A new organisation which uses yoga to engage and divert children away from crime, gangs and anti-social behaviour is joining the Levelling the Playing Field project as a local delivery partner. 

Urban Yogis was founded in March 2020 by Ben Eckett and Adam Ballard and operates in areas of deprivation and high crime in Lambeth and Croydon in South London.  

Ben and Adam discovered the benefits of yoga when they incorporated it alongside boxing, Brazilian jiu jitsu and fitness on their acclaimed Gloves Not Gunz initiative (which is also coming on board as a LtPF delivery partner). 

“Yoga is an excellent tool for helping young people who have experienced trauma and might be living that experience daily. It has a great impact on them mentally and physically,” says Ben.

Yoga enables participants to access their parasympathetic nervous system (the opposite of the sympathetic, or ‘fight or flight’ part of the nervous system). It relaxes the heart rate and teaches techniques to slow and deepen breathing. “It’s giving them time to rest the mind and not think about other things,” Ben explains. 

Adam and Ben had previously run a successful ‘BoxFlow’ programme which combined boxing and yoga. Recognising its impact, in February they took over as directors of New York-based Urban Yogis, which was set up to address trauma from the rise in gun violence in the Queens area of the US city. 

Now that same impact is being felt by 9-18-year-olds in Lambeth and Croydon, funded by money from Sport England’s Tackling Inequalities Fund, which was distributed by the Alliance of Sport in Criminal Justice to Levelling the Playing Field’s local delivery partners. 

Yoga might ostensibly seem like a difficult ‘sell’ to engage the average tough, inner-city 17-year-old, but Ben says the existing relationships between staff and participants are key to getting them to try new things. 

“A lot of our workers are from the areas we work in. They’re diverse and relatable to the young people, which helps massively,” he explains. 

“We tend to start with some of the yoga postures that look impressive and require a bit of strength to achieve. That’s really quite superficial, just to get them to engage with it. 

“Once we’ve got them hooked, that’s when you can put in the stuff that’s going to really benefit them, such as the breathing, meditation and emotional regulation techniques. The meditation is what they enjoy the most, which is quite surprising. Some of them say, ‘Wow, that was so deep!’ 

“They can use those techniques in their everyday lives. When they get stressed, anxious, upset or angry they will remember to breathe in for four seconds, out for four seconds, slow their heart rate down and regain control.” 

In the classes, a youth worker works alongside the yoga teacher and delivers workshops specific to the issues faced by the attendees, such as education, violence or county lines. The youth workers offer mentoring for anyone identified within the classes as requiring extra support. 

The project works closely with local Youth Offending Teams and social care staff to identify and refer children who would benefit. There are plans to extend beyond the targeted and open-access community sessions into schools and prisons. 

Urban Yogis are planning a four-day yoga retreat in Cornwall in summer 2021 for six older children who have especially enjoyed and benefited from the programme, and who have the potential to become volunteers. They will learn more about yoga philosophy, physiology and anatomy, then volunteering will hopefully be a path to becoming a trained yoga teacher on the programme. 

Such a positive outcome would be the ultimate testament to the programme’s impact.