Outskirts Press, INC.

Eric Christopher Rugel was raised in Brooklyn. Eric and younger brother Evan were raised in poverty by their mother and grandparents which proved to be a blessing in disguise. With help from her family, Eric’s single mother was given the opportunity to attend college at Niagara University while his grandparents raised him. His grandparents pushed his mother to finish her education so that she could better provide for her two sons. After his mom graduated, she instilled in him the same that was instilled in her—the importance and value of education. After the death of his grandmother, who was close to him, he struggled drastically in school but got back on his feet with the ambition of making his mother proud and being disciplined by his track and field high school coach who he viewed as a big brother. Sports and guidance from local hustlers kept him out of the get money quick routes that had major life changing consequences; but were popular in his environment due to limited options/resources in the job field. He graduated from Sheepshead Bay High School and was accepted into the oldest historically black college Cheyney University of Pennsylvania. It was there that he chose to pledge into the Delta Pi chapter of the prestigious and oldest black Fraternity in the divine nine: Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity, INC. After a year and a half, he ended up transferring to the University of Houston with the aspiration of getting an accredited degree in his field of choice. Eric graduated and earned an accredited degree in the field of hotel, restaurant, and tourism management which was ranked top 3 in the nation at the time. He currently is working on his master’s degree to become a Registered Dietitian Nutritionist. He envisions his future in being a restaurateur, consultant and someday being able to collaborate with hoteliers to get his chains in hotels and resorts across the world. His passion is serving all people with everything from food and beverage, guaranteeing a great all around experience, and helping others with knowledge and direction that can help with personal growth and development. In communities ranging from Bedford Stuyvesant, Brownsville & Bushwick Brooklyn to Hollis & Jamaica Queens, north and south Houston, Yonkers and South Bronx; Eric has dedicated his time to mentor, guide and coach the youth he encountered to strive towards a better & promising if dedicated life and showing the cause and effect of actions and decisions one makes in life. He believes that more black leaders and successful minorities who come from poverty should be willing to educate and share blueprints of success to highlight various lines of work that will drive one out of poverty and into better positions to take care of one’s self and family in this capitalistic society. His ambition to write this book came from a void he noticed growing up in the ghettos of NYC. Growing up in the city full of organized crime, cut-throat attitudes, and having one’s guard up at all of the time can be a hard but sweet experience. Looking back at his overall experiences, Eric noticed and pinpointed multiple occasions when he saw his friends, himself, and fellow youth reverting to mentally recycled slave trends. Decisions were made due to no guidance/leadership in the community and lifestyles were emulated without thinking because of the excuse of being a product of one's environment and the imagery of the entertainment world. He decided to come up with a few suggestions / self-building tools to create and develop more community leaders—leaders who will take their communities back from mental and eventually physical oppression. Eric believes changing the life outcomes of all people in the world's ghettos starts with early development and is what should be popular over what most people have been forced to accept as reality and perception. Eric linked up with his good college friend Wilfred Brown who he shared the idea with and together with their backgrounds of experience, education, common sense, and opinions, they came up with this masterpiece/blueprint to the underground railroad of mental freedom. Let us do better by rebuilding our minds; we know we can’t save everyone but each one can reach one. It takes a village to raise a child. It takes multiple communities and multiple leaders with everyone’s interest at heart to raise a revolutionary mindset to guide us as a people towards the light of success, change, and prosperity. Thank you’s: Wildfred Brown who helped me put together this work of Art through debates and opinionated conversations on the topic of mental slavery. Also Wil’s experience as an author was appreciated as he took the time to enlighten me on the process and formatting. My mother Michelle who raised two Kings as a single parent in the communities of Bedford Stuyvesant and Bushwick Brooklyn. Her plight and struggle made us hungry for better living, her words and discipline shaped us into men, and her love and determination for us to succeed and do better has shown in the way we hustle. I would like to thank my wife Keziah for always believing in my many ideas and ambitions for the present and future. She is my Queen and projects her King to heights imaginable with her support and honest feedback. Rainie Williams; my LB for inspired me with his line of books to even consider the idea in the first place. I’ve always been a writer but never considered sharing my views to the world. Wilfred Desha Brown was born in Houston, Texas but raised in Weimar, Flatonia, Houston and Baytown, Texas, as well as Guthrie, Oklahoma. Wilfred was heavily influenced by his mother who was a licensed vocational nurse and mother of five to study hard and achieve in school. Wilfred’s father, Wilfred Cecil Brown, also set an admiral example for young Wilfred as a high school math teacher and sports coach. Life was fairly middle class and stable for Wilfred until his father passed away when he was still in middle school. After the death of Wilfred Senior, Wilfred’s mother began to work multiple full-time jobs to keep the family middle class. A straight A student up until this point, with little supervision at home, Wilfred began to explore the streets of Alief, Texas. Wilfred witnessed many of his friends die in gang violence, serve prison sentences, or die before they reached 18. To stay positive, Wilfred focused on sports and entrepreneurship. Wilfred played soccer, football, golf, baseball, and ran track to avoid gang life. He also founded multiple businesses and provided legitimate job opportunities to people in his community. However, during high school, Wilfred was caught up by the American Dream and the get money lifestyle. He pursued music, entertainment, and sports as viable career paths until his mother became extremely ill with fibromyalgia. Wilfred’s mom’s illness forced him to rethink his lifestyle and refocus on what his parents had instilled in him—education. Wilfred went on to finish high school as the captain of his golf team and earned a 3.8 GPA. He later went to college and earned his Associates degree with High Honors, his Bachelors in Business Administration in Marketing and Master’s degree in Human Resource Development from the University of Houston, as well as a Master’s of Business Administration from Texas A&M – Commerce University. Wilfred now works as a Certification Solutions Architect in the tech industry and is one of the world’s leading experts on corporate learning. Previously, Wilfred worked as a Big Four Consultant and Consultant in the Oil and Gas industry. Wilfred’s ambition to write this book came from his experiences growing up in a high-crime area. He noticed the difference in the environments of rural blacks and urban blacks because of his own rural background and began to wonder why outcomes for both groups were so dismal. Researching and writing this book has been one of the hardest things he has ever done.