I would like to teach you how to breathe.
While this may sound pretentious, breathwork is experiencing increasingly widespread awareness alongside the wellness trends of yoga, meditation, apps, courses, retreats and figures like Wim Hof.
Like the mind, the breath is your constant companion. We can go weeks without food, days without water, about an hour without warmth, but mere minutes without air. Each of us takes about 20,000 breaths every single day, but who’s counting?
To the uninitiated, breathwork is defined here as intentionally breathing to affect the body and mind.
Like a trained sommelier whose refined palate can detect all manner of nuance in wine, I wish to similarly impart an appreciation for the nuances of your breath and invite you to sip some air with your psyche.
As the Jung quote goes: “Until you make the unconscious conscious, it will direct your life and you will call it fate.”
Science, Tradition & Aristotelian Inspiration
James Nestor’s massive bestseller Breath shares how science is catching up to millenia-old traditions in validating how the quality of the breath influences the quality of mind and by extension, quality of life. Physiology affects psychology. One such tradition stems from one of yoga’s eight limbs – pranayama. Prana, in Sanskrit, refers to life force and breath; while yama is often translated as control, an alternative interpretation is extension, i.e. to extend the breath and its accompanying life force. Analogous concepts to prana are prevalent across other cultures: pneuma (Greek), qi (Chinese), ki (Japanese), hā (Hawaiian), ruach (Hebrew).
For the sake of our wellbeing, it behooves us to familiarize ourselves with this aspect of our physiology consciously. Like blinking, It is one of a few activities that are both voluntary and involuntary.
As there are many schools of thought on breathing, I find it fascinating that such a seemingly simple and trivial activity yields so much complexity. Simple, trivial yet vital. On the one hand, we are always one breath away from death. On the other hand, cultivating a relationship with the breath through meditative practices can lead one all the way to enlightenment.
Let’s closely examine the different elements involved in breathing through the lens of this quote from Aristotle:
“Anyone can become angry - that is easy; but to be angry with the right person, to the right degree, and at the right time, and for the right purpose, and in the right way, that is not within everyone’s power, and is not easy.”
Applied to the breath, a parallel postulate might go like this:
to breathe without awareness is easy; but to breathe in the right way at the right time for the right activity at the right intensity, this is not easy.
Dramatis Personae of the Breath
Like an acting troupe, breathing involves a whole cast of characters I’d like to introduce.
There’s the nose with its two nostrils, sinuses, turbinates and mucus membranes. Breathing through the right nostril stimulates alertness while the left promotes relaxation. Similarly, inhalation is generally activating while exhalation is calming.
Then there’s the mouth. It is possible to breathe through either nostril, the mouth, or some combination thereof. In general, nose breathing is preferred outside of specific techniques.
The lungs. Where the magic happens: oxygen gets absorbed into the bloodstream while carbon dioxide gets filtered out. Their total surface area is about the size of half a tennis court while the average person breathes in around 11,000 liters of air each day.
Then there is the requisite musculature.
The diaphragm is clearly the star here – the main dome-shaped muscle at the bottom of the rib cage separating the abdomen and chest that flattens and allows the flow of air in and out of the lungs through changes in pressure between body and world. Emphasizing the diaphragm is generally referred to as belly breathing, as the flattening of the diaphragm distends the abdomen and its viscera.
In a more supportive role, there are also the intercostals, the muscles that facilitate the expansion and contraction of the rib cage. Emphasizing this aspect is generally associated with chest breathing.
Some bit players also include the abdominals for forceful expiration and a host of other muscles attached to the rib cage.
Other factors to consider are more qualitative than structural.
There is the smoothness of the breath, which could be interpreted as the coordination of the diaphragm along the arc of the inhale and exhale. There are teachings from pranayama that elucidate certain dysfunctions based on difficulties along the different breath phases (e.g. inspiration, inspiratory pause, expiration, expiratory pause).
Segmentation of the inhale and exhale into more than one phase. (e.g. the physiological sigh described below features a double inhale).
How active or passive – e.g. how effortful is the inhale and exhale (or both).
The rate of breath. There is a huge range here. One self-explanatory technique is called the one minute breath; others aim for two to three breaths per second; and for general health the optimal rate, according to Nestor, is 5.5 breaths per minute.
Pauses at the top (between inspiration and expiration) or bottom (between expiration and inspiration) of the breath.
