I recently began visiting a number of young adolescents, ages, 11-16 years old, at a juvenile detention center by court order for numerous serious crimes. Their length of stay varies from 30 days to several years. It is a place, for many, that is a crossroads for their entire life. Into this setting I came to work with 15 challenged youth and one staff member in a half-day workshop. The theme I chose was “Success”. When the youth were asked their definition of success, they said things such as, car, money, women, power, and so on. You could see the youth were not used to really communicating in a group. As part of our ground rules, the staff person had to participate as well. We discussed the idea of success being an inner experience rather than an external object. For example, when you want money of a car, what experience are you really looking for? Some of the answers were freedom, peace, joy, and security. As we began to delve deeper into their true needs, you could see this awareness making an impact on them. Next, we challenged the youth to come up with an affirmation using two to three key words that represented the experiences they wanted in their lives, such as, “I want more freedom, and peace in my life!” The next risk was to invite every youth stand up, one at a time, and state their affirmation in such a way that every person there understood it. It was essential that everyone recognize that each affirmation arose from a place of conviction, belief and internal power. Each person could not sit down until everyone agreed that each person’s affirmation was internalized as a powerful tool for transformation. As you can imagine, this process brought up a lot of feelings, from anger to frustration to fear to laughter. What we observed was that the group did not allow any fellow youth to “slide by”. They held each person to a high standard of accountability. This was also done for the lone staff person. The outcome was amazing. You could sense the newfound esteem and confidence, individually and collectively. They had reached deep down inside themselves and confronted the old beliefs with new a new experiences of purpose and success. A seed had been sown, and now it was up to them to keep it growing. As research shows, it is ideal to have ongoing long-term contact with people, but when there are only short-term interventions available, it is vital to do stimulate a new attitude of hope and possibilities. Staff Member Comments: "I have learned that these boys can work together. I have been here for some while and to get these boys to cooperate with each other is amazing. These boys showed me that they are more intelligent than people tend to think." "They are more intelligent than people tend to think". We need to as educators, parents, adults, begin to see our youth in a different light. My experience shows me that EVERY young person has that place of inner peace and magnificence if we know how to bring it out. That is our challenge. When we, ourselves, connect to our own peace within, then we can share this God-given gift of "a peace that surpass understanding". Youth Comments: "I learned that people care about me and that I can do more things with help from my friends." "Today I learned more than I can imagine. I will go on forever, knowing, I have learned something that will better my life." "I learned to go for the gold and to be helpful to other people and show people to stay on the right path." "Today I learned that all people can change to do right after they do wrong." "I learned to keep trying when I feel like giving up." "I learned about myself. I have to be open and straighten out my life and to share my feelings with everyone. Thanks for helping with my feelings."