The Juneteenth Nationwide Vacation could also be new to the aware consciousness of some folks. However for a lot of others, we’ve been celebrating and commemorating Juneteenth for awhile now. For these unfamiliar, Juneteenth (June 19th, 1865) is the anniversary of the day Union troopers arrived in Galveston, TX and thru Normal Order #3 knowledgeable enslaved African People that they had been free—a full two and a half years after the Emancipation Proclamation and over three months after the top of the Civil Warfare with Lee’s Give up at Appomattox Court docket Home in April 1865.
To me, Juneteenth signifies a number of issues: a) as Jelani Cobb has written, the true which means of Juneteenth exists in “the huge chasm between the idea of freedom inscribed on paper and the fact of freedom in our lives”. And, b) a possibility to discover the idea of freedom in a person, non secular context—discovering my very own path in a system that seeks to demean or diminish me.
The ideas of freedom and defiant pleasure are foundational to my private and instructing practices. I got here to the observe of yoga as a way to course of excessive emotional misery at work, and thru constant observe discovered the surprising reward of liberation from (what I believed was well-deserved) anger at how I used to be being handled. Constant observe gave me the house in thoughts, physique and breath, to test in with what was actually occurring round me and select an acceptable response.
What started as liberation from the perceived want to reply in variety to somebody who handled me poorly, has continued to unfold into freedom from baser instincts and freedom to like, grace, peace, pleasure and compassion for myself and all who cross my path. Sadhana and abhyasa have gotten me ever nearer to freedom from samskara, getting me nearer to my true nature of affection, peace, presence, pleasure and repair.
On a broader non secular stage, Juneteenth is a chance not solely to have a good time the top of chattel slavery in the USA, however as a yoga trainer and working towards yogi, I see it as a possibility to discover different methods to create freedom in our lives—freedom in our thoughts, to loosen tightly held beliefs (whether or not as critique or being connected to outcomes). Juneteenth is an opportunity to contemplate how 
we are able to use our practices–meditative, bodily or civic engagement–to be of service to the liberation of all beings and alleviate struggling within the wider world, not only for ourselves. And never in a spirit of bypass, however being current with struggling utilizing the instruments of the breath, motion, meditation and give up to emancipate ourselves from psychological slavery (as Bob Marley sagely suggested) and discover freedom within the current second to take clever motion from the center.
The person and collective issues we face would require us to do the work internally and externally to domesticate the fortitude and resilience to liberate ourselves from the load of the previous to create space for the potential of a brighter future. Might we discover inspiration within the story of Juneteenth and the broader wrestle for freedom and embody the braveness to bridge the chasm that exists between the liberty we’ve and the liberty we search—each as people and in our society. Might we use the knowledge of historical past and the instruments of yoga and meditation to deliver the presents of freedom and justice for all, past the widespread notions of merely caring for ourselves.
Peace, grace, well being, freedom and pleasure to all.
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Reggie Hubbard is an internationally-recognized yoga and meditation trainer and the founder and Chief Serving Officer of Lively Peace Yoga. His yoga and meditation observe have served as a sanctuary of peace and perspective whereas navigating the stresses of being a black man on the earth and serving in stress stuffed jobs on the peak of politics. He started working towards yoga beneath excessive emotional misery at work and now shares his observe to all walks of life in service to serving to folks navigate this factor known as life with extra peace and ease.
Reggie has taught Members of Congress, Congressional Workers, main labor unions, main progressive organizations and people from all walks of life—easy instruments for managing stress and bringing peace to thoughts, physique and spirit.
Along with his yoga instructing observe, Reggie has held many senior strategic and logistical roles throughout quite a lot of fields, starting from world advertising, digital and group organizing, authorities relations, worldwide schooling to Presidential campaigning. He obtained a B.A. in philosophy from Yale College and an MBA in worldwide technique from the Vlerick Enterprise College in Belgium.
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