46 Christian Howes: What 4 Years in Prison Taught Me About The Human Spirit

Christian Howes spent 4 years in prison. When he got out he was a loaded spring destined for great things. Now he is the worlds greatest jazz violinist with multiple businesses that empower musicians everywhere. In this podcast we learn about the tragic story of his time in prison. This is the first of a two part series, in the next episode we learn about how he came out of prison and made his vision a reality. Get more from Lewis! Get my New York Times Bestselling book, Make Money Easy! Get The Greatness Mindset audiobook on SpotifyText Lewis AIYouTubeInstagramWebsiteTiktokFacebookX

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Lewis Howes?

  This is episode number 46 with violinist extraordinaire Christian Howes. Welcome to the School of Greatness. My name is Lewis Howes, a former pro athlete turned lifestyle entrepreneur. And each week, we bring you an inspiring person or message to help you discover how to unlock your inner greatness. Thanks for spending some time with me today. Now let the class begin.

• 0:33Lewis Howes?

  Hey, what is upgrades? Thanks so much for tuning in today. And we have a very special guest on today's episode. And I know I say that about every guest, but this one truly is someone that is very close to my heart. It's my big brother, Christian Howes, who I like to call Chris and all his friends call Chris. But I'm very excited about this episode because it's about a journey that he went through in prison. Coming from being one of the most talented violinists in the world, going to prison in his journey through prison for four years. And then life after prison, becoming arguably the number one jazz violinist in the world.

• 1:18Lewis Howes?

  One of the most creative strings players that the world has ever seen. And the transformation that he's had since before prison, during prison, and after prison. What it's meant, what it's done to him, and what he's created from this experience. I'm very excited to share with you this. And I got to sit down with him during Christmas in Ohio, in Columbus, Ohio, where I'm from, or where he lives. So this interview is coming from his recording studio. But I'm currently, a couple of days after the interview, came to New York City to fulfill one of my dreams, which was to play in the Big Apple New York City Handball Tournament.

• 1:57Lewis Howes?

  And it's not just any tournament. It's a very special handball tournament because there is an All-Star game that happens at the very end. And they bring together some of the best players from all over the world. Olympic gold medalists, European champions, et cetera, et cetera, of the best handball players. Some of them currently playing and then a lot of them who are retired. So it'd be like playing against Michael Jordan or Larry Bird in an All-Star game, but in handball. That's what it was about. And I just have to say that. It's been an amazing journey so far. For those that know about my journey and the goals to play in the Olympics and play for Team USA in the Olympics for Team Handball.

• 2:37Lewis Howes?

  And I started this sport a few years ago, moved to New York City on a dream that I wanted to make the USA National Team. And had no clue what I was getting myself into and how much work and dedication that I needed to have in order to give myself a chance. And it was, it was just an amazing experience. The, the arena was packed. There was, you know, what, what happened is New York City team played for 15 minutes and then the USA team played for 15 minutes and we went, did that for off and on two different times. So I got to spend, you know, 30 minutes on the court with some of the players from the USA National Team and played against some of the,

• 3:16Lewis Howes?

  the former and current best players in the world and really just had the most amazing moments. Flashes through my, before my, you know, from my experience of just being on this court and experiencing what it's like to be one step closer to achieving my dream and really just getting the opportunity to feel it and really just be in the moment and enjoy the moment. And not be attached to how it looked. You know, I messed up a couple of times, but I also feel like I did extremely well under the circumstances and I scored a few goals and and just had a great flow with my teammates. And I'm just extremely blessed and grateful for

• 3:56Lewis Howes?

  the opportunity to play with the team and the experience. Wow. An amazing experience and I cannot wait for what is up this year with my handball experience with USA National Team and our Olympic dreams and goals within a couple of years. So just wanted to share that little personal story with you guys really quick before we get into this episode. And with that, guys, very excited about this episode. It's going to be like a jazz piece. This episode is probably different than any other episode that you're going to experience. And there's going to be two parts. So the first hour interview is really my brother Christian's experience.

• 4:39Lewis Howes?

  Going to prison, what it was like in prison, what he had to deal with, the fears, the pains, the guilt, all the different experiences and some really heavy, deep stories that he shares about what it was like in prison for four years locked up. It was a very intense time for my family, my siblings and my parents as I remember visiting him almost every weekend, driving two and a half hours to see him and hearing the stories when I was eight years old until I was 12 years old while he was in prison and what it was like, it was just, it was definitely an interesting experience to say the least. So this interview is like, is like

• 5:22Lewis Howes?

  listening to jazz. So if you've ever seen a jazz performance, there's lots of improvisation. Um, and sometimes people really enjoy it. It's like, it's like an acquired taste. So I hope you guys enjoy this acquired taste for what you're about to hear. Obviously the stories and experiences are unique and different than what you've heard from most of my guests, but I think it's extremely powerful as well, what he experienced and what you can take away with it for your own life, experience, for your own business, relationships and things like that. It's very, uh, it's very interesting to me and that's why I'm honored and grateful and blessed that he was willing

• 6:06Lewis Howes?

  to come on School of Greatness and share with all of you greats what it was like in his experience. And he had, he doesn't really publicly talk about this that much. So I'm very, again, honored and blessed that he came on and shared it with, with me and all of you. So the first episode is going to be uh, what it was like during prison and then the next episode is going to be more about what it's been like after prison and how he's applied the lessons he learned in prison to being successful in his career, coming from a nobody, uh, you know, a convict to basically taking over the world, the jazz world as a violinist

• 6:46Lewis Howes?

  and what he's been able to create as a producer, uh, as a, as an artist, as a professor at the number one music school in the country and all these other things that he's been able to accomplish since applying these lessons from prison to a life after prison. So.

• 7:03Lewis Howes?

  Take a look at both episodes and let me know what you think over at the comments section on the blog over at LewisHowes.com or SchoolOfGreatness.com. But with that, guys, open up your heart and listen in for the one and only Christian Howes.

• 7:30Lewis Howes?

  All right. What is up everyone? It's Lewis Howes here back on the School of Greatness. Thanks so much for tuning back in. And I've got a very special guest on today. It's my hero, my big brother, Christian Howes, who I call Chris, but stage name is Christian. And we are in the dungeon, his recording studio at his house in Columbus, Ohio. And it's a late night. It's about 1:16 a.m. right now, a couple of days after Christmas. And I'm very excited about this episode. What's up, brother?

• 8:02Speaker 01

  Yo, bro. You're my hero. What can I say?

• 8:06Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, I'm excited. So I told my brother beforehand that we, we get to get real here and get deep about some, some things that have happened. And so I'm excited about this. And a little, if you guys don't know, my brother is, he's arguably the, the best jazz violinist in the world.

• 8:25Speaker 01

  One of, one of the best.

• 8:27Lewis Howes?

  Arguably the best, depending on who you're talking to. But he, he has a very unique style, very unique playing style that I don't know of anyone else who can play the same style. So it's very interesting, very unique, beautiful, mesmerizing, magnetic, all those things. And he's one of the best performers that I've ever witnessed, especially in the whole jazz, rock, bluegrass arena. So if you ever get a chance to watch him play live, make sure to stop everything you're doing and go watch him live. So. He uh, he has a very unique story, very interesting story. And when I was eight years old is when I really started to get to know my brother. And it was before that time, I pretty much never saw you.

• 9:11Lewis Howes?

  You were a ghost to me. And it's because he was getting in a lot of trouble as a, as a child. And when he was eight, you got sentenced to prison for, I think that was the sentence was like 25 years, six to 25 years, right?

• 9:26Speaker 01

  Well, when you were eight.

• 9:27Lewis Howes?

  When I was eight.

