“Think of three things you are grateful for and never minimize what you go through.”
The News Yogi
Journalism and Yoga. Morning news anchor, Leslie Rangel considers it the perfect combination for journalists looking to achieve mental wellness. In fact, she calls herself the “News Yogi” who finds joy in helping journalists navigate life after a covering deadline driven stories. Some of those work assignments include violence, stress-filled and traumatic events.
“Yoga for journalists started off as just yoga for me, as a journalist. Slowly, I started to recognize that it was helping me deal with stress and anxiety and depression too. I started to use it as means for myself and through that, I’ve gone on a journey of finding myself especially in this career. This career can be really tough,” Rangel said.
Rangel, a certified yoga instructor believes the art has helped with her confidence, setting boundaries, as well as finding her voice.
“People think yoga is a crazy hands-stand thing. Yoga can be as simple as just pausing, breathing and checking back into yourself; being mindful of what’s happening around you. A lot of times, especially as women, we can get caught up in living life on someone else’s expectations. It’s so important to get rid of those feelings through yoga.”
The award-winning journalist discovered her love for yoga about a decade ago which was right around the time she began her broadcasting career. However, it wasn’t until the Covid-19 pandemic, that Rangel realized that journalists could really use an extra boost of encouragement to manage daily stress from their jobs.
“If you would’ve told me in March that I would be teaching journalists yoga and launching a virtual studio, I don’t think I would have believed it,” Rangel exclaimed.
Now that’s she on a mission to share yoga techniques with journalists, Rangel focuses on movements aimed at helping a person slow down or eliminate chaos.
“Right now, I teach two types of yoga primarily. One is restorative, so that’s where you sit and pose. The other kind of yoga that I teach is more of a flow base. I also teach a lot of mediation without any movement and that is just breath-work,” said Rangel who’s also studying Yoga Psychology.
As for what’s next for Rangel, and the virtual yoga studio she leads with on-demand classes, only time will tell if she’ll expand and reach out to other professionals in stressful careers.
“For now, it’s just for journalists. I want to set my boundaries and not spread myself too thin. I am still a working journalist but I never close the door on any possibilities because you never know where it will lead you.”