Michael J Stephen

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Yoga vs. Prozac, Deep Insight, and 4 Breaths for a Better Heart

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4 Thoughts



1. Why 6 Breaths/Min Improves Heart Health & Quality of Life in Diabetes

I never get tired of talking about slow breathing : )

So, here’s a longer blog about the benefits for heart health & diabetes:

Why 6 Breaths/Min Improves Heart Health & Quality of Life in Diabetes

It’s framed around diabetes, but, of course, it really applies to anyone.

4 Breathing Exercises to Improve Your Heart Health and Extend Life Span

While we’re at it, here’s another guest blog for ResBiotic outlining 4 breathing exercises you can do for a better heart. Two are slow breathing, and 2 are not.

Enjoy!

2. Why Breath Holds Are Mental Resiliency Training

When we’re in a stressful event, we can use our breath to help us cope.

But when lack of breath is the stressful event, we must use our minds.

3. Insight: Just Help Them To Do What Nature Provided Us With

I’m taking pranayama teacher training with Eddie Stern and Robert Moses.

In their exercises script, they (somewhat offhandedly) threw in this deeply insightful message:

“We want to teach people to breathe better so it makes their lives better in whatever way they need their life to improve—we don’t always know what that is (even for ourselves) so we do not want to impose things upon them, just help them to do what nature provided us with better.” (my emphasis)

That is perhaps the best statement ever made about breathing and how it should be used & taught. It’s almost as if they’ve been doing this for a while…

4. Yoga and Breathing Exercises, or Prozac and Zoloft?

“Deep breathing is a potent inducer of the parasympathetic nervous system. The release of acetylcholine not only calms our organs, it also stimulates the release of serotonin, dopamine, and prolactin, the feel-good hormones targeted by medicines like Prozac and Zoloft. But yoga and breathing exercises produce this effect naturally and without side effects.”

- Michael J Stephen, MD, Breath Taking

Sounds good to me : )


1 QUOTE

“We must endeavor with all our resources and strength to become capable of doctoring ourselves.”
— Marcus Tullius Cicero
 

1 ANSWER

Category: Vagus Nerve

Answer: This organ receives the greatest supply of nerves from the vagus nerve, helping explain why deep breathing is so relaxing.

…

(Cue the Jeopardy! music.)

…

Question: What is the diaphragm?

In good breath,

Nick Heath, T1D, PhD
“Breathing is the compound interest of health & wellness.”

P.S. a hero of our time

Breathing for Diabetes:

If you love learning about breathing, or just want to live an overall healthier life, I think you’ll really enjoy this class (diabetes or not).

 
 

* An asterisk by a quote indicates that I listened to this book on Audible. Therefore, the quotation might not be correct, but is my best attempt at reproducing the punctuation based on the narrator’s pace, tone, and pauses.

Sign Up For The Breathing 411

Each Monday, I curate and synthesize information from scientific journals, books, articles, and podcasts to share 4 thoughts, 1 quote, and 1 answer (like "Jeopardy!") related to breathing. It’s a fun way to learn something new each week.

 
 
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Applied Elegance, a Gift of Breathing, and How to Practice Philosophy

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4 Thoughts



1. Applying the Lung's Elegant Structure to All Aspects of Our Lives

“While the heart has dense striated muscle, and the brain its conglomerated networks of communicating neurons, the lung is a thin, graceful structure of interconnecting fibrous tissue that is beautifully held together with a foamy substance that lubricates its functions in a quiet and effortless manner. It is an organ of elegance, not brute strength.”

- Michael J Stephen, Breath Taking

Our most important organ is designed to be graceful and flexible, not rigid and strong. To be of elegance, not strength.

Something for us to consider in all aspects of our lives…

2. Practical over Perfect: A Simple Way to Start a Breathing or Meditation Session

“Breath priming means that you take a few conscious breaths to set up the flow of breathing. … We prime our breath so it can function at a higher level.”

- Gurucharan Singh Khalsa, Ph.D., and Yogi Bhajan, Ph.D.

Breathwalk

I love this idea of “breath priming,” and I use it every day.

It’s pretty straightforward to do:

  1. Pick a breath that will set you up for whatever you’re about to do (for example, I use alternate nostril breathing before meditating).

  2. Other good options: breath of fire, humming, or a few physiological sighs.

  3. Do this breath for 1-3 minutes.

  4. Then start your session.

And, in my opinion, we don’t need to add more time. For a 10 min meditation, I use 2 min for priming and 8 min for meditation. Practical over perfect.

3. Breathing is Philosophy: Transforming Emotions and Living Better Lives

“That’s what the teachers depicted in The School of Athens once provided: they taught their students how to transform their emotions, how to cope with adversity, how to live the best possible lives.”

- Jules Evans, Philosophy for Life and Other Dangerous Situations

That sentence is exactly why I think breathing is the most direct path to practicing philosophy in our lives. With two added bonuses:

  1. Breathing is also physiology. It changes our body, allowing us to truly transform our emotions instead of just “thinking our way out of it.”

  2. There is no abstraction. You just breathe in preset patterns (like 4:6 or 4:4:4:4), see what works for you, and ignore the rest.

So here’s to being breathing philosophers, applying this stuff every day, and using our breath to help us become the best version of ourselves.

4. Internal vs External Stimuli, and a Gift of Breathing Exercises

External stimuli cause opposite or similar internal reactions, for example:

  • Our body responds to a hot environment with internal cooling.

