Breaking Chains with Vipassana
Leon Kennedy's life is a compelling tale of transformation, as he shared on a recent podcast episode. Born in 1967, Atlanta, to a family steeped in the Civil Rights Movement, his grandparents, Joseph and Evelyn Lowery, were key figures alongside Martin Luther King Jr. Despite this rich legacy, Leon’s childhood was marked by turmoil, especially after his parents' divorce. Rebellion and anger led him into criminal activities, culminating in a prison sentence. It was in maximum security prison that Leon discovered Vipassana meditation, a practice rooted in Burmese tradition. This meditative journey became his lifeline, allowing him to process his past, transform his mindset, and inspire fellow inmates. Leon’s story is a testament to resilience and the transformative power of mindfulness, bridging his civil rights heritage with personal redemption. His journey underscores the enduring impact of seeking justice and inner peace, illustrating the profound connection between past struggles and present transformations.
“By the fourth day, I had a crying crisis. I was weeping from my soul, and I couldn’t stop. For those of us who know about Vipassana, that ‘insight,’ it’s just you and that mat.”
The whole time I’m in prison, I worked for psychology services. I worked with all the groups, self-help classes. I teach them; another gentleman and myself, we teach all the self-help classes. When they have guests or professors, we’re the ones, the model inmates who are gonna take them around and speak with them. Vipassana comes into play. They want to try it. It doesn’t come through at first. But I’m a part of psychology. This kinda trickles down through myself and the other guy, OB, [Benjamin Oryang]. He’s from Uganda. He’s still in prison. He’s still doing the same thing we were doing the whole time. We’d try to help people and be a part of the solution, in a very, very dark place.
And they hand-picked us to be a part of Vipassana. There was a deep screening process. We didn’t know what it was; we heard about it and we did the homework. We watched the films and we educated ourselves about it. We found out, ‘You know, it’s going on in India.’ We had a psychologist at the time who was brilliant enough to want to introduce this in a system, where really, it’s slavery, bottom line. You are not a human anymore.
When you come into the Alabama prison system, it’s the culture. You are less than a man. Or a woman. Because the women go through the same thing; it’s the culture. It’s how they teach them to treat us. And that’s why it’s such an animalistic and barbaric system, because that’s how it’s framed up. And we ended up doing Vipassana. And it was one of the greatest experiences in my life.
By the fourth day, I had a crying crisis. I was weeping from my soul. And I couldn’t stop. For those of us who know about Vipassana, that “insight,” it’s just you and that mat. And I’m dealing with it. Sometimes I would do good, and sometimes I wouldn’t. But I dealt with it. And as it progressed, I progressed. Things started changing. OB and I, we converted the gym. We were over it. We had to transform a penitentiary gym at a level-six institution, one of the worst prisons in the country; we transformed that gym into a meditation center. A place of peace and serenity. It was amazing.
It was something I would never forget. We finished the course. It was a success. Because this was such a success, they were like, Jonathan and Bruce, ‘It was such a success that we’re gonna do it again, but this time, we’re gonna be using you, Leon and OB, as assistants to the teachers.’ So, that was such an honor. We took so much pride in protecting the program. In protecting the integrity of the program. It was no foolery. There was no goofing around with this, because we knew that the administration did not want this to succeed. The chaplain was considering this “devil worship,” because it was getting more attention than what he believed in. And mind you, I was a Christian.
We ended up doing a second Vipassana [retreat] as Assistant Teachers. We learned how to “serve;” we were serving. It was a success, a great success. A lot of guys completed it. We were 20 in and 20 out. We were the first in North American history for it to ever happen. It was a big deal. HBO wanted to do a film about it. Vipassana, [our story], it won at the Sundance Film Festival. It did a lot of good things. It helped a lot of people; it inspired a lot of people. It inspired me. It inspired all of us.