Te Rokihau, The calm breath. A Yoga Prison TV Video Project
In 2022 the Yoga Education in Prison Trust [YEPT] started work on a project with Ara Poutama, The Department of Corrections, Mental health, and addition services team, to bring more yoga to more people in prison, and the spur for this work; Covid, isolation and mental wellbeing.
Covid was quite a challenge for all; isolation, separation from whanau members and a stay in your bubble directive which left many of us feeling separated. People in prisons across the world felt isolation even more sharply, with visits from whanau now impossible, and all extra-curricular programs on pause. For the YEPT Covid meant that we could not fulfil our core mission of having yoga and meditation education in prions in Aotearoa. In response to this, the YEPT recorded several yoga classes and sent them to Ara Poutama, The Department of Corrections, to be loaded to the National Prison System. We wanted to offer something to help people to work through some of the feelings of isolation and separateness and to try to bring some calm to those very uncertain times.
The videos worked well, and after some discussion with Ara Poutama, we embarked on a more professionally recorded offering for people on prison in Aotearoa. At the start of 2023 we recorded and edited fourteen yoga and medication education videos ranging in length from 12 – 30 minutes, with seven classes for morning time and seven classes designed for the evening.
In May 202, Dr Rongo Ngata gifted the project the name, Te Rokihau, The calm breath. In thinking about the project Dr Ngata stated that Te Rokihau could align with Patanjali’s definition of yoga, which is translated by Paramahansa Yogananda as “the neutralization of the alternating waves in consciousness” (God Talks With Arjuna, p. 70).
Dr Ngata states, “with this in mind, we could draw on the imagery in the karakia recited by Paikea to calm the stormy seas. He uses the term “rokihau”, which means a perfectly be stilled wind (breath). Hau also refers to the “vital essence” or “vitality” of a person, so this also recognises the need to still one’s life force. It speaks of the striving for a state of inner stillness where stormy thoughts and feelings are settled, and one regains a sense of being centred”.
Te Rokihau project goes live on the national TV Prison system in Aotearoa the week beginning the 30th of October 2023. The YEPT will be able to reach more people in prison with yoga and meditation education, with the hope of contributing to people regaining a sense of being centred, inner stillness where story thoughts and feelings are settled.
