Creating a Healing Resonance inside Prison (with yoga)
My connection to the prison system that has taken different forms over the last few years – from teaching yoga and meditation at Salinas Valley State Prison, facilitating GRIP at Central Training Facility (Soledad) and visiting other prisons (San Quentin and Avenal) for training and support.
Additionally, I educated myself and others about the system of oppression that exists in the form of human incarceration.
For the independent study requirement of my 500hr advanced yoga teacher training: I produced an 8 session yoga program for prison.
My intention with the project was to create a yoga program created with foundation of safety.
I wanted to introduce yoga in a safe, accessible, and trauma informed way, set the foundation for a beginners' practice and cultivate a sense of community within the group of prisoners.
What resulted was a healing resonance inside the prison.
As we discovered – it’s possible to develop a yoga practice even with few material resources, limited mobility, and virtually no privacy or personal space.
Now, I am motivated to transform this yoga program into a safe, trauma informed, and accessible introduction to yoga...book:
shareable
transportable
easy to digest
and, importantlypossible to be circulated back into the prison system.