Between the time of our first intake of breath upon emerging from our mother’s womb to the last breath we will all eventually take, much of our breathing is done on an involuntary basis. Our breathing is such an essential part of ourselves and that which enables us to live, yet we give it less thought than we would brushing our teeth in the mornings.
Let’s think about this for a while. We are all human beings – manifested as our gross bodies, the body we see with our eyes, but we consist of more than just this physical body. As a being, we are a mind and a soul. Body, mind and soul interconnected by the string of the breath. Without the breath, we are non-existent.
Our breath is an indicator or barometer of our internal state. Think how often when we are anxious or worried , our breathing becomes shallow and quick. Our mouths become dry, our bodies feel cold, our thoughts racing. Emotionally we would be depressed or stressed. On the other hand, we take a huge sigh at the end of a long tiring day as we sink into our beds to rest. We relax, our breathing settles down to a regular rhythm, our hearts beating steadily. We mentally release the cares of the day.
If you are unwell, your breath will smell stale and hot. If you are relaxed, your breath will feel cool.
All this is very interesting, but did you know that your breath is not only just a measure of your body-mind state. You can use breathing to actually induce a desired state of body and mind. You can use different breathing techniques to relax , to energize or just to balance yourself. You can use your breathing to control your response to pain, to clear your sinuses and assist you in respiratory problems. In yoga, you would call the exercises which you do to control your breath “pranayama”.
In his book “The Yoga of Breath – A step by step guide to Pranayama”, Richard Rosen the deputy director of the Yoga Research & Education Center in Santa Rosa California says “Yoga breathing will not change everything. You will still be you, and feel anger, joy, misery and despair, just like you always do. What it can do, however is to give you the power to control your responses to huge events, to rein in powerful emotions and work out what to do with them , rather than let them wreak havoc.”
Before we talk about breathing exercises, let’s see how most people breathe and compare that to how proper breathing looks like.
Most people are not aware of their own breathing. We are inclined, especially if we live in the cities and are involved in stressful activities, to breathe too shallowly, mostly high in the chest, and too fast. Most often, we would breathe through our mouth and under extreme stress, we would tend to hold our breath. This just results in reducing carbon dioxide in the body (our bodies need to maintain a balance of carbon dioxide and oxygen in order to function properly) which constricts blood vessels and slows the circulation of blood and oxygen to the body and the brain. This will then excite the sympathetic branch of the autonomic nervous system and the flight-or-fight response. It is easy to feel anxious at this point and become forgetful or irritable.
Proper breathing involves what in yoga is called “three-part” breathing. If we imagine our torso as an empty vase, we would begin inhaling by “pouring” air into this vase as if we are pouring water into it , filling it up from the bottom. So you would pull in the air by allowing your diaphragm (your main breathing muscle supporting your lungs) to contract and move downwards into your stomach, thus resulting in your abdomen expanding. Then you would continue filling up the middle portion of your lungs by expanding your rib-cage sideways drawing the air into your armpits. At this point imagine your vase is 2/3rds full. Finally, fill up the vase by sliding your chest and collarbones up towards your chin and filling the top part of your lungs with air right up to the back of your neck where the bony part of your spine protrudes.
On your exhale, you would also empty your imaginary vase-lungs from the bottom (not from the top!) by squeezing your lower abdominal muscles, then your stomach muscles and then deflating your rib-cage and sliding your chest down.
There is scientific research to show that if you breathe in a slow and complete manner as explained before this, through your nose, this will give enough time for your lungs to extract the maximum amount of oxygen and energy from each breath. With the correct proportion of oxygen and carbon dioxide in the body, the blood vessels will be properly dilated. Blood and oxygen circulates smoothly and easily through your body.
The part of your body that requires the most oxygen to function is the brain. Deep within the folds of the brain lie three glands – the hypothalamus, the pineal and the pituitary glands - which form the control panel for your body. The Pituitary gland regulates your thyroid (affecting growth) the adrenals (ie adrenaline ) and most of the endocrine glands. The Pineal gland produces melatonin which influences cyclical levels of sex hormones and regulates sleep. Yogic teaching believes that one of the major functions of the pineal is to vibrate and control the nucleus projections of every cell of the body. The Hypothalamus acts as the intermediary between the central nervous system and the glandular system. In other words, these three glands controls your mind-body connections. Studies have shown that you can trigger off these glands and the para-sympathetic branch of the autonomic nervous system if you are able to bring down your breathing to below 6 cycles (inhale-exhale) per minute. In other words, if you can slow down your breathing you will be able to produce the relaxation response in your body.
Therefore, an efficient breather would constantly be able to affect this relaxation response – this person is constantly calm and clear headed.
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