  • But it responds to a stressful environment with internal stress.

Conversely, internal stimuli generally trigger similar external reactions:

  • Our body responds to slow breathing by interpreting the external environment as safe.

  • Our body responds to fast breathing by interpreting the external environment as dangerous.

This reveals a gift of breathing exercises. They don’t change our situation, but they do change how we interpret it, which may be just as powerful.



1 QUOTE

“The breath can command the brain, and the brain can regulate our moods. This gives us a way to practically direct moods.”
— Breathwalk

1 ANSWER

Category: Drive to Breathe

Answer: Your drive to breathe comes from this portion of the brain, which monitors blood pH and sends a signal to breathe when CO2 rises too high.

…

(Cue the Jeopardy! music.)

…

Question: What is the medulla oblongata?

In good breath,

Nick Heath, T1D, PhD
“Breathing is the compound interest of health & wellness.”

Available Now:

THE BREATHING FOR DIABETES SELF-PACED WORKSHOP

If you like geeking out on breathing, or just want to live an overall healthier life, you might really enjoy the workshop, diabetes or not.

It’s packed with easy-to-understand science and super practical breathing advice that you can immediately implement. I hope you’ll check it out.

 
 

* An asterisk by a quote indicates that I listened to this book on Audible. Therefore, the quotation might not be correct, but is my best attempt at reproducing the punctuation based on the narrator’s pace, tone, and pauses.

Sign Up For The Breathing 411

Each Monday, I curate and synthesize information from scientific journals, books, articles, and podcasts to share 4 thoughts, 1 quote, and 1 answer (like "Jeopardy!") related to breathing. It’s a fun way to learn something new each week.

 
 
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Nose versus Mouth, 800000 and 73 days, and Our Best Weapon for Stress

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4 Thoughts



1. A Simple Quip for Nose versus Mouth

Most of the time:

  • The nose is part of the respiratory system.

  • The mouth is part of the digestive system.

2. The True Power of the Breath: 800,000 and 73 Days

“With eight hundred thousand new medical articles being published every year, by 2020 medical knowledge is estimated to double every seventy-three days.”

Michael J Stephen, Breath Taking

Those numbers are insane. It’s basically impossible to keep up with science.

Fortunately, though, we know breathing (and sleep, exercise, meditation, etc.) has been used for millennia to improve mental and physical health.

Maybe we don’t know all the science, but that’s ok. We can just try it out, find what works for us, and enjoy the timeless (and timely) wisdom of the breath.

3. Two Steps to Get the Most of Your Breathwork

In The Art of Possibility, they have two steps for their practice of “giving way to passion.” I think they apply perfectly to breathing (or basketball, yoga, etc.):

“1. The first step is to notice where you are holding back, and let go. Release those barriers of self that keep you separate and in control, and let the vital energy of passion surge through you, connecting you to all beyond.

2. The second step is to participate wholly. Allow yourself to be a channel to shape the stream of passion into a new expression for the world.”

They sound a little idealistic and new-age, but that’s the point : )

4. Our Greatest Weapon Against Stress

Our greatest weapon against stress is our ability to choose one breath over another.

***

P.S. This is a play on a William James quote I saw on Insight Timer: “The greatest weapon against stress is our ability to choose one thought over another.”



1 QUOTE

““Clarity comes from engagement, not thought.””
— Marie Forleo

1 ANSWER

Category: Stress and Health

Answer: Counterintuitively, this (also referred to as “nature’s fundamental survival mechanism”) can be therapeutically harnessed to boost immune function.

…

(Cue the Jeopardy! music.)

…

Question: What is short-term psychophysiological stress?

In good breath,

Nick Heath, T1D, PhD
“Breathing is the compound interest of health & wellness.”

P.S. same girl

Now Available:

THE BREATHING FOR DIABETES SELF-PACED WORKSHOP

If you enjoy my work, or just like geeking out on breathing, I’m confident you’ll love the workshop (diabetes or not).

It’s packed with practical and helpful information, including:

  • 11 bite-sized key concepts on all things breathing

  • A 40-min Wim Hof and Diabetes Mini Masterclass (if you’re interested in WHM, I think you’ll find a lot of information in here you’ve probably never seen before, unrelated to diabetes)

  • A PDF of 100 inspiring breathing quotes

  • A Breath Matching worksheet to grow your practice

  • A simple plan for implementing what you learn (that actually works)

And if you don't like it, it’s 100% refundable, so you have nothing to lose.

P.S. If you purchased the live workshop back in March, you’ll see the updated presentations when you log in now.

 
 

* An asterisk by a quote indicates that I listened to this book on Audible. Therefore, the quotation might not be correct, but is my best attempt at reproducing the punctuation based on the narrator’s pace, tone, and pauses.

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Each Monday, I curate and synthesize information from scientific journals, books, articles, and podcasts to share 4 thoughts, 1 quote, and 1 answer (like "Jeopardy!") related to breathing. It’s a fun way to learn something new each week.

 
 
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Beating Biases, a Simple Truth, and How to Engage in Meaningful Tasks

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4 Thoughts



1. Use Breathing to Help You Engage Fully with Life

“Mindful Breathing is a useful practice in its own right. It allows us to take some time out from our busy daily routines, and often creates a restful state that allows us to recharge our batteries and find some inner peace. However, I’d like you to think of it as a versatile training tool to help you engage fully in every meaningful task in your life.”