• 9:27Speaker 01

  Yeah, and when I was um, about 19, that's when I was indicted on a drug-related charge. It was, well, it was trafficking, um, LSD trafficking. And essentially, I was, you know, a kid in college who, you know, was um, would buy, you know, since I played in bands, you know, in the bars. So then I had easy access to weed. And, and that was kind of my thing in college, you know, I like to smoke weed. And I guess it was kind of, I don't know, it was a way of fitting in, it was an escape. It was, you know, all the things that, that it typically is, I think, for college kids. And um, but since I played with these older guys in the bars on Ohio State campus,

• 10:11Speaker 01

  then I had easy access to stuff, you know, even though I was, you know, 18.

• 10:18Speaker 01

  And um, so I would be able to get this like, you know, like a, an ounce of weed. And then I could pass around quarters to, you know, friends of mine or people I knew from high school or whatever and kind of a, you know, made me feel important, made me feel like, you know, people wanted to hang out with me because, you know, Chris has the weed, blah, blah, blah, you know? And, and so then when someone came down and they were like, hey, we want to get some acid. Can you get it? I was like, well, I don't know, I'll make a call. And so I called, you know, the guy that I got the weed from and he was like, sure, how much do you need?

• 10:50Lewis Howes?

  And you're 18 at the time, right?

• 10:52Speaker 01

  Yeah, exactly. Yeah, it was, let me see. I was 19 when this, when this particular deal happened, so um, But the guy said, well, can you get me, you know, 15 sheets of acid? How much did that cost back then? Well, well, okay, you can talk about the, the cost of acid or LSD in different ways. So like, if you buy like one hit, at that time, it would probably cost like three to $5 for one hit. And a, and a hit of LSD comes on a little tiny piece of paper. Like a stamp. It's a little smaller than it's, it's like, yeah, it's, it's like. A quarter of a stamp.

• 11:30Speaker 01

  Yeah, exactly. It's like quarter stamp. So then a sheet would have a hundred of these little tiny perforated like quarters, quarter stamp sized like little pieces, I guess. And I guess there'd be different variations, but usually when I saw a sheet, like a sheet of acid, which has a hundred hits of LSD, you know, dropped onto it or whatever. Cause I think it came in liquid and they drop, they like soak the paper in the liquid and then you'd put it, you know, your tongue or whatever. But I think if I remember correctly, one of those sheets that had a hundred hits would be like a quarter size of an eight by 11 piece of paper. Okay. Maybe there's variation, like I said, but that's, that's kind of how I remember it.

• 12:08Speaker 01

  So this guy asked, so anyway, the cost, you know, if you're just buying one hit, then you might pay three to $5 for that one hit. But if you're buying a hundred hits in bulk, you could probably get it for like, you know, maybe a hundred and 50 to $200. So this, you know, some guys that I knew from my high school came down and, and, and one of them said, uh, you know, this is from my uncle. You know, my uncle, he wants this, you know, this acid or whatever. Can you get it? I was like, okay, sure, whatever. Let me make a phone call. And so I called the guy that, you know, I usually would get these ounce bags of weed from.

• 12:47Speaker 01

  And the whole, you know, buying an ounce of weed was basically, you know, then I'd get a quarter bag pretty much for free. And then I could sell the other three bags and, you know, it's very small time kind of pot, college pot dealer, you know, whatever typical kind of scenario. I've had a lot of people tell me that, you know, but anyway, uh, not to, not to get, um. Detoured, but so that's the cost. I called the guy. He was like, sure, come on over. So I got the money, you know, we all drove over together. I went in the house. I got the the acid, you know, I, I think we actually broke it into two separate trips. So I went and got like eight sheets once, went back a couple of weeks later, got another seven sheets for the guy, same kind of thing. So

• 13:32Lewis Howes?

  One sheet was like a couple hundred bucks.

• 13:34Speaker 01

  Yeah, sheet would be, yeah, exactly. Maybe a hundred and fifty dollars, something like that. So I think all told.

• 13:40Lewis Howes?

  So you got fifteen sheets?

• 13:42Speaker 01

  Yeah, all told fifteen sheets. And at the time, the way that they did the sentencing guidelines, the guidelines for sentencing, you know, for how much punishment, you know, are you going to give out? They had this thing called mandatory minimums. So it would be structured like if you sell, you know, up to ten hits of acid, then that would be one penalty. And then if you sell over, over ten hits, they call that bulk. Ten hits of acid would be bulk. So that's, that's fifty bucks, maybe, you know, they call that bulk. And then three times bulk would be thirty.

• 14:21Speaker 01

  And then ten times bulk would be one sheet, which they define ten times bulk for any drug. They called that at the time, super bulk. And if you were dealing super bulk of any drug, then you were considered, you were considered basically a quote unquote kingpin.

• 14:40Lewis Howes?

  No way.

• 14:40Speaker 01

  No, absolutely. And, and so then they had these mandatory minimum sentences that they would impose for each level of these bulk, you know, trafficking. And so I guess the only, you know, place where you could argue that maybe there's an inequity or disproportionality is when you look at the, the economic side. So we just talked about the cost of, you know, a hundred hits of acid for a hundred and fifty dollars. Well, you know, super bulk cocaine, I think was probably like a kilo or so. I'm not even sure because I don't really deal with cocaine, but or heroin or something like that. I think you'd be looking at a street value that would be, you know,

• 15:22Speaker 01

  much bigger, you know. So there's a lot of ways to look at that. I've never focused on ever, you know, and you know, you're my brother, so you can testify to this, you know, but I've never been one to talk about, oh, I got a bad deal or with such a bad rap, but. But the but the fact of the matter is that the I mean, I just look well, you know, let me just talk about that for a second. I just always looked at it like, you know, I screwed up, I made a mistake, and I did the time for it, you know, I I mean, it's Leo. A lot of people say like, oh, that's a bad rap, or that's so inequitable, or you were a good kid, you were on a scholarship, blah, blah. I don't really look at it that way.

• 15:59Lewis Howes?

  Because what was your sentence time?

• 16:01Speaker 01

  Well, um, so for for that, um, for that super bulk, there's a mandatory minimum that they imposed of fifteen to life.

• 16:09Lewis Howes?

  Fifteen years.

• 16:10Speaker 01

  Fifteen years to life.

• 16:12Lewis Howes?

  To selling fifteen sheets of.

• 16:16Speaker 01

  Well, actually, since it was two transactions, one was the eight sheets, and the other was the seven sheets. Each one of those was fifteen to life. So they could.

• 16:24Lewis Howes?

  Fifteen years minimum.

• 16:25Speaker 01

  Fifteen years minimum with an actual incarceration, which these are all these weird legal terms, actual incarceration of fifteen years. But every state measures years differently. So in Ohio, fifteen years on paper actually is ten and a half years day for day.

• 16:41Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 16:42Speaker 01

  And so I so the the so I was looking at if I went to court, and I was found guilty, which I would have been because I was guilty, then um, the judge would have had no choice.

• 16:54Lewis Howes?

  But to give you fifteen years.

• 16:56Speaker 01

  But to give me fifteen to life, not fifteen years, fifteen to life. It's it's known as an indefinite sentence. And that's part of the thing about the justice system. I think that a lot of people aren't hip to basically um, with a correctional system, or whatever you want to call it. Um, if you're serving an indefinite sentence, the once you get into prison, you know, there's a lot of things that can happen that may uh, you know, you may have to stay longer than that minimum bit.

• 17:25Lewis Howes?

  When you're in prison, if you get into trouble, or if whatever happens.

• 17:28Speaker 01

  Yeah, exactly. Because once you're in prison, you don't really have the same kind of due process that you have on the outside. And you know, it's sort of a like, really like a kangaroo court in prison, like all kinds of crap goes down. And so um, so it's a very vulnerable position to be in. But anyway, so I was looking at a mandatory minimum of fifteen to life, which they could have run twice. But um, at the absolute minimum, the judge's hands would have been tied to give me fifteen to life. So what I did was I pled guilty. And that earned me a lesser sentence of six to 25 years. So that was the actual sentence that I went into prison with was six to 25 years.

• 18:10Speaker 01

  And in Ohio terms, six years works out to four years, actual day for day. So I knew that I was going to have to do a minimum of four years, day for day, barring any kind of like pardon or clemency or something like that, but that's very rare.

