For centuries, yoga has been a tool used for grounding, healing, and finding inner peace.

These days, you don’t have to be in a studio or on a far-away beach to reap the benefits of this practice.

“Meditation can just look like pausing, closing your eyes, taking a deep breath,” says Chelsea Jackson Roberts, who leads Peloton’s Power in Presence yoga series. 

Jackson Roberts recently teamed up with Canadian Shayla Stonechild—a fellow global yoga ambassador for Lululemon, and a Red River Mètis and Nehiyaw iskwew (Plains Cree woman) from Muscowpetung First Nations—to lead three yoga and meditation classes centered around reclaiming your power. 

Though teaching on different sides of the border, Shayla and Chelsea both use their platforms to connect to their communities and beyond, leading their practices with strength and tenderness. 

We sat down with Shayla and Chelsea to learn more about the series, the importance of slowing down, and how yoga and meditation can be a profound vessel for healing.
 

Shayla and Chelsea, you've known each other and have supported each other on your yoga journeys for years! Now, you’ve joined forces for the latest Power in Presence series. What does it mean to both of you to share this platform together?

Chelsea Jackson Roberts: Shayla and I have a history together. We are both Lululemon ambassadors and I think it's beautiful that Shayla is the first Indigenous global ambassador and I'm the first Black global ambassador. We bring our cultures with us, we carry everyone with us. 

To have Shayla bringing new and fresh energy to the mat and that we could coexist in the space together and show up with our full selves and our communities behind us, it was really beautiful to share that with her.

Shayla Stonechild:  I don't think there was anyone else that I would've rather shared this moment with other than Chelsea. Seeing what she was able to do for the Black community in the States really inspired me to take initiative even within my own journey when I started.

This feels like such a full circle moment of both of our careers coming together and also being in solidarity with the Black and Indigenous communities. I also realize the responsibility that comes with that too. Being Indigenous and holding the weight of our communities on our backs is beautiful, but it also takes a lot of presence and courage to represent our communities in a way that we want them to feel proud of.

Let’s talk about the title of the series, Power in Presence. How can yoga help people reclaim their power?

Chelsea:  For people who have never practiced yoga, I always like to start with the definition of it, and it means to unite and join.  Yoga is this opportunity for us to be deeply grounded in our power. 

 I've been practicing yoga for 20 years now, and I think about how I've evolved. But with yoga as my companion, it allows me to resist anything that society is telling me about who I'm supposed to be or what I'm not supposed to do. 

"Yoga is what puts me back together and allows me to be in my joy." —Chelsea Jackson Roberts

Shayla: I think power can only truly happen through embodied presence.

When I think of yoga, I think of what it means: union. But I also think of the definition of Cree, nehinaw,  which translates into a four-bodied person. This makes up the foundations of the medicine wheel, a circle that represents the interconnectedness of everything and everyone.

That circle is divided into four to represent the physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual aspects of one's well being. Western society highlights three—the physical, the mental, the emotional—but often we're missing that spiritual component that roots us into our presence. 

That can look different for everyone, depending which culture you come from, which philosophy or religion you follow. But for me, my presence and my power comes through that spiritual connection. That’s through pranayama, through prayer, through setting an intention. That gives me power, and through that we begin to heal our lineages and timelines, and we begin to create a new future that has yet to be done.

When we talk about yoga, our minds often go to the movement aspect, but there’s also that mental side. What advice do you have for those who are nervous about stepping into a meditative space where they're alone with their thoughts?

Shayla:  For me, it's about simplifying the practice. When I get stuck on like, ‘oh, I have to do this mantra or this technique,’ it becomes too much. 

When I started really meditating, I had a structure of five minutes a day because I knew that was doable for me.  I live in Vancouver, so I would go down to the ocean and ground my feet into the earth, close my eyes, and listen to the waves.  I would invite first-timers or beginner yogis to go sit on the land and start listening to the sounds around you.

Chelsea:  I think there's a misconception that we think that we have to not have any thoughts or that those intrusive thoughts are awful and bad and we're not doing meditation right.

I always like to tell our students that you just notice. You just acknowledge them. I tell myself to bow to my thoughts, no matter what those thoughts may be. I'm just grateful that I have the presence of mind to even acknowledge that something is there.  

A meditation may also look like pausing, closing your eyes, taking in a deep breath. I live in New York City and most times it is quite difficult to find that peace and solace. I want people to know that if you don't have an ideal environment, you can still try and practice that meditation.

How can we use yoga as a tool to slow down, particularly for those who have experienced generational trauma?

Shayla:  Slowing down is a revolutionary act in itself, and it's reclaiming some of the practices that my ancestors utilized. We worked with the natural cycles and seasons of life, so there were moments where we were slowing down and there were moments where we were speeding up. For me, slowing down is a reclamation of where I come from and the lineage I come from, Plains Cree and Red River Metis. For Indigenous people, slowing down is what it’s going to take to heal those generational wounds, because we can't be fully healed or rested until we actually come back into grounding our nervous system. 

"The simple act of just slowing down is revolutionary in itself because the world tells us not to. I recognize that this is a privilege, but it's also my birthright in the same breath." —Shayla Stonechild

Chelsea:  I push back any time that someone says that restorative yoga or a slow flow is lazy. I reject a word like ‘lazy’ because my ancestors did not have an opportunity to rest, and so I'm reclaiming that for them. I'm reclaiming it so that my son can see examples of his mother and father resting and being intentional about that rest. When we press that pause button to take a moment, to breathe, to notice, that is the only way that we can move forward in a powerful, integrated way. 

Shayla, you’ve touched on the spiritual connection of yoga. How has your yoga practice intersected with the spiritual teachings of your culture?

Shayla:  When I was taking my first yoga teacher training, I was finding parallels between the eight limbs of the yoga practice, and Cree concepts. One I can draw upon is the niyamas and yamas. These are ethical disciplines on how you relate to the world, but also how you relate to yourself. The Cree concept of wahkohtowin talks about kinship, but on a deeper level, it’s about the responsibility that you have to yourself and to your community. For me, yoga is an anchor of bringing both of those worldviews together. Not merging them, but using them as a bridge.

When I teach yoga to Indigenous communities, oftentimes I'll draw parallels to words within my culture or to concepts of teachings that they'll understand so that they can maybe see yoga in a new light, because yoga is still really new to Indigenous communities. 

We need to dismantle this perception of yoga just being a physical practice, and I do that through language and I do that through teachings that's tied to my culture. My yoga practice anchors my rituals that I already have as an Indigenous woman—smudging, praying, offering, speaking to the land. 

Interview was edited for length and clarity.
 

Recommended

I Trained 1-On-1 With A Peloton Instructor, And This Is What I Learned

By: Marie Waine

Peloton instructor Andy Speer shares his tips for motivation, his current workout philosophy, and important form cues.

Read More

Recommended

8 Yoga Poses For A Better Sleep

By: Marie-France Pellerin

Winter is the perfect season for cocooning.

Read More