Incarceration to Inspiration = JUSTICE With Alana Moor

Howard Brown: 00:00:04

Hello, it's Howard Brown. This is the Shining

Howard Brown: 00:00:07

Brightly Show. This is the podcast with the best and the

Howard Brown: 00:00:10

most interesting guests ever. I am the maestro with the mic and

Howard Brown: 00:00:14

oh my god, this is a show that is going to just hit you

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emotionally. And it's amazing. It's going to inspire you as

Howard Brown: 00:00:21

well. I want to introduce Alana Moor, a lot of Welcome to the

Howard Brown: 00:00:25

Shining Brightly Show.

Alana Moor: 00:00:27

Howard, I'm good. Thanks for having me. So

Alana Moor: 00:00:30

grateful to be here.

Howard Brown: 00:00:32

Well, you're all the way across the country and

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British Columbia. I want to tell you, this woman is so

Howard Brown: 00:00:40

courageous, and has a lesson to teach. And I just am so thrilled

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to be introduced you recently. Let me take a little read of

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your bio, and then you can add some stuff in and fill in the

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blank. So Alana Moor's life took a dramatic turn in 2015 when she

Howard Brown: 00:00:55

was sentenced to 81 months in a Panamanian prison for

Howard Brown: 00:01:01

international drug trafficking. That's four and a half years of

Howard Brown: 00:01:05

this young woman's life. She trusted a client connected to

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some famous, famous music artists, you are promised to be

Howard Brown: 00:01:13

elevated in to your fashion dreams. And then things went

Howard Brown: 00:01:18

haywire. Oh my god. You actually were asked to be a druggie mule,

Howard Brown: 00:01:24

and you got busted. And you found yourself in prison, a lot

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of found strength through discipline and exercise, and

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reading. And she emerged not as a survivor but as a thriver.

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After her release, she founded the foundation to aid

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incarcerated women, became a certified mindset life coach,

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and is now a fierce advocate for formerly incarcerated Central

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American females. Alana is writing a tell all book, and her

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mission is to impact millions of young lives as a motivational

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speaker, as she blends her raw honesty, humour, and resilience

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to overcome adversity. She's a full time mother to his son

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justice, and we're going to talk about him. And you embody a

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positive ending to this Panamanian journey, and you're

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dedicated to uplifting others in transformation. And that's why

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you're on the show, because I am overcoming an inspiration. Alana

Howard Brown: 00:02:24

Moor, tell us a little bit more what did I miss? Or, and tell us

Howard Brown: 00:02:28

something interesting that we don't know about you?

Alana Moor: 00:02:30

Oh, that's great. Thank you for that introduction,

Alana Moor: 00:02:33

that was lovely. Anything that you missed, I would say that I

Alana Moor: 00:02:38

think you hit the nail on the head. You know, there was a lot

Alana Moor: 00:02:42

of things that I did while I was in prison. And we can get into

Alana Moor: 00:02:45

that, obviously. So something that people something

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interesting about me that a lot of people probably wouldn't

Alana Moor: 00:02:52

know, I am obsessed with Indian flute music. And I have this

Alana Moor: 00:02:58

sort of mantra in this meditation where I love to get

Alana Moor: 00:03:01

in the kitchen, and cook a really good meal. Obviously, I

Alana Moor: 00:03:07

have, you know, no limits on what I eat anymore. And listen

Alana Moor: 00:03:11

to Indian flute music and just be in an incredibly meditative

Alana Moor: 00:03:14

state.

Howard Brown: 00:03:17

I love that and allows you to actually what I

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call in my book, find your happy place, because it's your stress

Howard Brown: 00:03:24

free zone. And you should go there often everyone needs to

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find it, whether it's meditation, yoga, hiking,

Howard Brown: 00:03:29

biking, athletics, travel, music, I don't care, find your

Howard Brown: 00:03:33

happy place, go there as much as you can. Well, I want to dig

Howard Brown: 00:03:36

right in because you're young, and you made some mistakes. And

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we all we are actually, in the Jewish holiday of Yom Kippur war

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coming up, and it's it's making atonement, it's repenting. You

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made a mistake. And instead of actually just living with that,

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and just killing yourself about it, you actually did something

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about it, you use your time that you had to serve for this

Howard Brown: 00:04:02

mistake, for positive for helping other women. And now

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continue to do so afterwards. So that's very honourable. We are

Howard Brown: 00:04:09

human. We make mistakes. Now, other people had something to do

Howard Brown: 00:04:13

with that, and that sucks. But I want you to share a little bit

Howard Brown: 00:04:17

about your time in prison. And some of the lessons that you

Howard Brown: 00:04:21

learned.

Alana Moor: 00:04:23

Yeah. I mean, to talk about my time in prison.

Alana Moor: 00:04:28

Let's start with the beginning. Very quickly, you know, I was

Alana Moor: 00:04:37

going I made a decision when I was 24 years old that I wanted

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to go to school for fashion. And it was something that I believed

Alana Moor: 00:04:44

was going to be I was going to be the next big fashion

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designer, made a decision, went to school. Graduated became a

Alana Moor: 00:04:54

stylist met an incredible person that allowed me to work for them

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as a stylist and I was called into their office one day long

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story short, this person and I had a great relationship. And

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she called me into her office one day and said, I have a

Alana Moor: 00:05:08

really great opportunity for you, I really want to pay you

Alana Moor: 00:05:11

back for everything that you've done for me, I'm going to send

Alana Moor: 00:05:13

you to Panama on a vacation, and I have a friend there. You don't

Alana Moor: 00:05:18

have to worry about anything. I have lots of people that have

Alana Moor: 00:05:20

done this, you're gonna bring a bag back for me. And the thing

Alana Moor: 00:05:23

is, Howard is sometimes in life, when you want to get to the top,

Alana Moor: 00:05:27

and you see everybody around you getting there. You will do

Alana Moor: 00:05:31

anything that it takes to get there without thinking about any

Alana Moor: 00:05:35

consequences that may be at the end of your decisions. So I said

Alana Moor: 00:05:40

yes. And of course, I was like, Well, is it drugs? No, you don't

Alana Moor: 00:05:43

have to worry about anything. There was also somebody in the

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room with her that day, who happens to be the right hand man

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to one of the most famous musicians around so that helped.

