As some of you may already know, I spent my teenage years doing the opposite of what normal kids did. I never got to play sports, be active and have regular fun life experiences. Even once I turned my life around I was just learning how to love others and myself. I was busy learning how to be good father, husband and a post secondary student. This athletic hunger just didn’t fit in my life. Now as an adult I’m venturing out into things I never got to do.
I’ve never been involved in anything that u could win trophies, medals or even bragging rights. I never got to challenge myself physically and now I’m 40 years old so if I’m gonna do something, it’s now. If you know me you know I will try anything that’s fun, active and daring. One day I randomly noticed a poster for a Ninja Warrior Regionals Competition that was happening in 5 weeks time in my area. I’ve seen it done on TV and it looked like fun so that night I went on the website, paid the registration fee and signed up.
I purposely threw myself in not knowing what I was getting into, to challenge myself out of my comfort zone, plus I didn’t want to miss out. I know if I set a goal for myself I will be dedicated and push myself to do my very best so why not.
Rewind..For the last 6 months I had been working 2 jobs so I only exercised maybe once a week. I was really maxed out as far as time and energy on many things going on in my life so it really wasn’t wise for me to get involved in something like this but I love a challenge.
Once I signed up I was like, holy shit I better go check this place out. I went to the ninja gym for the first time, I played around for about 2 hours like a big kid and ended up tearing muscles/tendons in both my arms. I was injured for 4 weeks. This brought me a few days before the competition. With no training at all I really didn’t want to show my face and make a fool, but I kept telling myself I may regret not showing up and to “do what you’re afraid to do” so, I went and I brought my family.
I was shaking the whole time up until I had to do my run. My arms gave out half way through the course and my time and points were bad.
The last obstacles was the wall. It took everything out of me to pull myself up, but I did it. I placed 1st in Masters division (40 and up) To be honest I was also the only one in my region for my division so I now qualified for Nationals which I forfeited because it was too soon and really expensive to fly out.
I also qualified for worlds in Massachusetts. I really wanted to challenge myself, train hard and go to worlds but I felt like I have to prioritize and train for next year and kill it.
Someone asked me“ but what will you gain from this?” I used to be a full-time career criminal, high everyday in and out of jail since the age of 13 and now I’m teaching wellness methods to people struggling with addictions and inspiring them to be the best version of themselves. They hear my story and call me an inspiration..an Icon.
How can I be an inspiration if I don’t do the best I can, to be the complete opposite of the person I used to be and show people like me how fun and liberating it is to be a good father a great husband an athlete and a storyteller.
I’m an underdog nobody believed in. I was always seen as a failure, a fuckup, a lost cause, a delinquent nobody could trust. There are so many people just like me that feel hopeless and broken and feel like they will never change. Well I’m living proof you can change and if I can do it they can too. So what do I have to gain? I say “what do I have to loose.”
With Love
Jimmy
With love
Jimmy
Reformed Delinquent
]]>You see, I never planned on living this long, but I made a choice to do so, to not repeat what happened to me to my kids. Was I really going to be that guy that says ‘fuck it I’m gonna keep doing me’. Fuck no. Was it easy? Fuck no.
Think about it.. I’m running the streets for 10 years from 13 – 23, so when kids are playing sports and learning all this shit in school, creating these long lasting friendships and building on skills; I’m runnin the streets robing, stealing and learning how to dodge the cops and trying to keep up with 100 lies. The things I could have accomplished in that 10 years!!
I didn’t plan on living past 20, I wasn’t gonna be around for the consequences so I really didn’t give a fuck. Die by the lifestyle.
I was 19 when I had my first kid. So what? Stop everything, be a responsible father and grow up? Naa man…I’m living in a quick burst of chaos and hell fire, taking my anger out on the world. I’m going out young and angry. I didn’t care about anyone or anything, especially myself, so to ask me to turn it all around. Fuck no. You don’t want this guy raising your kid trust me. The next girl was different. She kinda put me in check a bit. She saw the guy behind the pain and she called him out on his shit constantly. At age 20 I had a baby girl with her. Now somewhere deep I wanted to be around, but still I was in my zone. “Trust me you don’t want me around, I’m bad news and you’re both better off without me”. I was leaving another kid without a father and a girl with a broken heart to be a single teen mom who just wants what’s best for her daughter.
It got hard to still be the same ruthless motherfucker that didn’t give a fuck. Drugs, alcohol and past pain made it easier to keep my heart at bay.
I found myself so torn between what I chose for myself early on, to what I was faced with now. It’s like selling your soul to the devil then 10 years later wanting it back.
Things were different now there was more at stake and more players in the game. I wasn’t only throwing my life away anymore I had 2 kids and a girl that loves me. By the time I figured all this out my kids were 2 and 3 years old.
I decide to turn my life around and man up, but choosing that didn’t mean life automatically got better. I had to earn respect and take responsibility for all the pain I caused. I had to put some real work in because nobody trusted me. FUCK!! living on the right side of the tracks was hard to learn. I’m not talkin tie your shoes shit, I’m talkin deep like how to love or feel or care. I had to recreate a version of myself that I respected. How I did that is a whole other story.
