At its core, the word “yoga’ means “to join” or “to unite”. If you think about yoga through the lens of the Yogic scriptures, the practice of yoga leads to the union of individual consciousness with that of the universal consciousness, indicating a perfect harmony between body and mind, man and nature.

Yoga is also a process, and an active one at that. It’s the way you engage with the world, and in doing so, create your own flow of life. Our yoga practice is how we engage, how we participate, how we show up. It’s how we create relationships. For many of us, it’s how we make sense of our world. 

At Aditi, we believe that yoga and the fight for social justice are tightly linked. As our country continues to deal with the realities of COVID-19, we also need to acknowledge that there’s a deeper and larger public health crisis, one that’s been left untreated in the United States for hundreds of years: racism. 

It’s been over a month since George Floyd was pinned down and killed by Minneapolis police officers — a senseless killing that triggered protests against police brutality, racism, and lack of accountability. It also forced many  white people to acknowledge and hold themselves accountable for their own racist behavior. Acknowledging this can be uncomfortable, frustrating, and overwhelming. And yet, there’s a hope in these actions. A way to create lasting change. A way toward growth.

Yoga teaches us to be keenly aware of our breath, our minds, our movements. It’s that self-awareness and focus, combined with action, that also needs to drive our social justice efforts. Here are a few of the actions we’ve been taking below. We know there are plenty of other lists like this one out there, but these are the resources we’ve been honored to learn from on our own journeys:

Read

  • The New York Times Magazine’s The 1619 Project

  • The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarnation in the Age of Colorblindness by Michelle Alexander

  • So You Want to Talk About Race by Ijeoma Oluo (she’s based in Seattle!)

  • How To Be An Antiracist by Ibram X. Kendi

  • White Fragility by Robin DiAngelo

  • Biased by Dr. Jennifer Eberhardt

  • Me and White Supremacy by Layla F. Saad

  • Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates

  • The Fire Next Time by James Baldwin

  • Anything by Rachel Cargle

Listen

  • Pod Save the People (podcast)

  • NPR’s Code Switch (podcast)

  • Still Processing (podcast) 

  • Rebecca Warfield Yoga, “What Yoga Can Teach Us About Actvism,” Dharma Drops Podcast (the podcast is about Warfield’s own feminist activism rather than racial justice activism, but it’s still a great listen — for understanding your own call to activism and how the tenets of yoga apply). 

Watch

  • Just Mercy

  • Let it Fall: Los Angeles 1982-1995 (a documentary about racial tensions in LA and the 1992 riots)

  • When They See Us (Netflix miniseries about the Central Park Five)

  • 13th (Netflix documentary exposing racial inequity within the criminal justice system)

  • I Am Not Your Negro (a documentary about James’ Baldwin’s unfinished novel)

  • Time: The Kalief Browder Story (a series that traces Kalief Browder’s horrific stay on Rikers Island, despite not being convicted of a crime)

  • The Hate U Give (film based on the young adult novel of the same name)

  • Selma

  • Fruitvale Station (biographical film about the events leading up to the death of Oscar Grant in the 2009 BART system shooting)

Donate

Support

One of the best ways to support racial justice is to shop and dine Black-owned businesses. Seattle Refined published a great list earlier this month: http://seattlerefined.com/lifestyle/support-black-owned-businesses-in-seattle