Are you someone that gets overwhelmed from the pressure and stress daily life can bring?
Do you find it difficult to focus and slow down your thoughts down?
Would you like to learn some simple strategies to add into your daily life that will help you focus, keep calm and feel at peace?
All I am going to be explaining to you in this article is how to remember to breathe…
The body can survive months with out food, days with out water but only a few minutes without breathing. Breathing is the foundation to life.
Thousands of years ago humans understood the importance of breathing in all areas of life; mentally, physically and spiritually. They utilised their breathing for so many purposes, ‘not just staying alive’. Breathing was utilised in ways like healing, manifestation, focus, relaxation and so on… There are certain ratio’s of breath they would use to generate the breath and energy to manifest what they intended to. I will explain more on this in one of my upcoming articles on ‘Ancient rituals’.
It is crucial to understand that breathing patterns affect our mental state because it is your mental state that will determine your wellbeing in your every day life.
The Psychology of Breathing
Your breathing rates are intertwined with your nervous system thus also interconnects with emotional states such as fear and caution vs calm and trust. This is internally and externally processed by the ‘fight or flight response– fast breathing vs the rest and digest response – slow breathing.’
In each individual our internal representation systems are different, meaning we all have our own favoured representation. You might be more of a Visual, Auditory, kinesthetic (feelings), or Auditory Digital (self talk).
A person with an internal favoured representation of Visual will usually breath at the top of their lungs and normally in a faster rate. An Auditory will usually breath in the middle and in a medium rate. Kinesthetic people typically breath from the bottom of their lungs so you’ll see their stomachs going in and out, and an Auditory Digital will sometimes breath from the lower abdomen.
Our favored representational system, becomes our own language for our experience and plays a significant part in our mental processes and consciousness.
Now you have an understanding of how your breathing is impacted, its impacts on your life and how it is linked to our mind, body and even on us spiritually.
Let’s look at spirituality…. Have any of you have experienced or researched the scientific effects meditating have on your wellbeing?
Let’s take a look at some simple breath techniques…
There is one thing that a lot of ‘ancient’ practices and so called ‘new age’ practices of breathing have in common, that is to receive the full richness and experience of a breath, the ratio of the breath. There are many diverse types of breathing exercises available but in this article I am going to keep it simple and focus solely on one aspect of breathing.
Your exhale should be double to what you inhale is, The ratio is 1:1:2. Meaning inhale for 4 seconds hold for 4 seconds and exhale for 8 seconds.
The ‘inhale and hold’ should always be through the nasal passage where a gas called Nitric Oxide is produced by the sinus mucous membranes in your nose and in small doses enhances your lung capacity significantly to absorb oxygen by 15-25%. Nitric Oxide also known to kill viruses, bacteria and other germs.
You then exhale through the mouth, exhaling for double the amount so it slows the exhalation. This extra time allows the lungs to extract a greater amount of oxygen and expand your lung capacity.
Note:
To get the best results every inhale breath should be a big belly breath, take that breath all the way to the bottom so your belly in sticking out.
Then you exhale slowly as though you are emptying your belly, sucking it back in.
If you are not comfortable with exhaling for 8 seconds then start off with 2 seconds in, 2 seconds hold and 4 seconds exhale slowly working your way up from there.
The more often you do this the more the benefits you will get.
Breathing can also be used as a ‘reset button’, so if you are ever in an overwhelming state just focus on your breathing ratio to get yourself in a calm state.
I recommend you make this a daily ritual. Start off by doing a minimum of 20 breaths each morning, maintain your full focus on just the breath. Be conscious of yourself and your presence in that moment.
I guarantee that this will kick start your day off by feeling calm, relaxed, centred and powerful.
Living Your Power Now
Michael Sorgiovanni
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