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.
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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.”
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.
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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.
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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.
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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.
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(Cue the Jeopardy! music.)
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Question: What is nitric oxide?
In good breath,
Nick Heath, T1D, PhD
Diabetes is Tiny. You are Mighty.
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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.