• 18:26Lewis Howes?

  Hmm. Amazing. And you were in a, you were on a full ride to Ohio State for your, your, your music talents and full academic scholarship, I guess as well. So they were like paying you to go to school, basically based on how talented you were. And you go, you go in at 19, you get out at 24, right? Or 20 or 24 or somewhere around there.

• 18:46Speaker 01

  Yeah, I was indicted when I was 19 and then it was a process of waiting for about nine months. And so I went in when I was 20, I spent my 21st, second, third and fourth birthdays. I did four years, day for day in Ohio prisons. Um, and

• 19:01Lewis Howes?

  What was it like when you got busted? What happened? Where were you? Do you remember knowing what was going to happen or were you completely in shock?

• 19:11Speaker 01

  Well, you mentioned that I was on a full scholarship at Ohio State at the time, but I was also on a full contract with a professional orchestra in Columbus. I was the youngest member, you know, that I know of still that had been hired full time with the Pro Music Chamber Orchestra. It was a really highly respected, you know, ensemble. And I auditioned for the job and I got a full-time position. Although it has a, a short season, so it wasn't like I was, or I should say like a sparse season. I think we did maybe 10 concerts in a year. So, so I had that. And, um, and so I was, I was really gigging as a professional classical musician

• 19:54Speaker 01

  on a very high level in Columbus already as a freshman and a sophomore in, um, in college. And then this was during my, I guess, at the end, oh, this was in the summer between sophomore and junior years at Ohio State.

• 20:10Speaker 01

  And I had some kind of a professional gig scheduled at the, the Palace Theater downtown Columbus.

• 20:19Speaker 01

  And you know, our mom called me and said, Chris, you know, the police showed up at our house and they're looking for you. And I wasn't thinking. So I told them that you were going to be at the Palace Theater performing tonight. And I was like, oh shit. And she said, you know, they have a warrant for your arrest. And you know, mom was, mom was kind of clueless. She didn't really understand what was going on. And I was like, okay, thanks for letting me know. So I didn't show up to the gig that night, you know, at the Palace. I just, I called somebody, said, I can't be there because I knew that they were gonna, and they did, they actually showed up to try to arrest me there. So what had happened is this thing called a secret indictment. So I didn't know that these guys, these guys from my high

• 21:03Speaker 01

  school, they said that they were bringing their, you know, uncle, the uncle was really an undercover cop. And these guys didn't know that he was an undercover cop. They didn't know that. They just didn't want me to be suspicious. So they said, this is, you know, the one guy said, this is my uncle. He just didn't want me to ask questions. But he didn't believe that this guy was a cop. But the people, or another guy, had actually set him up with the cop, knowing, because he had been busted. And so he had, it was this kind of whole trail of, you know. So what happened is, when they did the deal with me, when this undercover cop did these two deals with me, it had been nine months

• 21:46Speaker 01

  before. And then he just went away. Like, and I didn't hear anything for nine months. Actually, during that nine months, believe it or not, I kind of had like, made a lot of changes. Like, I had kind of woken up. Like, our aunt Laura had come over one time and yelled at me, and was like, what are you doing with your life? You're not, you're missing classes, and you're, you know, you're, you're, you know, this apartment's a mess. And I'm hearing stories that, you know, you're not doing well at school and stuff. And she's like, you're, you know, you're throwing away your life. My girlfriend, at the time, who you, you remember, Erin, Erin Gillan, who's still a dear friend to this day, she was, you know, she was beside herself, and my violin teacher, you know, the people at school

• 22:30Speaker 01

  were, you know, they noticed that I was slipping, you know, and, and. And it had kind of gotten to a boiling point and I was like, I need to clean up my act. So I was actually, I had kind of taken measures to try to, to try to, yeah, I wasn't really dealing anymore. I had really curtailed, you know, or curbed it back or whatever, you know, as far as just like smoking all the time. And I was, I was trying to turn over a new leaf. I was trying to be a little more responsible. But during the course of those nine months, basically this, this undercover cop and this whole sting operation, they, they just looked at their encounter with me as a way to get more information. And then they went after, you know, my source and, and they just, they were, you know, after the surveillance,

• 23:14Speaker 01

  the surveillance that they did, they just went on to try to catch bigger fish. And I didn't really know anything about it. I was just like, and then so nine months later, you know, they're showing up at my gig at the Palace Theater trying to arrest me. They got a warrant. They had everything on tape. They had everything, you know? So when that happened, I was totally, totally in shock. I was just like, holy shit, what's going on? Called a lawyer. The lawyer was like, okay, we're going to arrange for you to go and, and turn yourself in and we're going to find out what's going on. So I had to turn myself in at the county jail and sit in a holding cell, you know, for maybe two or three hours or something like that. That was traumatic. Wow. Even just going into the station and having, I remember like there was like a cop that was like pushing me through the hallway by putting this like pen in my back. Wow. Just like push it like, just like.

• 23:59Speaker 01

  Jabbing you. This is jabbing me. And I was, I just felt like so violated by the whole thing. And I got up there and I was like, I want to file a complaint. And they were like, sure, whatever. Just sit there. And I could see how they were going to play me. They were just going to make me sit there forever. So I like, was like, you know, I'm not going to even mess with it, but, but just that experience, even just sitting in that holding cell for three hours was so depressing. I can't tell you just three hours in a holding cell and having this cop, you know, you know, and just the way they kind of treated me because they just saw me as another, another criminal, you know? Wow. Which I was another criminal. I mean, that's what I was, you know, and uh, but just that experience was

• 24:41Speaker 01

  totally, totally traumatizing of just three hours. And um, and even, you know, that was with me having the lawyer who could, could set it up so I could have the minimum, the minimum evasiveness. It wasn't like they just, you know, arrested me and took me in because that would have, maybe I would have been there for a couple of days or whatever. But that was horrible. And then the lawyer, you know, met with somebody and he came back and he told us, you know, uh, yeah, well, it looks like this is what it is. You know, they caught you dealing drugs in, and the, the sentence for this is, is fifteen to life. That's what it is. And I was like, I was like, sure. Yeah, whatever. But tell me, you know,

• 25:20Speaker 01

  tell me the catch. I'm sure it's not going to be really like that. And he was like, why don't, there's nothing I can tell you. There's, there's no way around this.

• 25:29Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 25:29Speaker 01

  This, it is what it is. He was like, this is a mandatory minimum. I was trying to wrap my, my brain around it because I just didn't think that would be possible. I figured just the way I identified myself, like, sure, I'm a rebel and I'm breaking rules and stuff, but I'm on a scholarship and blah, blah, blah. I just didn't think it was possible that, that I could be in so much trouble, which is not an excuse, obviously. I mean, it, not knowing the law is, does not,

• 25:54Speaker 01

  it's not an excuse for breaking the law. So.

• 25:56Lewis Howes?

  Wow. So what was the biggest lesson uh, that you had up until you got sentenced?

• 26:05Speaker 01

  Hmm. The biggest lesson up until I got sentenced?

• 26:09Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, from like.

• 26:09Speaker 01

  Oh, you mean when I was sitting there? Because then I had to sit around for another nine months and wait for them to, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 26:17Speaker 01

  I mean, that was, that was really traumatic. You know, basically after I got out of the county and, and then the lawyer said, well, we're going to, it's going to take time until you get your final sentence and I don't know what I can do. It was just waiting and not knowing and, and you know, really, I was thinking in the beginning, like, well, surely something's going to happen. I, you know, I can't believe it's going to be that bad. There's got to be a way around it. And the more, you know, we talked to the lawyer, the more he kept saying, well, I just don't know. I'm going to try to meet with him. We'll see. I kept thinking, well, hopefully it'll be. Okay, he's gonna, we're gonna work something out. And finally, maybe like a month before the sentencing was gonna happen, he said, he had a meeting with the cops and the judges and the prosecutors or whoever about the plea deal. And he was like, this is what it is. It's gonna be a

• 27:02Lewis Howes?