And the ratio among these intervals. Box or square breathing involves equal time spent among the inhale, exhale and both pauses in between.
Moreover, while whether or not the vocal apparatus is involved complicates the discussion, it can achieve desired effects acting like a garden hose attachment affecting the pressure and flow of breath. Certain techniques also involve specific placement of the tongue.
My Breathwork Toolbox: An Excerpt
While an exhaustive list of breathing techniques is beyond scope, here are a few frequently used tools in my breath toolbox and my experience using them.
For example, hissing for as long as possible on an exhale is really effective at calming down the nervous system and lowering the heart rate. Similarly, pursing the lips and blowing air as if blowing bubbles through a straw accomplishes more or less the same effect. I have used the former during traffic to keep calm while I use the latter when laying down for a session of NSDR (non-sleep deep rest) or yoga nidra (corpse pose plus a body scan), two restorative practices I observe. They are essentially conscious power naps.
The physiological sigh is also a very useful breath pattern to know and have on hand when attempting to lower the heart rate rapidly whether from physical exertion or emotionally charged situations. It is quite simple – after taking a substantial inhale to relatively full capacity, sniff – then let out an exhale as long as you can manage. Repeat a few times and you ought to notice its effects. I like to use this when cycling uphill or at a traffic stop to recover – also helpful after a bout of intense physical exertion like sprints.
While the previous two were more calming, another technique I use frequently provokes more alertness. Breath of fire, as it is called, involves essentially panting through one’s nose with mouth closed. Quick, rapid, forceful, and shallow exhales drawing the navel in while letting the inhale happen passively. Performing this for even as little as one minute ought to rapidly shift your energy levels. This technique is a staple of kundalini yoga but can certainly be a standalone practice.
Furthermore, blocking one or both nostrils for certain intervals affects nitric oxide (NO) production in the sinuses. NO is a powerful endogenous vasodilator that promotes oxygen absorption and utilization. A very cool trick to resolve congestion involves holding out your breath while pinching your nose. Wait until the urge to breathe builds, then inhale as slowly as you can manage. Recover and repeat.
Director’s Cut
Other modulators to breathing involve the musculature of the pelvic floor, the abdominals, the back, spine and neck. In yoga, there are techniques called the bandhas, which translates to locks – this further affects the breath and its effects in numerous ways. There are three: root, middle, and neck. The root lock manipulates the pelvic floor – essentially identical to the kegel exercise involved in interrupting the flow of urine. The middle lock involves drawing the navel towards the spine and up, akin to ab vacuums or sucking in one’s gut with empty lungs. The neck lock, depending on tradition, involves either drawing one’s chin back or touching the chin to the chest. A combination of all three is called the great lock. These are generally considered more advanced elements of practice, but effects include generating energy, improving digestion and inducing mystical experience.
Last, I will touch on the role the mind can play – in qigong (Chinese qi, “breath, energy”; gong “effort, work” – literally breathwork or energy work) there is a saying “qi follows yi” – energy follows intent. So placing one’s attention on certain parts of the body or visualizing certain scenarios dramatically affects the breath. For example, simply imagine seafoam ocean waves gently lapping upon the surf of a white sand beach. One only has to watch a movie – we all know that a video is merely moving pictures coupled with sound, yet look how they reliably move us to laugh and cry.
The Last Word
Just as our emotions affect our breathing, so too can our breathing affect our emotions and quality of mind. This is the bidirectionality of the breath I alluded to in the opening – how breathing bridges the autonomic and skeletal (subconscious and conscious) nervous systems.
To summarize the elements discussed: nostrils, tongue and mouth, belly, chest, active or passive, segmentation, retention, rate, ratio, friction, vocalization, the locks, attention and visualization.
I also offered a handful breath tools:
Hissing
Pursed lips (aka Crow’s Beak breath in yoga)
Physiological sigh
Breath of fire
Antidote to congestion
Like your shadow, your breath isn’t going anywhere. At least, not as long as you’re living. So live. And take a breath of fresh air while you’re at it. Slowly.
As Swami Sivananda says, “A yogi measures the span of life by the number of breaths, not by the number of years.”
Learned a ton Tai! Great article, excited to try the new techniques. Also, loved all the subheaders!!
What a superb essay Tai!
I didn't see it posted in WoP pre-publication or I would have certainly commented before this.
It's really excellent, and beautifully written--thank you!