- Dr. Russ Harris, The Confidence Gap

This is the perfect way to approach any type of breath practice. We use it to find inner peace and build resiliency in a controlled environment. But, ultimately, we use that training to help us “engage fully in every meaningful task in [our] life.”

2. Beating Our Negative Biases with Slow Breathing

“We need to deal with real dangers. But much of the time we overestimate threats, which is an aspect of the negativity bias, and don't feel as safe as we actually are. This makes us feel bad, and it wears down physical and mental health over time.”*

- Rick Hanson, Ph.D., Neurodharma

Evolution wired us to notice the negative about 9x more than the positive. Although that’s good for survival, it’s not so great for our everyday health.

Enter slow breathing exercises. By activating the calming parasympathetic nervous system, they teach our bodies to feel safe. This dampens the negativity bias, helping us engage fully in things that matter (see thought #1).

3. Try it and See What Happens

“So, at the beginning, you might want to stay with the breath, or use it as an anchor to bring you back when you are carried away. Try it for a few years and see what happens.”

- Jon Kabat-Zinn, Wherever You Go There You Are

I have nothing useful to add, except that this is the best advice I’ve read for all this breathing stuff: “Try it for a few years and see what happens.” <— Count me in 😂 I hope you will join me, too.

4. Breathwalking in its Simplest Form

“Breathwalk at its very simplest means putting breathing patterns and walking together into a carefully and beautifully timed single, synchronized movement. It is walking harmonized with breathing.”

- Gurucharan Singh Khalsa, Ph.D., and Yogi Bhajan, Ph.D.

Breathwalk

Breathwalking is a terrific way to combine 3 ancient wellness techniques: walking, breathing, and meditation. Here’s a good one to get started.

  • Inhale 8 steps, exhale 8 steps

  • Do this for 3 min

  • Walk normally for 2 min

  • Repeat as needed

It’s simple yet surprisingly powerful. Give it a shot and see how you feel.


1 QUOTE

“These ancient techniques are a reminder of a simple truth that any of us can choose to harness right now: Oxygen is life.”

- Tony Robbins, Life Force

1 ANSWER

Category: Lungs & Gas Transfer

Answer: This is the distance oxygen has to travel to get from the alveoli into the blood vessels, where it can start its journey around the body.

…

(Cue the Jeopardy! music.)

…

Question: What is 1/3 of a micron?

P.S. Michael J Stephen, MD, says that this distance is so small that it “could double without any noticeable shortness of breath at rest.”

Extra: Slow Breathing is a Natural Antioxidant

I wrote a guest blog for ResBiotic titled: Want a Natural and Effective Antioxidant? It's Right Under Your Nose. Enjoy the 3-min read!

In good breath,

Nick Heath, T1D, PhD
“Breathing is the compound interest of health & wellness.”

P.S. Optimist vs. Pessimist vs. …

 
 

* An asterisk by a quote indicates that I listened to this book on Audible. Therefore, the quotation might not be correct, but is my best attempt at reproducing the punctuation based on the narrator’s pace, tone, and pauses.

Sign Up For The Breathing 411

Each Monday, I curate and synthesize information from scientific journals, books, articles, and podcasts to share 4 thoughts, 1 quote, and 1 answer (like "Jeopardy!") related to breathing. It’s a fun way to learn something new each week.

 
 
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Diverse Tactics (part 2), Less Relaxation, and How to Feel Confident

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4 Thoughts



1. Less Relaxation, More Self-Regulation

“Many people believe that biofeedback is a way to learn to relax. While it is true that you can learn to relax using biofeedback, relaxation is not the main goal. The main goal is self-regulation, which means being able to activate your nervous system most optimally for action and being able to relax and recover after the action is complete.”

- Inna Khazan, Ph.D.

Biofeedback and Mindfulness in Everyday Life

The same is true for breathing without biofeedback. Of course, there are methods for relaxing (those are some of my favorites).

But, we’re ultimately learning to regulate our nervous systems so they work optimally for action, for real life. Then, we relax and recover afterward : )

2. “Rule 1: The actions of confidence come first; the feelings of confidence come later.”

“This is a key point. If we want to do anything with confidence—speak, paint, make love, play tennis, or socialize—then we have to do the work. We have to practice the necessary skills over and over, until they come naturally. If we don’t have adequate skills to do the things we want to do, we can’t expect to feel confident.”

- Dr. Russ Harris, The Confidence Gap

And if we want to feel confident we can breathe to self-regulate in any situation, we have to practice these skills over and over. Until they come naturally.

We could say: The action of breathing comes first; the good feelings and self-regulation come later.

***

P.S. We can also apply this concept to being consistent. There are plenty of days when I don’t feel like doing my breathing practice (yes, even The Breathing Diabetic has days where he doesn’t want to breathe 😂). But, I always just start. The action comes first; the motivation comes later.

3. Diverse Tactics Part 2: Breathing Hammers and Nails

“The integration of a wide variety of perspectives is necessary for a more complete understanding of the full depths of human potential, as too much focus on a single perspective runs the risk of giving a distorted view of human nature. As Maslow said, ‘I suppose it is tempting, if the only tool you have is a hammer, to treat everything as if it were a nail.’”

- Scott Barry Kaufman, Ph.D., Transcend

Building off last week, here’s another excellent reminder that we need a wide range of methods, in breathing and life, to become the best version of ourselves.