  Wow, four years, basically.

• 27:03Speaker 01

  Yeah, he was like, it's gonna be six to twenty five minimum, four years. And that day I went and shaved my head. I cut all my hair off. I don't know why. It was just the thing that I did. I like, cause I had long hair and I, oh, I think it was because I thought, I don't know. I thought like, oh, if I go to prison, they're gonna make me cut my hair, so I'm gonna cut it.

• 27:23Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 27:24Speaker 01

  They don't, I don't know, some stupid like, but um, I remember that going and getting my hair cut off and just feeling completely devastated, feeling numb. You know, pretty much from my junior year in college, the whole time I was waiting, I just kind of like, I kind of checked out. Honestly, I didn't show up to a lot of classes. I just, I mean, I just was like, really kind of depressive.

• 27:46Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 27:47Speaker 01

  Just kind of checked out.

• 27:48Lewis Howes?

  So what was it like the first week in prison?

• 27:52Speaker 01

  So the first thing that happens is they, they send you to the county jail and the county jail is actually maybe the worst place. So you're, so I was in county jail for about two weeks. When you're in the county jail, you've got, maybe, you know, maybe there's ten people in a cell, you know, with bunk beds. And the food is unbelievably bad and it's so bad. It's like all slopped together and it's just like, you, you just can't even eat it. You don't even want to eat it. Like you barely eat any of it. I lost a lot of weight in the county jail. And then you got these different characters in there. Now, I was in there with my two co-defendants, you know, the, the two guys that were, and one of them just sat in the car the whole time. He never did, touched money. He never touched dope.

• 28:34Speaker 01

  But he did, he got the same sentence as me and, and, and my other co-defendant. And so the three of us were there. So there was a little bit of uh, security from having, you know, two people that I knew in there. But at the same time, it was very, you know, it was scary. It was depressing, but it was also in a way. I hate to use the term. I can't think of a better way to describe it. It was a little bit exciting. It was like, oh, I'm gonna check this out. And I, you know, my friends and an outsider are gonna wanna know what's it like. And I can let them know. And it's, you know, I mean, I felt this, I mean, I'm kind of embarrassed to admit it, but I felt a little bit of like, you know, oh, people are gonna think I'm like, you know, whatever, tough or, you know, or I don't know, that sounds ridiculous.

• 29:17Speaker 01

  But there was an element of that, you know, just like, you know, I'm gonna check this out. This is completely different. It's an adventure. But that was mitigated by, you know, just the, the reality of, you know, having these scary people around. Just being inherently very vulnerable in a cell with 10 people, you know, not knowing really the rules of all the shit that's coming at you all the time. And just adjusting to the new, uh, I mean, that took up energy and it kind of helped the days pass. Cause I was just learning new systems and learning the ropes of what, how this goes and how this goes and sort of getting information.

• 29:56Speaker 01

  But it sucked. And so after about 10 days, then I got shipped out to, um, the, the next phase, which is the reception. Uh, they call it reception or orientation. And, um, at orientation, that's kind of when it's like this kind of bootcamp vibe. So you get there and they make you strip and they make you bend over and they talk shit to you. They go through all your stuff. They like kick it around, you know, they, oh yeah, like they totally, you know, they got.

• 30:27Lewis Howes?

  Like haze you basically.

• 30:29Speaker 01

  Yeah, basically the cops, like you get there in reception, they're like, this is reception, you know?

• 30:33Lewis Howes?

  This is what's, you're not gonna mess around with us. This is how we're gonna treat you.

• 30:36Speaker 01

  This is how it's gonna be. You're a number.

• 30:38Lewis Howes?

  Don't try to act like you're special.

• 30:40Speaker 01

  Yeah, exactly. You're a number, you know, bend over, you know, um, you can't have that anymore. We're taking all your shit. Those pictures of your family, yeah, whatever. You're not gonna see those, you know, just, I mean, just like. You know, here, dressing this jumpsuit, this is what you're gonna wear from now on. You'll give us all your clothes, give us all your whatever. And so you kind of go through that for a couple hours or whatever, you know, they make you sit around and and then they put you in a cell, solitary confinement.

• 31:09Speaker 01

  And so in reception, basically, I was in solitary confinement for, I don't know, another two weeks. And then By yourself in a cell? Yeah, solitary in a in a cell. And then, except for meals, they would get you out of the cell. You'd stand in a line outside for what seemed like a long time. And then they would march you into the cafeteria. And then you would be waiting in a line for a long time. And then you get your food and they give you like five minutes to eat it. And I remember like, literally like, like, just scarfing down to try to get all the food in. And then they'd march, then be like, you gotta go.

• 31:50Speaker 01

  They get you back in the line, you'd stand there for an uncomfortably long time again. And then they march you back to your solitary confinement. And so when I was in there, I can't remember even if I had a book, honestly. I just don't remember. There was at least like a week when I don't think I had like a book or anything, just sitting You and your thoughts. Yeah, totally.

• 32:17Speaker 01

  And then those brief moments where you're just like standing in line and then, you know, rushing to your like really rushing to, I mean, I'm not exaggerating, like, it's like you did not physically have enough time to eat the food. But you would just would, you obviously you'd Show as much as you can. Yeah, you know, and the food was better there than it had been in the county. And I lost a lot of weight anyway. So I think after maybe a week in in reception, in solitary, I got moved to another pod within, like another dorm within solitary. And then I had a cellmate there. And he was this older cat that had been in and out and I think, you know, on different types of like burglaries or bank robberies or something like that. And he kind of schooled me and, you know, I remember having conversations with him.

• 33:00Speaker 01

  I was, I was able to have some books, I remember in that cell. And I think maybe we had like an hour of recreation every day, like in this, in this like

• 33:11Speaker 01

  Little indoor, you know, dorm room or whatever. Um, just enough to like get into a little bit of trouble or be threatened by a few people. And um, and then, then they shipped me out from there to what was noticed your uh, parent institution. Like the place that I was actually gonna go to, the joint, the penitentiary prison. You know, and in my case, um, that was the Ross County Correctional Institution. It was a pretty new prison, so it was clean. Um, they had, you know, new facilities. And they had two, two people to a cell. Um, so I moved there.

• 33:56Speaker 01

  You had a cellmate right away. I had a cellmate right away and I was kind of thrown into like the regular um, schedule, the routine of that prison. And so, and, and the routine of the prison is like, um, you get up in the morning at like seven for breakfast. They like, they like click the doors and the doors are unlocked. So you can go out, you can go out, you can go to around like in the pod or whatever. And then, or maybe you can go out on the track and then you can go, or you can go to breakfast. You come back at nine, you probably have to be counted again for like a half hour. Then you can go to work like at nine thirty or whatever, come back like at eleven thirty, get locked down again, get counted.

• 34:37Speaker 01

  Then go to lunch, uh, maybe come back, get counted again, then go back to work. Then come back again at like four, get counted, be locked down, then you have a few hours at night. Um, or after dinner, you have a few hours where you can either hang out inside or maybe outside until it's, until it's dark. And uh, then you get counted again and you're locked up for the night. And that's, you know, that's the routine. It's every day. It's every day and you've got, um, everybody's supposed to have a job. In in prison, you've got to have a job. So the first job I think I had was in the commissary. And the commissary is just the store. So every prisoner has like,

• 35:21Speaker 01

  they have money on their books, even if they don't have any family sending them money, then the state gives them like, I think it was like 12 or $20 a month that you could spend in the commissary to get whatever, you know, cigarettes, coffee, you know, maybe some clothes, maybe, uh, you know, canned goods, potato chips, you know, just, um, just. Candy or whatever. Yeah. And you could, you could order stuff like, I think back then cassette players or, you know, a few things like that. But once a week you could go to the commissary and you could spend up to a certain amount, maybe it was $25 every week if you had that money in your account. Cause when I first got there, it took a while for me to get any money on my account.