Alana Moor: 00:05:55

It was a great sales pitch. And I fell for it. And I said, Yes,

Alana Moor: 00:05:59

fast forward. A week later, I show up to I go to Panama, I

Alana Moor: 00:06:04

spend a week there, I show up to the airport. And I think that I

Alana Moor: 00:06:11

start having this feeling that something is going wrong. And I

Alana Moor: 00:06:16

see I start thinking, I wonder if there's drugs in my bag. So

Alana Moor: 00:06:20

we get to the airport, I get off and I'm thinking this is it.

Alana Moor: 00:06:24

This is it. These drugs, our dogs are going to mull me and my

Alana Moor: 00:06:28

life is over. So I'm waiting in line to get on this plane and

Alana Moor: 00:06:32

one drug drug dog walks by, nothing happens. Another one

Alana Moor: 00:06:37

walks by nothing happens. Another one walks by nothing

Alana Moor: 00:06:40

happens. So I get this sort of second wind of confidence. I'm

Alana Moor: 00:06:44

waiting for the plane I get through security. They call my

Alana Moor: 00:06:47

name on the loudspeaker. They take me into the back and it's

Alana Moor: 00:06:49

utter chaos. And somebody is screaming at me. Where did you

Alana Moor: 00:06:54

get these bags? Where did you get these bags. Fast forward

Alana Moor: 00:06:58

five hours later, a prosecutor that I now know to be the

Alana Moor: 00:07:01

prosecutor comes in, goes through my bags and they find 11

Alana Moor: 00:07:04

kilos of cocaine in my suitcase, I'm transferred to what I now

Alana Moor: 00:07:08

know to be a men's prison where I am ankle shackled and risk

Alana Moor: 00:07:11

Chaco shackled for three days with no water, no food, and no

Alana Moor: 00:07:16

shower, no toilet paper, I'm transferred then to a female

Alana Moor: 00:07:20

prison where I'm sentenced to six months, because in Panama,

Alana Moor: 00:07:23

you are guilty until proven innocent. And that was my entire

Alana Moor: 00:07:29

life ripped from underneath me in the matter of three minutes

Alana Moor: 00:07:33

in an airport.

Howard Brown: 00:07:34

Let's stop for a second. Because I want that to

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sink in for the listeners and anyone watching is that you

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trusted someone, they were mentoring you. You had a big

Howard Brown: 00:07:46

superstar that asks you to do something. And you felt in your

Howard Brown: 00:07:51

gut that it was wrong, but you wanted to climb the ladder. You

Howard Brown: 00:07:55

also I know you brought a friend and that friend, just by chance

Howard Brown: 00:07:59

of being your friend suffered as well. And you knew there was

Howard Brown: 00:08:03

something in that bag. And you went forth anyways. Yeah. And

Howard Brown: 00:08:10

and now had to pay some extreme consequences because you're in a

Howard Brown: 00:08:13

foreign country of foreign land. And you're a drug mule. And

Howard Brown: 00:08:21

basically, you now have to suffer the consequences from

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that mentor that was looking out for you. And all you did was

Howard Brown: 00:08:30

have a passion for fashion. And you wanted to you know, I made

Howard Brown: 00:08:34

that up. You just wanted to climb the ranks. So all right.

Howard Brown: 00:08:38

So you're a young woman, you're scared out of your mind. I can

Howard Brown: 00:08:42

imagine. You don't speak the language at that time. Correct?

Alana Moor: 00:08:45

I don't speak the language now. Correct. And so

Howard Brown: 00:08:50

in our previous talk, they made you sign a

Howard Brown: 00:08:52

document, you signed all your rights away. And they basically

Howard Brown: 00:08:55

were going to send in sentences sentence you to this woman's

Howard Brown: 00:08:58

prison, correct? Yeah. Right, pick us up from that shock and

Howard Brown: 00:09:03

awe, and what happens when you land there.

Alana Moor: 00:09:06

So I remember being in the back of a truck. And it's

Alana Moor: 00:09:11

this long dirt road to get to the prison. And the funny

Alana Moor: 00:09:15

juxtaposition is right across the street, there's a

Alana Moor: 00:09:17

university. And I remember driving down that thinking,

Alana Moor: 00:09:23

Okay, I'm about to become somebody's bitch. I'm about to

Alana Moor: 00:09:26

get the shit kicked out of me. And I'm about to have to learn

Alana Moor: 00:09:29

how to defend myself very quickly. I'm gonna have to

Alana Moor: 00:09:33

figure this out. And this is the interesting part of the story

Alana Moor: 00:09:36

that I always sort of still laugh to myself about. I

Alana Moor: 00:09:39

remember pulling up and getting off of the back of this truck.

