Prison Work & Living Spirit in Action

Guest: Damon Azali-Rojas

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This week we’re tuning in to the power of spirit.

Spiritual energy is a sustainable resource. The connection we have with our inner spirit can be a source of strength and motivation. It can also provide a sense of purpose and direction. We can cultivate our spiritual connection to guide and sustain us in all matters. When we cultivate this connection, it becomes a steady source we can draw on for support and guidance across all areas of life.

My guest is Damon Azali-Rojas. Damon is a trained community organizer, coach trainer and professional coach, as well as a high priest of Ifa, a Yoruba spiritual tradition. He is the founder and director of Coaching for Healing and Nonviolence, a program that brings coaching into prisons and trains incarcerated individuals on how to coach. In this conversation, Damon shares his work in prisons, his spiritual path and how he lives spirit in action.

Coaching for Healing and Nonviolence was launched in 2018 at California State Prison in Lancaster, California. Damon and his colleague, Amanda Berger, introduced coaching skills and training to incarcerated men on Yard A—individuals serving life or life without parole sentences, some of whom have spent decades in solitary confinement. Through this work, participants experienced profound shifts, including healing, a sense of inner freedom and renewed self-worth within the constraints of incarceration.

To illustrate the depth of this work, Damon shares a circle process he facilitated with the men. In this process, a powerful pattern emerged: in every case discussed, the actions connected to their crimes were rooted in a longing for acceptance and inclusion. One participant shared a deeply personal account:

“I was born a product of rape. At the age of 5 I had been in 48 different foster homes with my little brother. I am in here because I killed the man that sexually assaulted me and my little brother. Even though the lawyers knew what he did to us, I didn’t have the ability to say so. I was afraid that they would call me names, that they would say that I was gay. So I just stayed quiet and didn’t say anything. That was 19 years ago.” - Excerpted from Damon’s write up about that circle process here.

Damon’s work supports men through a deeply transformational training process. To understand its significance, it’s important to recognize coaching as a modality that supports alignment with one’s authentic self. In another example from his work, Damon describes a group coaching session on toxic masculinity, where a participant asked for coaching around “defining masculinity—what it means to truly be a man.”

How does one be in the depths of human suffering and not be consumed by it?

For Damon, the answer lies in staying connected to one’s divine essence and recognizing the divine in others. He bears witness to that inherent dignity in the men he works with, and through his training process, individuals begin to heal and step into their own capacity as agents of transformation.

His work is not only informed by his spiritual path — it is an expression of it. For Damon, spirituality is distinct from religion. He holds that we are living expressions of the divine and each of us has direct access to our higher self. He actively engages his higher self for guidance and direction, including when facilitating trainings, and he teaches others to do the same.

If your spirit feels called to support this work, please consider donating and sharing the mission of Coaching for Healing and Nonviolence. Your contribution directly supports meaningful healing and transformation for incarcerated individuals. All donations are U.S. tax deductible. Continued funding is essential to sustain and expand this program to serve women.

Enjoy this episode.

In this episode

• Teaching coaching skills to prisoners and launching a coach training program in California State Prison [01:12]

• Uniqueness of coaching and how it connects prisoners with their inner power and enables an experience of freedom [06:35]

• Committing crimes to secure acceptance from others and finding self-love and self-compassion in prison [08:20]

• Damon’s path into prison work and his start as a community organizer [12:12]

• Growing up Roman Catholic and becoming an Ifa high priest [15:56]

• Discovering that his spiritual work and community organizing work were one and the same [18:23]

• Directly connecting to and asking questions of his higher self [19:59]

• How to contribute to the efforts of Coaching for Healing and Nonviolence [23:25]

Related links

• Damon’s website - coaching, healing and spiritual services

• Coaching for Healing and Nonviolence

• Coaching Essentials – 2-day workshop to learn coaching skills in Los Angeles

• Coaching for Transformation - Los Angeles – 9-month coach certification training that brings together coaching, social justice and spirituality. This is the first and only accredited coach training program for the social sector.

• I Feel Your Pain: A 7-Step Survival Guide for Empaths, Intuitives and Highly Sensitive People - Niki Elliott, PhD

• The InnerLight Method - an energy therapy system for empathic, intuitive and highly sensitive adults and children. This system was developed by Dr. Niki Elliott.

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