• 36:03Speaker 01

  And I was pretty much relying on mom and dad, you know, whether they were going to send me money.

• 36:09Speaker 01

  Which a lot of times, even if they wanted to send me money, they might've felt conflicted about it because, you know, they probably were told like, well, don't send him too much money because then he'll be more vulnerable if he's getting a lot of money, you know? Cause if people think, you know, you're getting a lot of money, they're gonna, they're gonna, you know, Mess with you. Target you. Sure. Yeah. So I remember one of the first things that happened to me in Ross, though, uh, was that, um, some guy came up and he was like, hey, you want to go play, let's play some cards, you know? He kind of, you know, acted friendly with me or whatever. And then, um, so we went to play card and I had no idea what this card game was. It was called Tonk. I don't know if you've ever heard of it. It's kind of like a, a street game or whatever. It's good talk or something like that. They would play these like a few card games.

• 36:54Speaker 01

  Just really simple, you know, kind of like a blackjack or something like that. It's just like two cards and you're just betting on the cards, you know? It's just like, who's got a higher card? Right. And it's just a gambling thing. And I had no idea how to play this game, but I got in it, however, and I ended up losing like. Yeah, forty five dollars. Wow. And the most that you could spend in the commissary was fifty dollars. And he was like, that's all right. So here's, um, you owe me forty five dollars. And, um, so usually guys would either do, um, cigarettes as currency. Usually you have to pay me on Wednesday when you go to the commissary. And cigarettes, or I'll give you a list of all the stuff I wanted to come.

• 37:37Speaker 01

  So, uh, so then, uh, so then it was gonna be like two weeks until I could actually go to the store. Cause I didn't have any money yet, you know? It was like the first day or something, you know? And, uh, and so finally, when I went to go to the store, I, I went, I walked up to the dude and I was like, yo, so give me, you know, give me your list. You know, cause I'm going to the store today. Give me your list. He was like, bet, you know? And he came back and it was this big list. It was like four kids, a two to three packs of cigarettes, two bags of coffee, eight bags of chips, a figure toothpaste, you know, like, it was just like the, it was like a long list of all this stuff. And it added up to forty five dollars, but it was, it was like his shopping list. And that's what I owed him.

• 38:22Speaker 01

  I was like, all right, cool. Got it. So I went to the commissary, waited in line a long time ago, commissary, went in and I spent all my money just to pay this debt. And I came back and I got back in my cell and, uh, and so this dude comes up to the cell and he knocks, he's like, yo, what's up? And I was like, wait a second. He looks just like the other guy, but it's a different guy. Wow. No way. No, I swear to you. So. Was it twins or what? It wasn't twins, but it was like, I think the first dude, like I hadn't even seen him in those two weeks. And I saw this other guy and I just thought it was him. And I was like, yo, I'm going to the store. And the guy was like, okay, you know?

• 39:05Speaker 01

  In fact, as soon as I got back from the store and I remember the guy that had given me the list, he came and he got all his shit. And then like two minutes later, the real guy. Oh, man. Came and knocked at my door and I was like, wait a second. I just gave all this stuff. I thought that he was you. And he just, and he was like. Nope. He was like, nope, that's not me and you owe me my shit.

• 39:28Speaker 01

  It was deep, man. It was, it was. So what happened? That's the shit that happened. It was like, it sounds like you couldn't make that shit up, but that really happened. And so that was the beginning of my, of my. The journey, the first week. At Ross, yeah. But, but then the thing was, the reason I got sent to Ross Correctional in the first place, because my other two co-defendants, they got sent to this other prison, was because I knew a professional musician named Jeff McCargish, and he had done like work in the prisons, like going in, like, like working with musicians in the prisons. And he knew this warden that had, was really a proactive warden who had accessed these grants from the state

• 40:11Speaker 01

  to create this vocational music program. And they called it the Warden's Band. His name is Ron Edwards. And he was this young guy who was, you know, liberal, liberal minded, and, and he loved music. And so he wanted to have a program where guys in the prison could like play music and get rehabilitated and develop vocational skills so that when they got out, they might be able to work in the music world. And I think in a way for Ron, it was like him vicariously living out his music dream in a way. And he would buy all this gear and, you know, he, he, with this, you know, state money, he got a nice drum set. He got like a nice keyboard, like state of the art, like keyboard with sequencers and like risers

• 40:56Speaker 01

  and bass guitars and amps and electric guitars, amps, microphones, PA system, like everything, the whole nine yards. And then he bought a MIDI electric violin for me.

• 41:11Speaker 01

  I think, I think it cost like four grand. Wow. And he, he dealt with our, you know, the violin shop that we knew from the time I was growing up. And they helped, you know, say, yeah, this is what you need. And, you know, they, they brought it to me and everything. But, um, but he actually, you know, he really went to bat for me. He brought me to that prison. He handpicked me out of the county jail because Jeff went to him and said, I know this kid. He's a great musician. You need to bring him to your thing. And so he brought me and, um, and that became my job, playing with the Warden's Band. Wow, that's pretty nice. It was nice. It was, well.

• 41:50Speaker 01

  It it was nice in a lot of ways. It was a great experience in a lot of ways. At the same time, I was also going to college. So that became like really college was my job, but I was also doing the Warden's Band because they had Pell Grants at the time. So I could go and I could take classes in a real from real professors. And down there, they were coming from Ohio University, but they were the same professors, teaching the same classes for the same credits. Wow. But it was with all these convicts in the classes, you know, a lot of these guys maybe had a, you know, high school, not even a high school, but they got their G D and then they would go to, you know, school and they were older, maybe less educated, but they were they were invested. They wanted to learn. Yeah, I mean, a lot of time they really did, and it was really kind of deep.

• 42:34Speaker 01

  And, you know, to see, you know, these guys, these convicts, you know, they come from super poor backgrounds, maybe had this all this violence in their lives, maybe grew up in group homes and orphanages and had, you know, just all kinds of who knows what kind of drama that went that went down in their lives and their families. And that they, I'm gonna go to school, I'm gonna study psychology, philosophy, you know, literature, like history.

• 43:03Speaker 01

  I took a bunch of great, and and for me too, it was completely different. Like I had been in college on the outside at Ohio State University pursuing a music degree, but I couldn't pursue music classes there. They didn't offer that. So I was just taking whatever I was interested in learning about, which was humanities, was psychology, philosophy, literature, history, art history. I took a lot of great courses and I was really into it, you know, I was it was like, I was like, I gotta make the most of this time. I'm gonna, I'm gonna get in, this is something I can get, it was like,

• 43:37Speaker 01

  it was like a temple, you know, going to college, it was like a refuge. I mean, it was like a, it was a safe place with a professor speaking my language, like I was a smart kid, you know, with like good grades. Because I'd never tried in school, but now I was like, man, I'm into this, you know, this is like liberal arts education, you know, and.

• 43:57Speaker 01

  And I, you know, I met, there was a one person who I met in particular, who was really academically gifted, really smart guy. I don't, you know, just to protect him, I don't want to say his name, but he became a like, kind of like a big brother to me. And he was older than me and he was all about like trying to make the most of his time. Being disciplined in jail, physically, mentally, and also interpersonally, like he was trying to steer me away from like, don't mess around with these, all this dumb shit. Don't get involved in gambling or, you know, he was just, he had a good head on his shoulders and he was serving a longer sentence.

• 44:40Speaker 01

  But he helped steer me. I remember sometimes in the morning, I would go to his cell just like to get ready for breakfast before they would call us for breakfast. And he would always have the Today Show on and it was, uh, not Bryant Gumbel, but what's his brother? Anyway, I would just marvel at how articulate the, the hosts on the Today Show were. And he would, and he would talk, he'd be like, man, he was so articulate. It's just like, that's why we got to study like the, the books and like, just to be that articulate, like that's so slick. And I was, and I was, I was excited about shit like that. Like I wanted to, I wanted to improve my mind. But anyway, I, I started rambling a little bit about, about it, but, but I was, I was in the Warden's Band and I was in college.

