From Confinement to Calm: Yoga, Agency, and Restoration in Prisons
Claire de Mézerville López welcomes Juan Martinez to the Restorative Works! Podcast. Juan joins us and shares his experience as a dedicated yoga instructor innovating with inclusive yoga practices in unconventional spaces. We explore how yoga and meditation foster compassion and wellbeing within challenging environments, including prisons and centers for vulnerable populations. Juan shares his journey from the corporate world to becoming an accredited teacher, spreading the healing benefits of yoga through programs like Yoga Inclusivo Costa Rica and collaborations across Central America. Through poignant anecdotes and reflections, Juan illustrates how yoga is more than physical exercise—it's a tool for empowerment, agency, and self-discovery. Learn how Juan navigates logistical challenges to bring yoga to prisons, creating safe spaces for inmates to find peace and inner strength. Juan is a seasoned advertising and design professional, with over a decade of experience in advertising agencies across Costa Rica. In 2001, he was introduced to the practice of yoga. Today, Juan is an accredited Yoga teacher with the Costa Rica Ashtanga Association, the European Yoga Institute, Yoga 10, AccessibleYoga.org, the Prison Yoga Project, and the Trauma Center. Juan has extensive experience as an instructor with a specialization in working with disabled and prison populations. His approach goes beyond postural practice and seeks to show a sanctuary, a laboratory, an opportunity, a place for contemplation and expression of compassion, and respect for ourselves as well as for life itself through yoga. Tune in to hear firsthand accounts of transformation and resilience as individuals find solace and hope through yoga, reshaping their lives amidst adversity.