By: Chris Gallagher

Eighteen years as a juvenile court judge have taught Judge Frank Szymanski one thing: that so much human potential is wasted due to untrained minds. Serving as a juvenile court judge in Detroit has given Judge Frank a front-row seat for the deepest problems facing our communities: drug addiction, gun violence, domestic violence, and more. More than twice as many people die in the United States from drug overdoses and gun violence in a single year than were killed in eight years of combat in Vietnam. Nobody is talking about this. It’s outrageous and it’s time we do something about it. We have become accustomed to hearing about mass shootings in schools as a regular part of our news. Locks on doors, police in schools and teachers with guns are failed strategies that can only address the problem once the shooting has started. And by then it’s too late.

Judge Frank is convinced that we can address these issues through the widespread adoption of ancient practices that have been with us for thousands of years. Practices such as mantra meditation, mindfulness meditation, visualization, and yoga have all been proven to train the mind for emotional control and optimal performance. Judge Frank refers to the development of the power to control our emotions as a “superpower” because when we learn to control our emotions we bring an end to destructive behaviors, such as drug addictions and impulsive violence. Better yet we get in touch with who we are. We learn to tune out the noise and start living productive, compassionate lives in which we focus on spending our time doing the things that are important to us rather than watching or listening to something somebody else has created to steal our attention. 

Judge Frank refers to our attention as our greatest resource and when we train our minds on a daily basis we harness that resource for our own best interests rather than “consuming” content which generally does nothing for us other than provide us with a momentary diversion. Training our minds daily gives us perspective on what’s important.  

Research from the National Science Foundation points out that we have thousands of thoughts on a daily basis and 80% of those thoughts are negative and 95% are repetitive. If we are going to meet our potential we have to break out of this destructive negative mindset and the way to do this is by training the mind on a daily basis. 

Judge Frank’s latest move is a flying leap of faith from the juvenile bench to community, corporate, and educational stages as a motivational speaker to promote the daily adoption of these ancient practices knowing that every individual that he can convince to start meditating daily is another victory, another step towards making the world a more peaceful, compassionate place to live. We need a systemic cultural change in our communities. 

Judge Frank is leading a “Revolution in Consciousness” in which we can all begin to do the things that the most successful people are already doing. People like Oprah Winfrey, Lebron James, Steve Jobs, and Mick Jagger all developed regular practices of these techniques. Why? Because, while they are already ultra-successful and wealthy, they recognize that practicing these techniques daily improves the quality of every  aspect of their lives. Judge Frank is encouraging us all to recognize this, knowing that if we act on this it will transform the world. 

Serving At-Risk Communities 

Judge Frank notes that these practices are well-established; they just aren’t well-disseminated. The effectiveness and the benefits of practices such as mantra meditation, mindfulness exercises, visualization, and yoga have been verified in hundreds of peer-reviewed scientific studies, and yet rates of anxiety are at an all-time high because most people do nothing daily to train their minds. “To me,” Judge Frank says, “everything comes down to our need to get widespread adoption of these practices.” That means the answer isn’t just a seminar marketed to the middle class. It means taking this knowledge to classrooms, incarceration facilities, and marginalized neighborhoods.

The Revolution in Consciousness is already underway. Judge Frank has done presentations for the Supreme Court Administrator’s Office, corporations, coaches, and athletes, community groups, prisons, and youth detention centers. In addition to his judicial experience and work with at-risk youth, he utilizes his skills as a vocalist/songwriter, storyteller, teacher, and entertainer to bring this message home in theatrical fashion. He is also the author of IDENTITY DESIGN: Design the Identity You Need to Get the Life You Want, which serves as a guide to joyful, productive living. As he has said many times from the bench he believes the Lord intended all of us to live joyful productive lives and when we are not, it’s generally because we haven’t developed a daily practice to train our minds to do so. 

And while the Revolution is underway – it’s only beginning to scrape the surface of what’s possible, of what’s needed, if we are going to transform our communities and put an end to the senseless violence and damning addictions that plague our world. We brush our teeth every day but most of us do nothing daily to clean and train our minds and yet when we do we’ll be able to give real meaning to the call for Peace on Earth. This is Judge Frank’s vision and he’s looking for more stages, bigger stages to spread the message and “save the world.”

Asked what’s in the works short term Judge Frank indicated he had submitted a proposal to the Wayne County Executive’s office to hire him as a Director of Mindfulness or Meditation Czar. “I prefer the term czar because it implies I have some sort of imperial power to order the adoption of these practices,” he said with a grin. “I arranged a pilot program in which we taught a number of our most chronic and violent juvenile offenders transcendental meditation, which is a form of mantra meditation, and everyone who participated said this was the best intervention they’d experienced despite all the other services which they’d received at a cost of tens of thousands of dollars. We need to listen to these young men. If the best intervention is a fraction of the cost of our other services it’s time to change our priorities and make the introduction of these daily practices the first treatment option rather than some occasional last alternative. When I stepped off the bench and people asked what I planned to do next I told them: I planned to save the world – I’m just getting started.”

More info on Judge Frank and his work can be found at his website, judgefrank.com.

Published by Stephanie M.