I have sat across from people who are trying to change their lives—and watched the system close back in around them. In the jail where I volunteer, I have heard the same hopes repeated in different voices: a place to live, steady work, a chance to not come back. These are not unrealistic goals. But every path available leads back to the same barriers—poverty, limited access to resources, and records that follow them long after their sentence ends. Over time, a pattern becomes impossible to ignore: people are not simply failing. They are being returned to the same conditions, again and again. This is the problem I am committed to addressing. I am currently pursuing a degree in social work, with the long-term goal of working in reentry support and restorative justice. As a mixed-race student from a background shaped by instability and limited access to opportunity, I have experienced firsthand how systems can constrain what feels possible. Through my work as a volunteer chaplain, I engage directly with individuals navigating incarceration, offering support grounded in dignity, accountability, and presence. But I also understand that compassion alone is not enough. To create meaningful change, I need the education and credentials to move within—and challenge—the systems themselves. My path to higher education has not been traditional. I left high school before graduating and spent years navigating instability before earning my GED and enrolling in college in 2024. Returning to school required persistence, but also the ability to build something from very little. I have learned how to maximize limited resources because I have had no other option. That discipline now shapes how I approach both my education and my work. For the upcoming academic year, my total cost of attendance is $33,494. After receiving $13,902 in federal and state grants, I am still left with a net cost of $19,592. Even with federal work-study and $12,500 in student loans, I will still face an unmet financial need. This gap is not theoretical—it determines whether I can continue forward at the pace required to complete my degree and move into fieldwork. Despite this, I have remained committed. I am not pursuing education for status or security alone. I am building toward a role that allows me to work directly with individuals navigating incarceration and reentry—helping them access resources, stabilize their lives, and reconnect with their communities. At the same time, I aim to contribute to broader efforts that address the systemic conditions that lead to incarceration in the first place. This work requires compassion, but also integrity—the ability to stay consistent, even when progress is slow. It requires discipline, and the ability to make something meaningful out of limited resources. These are not abstract values to me. They are how I have learned to live. This scholarship would directly reduce my reliance on student loans and help close the remaining financial gap, allowing me to continue my education without compounding long-term financial strain. More importantly, it would support the work I am already doing—and preparing to expand. I have seen what happens when systems remain unchanged. I am choosing to become someone who can work within them—and help create something different. -- Financial Need Breakdown (2026–2027 Academic Year) Total cost for this school year: $33,494 Current finances: Federal Pell Grant: $9,244 PA State Grant: $4,658 Total grants (non-repayable aid): $13,902 Net cost after grants: $19,592 Additional resources: Federal Work-Study (projected): $3,000 Federal student loans (subsidized + unsubsidized): $12,500 Total covered (work + loans): $15,500 Remaining unmet need: $4,092

Going to college, for me, is not just about earning a degree. It is about interruption—breaking patterns that felt inevitable for most of my life. I grew up moving between different worlds, shaped by race, class, and instability in ways I didn’t have language for at the time. I am of mixed race, and that identity has always carried a kind of in-betweenness—never fully belonging in one space or another. At the same time, I experienced poverty, family disruption, and environments where long-term goals like college were not expected or supported. I left high school before graduating. For a long time, education felt distant—something that belonged to people with stability, resources, and a clear path forward. What changed was not one moment, but a series of realizations. I began to understand how much of my life had been shaped by systems larger than me—systems that distribute opportunity unevenly along lines of race and class. I also began to see that while I could not undo those conditions, I could choose how I responded to them. Earning my GED and enrolling in college was the first concrete step I took toward rewriting that trajectory. College now represents both access and responsibility. It gives me access to knowledge, language, and professional pathways that were previously out of reach. More importantly, it gives me the ability to understand my own experiences within a broader social context. I am studying social work, and through that lens, I am learning how individual struggles are often connected to structural inequality—how poverty, trauma, and marginalization are not isolated issues, but patterns that repeat across communities. What I am trying to accomplish through my education is not just personal advancement. I am working toward becoming a social worker who can engage directly with populations that are often overlooked or dismissed—particularly individuals who are incarcerated, reentering society, or at risk of entering those systems. These are communities where I have already begun to serve, and they are communities I feel accountable to. I want to provide support that is grounded in dignity and honesty, while also advocating for changes that address the root causes of inequality. Going to college also means creating a different legacy. The racial wealth gap is not abstract to me—it shows up in access to housing, education, healthcare, and stability across generations. Pursuing higher education is one way I am actively working to disrupt that pattern. It is a long-term investment, not just in my own future, but in the possibilities available to my family and the people I will serve. This path is not easy. Financial strain is constant, and the demands of school are often balanced against real-life responsibilities. But that tension is exactly why this matters. College is not something I am doing out of convenience—it is something I am choosing with full awareness of the cost, because I believe in what it makes possible. At its core, going to college means stepping into a life that is intentional. It means refusing to let circumstance define the limits of what I can contribute. And it means building the tools I need to turn lived experience into meaningful, sustained impact.