• 45:25Speaker 01

  And yes, the Warden's Band was amazing, but it was also problematic in various ways. Like there was, there's a lot of different, you know, stories I could tell about that.

• 45:39Speaker 01

  I mean, that's, you know, basically the Warden's Band was, um, it was predominantly African Americans.

• 45:47Speaker 01

  And there was one other white guy who had been in the band, but in a way, but he was getting ready to leave. So in a way I was like the token white guy in the band, or you could, you could argue, or maybe some people might've thought I was the token white guy in the band.

• 46:02Speaker 01

  So. Um, but I was, you know, I was, I was young and from a middle-class family, well-educated. Um, had been taking violin lessons my whole life. These guys came from a completely different background. So obviously, in some ways, in some ways, they looked at me like I was green and young and dumb and stupid and whatever. But in other ways, I think they resented me. Some of them, not all of them, but some of these guys resented me. Um, there was an older guy in the band who had been down for a long time, some violent crimes. And, uh, in particular, he didn't like me. I think he had an issue with, you know, he had an issue with me because I was white, because I was, you know, he thought I was,

• 46:47Speaker 01

  uh, had been pampered, whatever. And, uh, he was older. He had grown up in the South, you know, in a different time. You know, he had a lot of, um, he had a lot of, uh, he had a lot of anger. Uh, he had a lot of violence in his history. And so there was, there were those kinds of tensions, you know, and, and I was in a band where on one hand, like I was sort of the expert musician, right? Where I knew all this stuff, like music theory and all this training on the violin my whole life. But I didn't know anything about like black music, like African-American music. And that's what we were doing. We were playing like, okay, we played, uh, George Clinton, Mary J. Blige,

• 47:30Speaker 01

  MC, uh, was it Hammer, MC Hammer, Bobby Brown, um, Prince, um, a bunch of tunes all in that vein. That, that was our bag. That was what we did. And they would sequence the tunes just like they were and would perform just like they were on the record. And they would try to find a way to fit me in. I had this MIDI violin, so I could play like different sounds with like a flute sound or like a trumpet sound or what, you know, or just play like a regular violin sound. But it was, but they didn't want me to just, they just wanted it to sound like the tune. So, so they would have me like hitting a cowbell.

• 48:09Speaker 01

  I'd be like hitting the cowbell and like doing like a two step and like singing some background vocals, which were, which I was horrible at. And they would occasionally let me play a couple of notes. Like, I swear to you, man, it was like, it was so humiliating. And I would sit through the rehearsals. But then, like, the way they would conduct rehearsals was like a bad garage band, because they weren't, you know, I was, I was used to be in a professional orchestra. You know, it's like if you're on a professional football team, which you were on professional football teams and

• 48:43Lewis Howes?

  Then you go play flag football or something.

• 48:44Speaker 01

  And then you go play with some, just some dudes in a backyard. You know, and they're, and they're like, you know, and all the personalities and the drama and egos and all this stuff. So you can imagine the same thing like in this, in this band. So

• 48:56Lewis Howes?

  Now, there were some perks though, because you got to go play outside of the prison cell, right? Or the prison grounds. Because I remember watching you like, once every few months, we'd drive a few hours away and go watch you play on a stage in like a park or something.

• 49:11Speaker 01

  A lot of perks. Yeah.

• 49:12Lewis Howes?

  And I always remember, like, you playing Electric Slide. That's like what I remember.

• 49:16Speaker 01

  That's right. We played Electric Slide.

• 49:18Lewis Howes?

  I always remember that. And it was me and mom and dad and like Kat or someone. And then it was all the prison, the inmates' families were there. And so we were like the only white people in the middle of this park in the middle of nowhere. And playing all these songs and Electric Slide. And everyone would start dancing during Electric Slide. That's what I remember about it.

• 49:41Speaker 01

  That's so hilarious. Yeah, because you were nine.

• 49:44Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 49:44Speaker 01

  And, and yeah, there were perks, because the warden, you know, like I said, he was really kind of liberal and activist and or proactive, I guess. So he would take us out to do community service. Like, we would go to the parks, and we played at a semi-pro baseball game. We would go to other prisons and we'd perform. And this was a big deal to leave the prison. I mean, nobody leaves the prison when you're in prison. Nobody. But we were like, we were like fucking Blues Brothers.

• 50:14Speaker 01

  Like seriously, like we were going to other prisons, we were doing shows, we would do shows at at Ross at the at the prison we were at for special events. And so

• 50:23Lewis Howes?

  That's kind of cool.

• 50:24Speaker 01

  It was, it was really cool. You know, it was, we had a level of privilege that nobody else in the prison had. But with that also came, you know, some resentment.

• 50:35Lewis Howes?

  Serious resentment.

• 50:36Speaker 01

  Serious resentment.

• 50:37Lewis Howes?

  And you were a new kid on the block and people were like, why can't we go and do this? And what gives you the right?

• 50:42Speaker 01

  Yeah, absolutely.

• 50:43Lewis Howes?

  Why can't I can join this band and play this cowbell as good as you?

• 50:46Speaker 01

  Yeah. And it was even deeper than that because um, there was all this political behind the scenes drama that I wasn't even really privy to. Um, I mean, you can imagine, or if you don't know, like, a lot of the prisons are in these like rural towns. So you've got rural white people that are working at the prison as guards, and it's a state job, and those state jobs are really highly prized. You know, they have good benefits, they pay money, they pay seniority. A lot of times, you know, these people can get their friends in or their relatives in and that sort of thing. And so there's like a union of the guards, and a lot of times, it's in these

• 51:29Speaker 01

  rural towns. Um, you get these racial political dynamics going on. I mean, the warden in this prison, you know, happened to be a young African American. And then on top of that, he's, he's trying to, he, he's, um, he believes in the rehabilitation side of rehabilitation and corrections. And he's got this band that playing the electric slide and Jodeci and Keith Sweat. And, and so a lot of the guards did not like that. You know, a lot of these, uh, the white rural guards really resented, they didn't like the fact that he was taking us out, that we were going out and playing. They thought that's, you know, that's not what a prison is about. Um.

• 52:13Lewis Howes?

  I remember, I remember specifically one of the gigs on a park. At the end of it, I believe, if I don't, that you guys like got to go swimming too. I remember there was like a pool in the park. And I remember you guys all like jumping a fence or like going into this pool and the warden was like, go do your thing for 10 minutes or something and you know, or whatever. And I was like, whoa, that's pretty privileged.

• 52:37Speaker 01

  Yeah, it was, it was.

• 52:39Lewis Howes?

  I don't know if you remember that.

• 52:40Speaker 01

  The, the warden gave us a lot of trust.

• 52:42Lewis Howes?

  That's amazing.

• 52:43Speaker 01

  It, it was really amazing. I mean, there, you know, um, he, he trusted us and, and you know, we, you know, uh, from speaking for myself, and I think for all the guys, I think we, we were so grateful to him that for no other reason, I mean, cause I, cause I could have left, like maybe, maybe I could have got away with, if I was on a trip in a park or something.

• 53:05Lewis Howes?

  Right, right. Did catch you eventually.

• 53:06Speaker 01

  Maybe they would, but I mean, I wouldn't have just because this guy had, he had done, he had stuck his neck out so far, you know, to, he trusted us so much and he was given us such an opportunity. You know, so I'll always be grateful to Ron Edwards, you know, for, for that. But, um, so this political drama, it all, it, it led up to after I had been locked up for two years. There, there were a couple of things that had happened where I felt like the guards were kind of trying to get me tripped up in trouble for stuff that didn't happen or whatever. Like one time I ended up going to solitary confinement for, uh, two weeks

• 53:45Speaker 01

  because they said I had inappropriate affection, uh, with my girlfriend, uh, during a visit. You know, when you're allowed to have a visit like once or twice a month from, you know, your family or your girlfriend or whatever. So my girlfriend was out of state, um, a lot of the time because she was working on her master's degree, but she came in, you know, once a month, once every other month. So she would come in and you could have like a three hour like sit down and you're allowed to like kiss once at the beginning, a hug once, and then you can sit and hold hands, but you know, you can't do anything else or whatever. And at the end you could have a, so. They would have like these guards looking behind like one way mirrors and stuff checking on people and if you if you displayed inappropriate affection, then you could get in

• 54:28Speaker 01

  trouble. Well, the best of my memory, we didn't do anything, but they came out and got me. They said, that's it. You inappropriate affection. You're going to the hole. And they put me in the hole for two weeks because they said that. Oh, and they the funny thing was they even pointed to the the thing on my neck, which is, you know, it looks

• 54:48Lewis Howes?