But specifically for the breath, if we only have one breathing hammer, we’ll assume every problem is a nail. Let’s be mixed-breathing artists instead : )

4. Our Lungs and the Possibilities of the World

“Our lungs developed to utilize oxygen and efficiently drive our metabolic reactions. We are aerobic creatures, and if the lungs are our most important organ, then oxygen is the most important gas in the atmosphere. […] With oxygen, the possibilities of the world opened up.”

- Michael J Stephen, MD, Breath Taking

Just an elegant reminder of how vital our lungs and oxygen are—they literally open the possibilities of the world to us 🙏


1 QUOTE

“The lung changes the breath…into food for the vital spirit.”

- Alessandro Benedetti (1497)

1 ANSWER

Category: Energy Production

Answer: Oxygen is vital because of its ability to generate ~18x more of these “energy molecules” than anaerobic fermentation.

…

(Cue the Jeopardy! music.)

…

Question: What are adenosine triphosphate (ATP) molecules?

In good breath,

Nick Heath, T1D, PhD
“Breathing is the compound interest of health & wellness.”

P.S how self-help authors get ideas for their next book

 
 

* An asterisk by a quote indicates that I listened to this book on Audible. Therefore, the quotation might not be correct, but is my best attempt at reproducing the punctuation based on the narrator’s pace, tone, and pauses.

Sign Up For The Breathing 411

Each Monday, I curate and synthesize information from scientific journals, books, articles, and podcasts to share 4 thoughts, 1 quote, and 1 answer (like "Jeopardy!") related to breathing. It’s a fun way to learn something new each week.

 
 
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Learn Better, 4 Gifts, and How Breathing Can Actually Change the World

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Today is a special edition of The Breathing 411.

Because today is 4/11.

It’s also World Breathing Day.

And it also happens to be my 35th birthday (to celebrate, I did one breath per minute for 35 minutes this morning <— maybe I’ll make it a new tradition 🙏).

To honor the occasion, there are 4 Free Gifts in Thought #3 below.

Thank you from the bottom of my heart for reading.

With love,

Nick

 

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4 Thoughts



1. How Breathing Can Actually Change the World, in 3 Super Practical Steps

  • Step 1: Tape your mouth at night.

  • Step 2: Breathe nasally 90-95% of the day.

  • Step 3: Forget about the rest, and use your newfound energy from Steps 1 & 2 to help you do whatever you were put on this planet to do.

2. ANB Significantly Enhances Learning and Retention of New Motor Skills

“Our results thus uncover for the first time the remarkable facilitatory effects of simple breathing practices on complex functions such as motor memory”

- Deep Breathing Practice Facilitates Retention of Newly Learned Motor Skills

This 2016 study on alternate nostril breathing (ANB), published in Nature Scientific Reports, genuinely blew my mind. (See full review in Thought #3.)

Here’s what they did:

  • Participants learned a new motor skill.

  • A control group rested for 30 minutes.

  • A breathing group did 30-min of ANB.

  • Then, both groups were tested on the skill they had learned.

  • Both groups were also tested again 24-hours later.

The results showed that the ANB group significantly (it was almost ridiculous) improved the learning and retention of that skill:

  • They were significantly better at the 30-min mark.

  • They were significantly better at the 24-hour mark.

One 30-minute breathing session. One day of improved learning and retention.

3. Science 411s, Book 411s, and The Breath is Life Learning Center (4 free gifts)

To celebrate World Breathing Day, here are four gifts.

Science 411s: 4 Fundamentals, 1 Big Takeaway, and 1 Practical Application

  • Free Science 411: Deep Breathing Practice Facilitates Retention of Newly Learned Motor Skills (the paper from Thought #2 above)

  • Free Science 411: Heart Rate Variability Biofeedback Improves Emotional and Physical Health and Performance: A Systematic Review and Meta Analysis

Book 411s: 4 Thoughts, 1 Quote, and 1 Idea That Will Change Your Life

  • Free Book 411: The Happiness Track: How To Apply The Science Of Happiness To Accelerate Your Success

  • Free Book 411: The Art of Impossible: A Peak Performance Primer

You can read, listen, or download them as PDFs here.

I hope you enjoy them!

4. Why We Breathe: Chemically and Spiritually

“Our drive to breathe is regulated by the medulla oblongata … When pH decreases (becomes more acidic due to the increase in CO2), chemoreceptors in the medulla send out a signal for the body to breathe. This means that our carbon dioxide levels have to rise to a sufficiently high level for our brain and body to know that it is time to take the next breath.”

- Inna Khazan, Ph.D.

It’s the perfect day to review why we breathe. So there’s the technical reason.

But breathing is a lot more than just gases. As Michael J Stephen, MD, tells us,

“That oxygen, life, and lungs all came into our world in relatively close succession is no coincidence. Only with oxygen and some means of extracting it are all things possible—thinking, moving, eating, speaking, and loving. Life and the breath are synonymous.”

So beyond chemistry, we ultimately breathe to live—to think, to move, to love. Breathing is, after all, what makes “all things possible.”


 
 
 

1 QUOTE

“It was ecstasy, it was sweet, air soughing in and all my little alveoli singing away with joy and oxygen-energy coursing through every space and particle of me.”

- Keri Hulme

 
 
 
 

1 ANSWER

Category: Body Chemical Composition

Answer: This gas is the most abundant element in the human body by mass.

…

(Cue the Jeopardy! music.)

…

Question: What is oxygen?