Alana Moor: 00:09:44

And looking and there were all these women outside, in pink T

Alana Moor: 00:09:50

shirts and jeans, with giant rollers in their hair. There was

Alana Moor: 00:09:55

Spanish music playing in the background, and a bunch of girls

Alana Moor: 00:09:59

are getting their hair blow dried. And I thought, Where the

Alana Moor: 00:10:01

heck did I just show up. And I was so afraid that this moment

Alana Moor: 00:10:08

almost allowed me to sort of feel a little bit at ease. Like,

Alana Moor: 00:10:15

I was still very afraid. But I was like, Oh, okay. And I

Alana Moor: 00:10:19

remember a girl yelling at me and my friend, I love you for

Alana Moor: 00:10:23

their word, screaming at me. And there were all these other women

Alana Moor: 00:10:28

up against the fence on the other side of where I where I

Alana Moor: 00:10:31

was like these other women were staring at me up against the

Alana Moor: 00:10:35

fence, you know, little short shorts, hair and rollers, little

Alana Moor: 00:10:39

crop tops, my friend, I love you, whatever. And I remember,

Alana Moor: 00:10:44

the guards went through all of our stuff. And they handcuffed

Alana Moor: 00:10:48

us and they brought us in to the prison. And we had to walk by

Alana Moor: 00:10:52

all of these girls, and they were all hooting and hollering

Alana Moor: 00:10:55

at us.

Howard Brown: 00:10:56

This is the welcome waggon This is the

Howard Brown: 00:10:58

welcome waggon

Alana Moor: 00:10:59

This is the it's the fresh meat. It's the fresh beat

Alana Moor: 00:11:02

waggon. So basically what happens when anybody new walks

Alana Moor: 00:11:07

into a prison, they scream about it. Everybody knows fresh meat,

Alana Moor: 00:11:11

fresh meat, you know. And so I don't know this at the time, I

Alana Moor: 00:11:15

hear gibberish. And I was in shock. I mean, how do you go

Alana Moor: 00:11:23

from a life that you know, in North America to walking into a

Alana Moor: 00:11:27

Panamanian prison in the middle of the desert, with some of

Alana Moor: 00:11:30

Panama's most dangerous criminals that are just walking

Alana Moor: 00:11:34

around everywhere, not speaking the language, not having any

Alana Moor: 00:11:38

clue when you're leaving, and having to then decide which

Alana Moor: 00:11:45

route you're going to take for survival. So I've always said,

Alana Moor: 00:11:50

and I will always say, the second that I walked in, I knew

Alana Moor: 00:11:53

I had two choices. I was to be constructive with my time, or

Alana Moor: 00:11:58

destructive. Now, living in the middle of hell, destructive

Alana Moor: 00:12:03

seems like the best option, because negativity when you're

Alana Moor: 00:12:07

living in hell is so rampant. But I decided that both took

Alana Moor: 00:12:12

energy. And both I would have to focus and figure out how to do

Alana Moor: 00:12:18

either one. And I chose to be constructive. And from day three

Alana Moor: 00:12:24

of being there, I had to go through the initial trauma

Alana Moor: 00:12:26

shock, overwhelming feeling of where the fuck did I just end

Alana Moor: 00:12:31

up? And I made a decision very quickly and very early on, that

Alana Moor: 00:12:37

I was going to be constructive with my time. So I had a

Alana Moor: 00:12:43

decision to make. The question was how I also learned very

Alana Moor: 00:12:47

quickly that this is not like a prison in North America, where

Alana Moor: 00:12:50

you are given everything that you wear, everything you wash

Alana Moor: 00:12:53

with, you are given your feminine hygiene products, you

Alana Moor: 00:12:57

are given a schedule, there's no schedule, whatever you walk in

Alana Moor: 00:13:01

with is what you have, if you don't have it too bad, you

Alana Moor: 00:13:05

better figure it out. So I not only had to figure out a way to

Alana Moor: 00:13:09

survive financially in terms of having clothes to put on my back

Alana Moor: 00:13:13

and having soap to clean my body and having feminine and feminine

Alana Moor: 00:13:17

hygiene products to deal with what happens to women every

Alana Moor: 00:13:20

single month. I also had to decide how was I going to use my

Alana Moor: 00:13:24

time wisely. Because regardless of what my decision was the time

Alana Moor: 00:13:29

was going to pass. So was this going to be a waste of time, or

Alana Moor: 00:13:36

time that passed by that I used wisely and became a better

Alana Moor: 00:13:40

version of myself. Now there were definitely a few turning

Alana Moor: 00:13:42

points during my time that made that that sort of, you know, put

Alana Moor: 00:13:50

that into perspective of like, okay, this is the moment where

Alana Moor: 00:13:53

change has to happen.

Howard Brown: 00:13:56

Now, you had a roommate, which was your friend,

Howard Brown: 00:13:58

and you there's a lot of isolation time. Also, you're the

Howard Brown: 00:14:02

newbie, and then you're learning and eventually you don't become

Howard Brown: 00:14:05

the newbie, but right you there's an internal black market

Howard Brown: 00:14:08

there in order to acquire things, and you need to do

Howard Brown: 00:14:12

favours for other things. So, I mean, we see a lot of stuff on

Howard Brown: 00:14:16

TV, and I'm sure a fraction of it isn't even accurate. But, you

Howard Brown: 00:14:20

know, you had to live this, you know, in a foreign country. And

Howard Brown: 00:14:25

and then I think you actually had to call home, right? And

Howard Brown: 00:14:29

say, I effed up. I'm going to be here for a while. Yeah. And so

Howard Brown: 00:14:37

I'm sure there was some nasty stuff that happened, but you

Howard Brown: 00:14:41

decided to learn the language, right? You learned so you could

Howard Brown: 00:14:46

actually be able to speak and communicate. I think that's a

Howard Brown: 00:14:48

survival thing. But you also became a whatever reading they

Howard Brown: 00:14:52

had you became a voracious reader to expand your mind as

Howard Brown: 00:14:56

well. But also tell me about some of the relationships You

Howard Brown: 00:15:00

decided to actually be known to be someone that could help

Howard Brown: 00:15:04

others, and put that reputation out there in a prison of all

Howard Brown: 00:15:08

sorts. Tell me about that.