With Love
Jimmy
]]>Fuck barriers, and comfort zone bullshit. Just remove them entirely because its just another limitation you give yourself as an excuse as to why you CAN’T do something. If its positive you have to go for it, end of story.
Since I was 13 years old I have had a criminal record. 10 years later I turned my life around, but due to my past I felt so labeled that I put constant limitations on myself and always felt I needed a pardon before my life could start. This is one of the many barriers I put on myself.
I feared I would always be seen as a criminal, a lost cause, a delinquent that can’t be trusted. I Tried to follow the stereo typical norm and try to fit in, but sometimes its hard to relate to everyday people when all you’ve been doing for the last 10 years is be loyal to the streets and live cold and angry. I felt I had to pretend it never happened.
As soon as I started being a yes man and getting out of my comfort zone, my life changed drastically. My comfort zone grew bigger and more opportunities came from it. That’s when I knew that if I can do things that I thought weren’t possible to me, I can now achieve the impossible. It became a new fear that whatever I put my mind to I can achieve. So where do you draw the line if you don’t want a line? I knew that if fear is the only thing holding me back, then I have to go for it. I no longer go to sleep at night regretting things I can control. I work towards all my goals not just the easy ones and at the end of the day I feel a sense fulfillment that I do my best.
Do what you’re afraid to do and eliminate the fears you put on yourself.
With Love
Jimmy
]]>I've had many people ask me how I changed and how I got out of that lifestyle to become the man I am today. Let me tell you it didn’t happen overnight. Im still fighting the labels of a criminal and its been 15 years since my last court case.
]]>Ive had many people ask me how I changed and how I got out of that lifestyle to become the man I am today. Let me tell you it didn’t happen overnight. Im still fighting the labels of a criminal and its been 15 years since my last court case.
At first I did a lot of the big talk with no action. I would always say I’m moving out of town, I’m getting a job or I’m going back to school, but I never did it. I said it so much even I got sick of hearing my own empty promises. The problem with this was when I was actually ready to change everyone thought I was full of shit once again. I had to stop talking about it and just follow through. I was finally ready to change my life, but now I had to prove it because no one believed me. I had a court case coming up that could put me away for a while and that was the last thing I needed. The courts asked for a pre-sentence report from my Probation Officer so it bought me 6 months to get my shit together.
I walked away from my old life and my old friends. I swallowed my pride and worked 2 minimum waged jobs in my home town, biking to work and back. I rented a small room meant for students and spent any spare time I had trying to win my girl back and be a part of my kids lives. I had one last shot and there was no way I was gonna fuck it up. I stayed on the right track until court.
The judge told me before I left the courtroom that if he ever saw me again he would give me the maximum sentence. That was the last time I stood before a Judge.
With Love
Jimmy
(Newspaper clipping, 2003)
Let’s go back to the day I picked up my mugshots. Holy shit my heart was pounding. Seeing pictures with dates and charges pertaining to the arrests. Rewind back to the day it was so random but I heard police kept all mugshots on file so I went down to the local station and asked if they kept all mugshots. She said yes. They made me fill out a request form Describing exactly what I wanted and why. I wrote a request for any mugshot you have a record of including dates and charges pertaining to. She said if there’s anything they’ll call you. All the while I could barely write it. My hands were shaking and I was having a panic attack.
You see, when I was a kid it was different. We didn’t have Iphones taking tons of pictures or facebook where u literally have a digital bank of your life since birth like kids nowadays. Plus I didn’t spend much time with my family as a teen and young adult any belongings I had growing up would just get lost moving place to place or going in and out of jail so I had very min pictures of myself or memorabilia from age 13 to 23. This was huge so ya..i was panicing over even the thought of myself seeing them let alone showing my family and being able to use them as a positive in my book or blogs showing true before and after pics. Like who has mugshot as their before pics lol. But that’s me my story right.
For me thats what’s different. Its not a scrawny to brawny success story its a… I was a fucking criminal … and now I am living the opposite lifestyle I never thought I would live. A few weeks goes by and no call I was like I guess they can’t release the info, that sucks. The very next day I was walking out of the house and there was a big brown envelope in my mailbox with my name on it from the local police station. My heart dropped. I thought this was it. Even writing about it my heart pounds. I got in the car and told my daughter (17) to open it, but she didn’t want to. Maybe cause I said holy shit this is crazy I’m gonna cry. She said ya well that’s why I don’t wanna open it. It’s like I was about to meet my old self.
I get that everyone has memories but when u look at your criminal record and cry cause u can’t even remember doing half of the shit let alone getting arrested and going to court it gets pretty traumatic.So she opened it and said, it just says you have to pick it up at the police station. My heart was beating out of my chest so hard I could feel my shirt move. Pure panic mode. This is REAL SHIT.
