A Career Journey in and out of Darkness - An Ex-Offenders Efforts to Regain his Self-Respect

Mark Jory was 52 years old, married for 26 years, with two young-adult daughters, a small mortgage on his family home, substantial savings, and had been operating his own one-man business for 19 years. But he was living a lie! A decade-long secret was haunting him, and he was about to lose everything! One stupid decision put his stable, happy family life, business, reputation, and freedom, all at risk for a few moments of pleasure. Being ruthlessly blackmailed over several years had drained all his financial resources. As he held onto his stable family life by his fingertips, he stepped across the line from immorality and lies, to fraud and forgery! Mark tells his story as a career journey in three parts, the fall, the failure, and the climb. He reveals how a lack of career planning led him to make decisions that resulted in the loss of everything he valued. He describes life in prison for a 52-year-old first time offender, and how it felt to have reached rock bottom. Finally, he reflects on the journey to rebuild his life and career from unemployed criminal, to working and studying full time, overcoming discrimination and serious health issues, to gaining a degree, a new career and regaining his self-respect. While his story of getting into and out of prison is unique, it also reveals how society discriminates against those with a criminal history. He tells of several barriers and setbacks he faced because of his conviction. As he tells of his drive and motivation to find some form of atonement, we learn strategies that can help overcome the hurdles we each face in our own lives. For those without a criminal background, we learn how to be more forgiving of others' mistakes, and to judge people by their deeds today, not by their misdeeds in the past.