I did not take a straight path into higher education. In fact, for a long time, it did not feel like an option at all. I left high school four months before graduating. At the time, survival felt more urgent than education. I was navigating instability, substance use, and environments where long-term planning wasn’t something anyone modeled or expected. Education belonged to “later,” or more honestly, to someone else. It took years—years of consequences, reflection, and rebuilding—before I reached a place where I could imagine a different trajectory for myself. I earned my GED in March 2024 and enrolled in college immediately after. That decision was not just about school—it was a turning point. Higher education became a way to reclaim agency over my life, to understand the systems that shaped my experiences, and to build something sustainable moving forward. As a social work major, I am not only learning theory; I am learning how to translate lived experience into meaningful, ethical action. Attending college is directly facilitating what I hope to achieve because it is giving me both language and structure. I am developing a sociological and clinical understanding of issues I have lived through—poverty, instability, trauma, and systemic inequality. Instead of remaining personal and isolated, these experiences are becoming part of a larger framework that I can use to support others. Education is transforming my past from something I survived into something I can use with intention. My long-term goal is to become a social worker and, eventually, pursue a Master of Social Work and divinity training. I am particularly drawn to working with incarcerated individuals, people reentering society, and at-risk youth. These are populations that are often dismissed or reduced to statistics, but I know firsthand how much complexity exists beneath those labels. I want to be someone who can meet people in those spaces without judgment, while also advocating for structural changes that address the root causes of inequality. The impact I hope to create is both direct and systemic. On an individual level, I want to provide support that is grounded in dignity, accountability, and compassion—helping people stabilize, reconnect, and move forward. On a broader level, I want to contribute to efforts that challenge cycles of incarceration and poverty, particularly through restorative justice and reentry support. Too often, systems are designed to manage people rather than support them. I want to be part of shifting that. Financially, pursuing higher education is not simple. My family has faced significant financial strain, and decisions about school are always weighed against immediate needs. But choosing education is, for me, a long-term investment in breaking cycles—not only for myself, but for the communities I intend to serve. Support like this scholarship would ease that burden and allow me to stay focused on my studies and fieldwork, rather than constantly negotiating between survival and progress. Higher education is not just a credential for me. It is a tool, a responsibility, and a second chance. It is how I am building a life that is not defined by where I started, but by what I choose to do with it.

I’m a 43-year-old mixed-race mother of two, a professional tattoo artist with twenty-five years of experience, a Soto Zen priest-in-training, and a volunteer chaplain at the county jail. My path has never been linear. I grew up in instability, left high school before graduating, raised a family, built a career, survived hard years, and learned how to rebuild my life piece by piece. I earned my GED in March 2023 and am now a full-time social work student working toward a future that blends mental health care, chaplaincy, trauma-informed practice, and service to the people most often ignored. Everything in my life so far has pushed me toward work that centers compassion and holds space for people in crisis. As a jail chaplain, I sit with women navigating trauma, addiction, grief, poverty, and the weight of systems that were never designed to protect them. Many have never had a therapeutic or spiritual relationship built on respect. When I meet with them in the pod — one mother, one daughter, one survivor at a time — I see the exact place where the mental health system fails and the exact place where real healing begins. One moment in particular shaped my direction. A woman who had been withdrawn for days finally whispered to me that she didn’t think anyone cared if she lived or died. I didn’t fix anything. I didn’t preach. I didn’t offer clichés. I sat with her until her breathing softened, until she believed I was staying, until she remembered that she was still someone worth caring about. The shift wasn’t dramatic, but it was real: she started participating in groups again, took better care of herself, and even told another woman, “The chaplain reminded me I’m still a person.” That moment clarified my purpose: I’m meant to serve at the intersection of mental health, spiritual care, and social justice. My long-term plan is to earn both my MSW and MDiv, become a licensed clinical social worker, and continue serving in carceral and reentry settings. I want to offer trauma-responsive therapy, chaplaincy, and harm-reduction–oriented spiritual support to people impacted by incarceration, poverty, racism, disability, and generational trauma. Eventually, I hope to open a community-based practice that provides low-cost or no-cost mental health and spiritual care to those who traditionally struggle to access it: formerly incarcerated people, veterans, and families navigating instability. The positive impact I hope to make is simple but profound: I want to help people remember their humanity in systems designed to strip it away. I want to bring steady, culturally grounded, nonjudgmental care to the places where people fall through the cracks — jails, reentry facilities, shelters, and the neighborhoods most affected by systemic harm. I’m returning to school in midlife because I finally have the clarity, skill, and discipline to do this work with intention. My lived experience, my spiritual practice, and my service in the jail have shaped me into someone who knows how to sit with suffering without flinching, who listens deeply, and who refuses to give up on people. I don’t just want a career that sustains my life; I want a career that expands what’s possible for others. My goal is to help build a world where care is accessible, dignity is non-negotiable, and no one is treated as beyond repair. This work isn’t a career change. It’s the life I was always meant to grow into.