In good breath,

Nick Heath, T1D, PhD
“Breathing is the compound interest of health & wellness.”

P.S. I’m only 35, I have my whole life ahead of me

 
 
 

* An asterisk by a quote indicates that I listened to this book on Audible. Therefore, the quotation might not be correct, but is my best attempt at reproducing the punctuation based on the narrator’s pace, tone, and pauses.

Sign Up For The Breathing 411

Each Monday, I curate and synthesize information from scientific journals, books, articles, and podcasts to share 4 thoughts, 1 quote, and 1 answer (like "Jeopardy!") related to breathing. It’s a fun way to learn something new each week.

 
 

Timeless Healing, Anti-Harley, and 2 Rules to Improve Your Breathing

 
 

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4 Thoughts


1. Breathing Exercises Lower Inflammation and Change Gene Expression

“In those who practice breathing exercises, levels of inflammatory proteins in the blood are significantly lower, especially under certain types of stress. Mobilizing the power of the breath has also been shown to turn on anti-inflammatory genes and turn off pro-inflammatory ones, including genes that regulate energy metabolism, insulin secretion, and even the part of our DNA that controls longevity.”

- Michael J Stephen, MD, Breath Taking

I have nothing useful to add here, except, of course, one of these: 🤯

2. These Two Simple Rules Will Improve Your Breathing Forever

If I could give anyone any advice for everyday breathing, it’d be this:

  1. Breathe through your nose, especially during sleep.

  2. Make your breathing quiet.

You’ll get massive benefits with minimal effort using these two simple rules.

3. Timeless Healing: Slow Breathing + The Relaxation Response

“To evoke the relaxation response, you need to follow only two basic steps. You need to repeat a word, sound, prayer, phrase, or muscular activity, and when common everyday thoughts intrude on your focus, you need to passively disregard them and return to your repetition.”*

- Herbert Benson, MD, Timeless Healing: The Power and Biology of Belief

It’s that simple. And the word or phrase? Dr. Benson says, “The choice of a focused repetition is up to the individual. If you’re a religious person, you can choose a prayer. If you’re a non-religious person, choose a secular focus.”*

I’ve been using it this week in my slow breathing practice. I inhale and then repeat “be the change” in my head while exhaling at a 5 breaths/min pace.

I’ve never been a big fan of mantras (and I’m still testing different ones), but I’ve genuinely enjoyed this. It’s straightforward and highly effective.

Give it a shot and see how you feel.

4. My Fake Words, and Breathing as the Anti-Harley-Davidson

“Orfield Laboratories, run by Steven Orfield, is a small Twin Cities business that leverages the power of perception to help companies build better products. Harley-Davidson, for example, once hired Orfield to calculate the exact engine tone and decibel level that would give riders the impression that its motorcycles are powerful.”*

- Michael Easter, The Comfort Crisis

How crazy is that!? Harley-Davidson actually hired a company to ensure their engines gave “riders the impression that its motorcycles are powerful.”

I think breathing is the anti-Harley-Davidson. You just relax and breathe. If it’s powerful, it’s powerful. If it’s not, it’s not. No fake impressions needed.

***

P.S. Although I take pride in this newsletter, sometimes I feel like Orfield Labs trying to make breathing sound perfect. It’s not. But it is truly powerful. So, don’t just read my words, try it out and feel its strength for yourself.

Extra Thought:

5 Easy Breathing Exercises You Can Use for Better Sleep Tonight

I wrote a guest blog called “5 Easy Breathing Exercises You Can Use for Better Sleep Tonight” for The Breather, hosted by ResBiotic.

It’s a quick 4-minute read. I hope you enjoy it!

 
 
 
 

1 QUOTE

“When we focus on the breath, we become mindful of the universal nature of all beings.”

- Bhante Henepola Gunarantana

 
 
 
 

1 ANSWER

Category: Meditation & Relaxation Response

Answer: A trademark physiological result of meditation and/or the relaxation response is that the body consumes less oxygen, also known as this.

…

(Cue the Jeopardy! music.)

…

Question: What is hypometabolism?

In good breath,

Nick Heath, T1D, PhD
“Breathing is the compound interest of health & wellness.”

P.S. Science can catch these hands

 
 
 

* An asterisk by a quote indicates that I listened to this book on Audible. Therefore, the quotation might not be correct, but is my best attempt at reproducing the punctuation based on the narrator’s pace, tone, and pauses.

Sign Up For The Breathing 411

Each Monday, I curate and synthesize information from scientific journals, books, articles, and podcasts to share 4 thoughts, 1 quote, and 1 answer (like "Jeopardy!") related to breathing. It’s a fun way to learn something new each week.

 
 

A Shared Theme, Heal the Body, and Tony Robbins's 3 Breathing Practices

 
 

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4 Thoughts


1. A Shared Theme: Breathing is the Most Accessible Tool We Have

“Breath is a direct, easy, accessible, and rapid way to shape the state of the nervous system. … The way we breathe says a lot about the state of our body and the story we are living.”

- Deb Dana, The Polyvagal Theory in Therapy

This echoes so many of the thoughts shared here; that’s why I love it so much.

It’s incredibly inspiring to find common themes in books on happiness, health, strength, mindfulness, therapy, philosophy, and on & on. And one they all come back to is this: breathing is the most accessible tool we have for optimal living.

2. A New Definition of Shallow Breathing

“Shallow Work: Noncognitively demanding, logistical-style tasks, often performed while distracted. These efforts tend to not create much new value in the world and are easy to replicate.”

