Yoga Behind Bars (YBB, https://www.yogabehindbars.org/) is a Seattle-based nonprofit founded in 2008. YBB "shares trauma-informed yoga and meditation with incarcerated people to promote rehabilitation, personal transformation, and a more just society for all."
Trauma-informed movement helps incarcerated individuals tools and practices they can use to process their traumas from before and during incarceration. The practices empower them to reduce and manage stress, develop healthy coping mechanisms, and avoid substance abuse.
“We tend to look towards the justice system for justice, and what we get is injustice most of the time, especially for Black and Brown folk. Trauma-informed yoga is accessible embodiment practices that encourage participants to reclaim their agency through choice, inclusion and nervous-system regulation.” - Gabby Oglesby, Co-Executive Director of Yoga Behind Bars
YBB currently serves about 150 students each week across 5 facilities, but its reach is much bigger. Programs in correctional facilities in Maine, Colorado, Nebraska, West Virginia, Montana, Alaska, and Kenya have been inspired to teach yoga in prison.
It works: Only only 8% of incarcerated students who took at least four of YBB's classes returned to prison.
Read more about YBB’s (Yoga Behind Bars) work here: https://www.essence.com/news/yoga-behind-bars/
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Despite work in prison to rehabilitate themselves and build skills for a new life, it's hard for people coming home from incarceration to find work. If you have open roles, post them on Honest Jobs to give people a second chance: www.HonestJobs.com/