Newsletter Archive
Every edition of The Breathing 411, newest first — peer-reviewed breathing science in plain English by Nick Heath, Ph.D.
Newsletter Archive
The Breathing 411 Archive
Every weekly edition, newest first. 298 editions.
When I was teetering on the brink, I was able to physically calm myself down with a few deep breaths, and that helped me see through the adrenaline rush.
Breathing, it turns out, can be the quickest, most direct path to deep rest. When you can’t go to a retreat, you can bring the retreat to you. And all you need is your breath.
Dr. Nate Zinsser on proper breathing for peak performance, Oliver Burkeman on time management and facing reality, Jim Loehr on breath as the key to emotional control, and Become What You Are by Alan Watts.
Dr. Nate Zinsser on the universal benefit of training the breath, Oliver Burkeman on attention as life itself, Amishi Jha on attention as our highest form of love, Ted Loder on laughter and freedom, and the book Four Thousand Weeks.
Breathing as a bridge between conscious and unconscious performance, the rhythmic heart of all life, the exact formula for stress-reducing breath practice from a landmark study, and The Confident Mind by Dr. Nate Zinsser.
The science of yogic breathing and cerebrospinal fluid, Rick Hanson and Deb Dana on breath and the nervous system, Jon Kabat-Zinn on mindfulness as a lens, Alan Watts on not taking life too seriously, and The Comeback Quotient by Matt Fitzgerald.
How nasal airflow influences the brain and consciousness, the real power of breathing from Caroline Williams, reframing your circumstances from The Art of Possibility, and the book In Awe by John O’Leary.
Bhramari humming breath science for HRV, tinnitus, and blood pressure. Plus the essence of mindfulness, Thich Nhat Hanh on emotional storms, and the only practice that matters.
A new breath-to-brain video, how to never fail in meditation, helping everyone else relax, loving-kindness, and The Mindfulness Solution.
My all-time favorite “breathing exercise” reduces cortisol by over 30%. Plus joy from relaxed breathing, three simple lessons, and The Five Regrets of the Dying.
"Only nasal breathing allows your brainwaves to synchronize with the breath, offering a fast track to an alternative state of mind."
Last week I shared the first video in my new breathing science YouTube series. Another one is live this week.
I’m now creating short, plain-language explainer videos for every study I’ve reviewed.
“This work establishes respiratory rhythm as a physiologically tunable entry point for modulating anxiety states , providing a mechanistic roadmap for developing targeted bioelectronic strategies. Therapeutically,…
Breath work—learning how to change breathing habits and practicing specific breathing techniques—has remarkable effects on physiology. It cannot cause harm, requires no equipment, and costs nothing… and is the most…
“Research where people consciously change their breathing rates has shown that different ways of breathing can encourage particular frequencies to dominate across the brain, which can take us to a more alert and…
“Conscious breathing can create enduring states of focus, presence, and mindful observation, so that life’s challenging situations do not completely highjack us, allowing a greater degree of control. While we cannot…
“I think the amount of time that you spend on this work is not that important…what is important here is the regularity of doing this work. You want to do this every day without fail because you are attempting to…
“The results of this review provide evidence that HRVB and PB [paced breathing] at approximately six breaths per minute have positive effects on a variety of physical, behavioral, and cognitive conditions. The…
“We expand our inner presence and relaxation…and, over time, we find more and more of that inner expansion and relaxation in daily life. The same is true of doing deep meditation (more inner silence in life), yoga…
“A glimmer is the opposite of a trigger; it’s any object or experience that creates a moment of unforced ease or joy. It works the same way as a negative trigger…but instead of sounding an alarm, they turn on the…
“Every time you breathe out, your heartbeat slows a little. Exhaling taps the brakes on your fight-or-flight response so that your heart rate can’t get dangerously high.
“High heart rate variability is associated with smooth, efficient prefrontal cortex activity and executive-function tasks including working memory and inhibitory control. This means that by increasing your heart rate…
“We ask that you stop for a moment and think about the importance of this therapeutic aspect of humming. The bottom line is that humming can reduce your heart rate and lower your blood pressure.
“Humming is easy, and it has marvelous beneficial effects, from lowering blood pressure and heart rate to stimulating the release of vital hormones such as melatonin and nitric oxide. These positive results have been…
“Often meditation works this way: we measure its value in terms of the suffering that would have happened but didn’t—thanks to the fact that we have a practice.”
