Breathing is the most important movement we perform every day, and we breathe roughly 25,000 times a day! The challenge is that most people breathe all day long using a faulty breathing pattern, which triggers the nervous system to produce a fight-or-flight stress response in our bodies. We all know what good deep breathing does for us (lowers heart rate, lowers blood pressure, heals tissues and organs, improves immune health, etc.) But, did you know that shallow breathing (chest breathing) does the exact opposite? It’s true! Faulty breathing patterns, such as shallow breathing, actually send the body into panic mode, even if we’re just sitting at our computer surfing the internet or working on a project. Therefore, a breathing practice shouldn't just be isolated to intermittent bouts of spiritual awareness or meditation, but rather practiced for a minimum of 20 minutes a day so as to improve overall health and avoid unnecessary, self-induced, illness and disease.
Whenever we feel stressed in any way, whether our breathing pattern causes it or something else, our body will respond by activating the sympathetic branch of our autonomic nervous system (SNS) and produce catabolic (tissue destructive) hormones. This sends off a cascade of changes in our bodies and prepares us for battle, so to speak. Then, any subsystem in our body that won’t be needed to fight or “run from a lion” shuts off, including digestion, sexual functions, creativity, and more. Our body also produces vasoconstriction (tightens), pushing blood away from our organs and out to our muscles, stiffening the joints and preparing us, again, for a big battle. But instead of going into battle with a lion, most of us are just sitting at our desks or having a petty argument. Nevertheless, constant activation of the SNS is common because most of society is sitting too much and dealing with an overabundance of work and relationship stress, which stifles the movement of the diaphragm and creates a more shallow, hyperventilating-like chronic breathing pattern. In time, as stress hormones ravage the body, it begins to wear our tissues and organs down, and if we don’t flip a switch and practice a more functional breathing pattern, the long term effects are devastating.
The simple answer to flipping a switch and stopping the constant influx of stress hormones into our body is to practice diaphragmatic breathing. There is no secret to it, there are many techniques, and it works incredibly well. A breathing practice can be combined with stretching, walking, yoga, and other forms of relaxing movements. Again, anytime you take a deep breath you send a message to your brain that calm feelings and healing hormones are welcomed throughout the body. It’s physiologically impossible to take a deep breath and not produce some level of relaxation. When practiced for a minimum of 20 minutes a day, you will notice vast improvements in your body's ability to handle stress and heal from aches and pains. You can break 20 minutes up throughout the day to focus on breathing anytime. Functional breathing is always a beneficial practice. But continuous functional breathing for 20 minutes or more has been shown to pull our body further out of stressful episodes, and allows us to maintain longer states of homeostasis (physiological balance) in our body. Over time, you might even notice a sense of deep awareness and more consistent feelings of happiness. As mentioned, functional deep breathing is not just something to consider as an intermittent tool. A 20-minute deep breathing practice is arguably the most critical component of living a healthy lifestyle, especially in a modern world where stress, anxiety, and depression hold society captive.