- Cal Newport, Deep Work

We used Cal’s Deep Work Hypothesis to generate the Deep Breath Hypothesis. Let’s use this one to create a new definition of Shallow Breathing:

Shallow Breathing: Noncognitively demanding, rapid-style breaths, often performed through the mouth. These breaths tend to not create much value in our bodies and are easy to habituate.

3. The 3 Breathing Exercises Tony Robbins Uses

I just finished up Tony Robbins’s (literally) massive new book, Life Force. The audiobook is 22 hrs 50 mins! For a book called “Life Force,” I didn’t expect it to take ~10 hours to get to anything about breathing…but I digress 😊

In any case, it was worth the wait. Here’s how Tony uses breathing:

Breathwalking: “For example, one breathing pattern entails inhaling for four seconds, holding your breath for four seconds, exhaling for four seconds, and holding your breath for four seconds. A segmented 4:4 pattern that you can continue for several minutes while you walk in order to boost your energy and mental clarity.”* (He said this breathwalking method was one of his first intros to breathing, but I’m not 100% sure this is exactly the pattern he uses now.)

Really (really) Slow Breathing: He uses a 1:4:2 ratio breath with an 8-sec inhale, 32-sec hold, and 16-sec exhale, 1-3x a day. “I utilize this strategy to train the body to fully oxygenate by holding the breath longer and exhaling twice as long as you inhale, in order to eliminate toxins and stimulate the lymph system. I found it an invaluable tool to enhance my energy, my state of mind, and my sense of well-being.”*

Energizing Breathwork: “I also use a more explosive breath when I'm tired and need to snap myself into a peak state right before getting on stage. I drink my water, do my breathing, and I'm ready to rock and roll.”* Not sure what method he uses, but it might be Bhastrika (or Wim Hof breathing).

4. All Life Sciences are Breath Sciences

If breath is life, then all life sciences are, in some way, breath sciences.

  • Heart science is in some way breath science.

  • Brain science is in some way breath science.

  • Physiology is in some way breath science.

  • Psychology is in some way breath science.

  • & on and on

If you study life, you study breath : )

 
 
 
 

1 QUOTE

“Science is beginning to investigate in a serious manner something humanity has known for centuries—that the breath can be used to heal the body.”

- Michael J Stephen, MD, Breath Taking

 
 
 
 

1 ANSWER

Category: Respiratory System

Answer: The hollow organ that allows you to make sounds with your breath is called this.

…

(Cue the Jeopardy! music.)

…

Question: What is the larynx (or voice box)?

In good breath,

Nick Heath, T1D, PhD
“Breathing is the compound interest of health & wellness.”

P.S. Deep deep work

 
 
 

* An asterisk by a quote indicates that I listened to this book on Audible. Therefore, the quotation might not be correct, but is my best attempt at reproducing the punctuation based on the narrator’s pace, tone, and pauses.

Sign Up For The Breathing 411

Each Monday, I curate and synthesize information from scientific journals, books, articles, and podcasts to share 4 thoughts, 1 quote, and 1 answer (like "Jeopardy!") related to breathing. It’s a fun way to learn something new each week.

 
 

Breath is Mind: 25 Thoughtful Quotes on the Breath-Mind Connection

 

1. “When you practice mindfulness of breathing, then the breathing is mind.” - Thich Nhat Hanh

 

2.  “I am as confident as I am of anything that, in myself, the stream of thinking…is only a careless name for what, when scrutinized, reveals itself to consist chiefly of the stream of my breathing.” - William James

3. “As we discover, when we pay attention to its natural rhythm, the breath becomes calm. Simultaneously, the mind quiets down. It all happens naturally. … Any force is counterproductive.” - Bhante Henepola Gunarantana

 

4. “When the mind is agitated, change the pattern of the breath.” - Patanjali

 

5. “Breath is the king of mind.” - B.K.S. Iyengar

 

6. “When the Breath wanders, the mind is unsteady, but when the Breath is still, so is the mind still.” - Hatha Yoga Pradipika

 

7. “However, when the air is calm, so is the water. It is just so with the mind. The more often we breathe, the more agitated the energy of body and mind becomes. By breathing less frequently, we begin to achieve elemental harmony.” - The Tibetan Yoga of Breath

 

8. “By controlling your breathing, you can use a voluntary mechanical behavior to make a profound change on your state of mind.” - Emma Seppälä

 

9. “So get out of your mind and into your breath because the breath is the life-force.  Not your mind, the breath.  Follow your breath, and it will lead you anywhere in your brain—and thus the mind—that you want to go.” - Wim Hof

10. “Thanks to the regulation of breathing patterns, patterns in our thinking are not just affected, but revealed, together with their entanglement with respiration.” - Marco Bernini 

11. "Messages from the respiratory system have rapid, powerful effects on major brain centers involved in thought, emotion, and behavior." - Dr. Patricia Gerbarg and Dr. Richard Brown

12. “In other words, by changing the breath pattern one can induce a chosen state of mind.” - Swami Niranjanananda Saraswati (found in Restoring Prana)

 

13. “The breath is free from greed, hatred, delusion, and fear. When the mind joins with the breath, the mind temporarily becomes free from greed, hatred, delusion, and fear.” - Bhante Henepola Gunarantana

 

14. "The breath is the intersection of the body and mind." - Thich Nhat Hanh

 