Alana Moor: 00:15:09

Yeah, that's, that's great. So, day three, I remember

Alana Moor: 00:15:15

I go in to see the director of this prison. And I had been

Alana Moor: 00:15:19

doing a lot of writing and a lot of thinking, obviously, there's

Alana Moor: 00:15:23

a lot of time to think. And she goes, What do you want, like,

Alana Moor: 00:15:28

what could make your stay here a little bit better. I said, not

Alana Moor: 00:15:33

being here, A, but if we have to, if I have to be here, I

Alana Moor: 00:15:37

really want to, I really want to be able to work out. I know, you

Alana Moor: 00:15:42

know, I come from an athletic background, I was a soccer

Alana Moor: 00:15:44

player growing up, I was an avid competitive dancer my whole

Alana Moor: 00:15:48

life. So I also have always been into fitness. So I knew that my

Alana Moor: 00:15:54

mental health and my faith in God was going to be shown

Alana Moor: 00:16:00

through my ability to stay active, and to, you know, help

Alana Moor: 00:16:05

my mental health through physical fitness. Okay. So we

Alana Moor: 00:16:10

made a decision that day that I was going to start teaching

Alana Moor: 00:16:13

fitness. So day three of my prison stay in 2015, in a place

Alana Moor: 00:16:19

where I could not speak more than two words, and those two

Alana Moor: 00:16:22

words being Hola, and Cervesa, which I now know to be beer.

Alana Moor: 00:16:28

Those are the only two words I knew, I was thrown into a

Alana Moor: 00:16:31

position of leadership, where I got to teach fitness at 7am,

Alana Moor: 00:16:36

every single day. And I want to talk a little bit about how that

Alana Moor: 00:16:40

went for me. So I remember walking in the first day, and

Alana Moor: 00:16:43

they went in and they did this announcement like, Hey, we're

Alana Moor: 00:16:46

gonna start to have fitness classes. And this is the other

Alana Moor: 00:16:49

thing, Howard, the prison system in Panama is very behind, in

Alana Moor: 00:16:54

accessibility to courses to studying to, you know, allowing

Alana Moor: 00:17:00

people to expand their mind in any sort of a way. So there's a

Alana Moor: 00:17:03

lot of boredom. And what happens when people get bored. They act

Alana Moor: 00:17:08

out what happens when people get bored, they hurt themselves.

Alana Moor: 00:17:12

What happens when people get bored, they hurt others. So it

Alana Moor: 00:17:16

was kind of like this social experiment where a I became a

Alana Moor: 00:17:20

leader. So in a position of leadership in a prison, you are

Alana Moor: 00:17:24

less likely to be in a position of of being hurt by anybody

Alana Moor: 00:17:29

there. So all of a sudden, I look like somebody that can

Alana Moor: 00:17:33

defend themselves. So I start teaching fitness at 7am Every

Alana Moor: 00:17:37

single day, the first day, I think 10 people showed up, we

Alana Moor: 00:17:41

got to listen to music. And I was basically just going, huh,

Alana Moor: 00:17:47

and, and I Oh, no dose and tres and I had no idea how to speak

Alana Moor: 00:17:51

the language and people are laughing at me hysterically, you

Alana Moor: 00:17:54

know, and I'm talking, the girl that killed her husband, and

Alana Moor: 00:17:57

then hit him in her freezer is out there side by side with me

Alana Moor: 00:18:01

laughing at me because I have no idea how to say up or down in

Alana Moor: 00:18:03

Spanish. Here's the cool thing that happened. And I love this

Alana Moor: 00:18:07

story. We started to see girls create consistency in their

Alana Moor: 00:18:13

life, because they started to come out every single day,

Alana Moor: 00:18:17

Monday through Friday, for one hour in the morning to work out

Alana Moor: 00:18:20

with me. You know, I this isn't a gym. This is a cement floor

Alana Moor: 00:18:24

with you know, barbed wire all around you. And I was given some

Alana Moor: 00:18:28

chairs. And I had to figure it out how to use the body, how to

Alana Moor: 00:18:32

make people work together. That was the other thing. People

Alana Moor: 00:18:35

started to work together. People started to become calmer. There

Alana Moor: 00:18:42

was, you know, less violence with the certain 1015 women that

Alana Moor: 00:18:47

would come out consistently to see me. And I was able to teach

Alana Moor: 00:18:54

them about slowly I started to learn the language. So I started

Alana Moor: 00:18:58

to focus and that sort of ties in with it right, I got the

Alana Moor: 00:19:00

dictionary, I started to listen, I started to really force myself

Alana Moor: 00:19:04

to understand the basics of fitness in Spanish and be able

Alana Moor: 00:19:08

to teach it. So you start to see these girls create habits in

Alana Moor: 00:19:11

their life have consistency in their life. And I start to put

Alana Moor: 00:19:16

myself in a position of leadership. So I am basically

Alana Moor: 00:19:19

it's a it's a it's a Get Out of Jail like safe card. Right? I

Alana Moor: 00:19:25

remember this girl named Chola. Seven bullets in her body. One

Alana Moor: 00:19:29

of the toughest criminals in Panama. She got transferred to

Alana Moor: 00:19:32

our prison. And I remember her telling the entire jail the only

Alana Moor: 00:19:36

person that I will not fight in this jail and I mean fight she

Alana Moor: 00:19:40

has a double switchblade and she will cut anybody that comes

Alana Moor: 00:19:43

within a five foot radius of her. She was a very scary human,

Alana Moor: 00:19:48

but very loving at the core. She said the only person I will not

Alana Moor: 00:19:51

fight in this prison is Alanna. She is strong and she could kill

Alana Moor: 00:19:56

anybody. So fitness became my defence mechanism and it It also

Alana Moor: 00:20:00

became my power. And I, I was as strong as I'd ever been.

