Stay Free Forever
Stay Free Forever is a monthly podcast aimed at helping people, especially those who are currently and formerly justice-involved, to remain free and avoid incarceration or re-incarceration. We do this by talking about replacing risky thinking and behavior with sound, positive pro-social choices. Each discussion is guided by former corrections and parole officer Clifford Fewel, a journalist, writer, speaker and owner of the cognitive behavioral education company Stay Free Forever LLC.
Listen on:
Episodes
Saturday Jun 17, 2023
Saturday Jun 17, 2023
It began with a near-fatal beating that led to addiction, homelessness and losing her children. Hear Samantha Johnson recall her painful yet promising journey to recovery, sobriety, self-reliance and a career serving the sick and helping those who struggle as she did.
Monday May 29, 2023
Monday May 29, 2023
"We understand there is the law, and we have to act in accordance with it...but there's also a human here who has some needs! Are those sets of laws are helping me help this person? And sometimes they don't," says the man whose company, since 1975, has helped folks stop breaking laws and start living right.
Sunday Apr 23, 2023
Sunday Apr 23, 2023
From judge to judged; peer support specialist and former judge Terri Smith recounts her journey from trauma and addiction through recovery and redemption.
Thursday Mar 30, 2023
Thursday Mar 30, 2023
From athlete to addict to adult; Kimberly Smith shares lessons learned and how to keep them from fading.
Saturday Mar 04, 2023
Monday Feb 20, 2023
Monday Feb 20, 2023
Stay Free Forever's Clifford Fewel interviews Wyoming native Sarah Blakeman about her life, and about the "slippery slope" toward grand theft on which she found herself. "Just like an alcoholic doesn't start out in life saying, 'I think I'm gonna be an alcoholic,'" Sarah says, "I didn't start out thinking that I'm going to be a thief." Sarah shares how being caught, sentenced, incarcerated and freed has led her to a life of authenticity she had never thought possible.
Stay Free Forever
Whenever a person is let out of jail or prison, what they typically hear from staff is the admonition, "Don't come back!". When I worked as a corrections and programs officer in state prison, I always said, "Stay free forever!". I believe in the power of positive thinking and in the power of words.
This podcast reveals specific ways to stay free forever as told by women and men who are doing just that. And you must know it's a process, not an event. Or, I may chat with a judge or a teacher or other professional who believes in peoples' abilities to correct their own thinking, right their own ships and walk a new path that is clearly different from the one that took them to incarceration in the first place.
Please join us each month as we seek to spread the good word about all the ways one can choose to adapt and thrive. It can be done despite all of the judgment, obstacles, loneliness, temptations and envy, yes, envy, that face the person who steps away from the shadows of their former risky thinking and behaviors and into the blue skies and sunlight of freedom on one's own new terms.