How often do you think about your breathing?

I know it doesn’t rank high on my list of things to think about. Good thing too. If I had to think about breathing some days it might not happen. Fortunately, breathing is an involuntarily bodily function. Without a thought, breathing happens.

Now add a little thought to the mix and breathing becomes a powerful wellness tool.

Breathing is one of a few automatic bodily functions that you actually can influence. You can take short, fast breathes or deep, slow breathes. You can use your breath to create positive physiological changes in a matter of seconds. Breathing can be used to help reduce anxiety, improve sleep, lower blood pressure, increase attention and focus, and even manage pain. No wonder integrative medicine pioneer and expert Joan Borysenko says: “Breathing is the single most important skill for calming mind and body.”

Most of us spend the day taking short, shallow, imperceptible breaths high up in our chests. This kind of breathing makes our shoulder’s move. Certainly it meets our body’s functional needs, but does little to de-stress mind, body and spirit. For that we need conscious, deep breathing. The kind that expands our belly’s and rib cage’s. Babies take those deep belly breaths. As we grow older we are taught to “suck in our gut” to look thin and svelte. We stop taking those full, healthy breaths.

It may sound silly, but most of us need to re-learn how to breathe deeply. Learning to use your breath to regulate mind, body and spirit can be empowering. It gives you a measure of control when you often feel most out of control – when you are stuck in traffic, frustrated with the kids, tossing and turning in the middle of the night, under too much stress at work, or even in when you are trying to manage chronic pain.

Something to think about, huh?

Get Breathing

One of my favorite breathing exercises is one of the simplest. Exhale. Keep exhaling and exhaling and exhaling until you can’t exhale any more. Push all the air in your lungs out. Keep pushing until you gasp for air. Automatically you will take a deep, full oxygenating breathe. I think it feels great.

Here are a two websites with additional breathing exercises and techniques to try:

Three Breathing Exercises from Dr. Andrew Weil

So Hum Meditation from Deepak Chopra

Chill Out

For general stress relief ideas and techniques both with good sections on breathing, here are two of my favorite resources:

Instant Calm: Over 100 Easy-to-Use Techniques for Relaxing Mind and Body

Stress Free for Good: 10 Scientifically Proven Life Skills for Health and Happiness

In Depth

And for those of you who really want to learn more about how breathing and stress are connected, check out Dr. Herbert Benson’s classic: The Relaxation Response

- Stephanie Ross
Empoword co-founder and co- CEO (Chief Empowerment Officer)