Now I’m going to have you practice some of the breathing exercises that will help you when you are stressed or anxious; but before that I want to look at the relationship between stress and breathing. I think as an adult, certainly stress is a big aspect in changing breathing patterns and how you breathe.

When you’re stressed, notice if your breathing gets faster; or does it get slower? Faster.

If you’re stressed you will breathe using your upper chest, this is shallow breathing or do you notice using your diaphragm when you’re stressed?

When you are stressed do you sigh more or do you sigh less? You sigh more.

When you’re stressed do you breathe more or do you breathe less? I know some people hold their breath but generally we will start breathing more. We breathe faster, we bring more noticeable, we often breathe through the mouth.

That’s how we breathe when we’re stressed, but then we’re often told to take a deep breath. What I’d like you to do now is take a deep breath.

Did you increase the speed of it? Yes.

Was it like a big sigh? Yes.

If you were to look down at your chest you’ll see it’s upper chest breathing.

Taking the instruction to take the deep breath is endemic, you hear of it everywhere, we have this belief that the more air we breathe the more oxygen is delivered to the cells; but oxygen transfer takes place from the blood to the tissues in the presence of carbon dioxide. You breathe too hard, you get rid of too much co2 and the bond between oxygen and hemoglobin strengthens it’s called the oxygen dissociation curve.

The oxygen dissociation curve is a graph with oxygen partial pressure along the horizontal axis and oxygen saturation on the vertical axis, which shows an S-shaped relationship. Oxygen and carbon dioxide are transported in the blood as a result of changes in blood partial pressures.

But the other aspect is light breathing through the nose, you harness a higher concentration of nasal nitric oxide and nasal nitric oxide enhances oxygen uptake in the blood. To breathe through the nose you activate the diaphragm, activating the diaphragm and breathing through the nose will help activate the parasympathetic nervous system (PSNS). The slower and lighter you breathe the more you bring your body from a state of stress into relaxation, from sympathetic, fight or flight to parasympathetic rest & digest.

You need to do the opposite to the deep breath and that’s what we’re going to practice. So what I would like you to do is instead of breathing faster I would like you to completely slow down your breath, instead of sighing I would like you to have regular breathing, instead of breathing through the mouth I would like you to breathe through your nose instead of noticeable breathing I’d like you to have soft breathing.

So I’d like you to put one hand on your chest and one hand just above your navel and I would like you to tune in to your breath.

I would like you to feel the slightly colder air coming into your nose and the slightly warmer air leaving your nose. To feel the slightly colder air coming into the nose and the slightly warm air leaving your nose can influence your blood circulation through your breath.

Pay attention to your body temperature and check can we influence your blood circulation as you feel your breathing.

I’d like you to pay attention to the airflow as it comes into your nose and as it leaves your nose and I’d like you to start slowing down the speed of the air as it enters and leaves your nostrils.

Not to hold the breath, not to freeze your breathing, but to gently soften your breath, to slow it down and to slow down your breathing to the point you feel that you’re not getting enough air.

Can you slow down your breathing to the point that you feel you would like to take in a bigger breath.

So you’re following the airflow coming into your nose you’re following the airflow leaving your nose and you’re deliberately just gently softening it and slowing it down but to slow it down to the point you’d like to take in more air it shouldn’t be stressful. It should feel the same as if you’re going for a light walk and as you slow down your breathing carbon dioxide gently accumulates in the blood.

So I’d like you to also think of harnessing nitric oxide in the nasal cavity; the lighter you breathe through your nose the higher the concentration of nitric oxide that you bring into your lungs to breathe so lightly is quite so calm and so soft. If your attention wanders off bring your attention back onto your breath, breathe so softly so light you’re only doing this correctly if you feel that you’re not getting enough air.

I would like you to slow down your breathing to the point you feel that you’d like to take in the larger breath. That you feel a deprivation of air, continue slowing down the breath until you’re slowing down, continue slowing down the breath.

Two things to pay attention to the amount of saliva in your mouth and your body temperature. Okay so we can take a rest for a minute. You may have noticed you had an air shortage, felt you would like to take in a bigger breath that’s ok.

Buteyko Breathing

I’m going to try a slightly different approach I would like you for the next breathing practice is just to check which nostril is more blocked

Is that your left or is it to right?

What I’d like you to do is I’d like you to block your blocked nostril so the one that’s more congested is to hold that with your index finger and to breathe through your free nostril.

To start softening the breath as it comes through your free nostril so now we’re narrowing the concentration of air to one nostril. So that you breathe so quietly, almost as if the fine hairs within the nostrils do not move, you’re tuning into the airflow that comes into your nose and you’re feeling the airflow as it leaves your nose. You feel the airflow as it comes into your nose and you feel the air flow as it leaves your nose and you gently soften your breathing to the point you feel that you’re not getting enough air. The perfect person breathes  as if they do not breathe. Can you breathe so lightly to harness nasal nitric oxide to carry it into your lungs which will help to open up the airways. Sterilize the air improve ventilation perfusion breathing so soft, so calm, so quiet so I’d like you to continue for one more minute following the breathe feeling the airflow as it comes into your nose and feeling the airflow as it leaves your nose.

If your attention wanders off bring your attention back onto the breathe. It’s a very good exercise to follow your breathing take attention out of the mind onto the breath out of the mind onto the breath gently soft and your breathing, gently quiet your breathing gently, calm your breathing and the only thing you have to do is you’re paying attention to the airflow coming into the nose you’re paying attention to the airflow leaving your nose and you’re gently slowing it down and softly, gently slow it down.

You will notice a change in the amount of saliva in the mouth is your mouth drier or more moist?

When you get stressed how does your mouth go? dry

Well it  is the activation of the sympathetic nervous system (SNS), fight or flight, which is one half of the Automatic Nervous System.

When we do deep meditation how does our breathing change?

Our breathing goes down to almost nothing if you were to meditate for three four days in deep meditation you’ll find that your breathing, your metabolism drops, your breathing reduces everything changes get softer on the basis that stress makes people sick relaxation and reduced breathing would have to make them better.

When you focus on your breath and you deliberately start softening the breath you activate the parasympathetic nervous system (PSNS), the other half of the ANS responsible for rest and repair, you experience increased water in the mouth that’s generally accepted as activation of the, PSNS you can bring your body from a sympathetic tone, from being switched on, to being switched off within about three to four minutes.

By slowing down the breath it’s the complete opposite to the deep breath that’s usually instructed it’s absolutely vital to breath through the nose to help people if they’re in state of stress or anxiety. Mouth breathing is going to only contribute to these issues.

If anybody experienced a change in body temperature either cold or warmer or the same.

Okay now some of you may have felt a little bit colder, if you overdo it, it’s because it activates the sympathetic nervous system. This is what you create when doing the WHM, but as you know I would highly recommend the Wim Hof Method (WHM).

If the air shortage is too much a stress response happens, it’s a fine line between having our shortage and stress but that takes practice and I’m limited here.