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On April 28th, 2008, my mom and older brother drove me to prison, three years to the day after the FBI came to my front door. I’ll never forget that stop at Carl’s Jr. in Bakersfield, or what it felt like to surrender, lost, without a plan. I didn’t know how I would use my time or what life would look like when I got out.

Inside, I met Michael, who wasn’t wasting time. He was building. He pushed me to do the same. On October 12, 2008, I handwrote a blog, mailed it to my mom, and she posted it online. The next day I wrote again, and again. That first blog started Lessons from Prison, and, without me knowing it then, it became the foundation for the business I run today.

That writing made me visible. It gave my family something to see. It gave me something to point to when people asked who I was becoming. Years later, I read Seth Godin’s book Purple Cow, and it described exactly what I had lived. In a field full of cows, nobody notices the ordinary ones. They remember the purple cow.

In prison, everyone says they’ll change. Judges, probation officers, case managers, and even family members have heard it all before. What makes someone different is creating something distinct—something that exists on paper or online that others can see. For me, it was a daily blog. For you,  it could be a biography, a release plan, journals, book reports, or testimonials from people you’ve helped.

That’s why we encourage people in our community to create profiles on PrisonProfessorsTalent.com. Post your biography, journals, book reports, and release plan. Each entry is dated. Over time, that record grows. It shows steady effort instead of empty words.

I didn’t know when I wrote that first page in 2008 how much it would matter. But it did. It changed how my family saw me. It gave me momentum to come home prepared. It gave me something different than a DOJ press release or a headline.

That’s the purple cow lesson. Don’t blend into the background. Create something that sets you apart, something people remember when they have just a minute to judge who you are.

Justin Paperny