The contribution I want to make to the world is simple: bring mental health care directly to the people who are least likely to receive it. My work as a volunteer jail chaplain has shown me how many women fall through every crack in the system long before they ever reach a therapist’s office. Trauma, poverty, disabilities, and racialized inequities become barriers long before they become symptoms. To make mental health care affordable and accessible, I want to build hybrid community-based and carceral-based programs that combine social work, chaplaincy, and trauma-informed support. My long-term goal is to become a licensed clinical social worker and an accredited chaplain so I can provide low-cost or no-cost mental health care inside jails, during reentry, and in the neighborhoods most impacted by incarceration. Accessibility shouldn’t depend on transportation, insurance, or proximity to a clinic. It should meet people where they are — in shelters, community centers, jail pods, public libraries, and virtual platforms that require nothing but a borrowed phone. My contribution will be creating spaces where the people most ignored by traditional systems can finally receive care that is culturally competent, rooted in dignity, and built for healing — not punishment.

I returned to school because I reached a point in my life where I knew I could no longer keep putting off the future I wanted. I am a 43-year-old mixed-race mother of two, a tattoo artist of twenty-five years, a Soto Zen priest-in-training, and a volunteer chaplain at the county jail. I’ve spent most of my adult life supporting other people — family, clients, incarcerated women, and anyone who needed a steady presence. But it took me a long time to believe I deserved to build something for myself, too. I didn’t finish high school when I was young. Life got complicated early: instability at home, trauma that shaped the way I moved through the world, and the need to survive instead of dream. For years, going back to school felt impossible. Every time I thought about it, I heard the old voices: you’re too old, too busy, too behind, too late. Eventually those voices start to feel like facts. But they weren’t facts — they were fear. Everything shifted when my youngest child was diagnosed as autistic. We entered family-based therapy, and for the first time I saw what skilled, compassionate mental health care could do for a family under strain. Watching my child slowly stabilize gave me a different kind of courage — the kind that comes from recognizing what you’ve long needed but never received. I realized I wanted to be part of that work, not as someone who survived hardship but as someone equipped to help others through it. In March 2023, at forty-two years old, I earned my GED. It was one of the hardest and proudest moments of my life. Walking into that testing center felt less like “catching up” and more like reclaiming a part of myself I had abandoned decades earlier. That one step opened the door to everything that came next: enrolling in college, declaring my social work major, and beginning the long path toward becoming a licensed clinical social worker and an accredited chaplain. Returning to school hasn’t been easy. My family has endured long periods of financial instability, including a Chapter 13 bankruptcy that has shaped our budget for years. My husband spent nearly three years unemployed across two separate periods, and we recently lost our SNAP benefits. I attend school full-time, run my tattoo career, volunteer weekly at the jail, and help hold a household together during a time of rebuilding. The pressure is constant — but so is the sense of purpose. What inspired me to return was realizing that I am finally ready to build the life I used to think only other people could have. I want to serve people who are rarely seen with compassion: incarcerated women, veterans, trauma survivors, and those living on the margins. I want to offer the kind of presence and care that once helped my family find stability. Returning to school is not a detour — it’s the most direct path toward the work I am meant to do. Like Geneva Mabry, I am returning to education later in life with determination, clarity, and a deep belief in the value of service. I know exactly why I’m here, and I’m not turning back.