15. “Interestingly, the Greek word psyche, which we often use to indicate our mind or the emotional state of our mind, actually means soul or spirit, or most tellingly, the breath of life.” - Eddie Stern

 

16. “These practices demonstrate that the mind and the heart follow the lungs, not the other way around.” - Michael J Stephen

 

17. “The intrinsic link between prana and citta accounts for why the yogis insisted on breathing practices as the primary means to pacify the mind.  Through the breath, the ANS is directly impacted.  Breathing can effectively modulate the reactive loop, and restore us to a more coherent frame of mind.” - Robin Rothenberg

 

18. “I will breathe in, releasing the mind. … I will breathe out, releasing the mind.” - Mindfulness of Breathing Sutta (Majjhima Nikaya 118)

 

19. “Just as your mind influences the breath, you can influence the state of your mind through the breath as well.” - Sri Sri Ravi Shankar

 

20. “When we focus on the breath, our breathing naturally becomes calm. When the breath becomes calm, the mind and body also become calm.” - Bhante Henepola Gunarantana

 

21. “If our breathing is light and calm—a natural result of conscious breathing—our mind and body will slowly become light, calm, and clear, and our feelings also.” - Thich Nhat Hanh

 

22. “The Tibetan language describes this relationship between the wind and the mind as the wind-mind (Tib. rlung sems). This compound word describes the wind energy and the conceptual mind as always, intertwined and moving together—a singular motion.” - The Tibetan Yoga of Breath

 

23. “‘[A]ccording to the Navajo conception, then, Winds exist all around and within the individual, entering and departing through respiratory organs and whirls on the body’s surface. That which is within and that which surrounds one is all the same and it is holy.’ Finally, and most profoundly, this invisible medium in which we are bodily immersed, is what provides us with the capacity for conscious thought.” – David Abram, with inset quote from James McNeley

 

24. “When the incoming breath is offered into the outgoing breath, the outgoing breath is offered into the incoming breath, or when both are offered into the retention, the mind is purified of self-interest.” - Baba Hari Dass (found in Restoring Prana)

25. “The ‘I think’ which Kant said must be able to accompany all my objects, is the ‘I breathe’ which actually does accompany them. Breath is the essence out of which philosophers have constructed the entity known to them as consciousness” - William James

18 "Inspiring" Quotes on Breath as Life & Spirit

Here are 18 interesting quotes referring to the breath as life or spirit. It’s by no means comprehensive—just some that have stuck out to me over the years.

Enjoy!

1.  “Man was created of the Earth, and lives by virtue of the air; for there is in the air a secret food of life…whose invisible congealed spirit is better than the whole earth.”

- Michael Sendivogius

 

2.  “Of course, the word spirit itself, despite all of its incorporeal and non-sensuous connotations, is directly related to the very bodily term respiration through their common root in the Latin word “spiritus”, which signified both breath and wind.”

– David Abram, The Spell of the Sensuous

 

3.  “My words come from an upright heart; my lips sincerely speak what I know. The spirit of God has made me; the breath of the Almighty gives me life.”

– Job 33:3-4 

4.  “The fact is that when we focus on the breath, we are focusing on the life force. Life begins with our first breath and will end after our last. To contemplate breathing is to contemplate life itself.”

– Larry Rosenberg, Breath by Breath

 

5.  “Among the Creek Indians of the southwest, for instance, the creator God, the only divinity equal to or exceeding the Earth and the sun in its power, is called the Master of Breath.”

–David Abram, The Spell of the Sensuous

 

6.  “Interestingly, the Greek word psyche, which we often use to indicate our mind or the emotional state of our mind, actually means soul or spirit, or most tellingly, the breath of life.”

– Eddie Stern, One Simple Thing

 

7.  “That oxygen, life, and lungs all came into our world in relatively close succession is no coincidence.  Only with oxygen and some means of extracting it are all things possible—thinking, moving, eating, speaking, and loving.  Life and the breath are synonymous.”

- Michael J. Stephen, MD, Breath Taking

 

8.  “Then the LORD God formed the man from the dust of the ground. He breathed the breath of life into the man’s nostrils, and the man became a living person.”

– Genesis 2:7

 

9.  “The air I inhale enters my body and becomes part of me. The air I exhale moves into someone else and becomes part of her. Just by looking at how the air moves, we realize we are all connected to one another, not just figuratively, but also literally.”

– Haemin Sunim, The Things You Can See Only When You Slow Down

 

10.  “For breath is life, and if you breathe well you will live long on earth.”

- Sanskrit Proverb

 

11.  “Thus spirit = breath = life, the aliveness and power of your life, and to speak of your spirit (or soul) is to speak of the power of life that is in you.”

- Frederick Buechner

 

12.  “Breath is the bridge which connects life to consciousness, which unites your body to your thoughts.”

– Thich Nhat Hanh

 

13.  "Ancient Egyptian cultures also recognized the importance of the breath, the evidence of which we see today in the many ancient statues that had their noses broken off but otherwise were left untouched. This defacement was no accident, but a deliberate act by conquering groups to take the life, in this case the breath of life, away from these icons."

- Michael J. Stephen, MD, Breath Taking

 

14.  “Thus a great many terms that now refer to the air as a purely passive and insensate medium are clearly derived from words that once identified the air with life and awareness. And words that now seemed to designate a strictly immaterial mind or spirit are derived from terms that once named the breath as the very substance of that mystery.”