What the fuck. I am actually gonna get to see what I looked like during that time in my life.Again total opposite of the guy I am now. So I went to pick up the envelope and I took it back to my car, I took a deep breath and opened the envelope. There were only 8 pages so right away I knew it wasn’t everything. (Not glorifying)First pic was of me at 15 years old arrested October 18th 1995. Not my first arrest but either way I didn’t remember it. “Break and enter and possession of stolen property obtained by crime”
No clue what the fuck I did but either way I didn’t do it right. All the pics stemmed from 1995 to 2001. Man I looked fuckin horrible and ruthless and angry and sad…so sad. I looked so driven with hate it’s all in my eyes. Writing this is emotional cause you see.. the guy in the 2001 picture by then had 2 kids from different girls and he had that same fuckin “I DONT GIVE A FUCK” look on his face as the guy in the first picture in 1995. This alone made me cry.
Looking into the eyes of the guy who robbed me of my youth. This is so emotional. I could have been somebody I could have had good friends I could have been there for my family when my Mom past away. I could have had a relationship with my father and my brother and sister, I could have met Michelle and had kids when I was ready. But would it have happened? Was it meant to be? Was I supposed to live like that so I could be this? Did some get hurt to help the masses?
I guess that’s only if I actually do something with it. Let it not be for nothing right! My writings are a true example of a love/hate thing. Me teaching life lessons through my own experience is something I wanted to do and I am finally doing it, but on the same notion it hurts. I have to re-live the pain every time I write, but it’s much worse than that because the motherfucker that did all this had no recollection of even doing half this stuff so he didn’t have to feel that pain.
Now I’m stuck taking all that on cause I’m reliving it and the worst part is..it was ME. That’s even more painful. You wanna talk regrets, try writing about all the pain you ever caused everyone you love most without crying and hating yourself.
I write with love and I am forever grateful for my second chance at life.
With Love
Jimmy
]]>Welcome to my blog,
My blog is where I use my life experiences as a Reformed Delinquent to help others break down the same barriers I did and the ones I am still working on. To show how someone with a bad past or past pain can change their perception on life, become the best version of themselves and find true happiness.
I write with love. Writing about my past is painful, but it’s meant to be positive no matter how much it hurts. Love is Pain so I write..
With Love
Jimmy
]]>If you truly want to change, first you need to know WHY you’re choosing to change. For me it was a change in values. I no longer desired the respect from the streets I bled on. I desired respect from the people I was hurting the most. The ones who loved me unconditionally and had my back no matter what. I changed for LOVE.
Being in my hometown really fucks with my mental health and my emotional wellness. Everyday I drive by areas that remind me of trauma and pain. Places Ive done crimes or places Ive slept as a runaway to places I was robbed or beaten or places I’ve done harm to others. So much trauma and pain caused to me or by me, from being a lost soul. See my child hood has 2 sides. The first side is where I was the new kid in town. I got bullied for years just because, well I don’t fucking know. There came a point where the pain built up so much I was done fighting for the loosing team. This is the side I regret. But I was just scared kid. So I said “Fuck it , if you cant beat em join em”. I though it was a safe bet. I was young and it was survival. Little did I know this cowardly move would add to a world of pain for myself, the people I loved and many other victims of my future life’s destruction.
A few years deeper into this lifestyle something really traumatic happened in my life. I lost someone really close to me. This was the tipping of the scale. I wanted to die so I could be with them, but I truly believed suicide was a sin that would lead straight to hell and thats not where they were. So I decided to live as ruthless and dangerous as possible and if I died as a result so be it. I truly hated being alive. I grew cold and heartless until there was nothing left of the old me and I went all in.
I spent 10 years living a self-destructive lifestyle. Do crime for substances to numb the pain and fund the lifestyle, go to jail for the crimes get out and repeat. Then in 2002 I had a wake up call. My whole life flashed before my eyes and it scared the shit out of me. One true moment of clarity. It was a ‘go big or go home’ moment and I chose to go home. The only thing wrong with that is I no longer had a home to go to. I hurt and lost the trust and respect from anyone close to me. I now had to fix 10 years of pain and deal with why I started in the first place.
All I wanted to do was get outta my hometown. I soon realized the universe wouldn’t let me leave. It wouldn’t let me run away from my problems. “If you want to truly change it happens here first.” So I did. Fully. 180 degrees and I never looked back. I slowly earned the respect from the people who care about me. 1 year later I moved away so we could start fresh somewhere else. 3 years later I came back and have been here ever since.
The transformation wasn’t easy and there are still things embedded from my past behaviour that I still struggle with. I am nowhere near healed or perfect.. City locations, songs, people remind me everyday of the resentments the pain I caused still hurts, but if I had to flip it to a positive I could say, “I believe I’m here for a reason so if life put me here Im going to do my best to give it purpose”. So Im here, I’m present and I want to help others transform their lives and become the best version of themselves and break through the same barriers as I did.
With Love
Jimmy
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