Critical Question: “Why do we keep trying to ‘fix’ people while leaving the systems that harmed them untouched?” Liberation is something I practice every day — in my home, in my schoolwork, and inside the county jail where I serve as a volunteer chaplain. Over time, I’ve learned that the problem is never just personal failure, individual pathology, or “bad choices.” It’s the systems. The conditions. The histories. The machinery that shapes lives before people ever have a chance to shape themselves. And yet, almost every institution in this country continues to ask the wrong questions when imagining liberation. We try to modify individual behavior, “correct” people in impossible circumstances, and teach resilience to people whose suffering was manufactured by design. So the critical question I believe we, as a collective, are failing to ask is this: Why do we keep trying to fix broken people instead of dismantling the systems that break them? This question is not theoretical to me — it comes from lived experience as a BIPOC woman who grew up navigating poverty, instability, and generational trauma, and who now walks into a jail every week to sit with women who carry the same wounds. When I meet with them, the conversation is rarely about their charges. It’s about the world that shaped those charges: childhood abuse, housing insecurity, untreated mental illness, generational neglect, low-wage jobs, racialized policing, addiction born out of trauma, or the simple fact that nobody ever taught them how to be safe in their own bodies. These women are not broken. They are responding to systems that are functioning exactly as intended. The question matters because liberation work cannot be done from the outside in. You cannot “empower” people whose cages remain in place. You cannot demand accountability from communities who have never been given safety. You cannot repair what you refuse to name. I’m studying social work, training for Soto Zen priesthood, and doing direct service inside the jail because I refuse to participate in systems that blame individuals for wounds they received from society. My work is rooted in a simple belief: people are not disposable, but our systems often treat them as if they are. Liberation, to me, is the daily practice of refusing that narrative. It is asking better questions: – What would our communities look like if care was the default response to suffering instead of punishment? – What if mental health treatment, housing, food, and dignity were guaranteed? – What if we treated trauma as something to heal rather than something to criminalize? – What if we designed systems that believed people could change — and actually supported that change? The women I meet with each week remind me why this question matters. When someone on the pod tells me, “You’re the first person who talked to me like I’m still human,” I hear the real indictment. The problem is not her. It’s the system that taught her she was already gone. Liberation is not a singular moment. It is a practice — a posture — a refusal to abandon people to systems that were never meant to protect them. So I return to the question: Why do we keep trying to fix broken people instead of dismantling the systems that break them? The answer to that question — and the courage to act on it — is what I hope to dedicate the rest of my life to.

I have built my life around service—first informally, and now with growing clarity and training as I move toward a career in social work and chaplaincy. I am a 43-year-old mother of two, a tattoo artist of twenty-five years, a volunteer county jail chaplain, and a junior in a Bachelor of Social Work program. I’m also a Soto Zen Buddhist priest-in-training. Every one of these identities has pulled me toward the same truth: the most meaningful thing I can do with my life is serve the people who are too often overlooked, dismissed, or forgotten. My commitment to community care deepened when I began volunteering at the county jail. I work primarily with women—many living with trauma, addiction, grief, and the weight of choices shaped by poverty or survival. The jail is not a place built for gentleness, but it is astonishing how much healing can happen when someone sits down, listens, and stays present. One moment in particular shaped my path. During a weekly visit, I met with a woman who had been withdrawn for days. Officers and staff told me she had stopped participating in groups, barely spoke, and spent most of her time sitting alone at her table on the pod. When I sat down across from her in the common area, she didn’t look at me. I stayed quiet and let the space settle around us. After a long while, she whispered that she didn’t think anyone cared whether she lived or died. What I said wasn’t complicated. I told her that I cared, that I came because she mattered, and that nothing she told me would make me turn away. Slowly, she let herself breathe. She talked about her children, the fear she carried in her chest like a stone, and the shame that kept her from asking for help. I stayed with her until her shoulders softened and she finally made eye contact. When she stood to leave, she said, “You’re the first person who didn’t treat me like I was already gone.” The transformation that followed wasn’t dramatic—healing rarely is—but she began attending programming again. She showered. She laughed once or twice with other women on the pod. She told someone else that “the chaplain lady reminded me I’m still a person.” From the outside, these might look like small changes. To me, they were seismic. That moment taught me that service is not about fixing people. It’s about showing up where people break, and holding steady long enough for them to find their footing again. I want to spend the rest of my career doing exactly that. My long-term goal is to complete my MSW and MDiv, become a licensed clinical social worker, and continue working in carceral, reentry, and community-based settings. I want to offer trauma-responsive care, spiritual support, and practical resources to people navigating incarceration or reentry—especially women, veterans, and those whose lives have been shaped by systemic inequity. What I learned on that pod is what motivates me now: service is not abstract. It’s not theoretical. It is one person looking at another and saying, “You matter. I’m here.” I intend to build a career rooted in that kind of presence—steady, compassionate, and committed to lifting people up in the moments they need it most. This is the work that feels like home to me, and it’s the work I plan to carry forward for the rest of my life.

