The Prison Phoenix Trust

Once prisoners get in touch we usually send them two free books.

One is our own publication Becoming Free Through Meditation and Yoga written by our Director Sandy Chubb and Sister Elaine MacInnes, which offers suggestions for a daily programme of yoga and meditation within the cell. The other is a copy of We're All Doing Time by Bo Lozoff. This book offers spiritual truths and practical advice on meditation and yoga techniques expressed in streetwise language. Written with common sense and humour, it often has an astonishing impact on prisoners and frequently opens up a correspondence. Both of these books are on tape for those with reading difficulties.

In 2005 the PPT published the first ever tailor-made book for inmates with reading difficulties. Entitled Freeing the Spirit through Meditation and Yoga this book is a fully illustrated, colourful, easy to read guide to practising daily in the prison cell. (It is now translated into Swedish for Swedish inmates).

Bo Lozoff's books are available from Human Kindness Foundation, P O Box 61619, Durham, North Carolina 27715, USA.

Spanish, Italian and French speaking prisoners can obtain the book in their own languages, from Association Lumière en Prison, case postale, CH-1110 Morges-1, Switzerland.

We send out other books too which aim to help readers deepen their faith, whatever that may be, or to guide those with no religion into the realization of a spiritual dimension within themselves.

The staff in our Oxford office are trained in meditation, yoga, psychotherapy and psychology, and we rely greatly on a loyal team of well qualified volunteers.

Our volunteer letter writers work under supervision using special guidelines to help them encourage prisoners to sustain a regular practice. This enables them to keep advice to the prisoner to a minimum, allowing the prisoner to discover his or her own process of transformation.

We recognise it is hard to sustain a regular practice without a teacher. Part of our work is the establishment of yoga teachers in prisons and we offer one-off sessions to prisoners and prison officers, so that Governors can assess the benefits. They can see that stretching exercises help release tension which builds up because of frustration and anger. Prisoners can then sit still in meditation in readiness for quietening the mind.