Teaching Tai Chi in Prison

Tai Chi Posture 'Lift Hands'

In September 2022, a representative from a newly opened G4S category C prison called HMP Five Wells, contacted Deeper Being to see whether we could provide Tai Chi and Meditation training to prisoners on their rehabilitation block through the incredible charity Voluntary Impact. This article concentrates on the Tai Chi I delivered, rather than speaking for Rachael Cheang’s experiences of delivering Buddhist based meditation training to the prisoners, which was, for the record, equally profound.

Tai Chi has, for me, been a way to self-develop. Amongst many things it creates soft, gentle, effortless power that allows wisdom to blossom, trauma to release and a new confidence based on natural flow and centredness to emerge. It grows strength and tenacity and also the ability to discern right from wrong, take joyfulness in living according to your genuine self, be increasingly centred and calm and able to not be manipulated by the negative influences around you.  So you can imagine how excited I may have felt to be able to share such a heartfelt skill with people in such a desperate situation as prison.

It took several months to pass through vetting procedures but by November 2022 I began teaching the prisoners until the contract ended in spring of 2025.

Prior to beginning I investigated some simple well established statistics about prison populations that ended up intriguing me. Namely that it is estimated that up to 50% of the prison population is neurodivergent, covering conditions like autism, ADHD, dyslexia and learning disabilities/brain injuries. Yet in the general population these conditions comprise a much lesser proportion of the population. Further there are moments in childhood where those with ADHD are more likely to turn the wrong direction, become oppositionally defiant, may then develop conduct disorder, which may then lead to Antisocial Personality Disorder (ASPD), also known as sociopathy. To really drive home the link between ADHD and ASPD, one study concluded that up to 96% of ADHD prisoners could have ASPD!

One of the reasons that this intrigued me is that Rachael and I (the partners of Deeper Being) are both neurodivergent and considered to be flourishing and we do tend to have a larger than average contingent of the neurodivergent ‘tribe’ quite naturally drawn to training with us. We know how much our traditional approaches to mind and body training combined with modern scientific understanding have contributed to this flourishing and how much it is sorely needed out there. We have long, deep experiences of educating, raising and teaching neurodiverse people both within and without our extended family, so of course there was a natural draw towards seeing whether this could be extended to a prison population.

So when I arrived at the prison to teach for the first time, I must admit I was filled with the hope of making a real difference to people who may have a neurological similarity to my own extended family, but who had had, perhaps, not quite the same luck growing up. My first impressions were of how awful the environment was. Yes the prison was brand new, but it was austere, empty and hard. Rules, rules, rules. Security, security, security. As one would expect. But to actual encounter it feels different. So many locks and doors and protocols. Noise, noise, noise. I can hand on heart say that even a brand new prison is no holiday camp. That some would choose to be there can only show how awful things must be for some people outside of prison.

For the whole two years it was very hard to build momentum in the classes because of the range of factors that could cause prisoners to not be able to attend regularly or the class itself to be cancelled:

•   Lack of a staff member available to ensure my safety whilst on site

•   Emergency lockdown of prison, or the block I was teaching on for a variety of reasons

• · Sudden changes to the times prisoners are allowed out of their cells, normally due to reduced staffing levels

• · Individual prisoners forced to attend conflicting meetings or educational courses

• · Individual prisoners moved from one block to another and no longer having access

  
  

These disruptions were frequent. Prisoners are, unsurprisingly, hugely affected by changes to their routines. Missing one class often resulted in prisoners struggling to re-establish the routine to attend again. Outside of the prison I try to ensure that my classes run consistently and are very rarely cancelled for any reason whatsoever. In this environment nothing was under my direct control. I definitely noticed that cancelled classes caused the greatest disruption to the momentum of the class, sometimes causing its numbers to collapse to near zero and then it would take weeks to rebuild, only to get knocked back again by another disruption. Given the prevalence of ASPD and neurodiversity, it seemed pretty obvious to me that prisoners would struggle to re-establish the routine of choosing to come to Tai Chi if the pattern was disrupted. In short the environment was surprisingly unfriendly to neurodiverse individuals and those with personality disorders, who need more certainty and routine to cope, begin the difficult process of seeing themselves, begin changing and then eventually flourish.

Within all these obstacles, however, I was able to consistently convey the same core messages to the prisoners:  

• Tai Chi develops internal power by calming the mind, opening the energy channels and as a self defence/personal power system, it works well when you are calm and centred and so able to remain in control and accountable for your actions

• Tai Chi calms and relaxes the mind and body, giving you the space you need to think and implement strategies that moderate and help to regulate mood, emotion and behaviour

• Tai Chi teaches meditation (mindfulness) and teaches you that being calm and relaxed is more powerful than being emotional, stressed, tense, forceful and out of control

• If you make yourself happy, calm and content and are able to influence those around you to be happy, calm and content then you are making a fantastic environment for yourself. I would demonstrate this by aiming to fill the class with happiness, calm and contentment every time. I would directly demonstrate how you can do that to a group of people, whilst deliberately pointing out that I had done it to them, over and over again. It really made them think about one’s effect on other people and how that then affects oneself.

I hooked them into the idea of cultivating a Tai chi practice using the same demonstrations that I give to many perspective students:

• I pushed all new starters (that would let me) away with just one finger of each hand, something learnt from my teacher, Master Ding. This created instant rapport, becoming a trademark that prisoners would love to talk about, leading new prisoners to come and try the Art

• I coached them to be able to stand their ground and with someone pushing, be able to stay relaxed and calm and create space for themselves without resorting to strength, tension and emotional displays

• I let the training speak for itself. Almost universally, students felt positive impact on mood, calmness, centredness and general sense of wellbeing on completion of the session

A typical session was not much different to what I would offer to anyone coming to any of my classes. In terms of the specifics, I would use the standard Master Ding Academy format: Standing Post Chi Kung and then working on Master Ding’s Short Form and some posture testing/ looking at Tai Chi concepts and principles. The only thing I did do was to skip the warm up exercises as the students did need more philosophical talking to, banter and debating due to the high prevalence of ADHD prisoners, often undergoing withdrawal from alcohol or drugs, whilst simultaneously coping with trauma and mental health issues such as depression and anxiety.

Over the time many prisoners told me directly of the positive impact the sessions had on their lives, both mentally and physically. The role of Tai Chi teacher is to teach usefully in the now, whilst also sowing seeds for the future. There is so much stacked up against inmates that it must be very difficult to judge the relative success of any intervention, but I do know that many of the prisoners were grateful for the Tai Chi sessions. Tai Chi is so flexible that although it has a background as a martial art, it is perfectly possible to teach the true skills of cultivating and using internal energy without resorting to teaching it martially, but rather as something motivational and transformational. It can be used to gently strengthen, calm and grow people without the risk of violence, as I was able to demonstrate in the two years of teaching the Art at HMP Five Wells. Students of Tai Chi consistently grow in the confidence required to be truly themselves and become increasingly mindful of their impact on others.

Thank you to all staff and charities at HMP Five Wells and all prisoners for allowing the sessions to run. Best wishes in all your futures.