I came to mental health work the long way around—through art, through spiritual practice, through surviving my own life, and through sitting face-to-face with people most of society prefers not to see. I am a 43-year-old mother of two, a professional tattoo artist of twenty-five years, a lifelong martial artist, a volunteer jail chaplain, and a BIPOC student returning to school after decades away. Everything I am now, and everything I want to do, is shaped by the belief that healing is a human right, not a luxury. My commitment to mental health grew out of necessity. As a mixed-race woman who survived early instability, long periods of poverty, and trauma that shaped my body and choices for years, I learned quickly how few resources existed for people like me. I also saw how many people I loved—including myself—spent years pretending to be fine because asking for help felt unsafe, out of reach, or humiliating. Those experiences shaped my views long before I had the language of social work or mental health care to describe them. The turning point came when my youngest child was diagnosed as autistic. Family-based therapy opened a door I didn’t know existed. For the first time, I witnessed social workers and therapists who were calm, grounded, culturally aware, and genuinely present. They didn’t pathologize us—they supported us. Watching my child slowly stabilize with the right interventions changed my entire sense of what mental health care could be, especially for families who live under chronic stress, stigma, or invisibility. I want to be the person who gives that kind of steadiness to others. I currently serve as a volunteer chaplain in our county jail, where I sit with women living through the collateral damage of trauma, addiction, poverty, racism, and generational harm. Much of what I do now is spiritual support, but the deeper truth is that people are asking for mental health care in the only space available to them. Their needs are profound, intersectional, and largely unmet. Mental health services in carceral spaces—especially for BIPOC women—are scarce, underfunded, and often inaccessible due to stigma or distrust. I want to change that. My Bachelor’s in Social Work is the foundation for my long-term goals: earning an MSW, pursuing an MDiv, becoming a licensed clinical social worker, and completing full chaplaincy accreditation. This path will allow me to serve both clinically and spiritually at the intersection where trauma, injustice, and healing converge. My goal is not simply to offer counseling, but to create trauma-responsive, culturally competent care for people who are underserved, system-impacted, or living in communities where mental health support is still stigmatized. I am especially committed to working with previously incarcerated individuals and veterans—two communities where trauma is common but treatment is inconsistently provided. My own experiences inform every part of my activism and career aspirations. I know what it feels like to be overwhelmed, overlooked, or dismissed. And I know the enormous difference it makes when one person steps in with compassion, clarity, and skill. I am returning to school in midlife because this work is not theoretical for me—it is lived, daily, and necessary. Mental health care saves lives, strengthens families, and helps communities repair themselves. I want to be part of that work with the full weight of training behind me. This isn’t just my second career. It’s the one I was always meant to grow into.

