The Incredible Power of Breath: An Exploration into Mindful Breathing and Slowing Down

"Breath is life. If you breathe well, you will live long on earth." - Sanskrit proverb

Breathing is fundamental to life. The rhythm and depth of our breath are often reflective of our state of mind - calm or chaotic. It is intriguing how something as crucial as breathing, an act we perform around 20,000 times a day, often escapes our conscious awareness. This blog post explores the importance of mindful breathing and how a slower pace of life can contribute to our overall well-being.

Our Breath: A Mirror to Our Mind

The speed of our breath is often linked to our stress levels. Breathing is an integral part of the autonomic nervous system, a system responsible for managing our body's involuntary functions such as heartbeat, thermoregulation, and digestion. While these automatic processes free us to focus on our surroundings, it also means we are vulnerable to the overwhelming array of stimuli that constantly compete for our attention. In our fast-paced society, phrases like "I'm too busy," or "there's so much to do," have become the default responses to the simple question, "How are you?" This busyness, along with the stress it induces, have become somewhat of an epidemic, adversely impacting our health and mental well-being. But how does this relate to our breath?

The Physiology of Breath

Our external environment significantly impacts us. A stressful stimulus can trigger physiological responses like increased respiration, narrowed vision, and heightened alertness. These responses, although beneficial from an evolutionary perspective as they helped us survive threatening situations, can lead to health problems, unhealthy habits, and emotional imbalance when chronically activated.

However, many people aren't aware that specific gateways can consciously influence our autonomic nervous system, which controls our stress and recovery responses. One of these powerful gateways is our breathing.

When we inhale longer and stronger than when we exhale, we stimulate the sympathetic nervous system, our stress system. In contrast, a longer exhale compared to inhale triggers our parasympathetic nervous system, inducing a state of calmness. Through slow and deliberate breathing, where the exhale is longer than the inhale, we can physiologically counteract a stressful environment.

Cyclic Sighing: A Science-Based Breathing Pattern

Neuroscientist and popular podcaster, Andrew Huberman, often discusses a specific breathing pattern known as physiological or cyclic sighing. Recent research from his lab, published in Cell Report, demonstrated that practicing cyclic sighing for just five minutes daily can significantly improve mood and lower overall respiration rates. Cyclic sighing involves a short double inhale followed by a long exhale, roughly twice as long as the inhales. This breathing pattern is instinctively used by babies and small children when they're calming down after crying.

Cyclic sighing can be a valuable tool for managing stress. You might employ it when you feel overwhelmed by your children's antics, during an argument with your partner, before an important presentation, or when you need to appear calm and confident in front of an audience. It's also beneficial in a fitness context; it can speed recovery after a workout or between sets of strength exercises.

However, the key to leveraging this calming breathing pattern is mindfulness. This means being aware of your thoughts, emotional state, body, and movements. Developing mindfulness is like building a muscle or learning a new language - it requires time and consistent practice. Recognizing this can help shift our perspective and increase our willingness to commit to the practice.

The Importance of the Right Environment

Change often requires a change in environment. If you're continuously battling a hyperactive sympathetic nervous system, it can be tough to introduce new habits like mindful breathing. Altering your surroundings can make this transition easier. A 20-minute daily walk in a park, for instance, can significantly reduce stress markers.

Embracing Slow Living

Slowing down, being more intentional, and finding joy in small acts like making coffee the traditional way, journaling on paper rather than on a computer, or enjoying a matcha tea ritual can serve as valuable reminders of the beauty of mindfulness. These deliberate practices not only help you breathe slower but also make you more present in your actions. The more you cultivate such moments, the more likely you are to be aware of your state when on the verge of losing yourself to stress. And in those moments, you can harness the power of mindful, slow breathing to calm yourself down.

The practice of mindful breathing is not just an esoteric belief. It's grounded in physiological and neurological principles that everyone can tap into. If you found this post helpful, do explore more content on mindfulness and how just five minutes of deliberate breathing daily can significantly improve your life.