Howard Brown: 00:20:06

But at the meantime, you're running, you

Howard Brown: 00:20:08

know, aerobics on a cement floor with no gym pads, and people are

Howard Brown: 00:20:12

coming out and starting to come out. And you're teaching them

Howard Brown: 00:20:14

how to stretch, and you're starting their day with a

Howard Brown: 00:20:17

purpose. And they're actually doing some physical fitness. And

Howard Brown: 00:20:21

I'm sure they told others and the class grew. And that's a

Howard Brown: 00:20:24

beautiful story, because you're trying to survive. I mean, it's

Howard Brown: 00:20:28

no fun there, and you have a lot of downtime. And a lot of bad

Howard Brown: 00:20:33

stuff goes into that, because there's a chain of command and

Howard Brown: 00:20:36

you fortunately navigated and took the right path that way as

Howard Brown: 00:20:40

well. So take me through a few more things that prison that are

Howard Brown: 00:20:46

that stand out, that you want to share?

Alana Moor: 00:20:48

Yeah, definitely. So I would say that for me, I

Alana Moor: 00:20:52

noticed very quickly, there's a few things that stand out for me

Alana Moor: 00:20:55

that I that I love. This is something that sticks out a lot.

Alana Moor: 00:21:00

Not every day in prison is bad. You know, you you definitely get

Alana Moor: 00:21:04

to create a good time for yourself if you want to. So I

Alana Moor: 00:21:08

really, there's this whole moment of time in prison. That

Alana Moor: 00:21:13

was the shift for me. Okay, so I was teaching fitness. But I also

Alana Moor: 00:21:18

within that year and a half found out that I was sentenced

Alana Moor: 00:21:20

to 81 months in prison where I had been lied to by a lawyer and

Alana Moor: 00:21:24

told that I was going home. So I was dealing with that stress and

Alana Moor: 00:21:28

the stress of not knowing. So I started to read a lot. I mean,

Alana Moor: 00:21:35

my own mother brought me an entire suitcase, not with

Alana Moor: 00:21:38

anything in it. But books. I started to read books, I started

Alana Moor: 00:21:42

to read about business, I started to write business plans

Alana Moor: 00:21:45

for different ideas that I had, because I knew I needed to keep

Alana Moor: 00:21:48

my brain sharp. The time was going to pass, they wouldn't let

Alana Moor: 00:21:52

me complete my degree. I wanted to complete my degree and do my

Alana Moor: 00:21:56

masters. They said no, the government of Panama refused my

Alana Moor: 00:22:00

education. So I did grade Kindergarten to Grade 12. So

Alana Moor: 00:22:06

during this time, I begin to adopt, you know, I sound like

Alana Moor: 00:22:10

everything's going good, but I have a bit of a bad attitude.

Alana Moor: 00:22:14

Because when you're surrounded by people that are bullying you

Alana Moor: 00:22:17

all the time. And when you're surrounded by guards that a lot

Alana Moor: 00:22:20

of these people have never even seen a white person like me.

Alana Moor: 00:22:24

That's the reality. So they think that I come from

Alana Moor: 00:22:26

privilege, they treat me differently. I was bullied by

Alana Moor: 00:22:29

guards, I was bullied by different people within the

Alana Moor: 00:22:32

prison. I had to protect myself. And then you're also dealing

Alana Moor: 00:22:36

with its high school. You know, you have women that are, you

Alana Moor: 00:22:39

know, setting things on fire and slitting their wrists and

Alana Moor: 00:22:42

fighting each other in front of you. And you have to think it's

Alana Moor: 00:22:45

normal. You're in a cell that's full of bunk beds, 72 bunk beds

Alana Moor: 00:22:51

with one toilet, no shower, everybody has to do the same

Alana Moor: 00:22:55

thing. And they're infested with cockroaches, you have an

Alana Moor: 00:22:58

industrial fan, 24 hours a day going, you have 72 radios in one

Alana Moor: 00:23:03

cell. And no one ever is quiet. There was never any quiet.

Alana Moor: 00:23:09

Imagine four and a half years of noise. So I was it was getting

Alana Moor: 00:23:13

to me. And I was starting to get a bit of an attitude. So I

Alana Moor: 00:23:16

remember this one guard had it against me, this is a very cool

Alana Moor: 00:23:19

story. I had a cell phone at one point in prison because the only

Alana Moor: 00:23:23

way to communicate with people was through having a cell phone,

Alana Moor: 00:23:27

you can only imagine where women would hide the cell phone to be

Alana Moor: 00:23:31

able to not have it there. I did not do that. So I got my cell

Alana Moor: 00:23:33

phone taken away very quickly. She was against me. She had nine

Alana Moor: 00:23:37

guards come into the cell at 930 at night one night to take my

Alana Moor: 00:23:40

phone for me. Okay. The next day she shows up to the jail. She

Alana Moor: 00:23:44

laughs in my face and calls me a fucking dumb gringa. And I snap

Alana Moor: 00:23:51

and I see red. And I begin to follow her and my thought is I'm

Alana Moor: 00:23:56

going to kill her. And this is nothing. She's so mean to me.

Alana Moor: 00:24:00

And I remember two girls put their arms in front of me and I

Alana Moor: 00:24:03

was like, No, I've had enough. Okay, I tried to fight this

Alana Moor: 00:24:07

guard. I ended up getting in trouble for it. That was the

Alana Moor: 00:24:13

moment I remember going into the back after it happened. I got in

Alana Moor: 00:24:16

a lot of trouble. I got six months probation. And I was

Alana Moor: 00:24:20

bawling my eyes out and I'm like, What am I doing here? How

Alana Moor: 00:24:22

am I going to survive? And this girl was like, You got to get

Alana Moor: 00:24:25

your shit together. You got to find things that you love to do.