I have been living on the poverty line my entire life, and receiving this scholarship would mean the world to me. My husband and I have been dealing with a long and grueling bankruptcy process, and we are still working hard to provide for our family. Despite all the adversity, I am determined to create a better life for my children than I ever had. The financial crisis hit us hard, and we have been struggling ever since. With the help of this scholarship, I can make a real difference in our lives, and I aim to make a difference in the lives of many others. During the financial crisis of 2008, the dreams that my husband and I had for our family got crushed. Our second child had just been born the year before, I was a stay-at-home mom of an infant and a toddler, taking in whatever freelance art jobs I could; and he was a freshly minted machinist school graduate who suddenly couldn't get the golden ring that had been promised. The financial crises did a lot of big bad things to a lot of good little people all over the world. My young family was, unfortunately, no exception. When my husband finished school and began his new career, it seemed like it would be a way to achieve a higher standard of living than either of us had ever experienced growing up. But during the next several years, he worked a series of low-paying machinist jobs that frequently laid him off. This put us on a never-ending cycle of unemployment compensation checks that were only a fraction of his already low wages, relying on food stamps, visiting welfare offices, filling out LIHEAP Crises applications, and dealing with shut-off notices. Since we couldn't afford daycare, I couldn't work outside of home. Whenever he was experiencing one of the all-too-frequent layoffs, we would try to make ends meet by hauling scrap. We visited food pantries. Once our youngest was old enough to begin Pre-K, I returned to working full-time. I consistently juggled two jobs, sometimes totaling up to 70 hours per week. This continued until last year. I am determined to provide a better life for my family. I recently obtained my GED after a 25-year hiatus for the express purpose of enrolling at a university. This scholarship will help me pay for tuition and education expenses while minimizing new debt as much as possible. I know that going to college at 43-years of age will pose unique challenges, but I'm not intimidated by hard work and I love to learn. I'm looking forward to the climb ahead. After obtaining my Bachelor's Degree of Social Work, I intend to become employed as a social worker, perhaps working at a non-profit aiding formerly incarcerated individuals and their families, or at a non-profit or government agency that supports veterans. I plan to do this while continuing my volunteer work as a jail chaplain. It is also my goal to pursue a Master's of Social Work and Divinity concurrent to employment. As someone who has dealt with many hardships in life, I empathize deeply with the struggles that my fellow human beings face. Despite the challenges, I have been able to overcome them and so I feel a deep sense of obligation to help others find a way forward. By receiving this scholarship, and the education it will help provide, I hope to become a valuable resource and toolkit that will be utilized to serve others. The fewer of us that are lost, the greater the good we can collectively achieve.

I am a practitioner of Soto Zen Buddhism in the lineage of Sokan Gengo Akiba Roshi. Since I met my teacher, Rev. Kotoku Crivello Roshi, I have received the Precepts and have begun work that has been a lifelong goal: I am a volunteer chaplain at a large County Jail housed in southwestern Pennsylvania. I have also begun the process of full ordination in my lineage, and am currently a novice monk. I have begun sewing my Kesa, and am working toward becoming a Soto Zen priest. I am 43 years old and new to both chaplaincy and college, but my Buddhist practice has been an integral part of my entire adult life. It has been my intention for over 20 years to find a way to take that same practice "inside" to offer benefit to those who are incarcerated and may or may not have ever encountered the Teachings. Serving the underserved, remembering the forgotten, and caring for the people who have been all but discarded as least deserving is my greatest motivation. I have been and felt many of those things, and we all touch them at times. Since I am determined not to look away, I know that I must do something. And sharing our practice is the best thing that I know to do. Currently, in the course of my volunteer work, I am the co-lead in a weekly Women's Mindfulness and Meditation Group. Additionally, I spend several hours a week doing individual visits with Buddhist inmates. It has been incredible to realize that this work is everything that I imagined and that it is as good a fit as I believed it would be. I always intended to return to school and pursue a higher degree once my children had matured, and now, with one child in college and the other finishing high school, it appears that my path has become clear and that the road is rising to meet me. I have found the place where I can fold my practice and livelihood most seamlessly into one another. Having received the confirmation that I am very suitable for this work and that it is an ideal fit for me, I began looking into programs in which I could become fully accredited as a Buddhist Chaplain. I realized that to chart my path the way that seemed most effective, I would need to attain both a Bachelor's Degree and a Master's Degree. An eventual MDiv seemed obvious from the beginning, but I needed to consider what the backbone of my education would be. Because of the specific type of work that I feel called to do, and because of the specific needs of the people that I most desire to work with, I believe that a foundation in social work will strongly balance and complement Divinity training. I would eventually like to pursue not only an MDiv but also an MSW. After obtaining my Bachelor's, I am looking forward to being employed as a social worker, perhaps working at a non-profit aiding formerly incarcerated individuals and their families, or at a non-profit or government agency that supports veterans. I intend to do this while continuing to do volunteer work as a fully accredited chaplain at County or another correctional facility. Of course, if I am called to do the reverse, that would be equally satisfying, and I will be available and prepared. My practice is the foundation of all of the work that I am doing and will do. I'm continually grateful for the opportunity to be here, constantly realizing this life. In Gassho.