Turning Poison into Medicine

A man in prison called my cell. I picked up an unknown number and heard an automated message: an incarcerated individual from a California prison was trying to reach me—would I accept the call? I’ve taken calls like this before, usually from pen pals I’ve made through our prison program and culinary internship for formerly incarcerated individuals. But I couldn’t think of anyone who might be calling me from California.

On the line was a man named Saul, who introduced himself and asked if I was with Unconditional Freedom. When I said yes, he sounded delighted. He explained that his wife had found my contact information on our website and that he’d been trying to get in touch for months. He had completed The Art of Soulmaking, a workbook he discovered on the Edovo tablet in his prison. Written by Nicole Daedone and Beth Wareham, the workbook is a journey of personal growth, self-discovery, healing, and reflection. It’s a cornerstone of our nonprofit’s Prison Monastery program, which reimagines prison as a monastic environment for transformation and growth. After all, prison was originally intended for penitence, though our current system has strayed far from that vision.

The Art of Soulmaking workbook, photo courtesy of Soulmaker Press

Saul spoke passionately about how much The Art of Soulmaking had impacted him. He recounted his favorite sections and the lessons that resonated deeply. He had taken extensive notes and was eager to share them with me. “I’ve got nothing but time,” he said as the automated system warned that the call would soon end. Saul shared that he had already been in prison for 20 years, serving a life sentence. But through efforts like working through the book, he felt he was turning his life around and believed he might even be released early.

It’s extraordinary to witness the power of this book and its capacity to change lives. I’ve read it myself and appreciated its beauty and meaning, but I’m not in prison. I’ve experienced the prisons of my own mind—trapped in limiting beliefs or toxic thought patterns—and I know firsthand how transformative these concepts can be. But I don’t know what it’s like to live behind physical bars, day after day. My understanding is limited to what friends, acquaintances, and pen pals have shared with me and the moments I’ve spent inside prisons for our nonprofit’s programming. Those brief visits left me wondering how anyone could endure such bleak, dehumanizing conditions.

Saul asked if he could teach the workbook to others. He explained that he was a trained peer support specialist and facilitated groups in his prison yard. He welcomed additional training from our team and said he wanted to share the program more widely. He planned to speak with his supervisor about bringing the workbook to every yard in the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR) system.

Participant in the Art of Soulmaking corresponding with a volunteer letter-writer outside the walls. (courtesy)

While I was touched by his enthusiasm and his vision for spreading the program, I didn’t have the heart to tell him how unlikely that approval would be. Our in-person programming at another CDCR facility had been indefinitely suspended over a year ago when Nicole Daedone, the workbook’s co-author and the visionary behind the Prison Monastery program, was indicted.

Ironically, her work to bring liberation and healing had led to her own federal indictment, which she is fighting vigorously. The government’s indictment against Nicole is a wrongful assault on women’s freedoms, an attack on women’s sexuality and true femininity.

Even though she wasn’t a paid employee or board member of our nonprofit, Nicole’s association with the book was enough to have our entire program canceled. I couldn’t help but note the absurdity; the maximum security prison said that our affiliation with the ideas of a woman, presumably innocent, made us too dangerous to offer programs in their facility

The cancellation was a blow, especially to our team members who had dedicated themselves to teaching yoga, meditation and self improvement inside the prison every morning at 5 a.m. But it was devastating for those inside. Our program had been one of the most popular offerings, and it disappeared overnight. The prison had even approved a farm where we planned to teach incarcerated women to grow their own produce, which they could later enjoy. That idea also vanished when we were removed from the facility.

Our yoga classes inside the prison. (courtesy)

And yet, here was Saul on the phone, proof that the work persisted. Despite the cancellation, despite the halted in-person programming, the workbook was still reaching people, changing lives. The words from Deuteronomy 16:20 echoed in my mind: “Justice, justice shall you pursue.” It felt like something larger than me was at play—that by pausing my day to take this unexpected call, I had been gifted a moment of profound connection.

Our programs aim to love the unlovable, to turn poison into medicine. This call was a glimpse of how to do just that. When someone you care about is unjustly accused, how do you find the strength to love through the pain? When circumstances feel unbearable, how do you transmute them into growth? These are the same questions we pose to those behind bars, and they’re the same questions I ask myself as I watch friends wrongfully accused for their work in freedom and healing.

In Saul’s determination to share the medicine he had found, I rediscovered it, too.