Alana Moor: 00:24:28

You got to do it. I was like, Okay. And I remember walking two

Alana Moor: 00:24:32

things happen. I saw this note on the wall that said public

Alana Moor: 00:24:35

speaking competition. So what they were doing was a national

Alana Moor: 00:24:38

wide public speaking competition. And basically you

Alana Moor: 00:24:42

did it at the prison. You wrote a speech. You did it there. If

Alana Moor: 00:24:45

you won, you got to go to this beautiful theatre in the middle

Alana Moor: 00:24:48

of Panama City with no handcuffs, and you were put on

Alana Moor: 00:24:52

national television and radio to compete and you could win and I

Alana Moor: 00:24:59

win I remember I used to pray on my knees every night and I got

Alana Moor: 00:25:02

this overwhelming feeling of you need to do it. And I woke up the

Alana Moor: 00:25:05

next day and I went into the office and I said, Can I do this

Alana Moor: 00:25:08

even though I don't speak Spanish, and they were like,

Alana Moor: 00:25:10

yep. And I spent the next month and a half, learning the

Alana Moor: 00:25:14

language perfectly writing a speech in English, translating

Alana Moor: 00:25:17

it into Spanish. Now, if you think about this, I had a lot of

Alana Moor: 00:25:20

time on my hands. So this was great. I did that. I competed, I

Alana Moor: 00:25:25

won. In prison. I went to this theatre in Panama City. And I

Alana Moor: 00:25:31

had my father fly down. And he saw me with no handcuffs compete

Alana Moor: 00:25:37

on television. That was a shifting moment for me. And just

Alana Moor: 00:25:41

the last thing that I'll say to this is that guard I, we had

Alana Moor: 00:25:48

problems for month months. And I remember one day, we had this

Alana Moor: 00:25:51

kid's day. And they wanted us to, they wanted somebody to

Alana Moor: 00:25:54

dress up as a clown. And nobody wanted to do it. And I was like,

Alana Moor: 00:25:58

I'll do it. I dressed up as a clown. And I went out. And I and

Alana Moor: 00:26:02

I, we had a day with the kids, the kids could come and we did

Alana Moor: 00:26:05

games for them and things like that. And I remember I had this

Alana Moor: 00:26:08

voice in my head that said, today's the day you're going to

Alana Moor: 00:26:10

apologise to Flores to this guard. And I was like, No, I'm

Alana Moor: 00:26:14

not. And my head was like, Yes, you are. And I walked into her

Alana Moor: 00:26:18

office that day, three months after this thing had happened. I

Alana Moor: 00:26:20

sat down on the floor in a clown costume. And I apologised for

Alana Moor: 00:26:25

what I had done. And six months later, she died of breast

Alana Moor: 00:26:28

cancer. And that was a huge pivotal moment for me. And from

Alana Moor: 00:26:33

that moment, I invested all my time and shifting my mindset. I

Alana Moor: 00:26:38

designed clothes, I worked out twice a day I did every course

Alana Moor: 00:26:41

that came to prison, I went to school, I went to church. And I

Alana Moor: 00:26:45

made sure that during this time that I without the resources

Alana Moor: 00:26:49

created my own resources to become the best possible version

Alana Moor: 00:26:52

of myself that I could. Because mindset, it's all about your

Alana Moor: 00:26:58

mind. You choose your attitude. And you know, the book, we

Alana Moor: 00:27:03

talked about it, you know, Viktor Frankl, yeah, A Man's

Alana Moor: 00:27:07

Search for Meaning three years in a concentration camp.

Alana Moor: 00:27:10

Everything can be taken from a man but one thing, the last of

Alana Moor: 00:27:14

human freedoms, right to choose one's attitude, in any given set

Alana Moor: 00:27:20

of circumstances, to choose one's own way, that book changed

Alana Moor: 00:27:24

my life. And I realised that I could find freedom in the middle

Alana Moor: 00:27:28

of Hell, if I wanted to. You make the choice. And that's what

Alana Moor: 00:27:33

I did. And the hardest part of being in prison, as Viktor

Alana Moor: 00:27:36

Frankl talks about in his book, The hardest part of being in a

Alana Moor: 00:27:38

concentration camp is not living in El, it's not knowing when

Alana Moor: 00:27:42

you're getting out. Because how do you create goals when you

Alana Moor: 00:27:45

don't have a tangible ending? Now, could I physically create

Alana Moor: 00:27:50

change in my life when I didn't know when I was leaving? That

Alana Moor: 00:27:54

was the hardest part.

Howard Brown: 00:27:56

I want to say that shuddering a little bit, because

Howard Brown: 00:28:00

you actually had the ability to shine some light, in the darkest

Howard Brown: 00:28:05

of moments in complete darkness, the speaking competition, you

Howard Brown: 00:28:11

know that you pursued it to be the clown that no one wanted to

Howard Brown: 00:28:15

be, you raise your hand and said, Pick Me. And so you're

Howard Brown: 00:28:19

able to do that just this human resolve that you're showing is

Howard Brown: 00:28:24

so important. And as I always say that we don't compare, I had

Howard Brown: 00:28:29

my own prison, I've been a sage for cancer. There's nothing

Howard Brown: 00:28:33

there's nothing to compare. But it's darkness. We all suffered

Howard Brown: 00:28:36

darkness. And we did not, or could not, or chose not to find

Howard Brown: 00:28:41

the light to be able to get out of that. And you tried to and

Howard Brown: 00:28:45

did. And I tried to and did. And this is why we're on this show

Howard Brown: 00:28:48

together today to lift other people up from their darkness.

Howard Brown: 00:28:52

And this is going to become a book and I'm sure a motion

Howard Brown: 00:28:55

picture. So tell us about what's what's going on with your book.