–David Abram, The Spell of the Sensuous

 

15.  “Zen Master Hogan said that the whole universe is in the breath. If you really pay attention to it, it takes you to its immaculate source.”

– Larry Rosenberg, Breath by Breath

 

16.  “Arise! the breath, the life, again hath reached us: darkness hath passed away and light approacheth.”

– Rig Veda 1:113:16

 

17.  “The breath of life is in the sunlight and the hand of life is in the wind.”

– Kahlil Gibran, The Prophet

 

18. “Life and respiration are complementary. There is nothing living which does not breathe nor anything breathing which does not live.”

- William Harvey, 1653, Lectures on the Whole of Anatomy

Applying Gandhi's Wisdom, The Science of Learning, and $100 to Your Breath

 
 

Listen Instead of Reading

 

Hey,

Welcome back to another issue of the The Breathing 411. Here are 4 thoughts, 1 quote, and 1 answer that I hope you enjoy this week!

 
 
 
 

4 Thoughts


1. Why Your Breathing Gains Get More Boring With Time

“Gaining the first $100 at the track feels much better than winning the second $100, which feels better than winning the third $100, and so on. Eventually, if things get good enough, there is almost no psychological benefit when they get even better. This relationship reflects what economists call diminishing marginal utility.”

- Barry Schwartz, The Paradox of Choice

Building off last week’s “Satisfaction Treadmill,” let’s not forget this passage when our breathing, or anything else we’re working on, starts feeling boring.

We’re still making gains. They just might not feel as dramatic, because we already feel so good.

***

Related: James Clear’s Plateau of Latent Potential

2. Applying Gandhi’s Wisdom and Scientific Research to Appreciate Your Favorite Breathing Practice

“Humans do not give greater credence to an objective record of a past event than to their subjective remembering of it.”

- Make It Stick: The Science of Successful Learning

Translation: What you experience holds more weight than what you learn.

As the Make it Stick authors also tell us, research shows it’s “nearly impossible to avoid basing one's judgments on subjective experience.”

Some might say this is a flaw of being human—we base things on emotions instead of facts. I say it’s amazing, at least when it comes to breathing : )

Because with breathing, this means that whatever you experience is what’s true for you. Your practice is yours; no science or statistics needed.

Practically, it means that if your experience with Wim Hof was terrific, then you should keep doing it. Or, if slow breathing was life-changing, do that.

As Gandhi tells us, “As long as you derive inner help and comfort from anything, keep it.” This applies perfectly to breathing. And science agrees.

***

P.S. If you like mouth breathing 24/7, I’m sorry, that doesn’t count here 😂

Related: “What is the Right Breathwork Method For Me?” from Breathwork Alchemy (Excellent Instagram post—concise and packed with wisdom)

3. Mouth Tape: End Mouth Breathing for Better Sleep and a Healthier Mouth

“Becoming a nose breather is a process, but even repeated cycles of just a few minutes of nose breathing can effectively train your body to do it regularly.”

- Dr. Mark Burhenne, Mouth Tape: End Mouth Breathing for Better Sleep and a Healthier Mouth

Mouth taping is odd. It’s perhaps the most important thing we can do for our health, but it’s hard to recommend without sounding slightly crazy.

Fortunately, Dr. Mark Burhenne wrote this great article, which covers basically every aspect of taping up at night. It will now be my go-to for anyone interested in the topic.

Enjoy the great read, and enjoy sharing it with others.

***

Related: Mouth breathing during sleep significantly increases upper airway resistance and obstructive sleep apnea

4. To Take Care of Your Heart, Take Care of Your Breath

“In other words, the primary role of the heart is to distribute the oxygen brought into the lungs during inhalation, and to bring carbon dioxide back to the lungs where the excess can be breathed out.”

– Patrick McKeown, The Breathing Cure (pg. 237)

I’ve never thought of it this way: Your heart’s main job is to make your breathing useful to the rest of your body. So from this viewpoint, it’s obvious they must work together. And all the science we review makes perfect sense.

Of course breathing efficiently would make our hearts work more effectively. And of course we would see measurements like heart rate variability increase and blood pressure decrease.

That’s because the heart and breath can’t be separated. Thus, we might even say, to take better care of your heart, take better care of your breath.

***

Related Quote: “Although the lungs are clearly an essential element of the processes we associate with breathing, they alone do not provide the whole story.” - Respiratory Physiology: A Clinical Approach

 
 
 
 

1 Quote

“Deep breathing is a potent inducer of the parasympathetic system. The release of acetylcholine not only calms our organs, it also stimulates the release of serotonin, dopamine, and prolactin, the feel-good hormones targeted by medicines like Prozac and Zoloft. But yoga and breathing exercises produce this effect naturally and without side effects.”

- Michael J. Stephen, MD, Breath Taking

 
 
 
 

1 Answer

Category: Nasal Airways

Answer: Although the effect is less commonly discussed, when this gas is released into the nasal airways, it helps warm incoming air.

…

(Cue the Jeopardy! music.)

…

Question: What is nitric oxide?

In good breath,

Nick Heath, T1D, PhD
Diabetes is Tiny. You are Mighty.

P.S. Except for what happens in my brain

 
 
 

Sign Up For The Breathing 411

Each Monday, I curate and synthesize information from scientific journals, books, articles, and podcasts to share 4 thoughts, 1 quote, and 1 answer (like "Jeopardy!") related to breathing. It’s a fun way to learn something new each week.