A touching, inspiring and humbling true story.
Due to the murder of a Sergeant, Jarvis is sentenced to death.
Facing the death sentence forced Jarvis to face himself. He
encountered Buddhism and started practicing meditation and the path
of peace. From a man of violence, he transforms into a man of peace
in an environment that is hardly supportive.
This book opens us up to the violent outer environment of the
prison, and the fearful and vulnerable inner world of the
prisoners. Most of them have untold stories of pain and childhood
abuse.
The book hits back at me, as I start to see how un-Dharmic my life
is compared to Jarvis. I may be outside the prison cell, but my
mind is not free at all; and my body, like his, is actually on
death penalty (penalised by virtue of the fact that I was born).
Very admirable being, who knows, he may be a Bodhisattva?
Some interesting observations and insights Jarvis shared:
"Well, for the first time, I'm starting to see something - that the
anger and bitterness on the faces of these congressmen and
the president of the United States is the same as on the faces of
all those environmentalists and the Klansmen. The only
difference is that the Klansmen wore khaki and hoods, the
demonstrators were dressed for going to jail, while the congressmen
and the president wore real expensive suits."
Jarvis was also very fortunate that the Chagdud Tulku Rinpoche came
to visit him twice in the prisons. The second visit was to grant
him the Vajrayana Empowerment. The empowerment was conducted with
the help of an interpreter (translator) through the phone. It was
amazing that all throughout the empowerment, Jarvis was able to
hear all the instructions clearly. Yet once the empowerment was
over, Jarvis suddenly became aware of all the noise that was around
him (as there were also other prisoners beside him who were talking
to their visitors through the phone).
Anyway, Jarvis generously shared some of the precious advice and
instructions given by Chagdud Tulku Rinpoche.
"One way of understanding the deeper nature of our experience is to
think of this life as a dream. Enlightenment is waking up, finding
freedom from the dream of suffering. Through meditation we come to
realize that everything is like an illusion....
"Just as movies are really only light on cellophane, realize that
all this is really the movie of your mind. Try to understand that
hte true nature of your body, speech, and mind is deathless,
faultless, and pure....
"From now on, your spiritual practice will involve these three
commitments: harmlessness,
helpfulness, and purity.
Eventually, you will relize your own pure nature. As long as the
dream of life seems real, you will feel heaven and hell, experience
helpful and harmful people. These are simply the displays of mind's
purity and mind's hatred. It's like being surrounded by mirrors -
if we are dirty and ugly, that's what we will see. We have to clean
ourselves for the image int he mirror to change. It's all a
function of mind.
"Life is impermanent. Whoever is born will die, but we don't know
when. ALl we can be sure of is the present moment. Every moment is
a chance to practice these three commitments. This is how we break
out of the cycle of karmic existence.
The last chapter of the book is an Afterword written by Chagdud
Tulku Rinpoche himself.
Very inspiring book. Do try to grab it if you can. 
May all beings be freed from cyclic existence.