Alana Moor: 00:28:58

Oh, gosh, you know, I will say I will talk about my

Alana Moor: 00:29:02

book in one second. And I just want to say to what you just

Alana Moor: 00:29:04

said, when people come to me, and they say I could never go

Alana Moor: 00:29:07

through what you went through, you said it yourself. Just now.

Alana Moor: 00:29:10

You know, your story must be worse. It's never about the

Alana Moor: 00:29:12

story. It's about the feelings. We all go through difficult

Alana Moor: 00:29:18

situations in our lives. I could never think about what you've

Alana Moor: 00:29:20

gone through. I don't think I could get through it. And if you

Alana Moor: 00:29:23

looked at me, you would say yes, you could. Because in in the

Alana Moor: 00:29:27

face of adversity, we are given the skills that we need to

Alana Moor: 00:29:31

change. It's just whether or not we're willing to work hard

Alana Moor: 00:29:34

because it's not fucking easy. So my book starts like this. I

Alana Moor: 00:29:40

have over 12 journals that I began to write because I knew I

Alana Moor: 00:29:47

always wondered what my purpose was. And I had these pivotal

Alana Moor: 00:29:52

moments. And that speaking competition was the huge pivotal

Alana Moor: 00:29:55

moment where I thought if I could change one person's life,

Alana Moor: 00:29:59

or One person's decision to choose themselves, and to do the

Alana Moor: 00:30:05

work to get where they wanted to go. So they don't have to make

Alana Moor: 00:30:08

the decision that I made. Or if I can teach people about mental

Alana Moor: 00:30:12

toughness, and about how to get through situations because you

Alana Moor: 00:30:18

can, I don't want the excuses, literally, I've realised that

Alana Moor: 00:30:22

going to prison is probably one of the five most difficult

Alana Moor: 00:30:25

situations you could go through in your life. And I thought, I

Alana Moor: 00:30:30

just knew, I just knew, it just came to me that I needed to

Alana Moor: 00:30:34

share my experience and my story. And here's the thing, I

Alana Moor: 00:30:37

remember someone saying to me in prison, prison is a different

Alana Moor: 00:30:40

world. And I became numb to a lot of the stories in the

Alana Moor: 00:30:43

situations that I went through, because we could sit here for

Alana Moor: 00:30:46

five hours, five days and talk about hilarious stories of

Alana Moor: 00:30:50

people infiltrating drugs, and people throwing alcohol over the

Alana Moor: 00:30:53

fence and girls running to pick it up and how the system works,

Alana Moor: 00:30:58

right? There are rules behind bars, there's no rules, and I

Alana Moor: 00:31:01

want to be able to share my experience, the good, the bad,

Alana Moor: 00:31:04

the ugly, there were good days, there were bad days, there were

Alana Moor: 00:31:07

funny, funny moments. There was amazing learning experiences. I

Alana Moor: 00:31:12

don't wish this on anybody, but I would never change it for the

Alana Moor: 00:31:16

world. And so I feel like, why do we come to this earth, to go

Alana Moor: 00:31:20

through an experience to help somebody else? So I've started

Alana Moor: 00:31:24

my book, I haven't finished it. But it's basically talking more

Alana Moor: 00:31:28

about, you know, I want it to be really raw. So I really want to

Alana Moor: 00:31:33

share the real things I was writing about, right? Here's a

Alana Moor: 00:31:37

raw look at how it was, here's what I've learned from it. And

Alana Moor: 00:31:41

here's what I wish for you. You know, I did a lot of things in

Alana Moor: 00:31:45

prison every single day that I forced myself to, like, let's

Alana Moor: 00:31:48

say our gratitude list, right? Or, or, or planning out my

Alana Moor: 00:31:53

future and how that looked. So I want to be able to help people

Alana Moor: 00:31:57

to do that for themselves. And look at the big picture, but

Alana Moor: 00:32:02

then also look at, you know, who isn't what it's like, what I

Alana Moor: 00:32:08

went through so that they don't have to go through it?

Howard Brown: 00:32:11

Well, you can tell your story. And it's there was

Howard Brown: 00:32:16

horrible times to don't don't care. It was not a bunch of

Howard Brown: 00:32:19

roses by any stretch. I'm sure there was a lot that you even

Howard Brown: 00:32:21

talked about, you know, a switchblade and, and nasty stuff

Howard Brown: 00:32:26

happening as well. But I want to wrap things up a little bit. But

Howard Brown: 00:32:33

I want you to talk about to the word justice. I want you to talk

Howard Brown: 00:32:37

about justice, the meaning and justice your son, please. Yeah,

Alana Moor: 00:32:43

thank you. You know, I that's, that's where do I even

Alana Moor: 00:32:50

start? So justice, my son, I fought for my freedom for a long

Alana Moor: 00:32:55

time. When I got out of prison, I ended up as you know, going

Alana Moor: 00:33:01

and spending time with a woman whose name is Sonny justice. And

Alana Moor: 00:33:06

she basically created Burt's Bees into the brand that you see

Alana Moor: 00:33:10

now has taught me so much about self love about running

Alana Moor: 00:33:14

businesses about managing businesses, and did that with

Alana Moor: 00:33:18

her came home was deported from Panama, defeated, heartbroken

Alana Moor: 00:33:24

because I had while I was in prison, I met my partner, I met

Alana Moor: 00:33:29

the love of my life. That's a crazy story. And I had to leave

Alana Moor: 00:33:35

him I had no choice. And I remember I got home. And two

Alana Moor: 00:33:39

weeks later, I found out I was pregnant. And I didn't know when

Alana Moor: 00:33:44

I would see my partner again. And how do you walk away from

Alana Moor: 00:33:48

somebody that you love, but also somebody that supported you in

Alana Moor: 00:33:50

the darkest moment when they didn't have to, had no

Alana Moor: 00:33:53

obligation to come and see a person in prison, when you could

Alana Moor: 00:33:58

be seeing a woman that's out in public doing good things with

Alana Moor: 00:34:01

her life. And you chose to be there for me. And, you know,

Alana Moor: 00:34:07

through that, also, like, you know, as I started my little

Alana Moor: 00:34:10

foundation and all of that, like I wanted to pick a name because

Alana Moor: 00:34:15

this was like a full circle moment. Panama took my life

Alana Moor: 00:34:20

away. And then Panama went ahead and gave me life. And I raising

Alana Moor: 00:34:28

a son is not easy when you're starting your life from scratch.

