How I breathed my way into physical and mental well-being
“Everything breathes: breathing is the inspiration of Life within all living forms of reality. All matter is in a continual state of particle exchange. In humans, breathing is the biological basis and spiritual expression that renews life, propels awareness and focuses body-mind functioning in time and space.” (1st Principle of Conscious Connected Breathing – J. Yost)
I love this, says it all.
Many years ago I seriously went onto a “breathing diet”, but not to lose weight. Every evening for 3 months, not exception, I would do 30 min of deep abdominal breathing, before falling asleep.
I was studying at James Madison University in Virginia, USA, at that time and I was doing 2 things every single day: studying and going to the recreational center to swim, climb, play squash, run (outdoor) and all sorts of indoor and outdoor activities.
My aim
I was taking exams after exams, every other week I had an exam, in a foreign language and within a totally different education system than the one I was used to. Stress levels were at their highest. And with me being a nerd, a perfectionist one, I was determined to get all A’s. I put a lot of pressure on me.
From the sports point of view I wanted to swim 25 meter without taking a single breath.
And so I decided to do breathing exercises to increase my lung capacity but also to keep me calm and focused for my exams and presentations. Do you know what happened within the 3 months of daily breathing exercises? I transformed
What I did
The breathing techniques I was doing were the triangle, the square and the rectangle breathing. Allow me to briefly describe them below.
First things first. If you have a heart or cardiovascular condition, high or low blood pressure or a condition or illness that could be affected by the breathing exercises then please seek medical advice before commencing breathing exercises.
Step 1. Make sure you breathe correctly, that means when you breathe in you make your stomach big, when you breathe out you pull your stomach in.
Step 2. Breathe in through your nose and out through your mouth
Step 3. The exercise. Let’s take 4 seconds as count for breathing in, out and holds. You can adjust them to fit your level:
Linear breathing technique
I use this as a warm up for the others.
• BREATHE IN through your nose on a count of 4
• BREATHE OUT through your nose on a count of 4.
• Repeat
Triangle breathing technique
Imagine an equilateral triangle. It has 3 equal sides
• BREATHE IN through your nose on a count of 4.
• HOLD on a count of 4.
• BREATHE OUT through your nose on a count of 4.
• No hold after this one. Repeat
Square breathing technique
A square has 4 equal sides.
• Thus BREATHE IN through your nose on a count of 4.
• HOLD on a count of 4.
• BREATHE OUT through your nose on a count of 4.
• HOLD on a count of 4.
• Repeat
Rectangle breathing technique
A rectangle has 2 short equal sides and 2 longer sides equal as well.
• BREATHE IN through your nose on a count of 4.
• HOLD on a count of 8 (longer than the in breathe).
• BREATHE OUT through your nose on a count of 4.
• HOLD on a count of 8 (longer than the out breathe).
• Repeat
When you breathe in you are not actually sending oxygen into your stomach. All oxygen goes into your lungs. Inflating your stomach helps fill in the lungs. And it gives you something to focus your mind on.
The results
So what happened after the first week of doing breathing exercises religiously?
Physical benefits:
• It improved my cardiovascular capacity
• Increased the amount of oxygen in my blood, so I would recover better and faster
• My heart became stronger. The heart is a muscle and like any other muscle in it can be developed with practice.
• When I injured myself it would heal faster. Breathing stimulates on a healing level as well calming in the case of a pain.
Psychological benefits:
• As mentioned before I was studying in a foreign language, within a different education system and stress levels we very high. Breathing helped me calm my nerves before my exams and presentations.
• Breathing also helped me control my anxiety and have patience with people around me.
• I used to be extremely angry. Breathing helped regain control over my emotions. I could not change my thoughts but I could change my actions and that changed my mental well-being.
So give them a try and if you’d like to know more If you’d like to know more please download my free ebook “15 Healthy Habits For The Body”
She works with entrepreneurs, men and women, and re-engineers how the body functions to run like clockwork. This is done through building lasting foundations and a fit, strong and powerful body through Natural Movement in the Natural Environment.
Her mission is to challenge the status quo to enable people to reach their goals. This is done through building strong, lasting foundations in the natural outdoor environment; reducing the risk of injuries and educating people on the power of the fundamentals of Natural Human Movement™.