Stay Ready

Written By Jacquelin Walker

Reflections from YOGAMOTIF teachers


As I woke up to yet another 70 degree day in Pittsburgh, I found myself one part terrified and one part grateful for the sun. If climate change is teaching us anything, it is that change is going to happen rapidly and chaotically, yet who said rapid chaos excludes moments of pleasure, joy, and wonder? 

Change is going to come whether we feel ready for it or not. However, the lesson I’ve learned thus far in this life is that it is possible to trust in oneself enough to navigate most any change. When faced with change that seems insurmountable, I remember the affirmation: I am ready.  

  • I am ready to face the challenges ahead?

  • I am ready to take necessary action to ensure my well being?

  • I am ready to move at a pace that is sustainable for me?

While change is inevitable and sometimes scary, acknowledging what I am ready for allows me to move with the change, to adapt to that change, to stand clearly in the truth of what it means to be human. 

Consider:

  • How do you handle change? 

  • How would you like to handle change? 

  • How perceptive and amenable are you to the changes that are coming?

  • What are you ready for?

Practice:

  • Set a timer for five (5) minutes

  • Sit comfortably. Breathe deeply, in and out through your nose, if that’s accessible to you. 

  • Continue breathing, filling up your lungs until your belly expands. 

  • Exhale fully - expressing the air from your nose. 

  • Continue with this rhythm and breathing. 

  • Visualize yourself and all that you are ready for with each inhale. 

  • Release any tension within your body with each exhale. 

  • Continue this list until you are ready for silence. 

  • Continue until the timer ends. 

This reflection is a part of Spring into Wellness, A funded project through the University of Pittsburgh’s Office of the Provost and its 2022-23 theme, the Year of Emotional Well-Being. This three-part Spring into Wellness project includes in-person classes, a 31-Days of Creative Wellness virtual routine, and a weekly inspirational newsletter.

Jacquelin Walker

Jacquelin Walker is a lawyer, artist, yoga instructor, and advocate for equity in arts, entertainment, and law practice. She creates spaces for voices excluded from these industries using her legal, creative, and yoga practices as labs to explore the possibilities that open to all of us when we center the care, concerns and visions of the folks marginalized within these communities.

Walker’s yoga practice and instruction focuses on sharing tools that help others create self-awareness with an eye toward individual and collective healing and expansion, centering principles of justice, joy, rest, and leisure.

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