It's a Practice

I wasn’t sure what to write about this week, so when in doubt, write about yoga. People who know me well know better than to ask me anything about yoga unless they want to be in a conversation about yoga for a while.

A little more than two years ago I relocated from a big city (Tampa, Florida) to a small, rural area (northern Maryland) for a job in an even smaller rural area (south central Pennsylvania). When I moved I had been taking yoga at a studio in Tampa (Thank you, Erin and Lucky Cat for being my first yoga home) and was appalled that there were no studios near my new home that had classes that fit my schedule.

I was not thrilled about taking yoga online. Part of the whole yoga experience for me is being in a room with other people practicing mindfulness. The act of breathing together alone creates an energy that can’t be described.

I joined Peloton.

When I was scrolling through the possible instructors, I found Chelsea Jackson Roberts. I thought to myself “a black yoga instructor … Yassssss …”. Once I took a class of hers, well … I haven’t taken yoga from any other teacher on Peloton since.

I checked my milestones this morning. Not something I ever keep track of and was astounded to find I have taken more than 400 yoga classes with Dr. Roberts. (Yes, Dr. She got her Ph.D. You go, Chelsea.) I remember those first few classes when she would call out people’s screen names and say “Welcome to the Century Club, yogi,” and thinking “I’ll never get in that Century Club.” And yet here I am four times over and I hadn’t even been paying attention.

I just showed up. And keep showing up. Yay Me!

Dr. Chelsea Jackson Roberts has affected my healing journey in many small ways that have added up to, well, she has been helping me find the pieces of myself that I lost through the years and she doesn’t know it. We’ve never met. And I usually don’t take her live classes because they don’t match up with my schedule. So she wouldn’t recognize my screen name either.

Her classes are a completely different vibe. She helped bring gospel music back into my life. Her Gospel yoga flows gave me permission to lean into a genre that even though it isn’t my belief system, it made room for me.

In Peloton you can scroll through the playlists, so she also introduced me to many different artists that I had never listened to before and absolutely love. From India.Arie to Lizzo to A Beautiful Chorus. There are actually too many to name, but I’m grateful for all of them.

The things she says in class slowly started replacing the phrases I had been saying to myself all my life. Instead of my father’s voice saying “suck in your gut” I now hear Chelsea saying “draw the naval to the spine, not to minimize but to strengthen.” I hear her telling me to be grateful for my abundance and to make room for it.

Giving MY body permission to be on that mat.

She has been teaching me to show appreciation for the parts of me that I find hard to love.

She has been teaching me how to be mindful. How to meditate. How to breathe with intention. (How to do many things with intention.) And how to be kind to myself.

Most mornings I step on the mat by 6 a.m. and Chelsea Jackson Roberts’ voice is the first human voice I hear welcoming in the day. I didn’t realize until this morning how profound my connection is to this woman I have never met. And how powerful that can be.

That her words have been shaping the woman I am becoming. And she says them most of the time while teaching yoga to an empty studio. What kind of faith did that take? To show up for that job at Peloton years ago and step into an empty studio in front of cameras and to breathe alone?

Like I stepped into my empty spare bedroom and turned on the Peloton app and breathed alone. And again. And again. And again. And kept showing up.

Would I rather be in a studio taking yoga with people? Absolutely. But doing this alone for now is part of my journey.

Chelsea Jackson Roberts has been there, a quiet force of nature, through some extremely difficult times in my life.

She was there when I started trauma therapy. When I decided to get divorced. When I started shedding all kinds of relationships that do not serve me.

She was there when the 54-year-old cartilage in my right shoulder gave way and I face planted on my bedroom floor doing a chaturanga incorrectly (and I knew better. I wasn’t listening to my body. That’s a practice, too).

And she was there this morning. On a normal February day when I woke up, drank my coffee, and again stepped onto the mat.

“Good morning, Peloton. Are you ready?” she says with a gorgeous smile followed later by something that usually will make me laugh out loud in the middle of my practice.

I have a lot of teachers in my life. Innumerable. But some of them make a larger impact than others. At some point I will create a gratitude page on this website and start thanking all of them. I try and thank most of them when I talk to Spirit and am counting blessings.

But today, the last day of my 54th year in this meat suit my soul is walking around in (thank you Julie Pasqual, another teacher), I’m thanking Chelsea Jackson Roberts.

And thanking Peloton for the diversity and inclusion. For the quiet representation. For showing up in a way other corporations haven’t been able to show up for the under-represented. For hiring Chelsea and allowing the Gospel yoga flows. Allowing her to be her authentic self on the mat.

Because in more than 400 small, consistent ways, she changed my life. And helped change my relationship with my body. As she has said many times, “yoga is a work out but it is also a work IN.”

It’s the work IN that changed the important things that needed to be changed. And she was a part of that. And the entire time I was getting emotionally stronger, my body was getting stronger as well.

Imagine that.