuck with us that we haven’t felt comfortable to talk about. Check out these unspoken stories next month. We’re sure more than a handful of people can relate to them.