You know the saying, “ A good day starts the night before ”? We might say: “ A good year starts the month before .”
“Taking five deep, intentional breaths activates your parasympathetic nervous system, grounds you in the present moment, and begins to calm the storm. It's the first step in shifting from reaction to clarity—from…
“The synchronization between respiration and slow neural activity is likely key to understanding the brain-physiology relationship…Slow rhythms thus provide a link and shared feature of respiration, neural, and…
“Most contemplative practices share the commonality of slowed breathing, either intentionally, or as a consequence of the calming practice… changes in breathing rate are quickly signaled to the brain , allowing the…
“It is a gentle, slow practice…and pace (not speed) matters. There is no rushing, no urgency embedded into a step.
“The next time you feel a surge of strong emotion, try using your breath to calm and soothe your mind and body. Take a few slow, deep breaths.
“Humans produce verbal language by controlling the flow of air over the voice box and vocal cords. Our words are carried on a wave of breath, the same breath that feeds the cells of our body with oxygen from the…
Two influential meta-analyses published two years apart showed that breathing interventions significantly lower stress & anxiety.
Here is Leah Lagos, Psy.D., explaining a study where participants breathed at 6 breaths a minute for 5 minutes:
“It is so important to Breathe It Out. This is the one exercise that I ask all my clients to rely on as an in-the-moment go-to strategy…Here it is in its simplicity: Breathe through your nose, breathe slower (which…
“In my professional opinion, yawning is one of the best-kept secrets in neuroscience. Even my colleagues who are researching meditation, relaxation, and stress reduction at other universities have overlooked this…
“Slower regulated breathing has a calming effect on both your body and mind, and it also decreases metabolic activity in different parts of the brain. This is very important because our frontal lobe tends to be…
“Over thousands of years of evolution, fast and powerful pathways between the respiratory system and the brain have been established. If breathing stops, death occurs within minutes, and so the brain prioritizes…
“One of the essential techniques that I distill from this body of knowledge about pranayama is that the qualities of breath that you want to develop are to make it deeper, slower, quieter, and more regular.”
“The practices of slow breathing and relaxation benefit the heart and respiratory system in many ways. The baroreceptors become more responsive to changes in blood pressure, the heart rate becomes more lively and…
“I realized then that to recover from our loss of attention, it is not enough to strip out our distractions. That will just create a void.
“While various techniques may yield different short-term psychophysiological effects, their distinctive long-term significance diminishes over time. It is systematic, consistent practice that enables individuals to…
“If there is anything amiss with our breathing, the brain needs to know quickly to take action immediately. For instance, if the airway is obstructed by a piece of food, the brain has only three or four minutes to…
A 2025 study published in Nature Scientific Reports found that just 30 seconds of slow breathing (6-second inhale, 6-second exhale) reduced heart rate and anticipatory anxiety when participants were presented with…
“Proper breathing can help you cope with stress, sleep better, be less angry or moody, and refresh your energy. It can slow your heart rate and reduce your blood pressure.
Dr. Sinclair has two PhDs, one in sport psychology and another in developmental psychopathology.
“But when you are in control of your emotional state, your breaths are regular. They are in through your nose: slower, softer, and quiet.
“Emotional control rules your ability to get results under pressure. The foundation of emotional control is a calmer, clearer mind…If you can slow down, you can mitigate a bad mood and settle your feelings of stress…
“We propose that the ANS [autonomic nervous system] is modulated by breathing so that in sympathetic dominant states like stress and anxiety, slow-deep breathing techniques and meditation can shift sympathetic…
“This indicates that respiratory interventions may offer a promising anxiety intervention approach in psychiatric and non-psychiatric samples who do not have access to, are unwilling to engage in, or have not…
“Collectively, the emerging consensus view from both animal and human neuroimaging studies places the breath, and its role in modulating neuronal rhythms, as a central regulator of higher order cognition. Through…
“Here, we show for the first time, that decelerated breathing at a rate of 6 cycles/minute has a strong influence on the slow cortical potentials (SCPs) of the brain. At this rate a maximum synchrony between…
The motions involved in breathing physically move your entire body. (Fun aside, this is why fMRI scans need to remove breathing “noise,” and part of why archers often shoot at the end of an exhale: to avoid movement.)
Nasal airflow stimulates the olfactory bulb, which is not only associated with smell but also regulates brain rhythms.