  Mark or something like a

• 54:49Speaker 01

  It's from playing the violin.

• 54:50Lewis Howes?

  Oh, wow. Like a little red mark.

• 54:52Speaker 01

  It's a little red mark on my neck. Yeah. And they they were like, oh, that's, you know, that's evidence of you. But it doesn't matter. Like I said, once

• 54:59Lewis Howes?

  Doesn't matter what you say or anything.

• 55:00Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's like they just said, you know, we saw you had inappropriate. So I was convinced some things that happened like that were that the guards were trying to create problems for the warden for the warden's band for police. So then, like, one of those times we went out to the park to play like you were talking about, um, uh, mom came and she took pictures and then she sent me the pictures later because the warden's family had come too. So she sent me the pictures. And you know, mom, you know, was always calling the warden to check and see like, how is he doing? And how's my what can we do? You know, our parents, you know, they they get involved, you know, they want to they're going to be this squeaky wheel. And so they were on a good, you know, they knew him, they had his phone number, you know, and she sent me these

• 55:44Speaker 01

  pictures. She said, give these to Ron, you know, pictures of his kids, pictures of his family, just as a friendly gesture, like you would do, you know, to anybody. So somehow somebody found out I had these pictures. And then the guards came around and they went through all my stuff. They they call a shakedown. They shook down our cell and they went through my stuff and they found these pictures and they put me in the hole.

• 56:09Lewis Howes?

  Jeez.

• 56:10Speaker 01

  Because.

• 56:13Speaker 01

  It's a threat to the security of the institution.

• 56:16Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 56:17Speaker 01

  For me to have pictures of the warden's family. They saw that as like some kind of evidence that I might be like blackmailing. The warden or threatening like, which is a stretch, but they, what they did was they put him in a bind too. Because then he couldn't do anything about it. Like he, it was really, they were trying to get after him by taking his, his, his white violinist out of the, out of the band, you know, cause then how's the band gonna go on?

• 56:45Lewis Howes?

  Right.

• 56:45Speaker 01

  They don't have a white dude in it. You know what I'm saying?

• 56:48Lewis Howes?

  Geez.

• 56:48Speaker 01

  It's gonna be a little harder and um.

• 56:51Lewis Howes?

  So you spent six weeks in the hole total?

• 56:53Speaker 01

  Well, just during.

• 56:54Lewis Howes?

  Two weeks in the beginning.

• 56:55Speaker 01

  Two weeks and then two weeks again there. Yeah. So that was four weeks up through the first two years. Well, plus we talked about I was in solitary in reception.

• 57:03Lewis Howes?

  Yeah, yeah, exactly.

• 57:04Speaker 01

  Yeah. So I guess it was like six, but so then they, they took me the whole, and I was like, what's going on? And, and basically like the warden couldn't do anything about, he couldn't touch it. Cause this was like, basically they're putting him in a difficult association.

• 57:15Lewis Howes?

  Sure.

• 57:16Speaker 01

  Yeah. So, so they rode me out to another prison. I had to go.

• 57:20Lewis Howes?

  So you had to leave?

• 57:21Speaker 01

  I had to leave that prison.

• 57:22Lewis Howes?

  You couldn't play, you couldn't play anymore then?

• 57:25Speaker 01

  Uh, not for a while. I went to, I ended up going to a completely different prison with a completely different structure of living.

• 57:30Lewis Howes?

  And this is where you lived in a big, open room, right? You had a cell with a room inmate, another inmate in the first two years.

• 57:37Speaker 01

  Right. Real clean.

• 57:38Lewis Howes?

  And the next two years, you're in like, there was like a hundred or two hundred guys in a room.

• 57:42Speaker 01

  Like two hundred and fifty guys in a room.

• 57:44Lewis Howes?

  Just a big room with cot by cot, side by side.

• 57:46Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah. Three, three feet between each bed, you know?

• 57:49Lewis Howes?

  And what was the scariest part about sleeping in a room with two hundred and fifty convicts?

• 57:55Speaker 01

  Well, when you think about this idea of being alone all the time in prison, that's what most people think about. Like you're locked up in a cell and you think that would be torture, right? That would be horrible to just be alone all the time. And it is, but actually being in a room with two hundred and fifty other motherfuckers is, are possibly worse.

• 58:13Lewis Howes?

  It's scarier.

• 58:14Speaker 01

  Yeah. I mean, it's just, I mean, it's just inherently.

• 58:17Lewis Howes?

  There's no security, there's no safety.

• 58:19Speaker 01

  It's inherently very vulnerable, you know? And when they say maximum security, that's when you're, you know, basically you're in a cell, you know, all the time because, but then you're safe. So if it's if it's medium security and they've got you in a dorm like that, you're actually less safe in a lot of ways. And, you know, guys that are in medium security prisons, a lot of them have been in maximum security prisons, but they work their way down to medium after maybe 10 years in a maximum. So it's still very, so you still have a lot of lifers, you have murderers, you have all kinds of criminals in a medium security institution. And it's very, you know, like I said, it's inherently just a very vulnerable

• 59:01Speaker 01

  place to be in because you're just, you're just, you're vulnerable.

• 59:05Lewis Howes?

  What was the scariest experience you ever faced?

• 59:09Speaker 01

  Scariest.

• 59:11Lewis Howes?

  Or most vulnerable?

• 59:13Speaker 01

  Hmm, wow.

• 59:15Lewis Howes?

  I remember you always, we'd come visit you like every week or two weeks, it seemed like. We'd always drive and see you. And then I'd hear about all these stories and I forget most of them, but I remember you telling some crazy stories.

• 59:28Speaker 01

  Well, I mean, I would have to say that, you know, when you think about prison, you know, people think it's violent, you know, and it's scary, but the best way for me to describe, you know, the violence. And I've said this before, but I think that the violence is something that emerges. It's a feeling that emerges in the absence of, you know, other human, you know, things, uh, you know, freedom, trust, intimacy.

• 1:00:05Speaker 01

  Love, whatever, you, when you don't feel free, when you don't trust anybody around you, uh, when you're not, you don't have any intimacy or closeness with anyone. That feels like violence. It's like an absence. And, you know, you're just constantly. Afraid, you know, you're constantly, you just don't know what's gonna happen every day. You just, you just, you know, there's all kinds of things that could happen. And you don't know when they're gonna happen. You know, and there's just little shit that happens constantly. And you're like, how do, how am I gonna react to this? Just like people just like staring you down or bumping you out of the way.

• 1:00:47Speaker 01

  Or just little power plays, like someone turning the television station. It was just like stupid, you know, someone comes up and sits in your bed or they just stand too close to you or whatever. Just all these infringements in your space, just constantly, you just never. You know, people that you see all the time, people you live right next to, you live in the same cell with. Or you're just like three feet away from them all the time. Or, yeah, I mean, it's just, it's just constant. You know, you just, just little shit just happens constantly when, and you're, you're like. This guy just, you know, called me a name or just like stared me down or like. You know, moved into my space or encroached upon my space or like, you know.

• 1:01:32Speaker 01

  You know, basically told me to give him a cigarette or, you know, it's like, you know. And it's like, how am I supposed to deal with that? Like, how do I react to that? You can either, I can either react to it by. How did you react to that stuff? I mean, differently at different times, but.

