Are you still breathing well?

I’ve had a wonderful summer this year – I loved the warm weather and made the most of it even if just at home, i.e. not on holidays.

I discovered the joy of immersing myself in the normally freezing water of a nearby stream! I revelled in the feeling of warm air on my skin at 10pm. I enjoyed seeing flowers thrive differently in such unusual conditions – some blooms outdoing themselves while others shrivelled and died.

I also got away for the third year running to a community ecocamp, (earthsong.ie) where we lived close to nature, sleeping under vinyl (wouldn’t canvas sound better!?) There, I got the chance to do lots of different movement classes, yoga and others. Very interesting…. I’m always learning. There is always some nuance to take on board.

The one common thread to so many movement disciplines is the breath. Keep coming back to your breath. Use it to ground yourself, to be in your own body. Without the exchange of oxygen that takes place automatically as we breathe, we’d be dead within a few minutes. Most of us don’t pay any attention to the act of breathing.

I’m not recommending that we breathe with awareness all the time, no, but do stop periodically and ask yourself whether you are still breathing well. This is especially useful if you’re engaged in some stressful activity – preparing to go to work, facing a load of laundry, thinking about the shopping (… I could go on!)

Lift your heart and crown, drop your shoulders and lengthen your neck, focus on making your exhalation longer each time and the inhalation will naturally become fuller.

Look at a diagram of your lungs – visualise the air you take in coming into all the little alveoli. These are the tiny, balloon-shaped air sacs at the end of the respiratory tree and are arranged in clusters throughout the lungs.

Further along, notice the involvement of your pelvis, abdomen and ribs in the breathing action.

As you exhale, draw your low abdomen in and upwards. As you inhale, imagine you are in fact breathing in through your perineum (between anus and genitals). As you exhale next, seek again the in and upward pull of your low abdomen. Keep it gentle, about 20% of maximum.

The breath of life. Learn to breathe deeply and calmly.