Alana Moor: 00:34:32

raising a son is not easy when you're doing it as a single

Alana Moor: 00:34:34

mother. Raising your son is not easy when you're doing it. With

Alana Moor: 00:34:37

all with everything going for you. It's not easy, but there is

Alana Moor: 00:34:44

justice behind what I went through. And like I just said,

Alana Moor: 00:34:49

justice is that full circle moment for me. And my son is

Alana Moor: 00:34:53

just the most beautiful Latino man you've ever seen. My laptop?

Howard Brown: 00:34:57

Yeah, of course you are. Right And it's

Howard Brown: 00:35:00

beautiful. You also finally had some trusted caregiver mentors

Howard Brown: 00:35:07

that that really cared for you, your partner he's dedicated to

Howard Brown: 00:35:11

you. And then sunny justice taught you that there is a

Howard Brown: 00:35:18

brighter tomorrow. This testimony is so powerful. I want

Howard Brown: 00:35:23

to actually just wrap up the show we're gonna do our shining

Howard Brown: 00:35:26

brightly moment. So let's shot together, put on your

Howard Brown: 00:35:29

sunglasses.

Alana Moor: 00:35:30

The great thing about these is these are

Alana Moor: 00:35:32

actually from panama,

Howard Brown: 00:35:34

panama Jack are real Panama's sunglasses while

Howard Brown: 00:35:37

we are shining brightly here, because your your testimony is

Howard Brown: 00:35:41

so powerful. Your perseverance, your resolve your resiliency,

Howard Brown: 00:35:46

and to start and give justice a good life. Give yourself a good

Howard Brown: 00:35:50

life. And may you be reconnected with your partner soon. Please

Howard Brown: 00:35:54

tell people how they can everyone's gonna want to get in

Howard Brown: 00:35:56

touch with you. So how's the best I'll get there. Get in

Howard Brown: 00:35:58

touch with you.

Alana Moor: 00:36:00

Thank you, you're so sweet. So I would say my

Alana Moor: 00:36:04

Instagram is at Alana Moor speaks more being spelled mooR.

Alana Moor: 00:36:11

My name is spelled A h l a n a. And then I have a little website

Alana Moor: 00:36:17

WWW.AlanaMoor.my.Canva.site. Those are probably the best ways

Alana Moor: 00:36:24

to get in touch with me send me a DM. Yeah, and I'm

Howard Brown: 00:36:29

going to include everything in the show notes and

Howard Brown: 00:36:32

in the comments on social and everything like that people are

Howard Brown: 00:36:35

going to want to reach out to you because you're also although

Howard Brown: 00:36:38

you're working on the book, you are a speaker. And you also

Howard Brown: 00:36:41

actually are a mindset coach, and you have a giveaway. So tell

Howard Brown: 00:36:46

people that you're going to give away some discount off your some

Howard Brown: 00:36:49

of your coaching.

Alana Moor: 00:36:50

Ah, this is awesome. So yes, I am a mindset coach, I

Alana Moor: 00:36:54

am going to offer if you send me a DM saying shining brightly,

Alana Moor: 00:36:58

obviously thank you to Howard. I'm giving 50% off your first

Alana Moor: 00:37:02

four sessions with me for mindset coaching, we'll do a

Alana Moor: 00:37:06

discovery call and we'll get into your four sessions. And

Alana Moor: 00:37:09

it's I'm just so looking forward to work with working with people

Alana Moor: 00:37:13

to help them to really shift their mindset and shift their

Alana Moor: 00:37:15

life. And also on my website, you can get in touch with me for

Alana Moor: 00:37:19

speaking engagements, you can donate to my foundation, which

Alana Moor: 00:37:23

actually helps bring dignity packages to women in prison in

Alana Moor: 00:37:26

Panama. I'm working to make that bigger and better every single

Alana Moor: 00:37:30

day. So I would love to collab and chat with anybody about that

Alana Moor: 00:37:33

as well.

Howard Brown: 00:37:35

It's beautiful. And so this has been one

Howard Brown: 00:37:39

powerful show, and I you are a light and you're taking a awful

Howard Brown: 00:37:45

situation and making it better. I'm sure you can coach lots of

Howard Brown: 00:37:49

men and women that that need that type of help as well. And I

Howard Brown: 00:37:53

do the same. And we're that's why we're so aligned. And so you

Howard Brown: 00:37:57

can reach me at shining brightly.com You can find out

Howard Brown: 00:38:00

about speaking and my my book, of course and the podcasts and

Howard Brown: 00:38:04

my advocacy work, and I help and mentor entrepreneurs young ones

Howard Brown: 00:38:09

at Babson College and cancer patients, and I work in the

Howard Brown: 00:38:12

interface space. So come interact with me as well. I have

Howard Brown: 00:38:15

downloads for mentorship, survivorship and interfaith

Howard Brown: 00:38:19

relations. So this has been another great show. We will

Howard Brown: 00:38:21

close it out by saying let's all shine brightly a little bit each

Howard Brown: 00:38:25

day for ourselves, for others and our communities. And yes,

Howard Brown: 00:38:30

the world will be a better place. Amen.

Alana Moor: 00:38:32

Thank you so much, Howard. Thank you for having me.

Howard Brown: 00:38:35

My pleasure.