A reminder that I am teaming up with Eddie Stern to bring back the Breathing for Better Brain Health workshop on June 8th. In it, you’ll learn the science of how breathing affects our brains, plus practical ways of…
1. CO₂ crosses the blood-brain barrier and reacts with water in the CSF to form H⁺ and bicarbonate.
1. CO₂ crosses the blood-brain barrier and reacts with water in the cerebral spinal fluid (CSF) to form hydrogen ions (H⁺) and bicarbonate.
1. Slow breathing activates the calming branch of the nervous system, sending signals of safety to the brain.
“So what can help us when rational thought can’t? In our cerebrally oriented life, many of us have forgotten one critical piece: the role of our body to help our mind.
“…most people don’t realize the profound potential the breath has for mental health.
“Approached consciously and with awareness, your breath also helps you relax, release stress, and align yourself with your quiet, still center. You can be anywhere, with any kind of stress or chaos, and your breath…
My good friend, mentor, and all-around awesome human Paul Hunt is leading an 8-week Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) course starting on April 15th.
“I had no idea the impact a simple, gentle walk would have on my life. The impact comes not only from the actual physical walking but also from the discipline, the practice, the commitment.
“With rigorous testing, we demonstrated that the three yogic breathing patterns (slow, deep abdominal and deep diaphragmatic) immediately increased both cranially directed instantaneous CSF velocities and power of…
“Since sitting silently in meditation – as in traditional mindfulness practices – may be challenging for anxious people with high degrees of physiological arousal, breathing may be preferable because it engages the…
My great friend Colleen Loehr, MD, is co-leading a SKY breathing course for the Art of Living. This is the infamous practice that started James Nestor on his path to writing Breath .
Healing Through Breathing (by Eddie Stern) : One of my favorite breath books in recent past. It’s only available on Audible.
“An intelligent control of our breathing power will lengthen our days upon earth by giving us increased vitality and powers of resistance, and, on the other hand, unintelligent and careless breathing will tend to…
“Once you start meditating, breathing is no longer just breathing. When we start paying attention to our breathing on a regular basis, our relationship to it changes dramatically.
“You enter the forest at the darkest point, where there is no path. Where there’s a way or path, it is someone else’s path; each human being is a unique phenomenon.
It’s called: The Mixed Mindful Artist’s Guide: The 5 Biggest Mistakes Coaches Make with Breathing, Meditation, and Mindfulness (and How They Might Be Holding Back Your Coaching Practice).
“Specifically, as slow and deep breathing is initiated during a contemplative practice, the internal state of being settles into a relaxed state with a slower heart rate. With this slowing of heart rate, a positive…
“Studies of brainwaves during breathing suggested that the strongest effect of synching up with breathing rate comes on an in-breath. It sounds a bit cheesy, but it’s also true: when we breathe, we are literally…
“We can form an intimate relationship with our breath, our nervous system, and thus understand on a deep level the way our mind works. Ultimately, this is not about simply breathing; it is about finding a deep…
“This is the first comprehensive literature review on nocturnal mouth-taping. It aims to ascertain what research is available that evaluates mouth-taping during sleep and to summarize this research.
“If we only practice when all the outer conditions seem nice but not when people are noisy, or when there are problems, or when we are feeling ill, or something adverse comes up, then we don’t know how to practice.…
“Breath is a curious operation because it can be experienced as both a voluntary doing and an involuntary happening. You could do a breathing exercise and feel that “ I am breathing ” in just the same way as you can…
“The synchronization between respiration and slow neural activity is likely key to understanding the brain-physiology relationship. Higher degrees of coupling between respiration and brain activity likely manifest as…
“Intention plays an important role in each moment of consciousness: it determines the objects of subsequent moments of consciousness. The stronger our intention to attend to a particular object, the more moments of…
“That point at the tip of the nostril can be viewed as a sort of a window between the inner and outer worlds. It is a nexus point and energy transfer spot where stuff from the outside world moves in and becomes a…
“When we truly observe the breath, we are automatically placed in the present. We are pulled out of the morass of mental images and into a bare experience of the here and now.
“In the practice of meditation you become sensitive to the actual experience of living, to how things actually feel. You do not sit around developing sublime thoughts about living.
