Philadelphia residents recently got their bodies moving through two exciting community partnerships with the Free Library's Culinary Literacy Center's Healthy Communities programming!

While about half the classes offered by the Culinary Literacy Center revolve around plant-based culinary recipes and cooking classes (which is where we got our name!), the others focus on fitness, yoga, and body movement.

We yet again had the opportunity to partner with Roots2Rise, a nonprofit making yoga accessible to anyone—regardless of age, abilities, demographic, gender, or income level they come from—offering 5-week virtual yoga classes for youth and adults from March to May 2021.

One of the yoga Instructors stressed the perspective that individuals should consider in their practice:

"There's no end goal in (yoga)... you can't be 'good' or 'bad' at it. You're always practicing. Even people you see doing crazy handstands and stuff—they're practicing. We are all practicing."

This is a great reminder of how yoga is forever cultivating the idea of self and how to better be with self. Roots2Rise teaches yoga in a pressure-free environment, inviting folks of all levels to try out and explore new concepts.

Yoga not your thing? The Culinary Literacy Center also linked up with ULiftU, a nonprofit that empowers currently and formerly incarcerated citizens to be professional Fitness Coaches. ULiftU even has a certification program where their graduates are paid a living wage to run classes for underserved groups to address chronic disease in Philadelphia. Residents participated in 5-week classes from March until July.

Did you miss one of these 5-week sessions? Want to have one easy link to access Yoga and Fitness workouts? No worries! You can check out our LinkTree page to access these Yoga and Fitness workouts.

We hope you will feel inspired to incorporate movement into your everyday lives!

Healthy Communities aims to provide accessible, fun, and nurturing programming to tap into physical health and wellness, as well as holistic practices of mindfulness and mental health.