• 1:01:50Speaker 01

  The, the problem is, it's not just as simple as, you know. I'll just fight and then everybody's gonna respect you. Because for a few reasons. You gotta remember, I was serving a six to 25 year sentence. So if you get in a fight, no matter if somebody hits you or you hit them. It's a fight and there's, and the way that they treat it in prison is like. You were in a fight, we don't care who hit who first or whatever, it doesn't matter. You're going to the hole for two weeks. And you'll have it on your record that you were in a fight. You're gonna lose visitation privileges. You might get kicked out of school for the semester. You might get moved out of that dorm to a less favorable, uh, living situation.

• 1:02:35Speaker 01

  Lose various types of freedoms that you have acquired by having good behavior. Um, lose commissary privileges. Yeah, you know, they just make your life worse and more unpredictable. And that record is gonna affect when I go see the parole board. Because there's no guarantee that I'm getting out for 25 years. So I know I'm gonna see the parole board in four years. But when I see the parole board, parole board is gonna be like, ah, well, we could let you out. Or we could tell you to come back in five years or one year or so.

• 1:03:10Lewis Howes?

  So you mostly just never fought them?

• 1:03:12Speaker 01

  I tried to avoid it. I tried to avoid it, but that's the thing. How do you avoid it? You know? You, you can't just give in to every encroachment on your space. I'll tell you what it, it made me, uh, really respect was women's experience. Hmm. Because, um, because I think in a, you know, in a way that this is kind of like women experience like the regular free world in this way, like in a way where men are constantly encroaching on their space or constantly, you know, disrespecting them. Because they've got this, some kind of physical power over them.

• 1:03:56Speaker 01

  And, um, so women have to develop all these strategies for, for, for dealing with that. I really became intensely interested in, in that. And that was one of the things I studied in, you know, classes, you know, I took, uh, women's studies or feminist philosophy and read a lot about that. Um. But I I'm less qualified to talk about it than a woman, but but if I had to, I would say, you know, you you can rebuff people with humor, you can you can appear to be crazy. You can um try to just play it off, you can ignore things, or you can respond with um aggression.

• 1:04:40Speaker 01

  And there were different times that I tried all those different things. And over time, I got stronger and tougher and a little, actually a little crazier. I mean, by the time I was, you know, three years into my bit, my fourth year, I had gotten pretty callous to the whole situation. I had gotten to the point of even being reckless at times. And I'd been working out the whole time, so I got strong. I was really strong.

• 1:05:07Lewis Howes?

  You were jacked.

• 1:05:08Speaker 01

  I was I was jacked up. I I mean, I would work out like three hours a day and I was boxing.

• 1:05:12Lewis Howes?

  Yeah.

• 1:05:13Speaker 01

  I was running, boxing, powerlifting. I was doing everything. I mean, not every month, not every day, because I would go through periods when I'd be really depressed. But then I would try to get try to get it back on and I would I would work out intensely, you know, and uh and so and then I just I just got to know my way around and uh and I started to get a little crazy, you know. And after a while, I was I was one of those guys, you know, pushing people out of the way. I mean, I wasn't letting myself get pushed out of the way, you know, to the point where it got dangerous. You know, there were there were times when I when I called people out. There was there was a one time I remember this guy who had who had constantly been um trying to intimidate me ever since I got there.

• 1:05:59Speaker 01

  And he was just a scary looking dude. And he would always just, he just had a big bark, you know, he would always just come full force with like, you know, just this like and like, he just looked like he was ready to go, like, you know, all the time. And he would see me, he'd just give me like the most penetrating fucking look, you know, or just, you know, just like stand like just cut in front of me in line and just like turn around and look at me like, what bitch? What are you doing, motherfucker? That's right. That's why, you know, I mean, just like, ready to go, just this dude was like jacked up. And he was just like, he had, he was connected and like, you know, he

• 1:06:36Speaker 01

  and so this one time I was just walking. Just walking through the dorm and I walked like through a row of beds or something like that and and he like, you know, he called me out, yelled at me or something, said something like, don't walk, you know, don't walk down here bitch, or something like that. And something snapped in. And I was like, what? Let's take it to the bathroom. Because that's if you really wanted, if you're really serious.

• 1:07:03Lewis Howes?

  You want to hide it.

• 1:07:04Speaker 01

  If you wanted to fight, if you were really serious about fighting, like, because you could be stupid and just be like, okay, just start fighting right there. But then the guards, the guard will see you. Because you're in this big room, but there's a guard that they'll see a fight happening in the room, you know. So you're like, okay, meet me, meet me in the bathroom. And then you go in the bathroom, you know, the guards may not know what's happening for a while, or people may look out for you and tell you like, hey, the guards are coming to stop fighting or whatever. So, so I was like, follow me in the bathroom. I'm not listening to your anymore. I was ready. I just didn't care.

• 1:07:36Lewis Howes?

  And you've probably been training for a while. You were like.

• 1:07:38Speaker 01

  I was, I was, yeah, I was, I was.

• 1:07:40Lewis Howes?

  Jacked.

• 1:07:41Speaker 01

  Yeah, I'd been boxing.

• 1:07:42Lewis Howes?

  So like, I'm ready.

• 1:07:43Speaker 01

  Trainer. I was like, powerlifting. I was really strong. I was really healthy. I was really, and I was really pissed off. I was so pissed off and I was so tired of being just scared all the time. I was like, ready to take out everything on this dude. And I went in the bathroom and I picked up a mop ringer. I don't know if you've ever seen a mop ringer, but it's like this really heavy steel contraption, like on the end of a big, like, wooden rod. And I just, like, picked it up and I got into a batter's swing. And I waited for him to come into the bathroom. I swear to you, I was so ready to take his head off with that thing, man. And he never came.

• 1:08:26Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 1:08:27Speaker 01

  He didn't show up. So when I, once I called him out, once I called, he didn't come.

• 1:08:33Lewis Howes?

  And did he ever bother you again?

• 1:08:34Speaker 01

  He never bothered me again.

• 1:08:36Lewis Howes?

  Really?

• 1:08:36Speaker 01

  He never even looked at me again after that.

• 1:08:38Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 1:08:39Speaker 01

  It was deep. But I mean, that could have been completely different. Like, if that would have gone a different way, I would probably still be there.

• 1:08:48Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 1:08:49Speaker 01

  Because that would have been more than just a fight. It would have been like, I mean, I would have hurt the dude. I might have killed the dude. I don't know.

• 1:08:55Lewis Howes?

  Wow.

• 1:08:56Speaker 01

  But he didn't show up. He didn't, he didn't walk through the door.

• 1:08:59Lewis Howes?

  That's, that's good. He didn't.

• 1:09:01Speaker 01

  It's good. It's good for me. Yeah.

• 1:09:03Lewis Howes?

  What's the biggest lesson you learned from prison then?

• 1:09:07Speaker 01

  I learned a lot of lessons, you know, but one I would say is that it's part of human nature to adapt to the situation that you're in. So when you're in an easy situation, it's your nature to get soft. And when you're in a hard situation, you can get hard. Like you can get tough, like you can deal with it. And when I got out of prison, I always, I told myself, you know, I never want to forget what I'm capable of enduring. Like, I don't want to get soft to the point that I feel like I need to be able to go to a nice restaurant, or I need to have a nice house, or I need to have this, because

• 1:09:50Speaker 01

  I don't need, I can live in a cell. I can eat canned food, I can eat, you know, I can tolerate a lot, and I don't want to forget that. I don't, I don't want to not be grateful for just having freedom. You know, like, it's, you know.

• 1:10:15Lewis Howes?

  And there you have it, guys. This is the end of part one, but make sure to tune back for the second episode to learn about the lessons that he learned in prison and what he did to apply them in being a successful jazz violinist, traveling all over the world, and how he's applied it into his business. Very cool second half, so I want you guys to tune in and hear the second half of this episode. You're not going to want to miss out on what Chris talks about. With that, guys, thanks so much for tuning in today, and make sure to go out there and do something great.