If you want to endure prison, you need more than good intentions. You need a strategy.
When I began serving my sentence in 1987, I did not have freedom, privacy, or control over my environment. I spent the first year in solitary confinement. I was 23 years old, locked in a small cell, and facing the reality that I could lose the best years of my life to idleness, anger, or despair.
I knew I had to make a choice. I could let the system break me down, or I could build a routine that would keep me strong. That decision became a turning point. I began to see physical fitness and mental health not as separate goals, but as connected parts of survival.
That is the message I want to share with anyone going into the system. If you want to get through prison in the best possible way, think seriously about how you will care for your body and your mind.
Start With What You Can Control
Prison takes away many choices. It controls your movement, your meals, your schedule, and your environment. But even in prison, you still control some things.
You can control what time you go to sleep. You can control what time you wake up. You can control whether you use your time well. You can control whether you set goals and whether you push yourself to reach them.
In solitary confinement, I did not have a yard, a track, or a weight room. I had a cell. So I worked with what I had. I set a goal to do 500 push-ups every day.
That number mattered less than the discipline behind it. I had a target. Either I hit it or I did not. By setting a measurable goal and working to achieve it, I strengthened more than my body. I strengthened my confidence.
That is one of the most important lessons I learned in prison. When you set a goal and follow through, you begin to prove something to yourself. You begin to believe that your choices still matter. That belief can protect your mental health in a very difficult environment.
Let Your Routine Evolve as You Evolve
The strategy that helps you in the first month of a sentence may not be the strategy that carries you through the tenth year.
When I transferred from solitary confinement to the penitentiary, I had more opportunities. I could train with weights. I could go outside. I could use free weights, bench presses, squat racks, dip bars, and pull-up bars. For years, I trained hard with weights.
But as time passed, I changed.
Around age 30, I realized I still had many years ahead of me. I began adding distance running to my routine. Later, I shifted even more. By my mid-thirties, I relied less on heavy weights and more on bodyweight exercises like push-ups and dips. Over time, I increased my running distances even more.
I remember reading that running is a thinking man’s sport. That idea stayed with me. I wanted to become a thinking man. Running gave me space to reflect, to think, to process, and to build endurance in ways that went beyond the physical.
The lesson is simple. Your fitness plan should fit your stage of life, your sentence, your age, and your circumstances. The goal is not to copy another person’s routine. The goal is to build a routine that helps you remain disciplined, healthy, and productive.
Physical Fitness Supports Mental Health
Too many people think of exercise as something cosmetic. In prison, I saw it differently. Fitness was a tool of self-preservation.
Exercise helped me cope with stress. It gave structure to my day. It reduced the feeling of helplessness. It gave me a way to measure progress in an environment where so much feels stagnant.
When you say, “I will do this today,” and then you do it, you restore a sense of order. You begin acting as the CEO of your own life. That mindset matters in prison because the system constantly tries to define you by your number, your charge, or your custody level.
You must define yourself by your actions.
For me, exercise helped me preserve that identity. It reminded me that I was still responsible for how I lived each day. It strengthened my body, but it also kept my mind from drifting toward hopelessness.
If your mind is not strong, prison becomes harder than it has to be.
Avoid Unnecessary Risk
I made a deliberate decision not to participate in organized sports while I was in prison.
That was not because I thought sports were bad. I think sports can be valuable. But I had to assess risk and reward in the environment where I was living. In volatile institutions, especially high-security penitentiaries, emotions can escalate quickly. People may get taunted, embarrassed, or challenged. A minor conflict on a court or field can turn into something much more serious.
I saw situations where the consequences were severe.
So I chose activities that allowed me to build strength without exposing myself to unnecessary danger. I could not control how another person might react, but I could control the routines I chose for myself.
That is another important principle for anyone in prison. Do not just ask whether an activity is healthy in theory. Ask whether it is wise in your environment. Good judgment is part of self-advocacy.
Build a Record of Discipline
One of the best things you can do in prison is document what you are doing.
Do not just work on yourself. Record the work. Show the goals you set, the habits you build, the books you read, the lessons you learn, and the progress you make. At Prison Professors, we encourage people to build a documented record of growth because that record can restore confidence, strengthen support, and help others believe in your commitment to change. Our mission is to help people in prison prepare for success through free, self-directed resources, and that begins with personal responsibility and daily action.
I always tell people the same three things: I will be honest, I will never ask anyone to do anything I did not do, and I will never ask anyone in the system to pay me a penny. Those promises are central to the work we do.
Documentation matters because confidence grows when you can see evidence of your own effort. Support also grows when others can see that effort. The harder you work on yourself, the easier it becomes for others to believe in you.
That support can matter tremendously while you are inside and after you come home.
Use Prison to Build, Not To Drift
You may not control the food. You may not like the conditions. You may not have access to the level of nutrition, rest, or recreation you would choose on the outside. Those limitations are real.
But even within those limitations, you can still build.
You can decide that each day will include movement. You can decide that each week will include measurable effort. You can decide that your physical discipline will support your mental discipline. You can decide that prison will not turn you into a passive observer of your own life.
That does not mean the journey is easy. It means the journey becomes purposeful.
When I look back on the 26 years I served, I know that fitness was never only about staying in shape. It was about preserving my identity. It was about protecting my mental health. It was about proving, day after day, that I still had the power to influence the man I was becoming.
That same opportunity exists for you.
You do not need my exact routine. You need your own plan. Build one that matches your age, your sentence, your condition, and your goals. Then follow it with discipline. Measure it. Adjust it. Keep going.
The system may call you an inmate, a convict, or a prisoner. But you still have the power to decide how you will live through this chapter.
Reflection question: What daily routine could you begin right now that would make you stronger in body, steadier in mind, and more prepared for the future you want to build?