“There is a formula for this: 10 percent of thinking can be concerned with the past, 15 percent with the future, and the remaining 75 percent with the present. When we live mostly in the present, we can move easily,…
“The lungs are tied into the universe of physics like no other organ, perfectly using the space allotted to maximize flow. And optimizing flow, and movement, is clearly one of the purposes of life from a biological…
“We term this phenomenon the great 10 second synchrony between breath, heart and the brain.”
“Probably the best place to start is with your breathing. If you can manage to bring your attention to your breathing for even the briefest of moments, it will set the stage for facing that moment and the next one…
“Think about a digital photograph. The vividness and clarity of the image depend on the number of pixels.
“Relaxation is the basic competency in meditation that enables all the others. Mind training without relaxation is like a tree without strong roots—it is not sustainable.
“When you control your breath, what you are actually doing is taking your brainwaves in hand and tethering the rate of their fluctuations to your breathing rate.”
“ I look for changes in character and conduct. How selfless can you be?
“Whatever rate you breathe at, whether you focus on the breath for alertness, slow it down a bit for relaxation, or a lot to reach an altered state of consciousness, only nasal breathing allows your brainwaves to…
“Remarkably, it’s possible to use your breath to train your body to react more healthily to stress, both in the moment and over the longer term, by virtue of the way that it changes the level of activity along the…
“Despite centuries of reports from followers of Eastern traditions that slow breathing can improve focus, bring a sense of calm when we might otherwise lose it and even whisk us away to an altered state of…
“Life is movement, and our breath keeps us going every minute of the day…To bring awareness to that, and to begin to harness that power of movement towards understanding who we are, why we are here, and what we…
“The most universal practice for tapping into the Life Force is really a number of practices—mediation, prayer, reading, journal writing, exercise—that make up the morning rituals that so many people swear by. Rather…
“Mental status (anxious versus calm) is reflected by breathing pattern and it is believed that conscious regulation is key to achieving control over mind/mental status.”
“But none of this is the final destination of spinal breathing. We are going in so we can come back out and enjoy our inner qualities in the outside world of our everyday living.
“The film director David Lynch formulated it most compellingly when he told me ‘ The thing about meditation is, you become more and more you. ’ So you should not have the slightest concern about meditating in ways…
“Living well, therefore, is merely a game of learning how to steer our energy toward life. It requires us to direct our loving attention toward the pulse that ebbs and flows within us, finding the precise rhythm of…
“Anxious individuals who are unable to withstand the anxiety that accompanies the possibility of something bad happening in the future may experience respiratory interventions as a means by which to control their…
This passage comes from Advice Not Given by Mark Epstein, MD. It’s a Zen story about Bodhidharma, a famous Buddhist monk, and Huike, who was intent on learning from him:
“What science is also revealing is that there’s an additional simple, watery means to mindfulness. Indeed, think of it as Blue Mindfulness.”
“Slow breathing is, in fact, a type of positive stress in and of itself, because you are making an autonomic function of your body intentional…sometimes, as you might notice, your nervous system might resist a little…
“The entire purpose of the human brain is to produce movement. Movement is the only way we have of interacting with the world.”
“This knowledge can and should provide a sense of freedom for individual practitioners and program developers alike in tailoring programs to meet their needs for stress reduction effectiveness.”
“Breathing practices, when used in isolation, have the advantage of being universally accessible, scalable, and cost-free. They are not limited by access to healthcare services nor burdened by side effects and put…
“The most empirically supported way that contemplative practices confer their psychological and physiological benefits is by lowering threat arousal through shifting the autonomic nervous system to parasympathetic…
Thus, we can perform a breath practice followed by loving-kindness meditation as a simple yet deeply restoring way to start each day 🙏
The first is this: emotions transform how we perceive the world. … Each emotion is a lens through which we see the world.”
Just by looking at how the air moves, we realize we are all connected to one another, not just figuratively but also literally.”
“In sum, an incredible amount of cellular energy is spent navigating states of moderate threat arousal, energy that could otherwise be used for other health-promoting biological processes such as cellular restoration.”
With it, latent seeds, which are common to every human—those of kindness, goodwill, forgiveness, and confidence—begin growing.
“We must continuously breathe precisely to bring oxygen to mitochondria to fuel oxidative phosphorylation, to charge our mitochondria, which sustain cellular life, brain activity, and consciousness.”
“You might notice that as soon as you begin to observe your breath, it changes a little. Perhaps it gets a little longer, or fuller.
“Any framework, method, or label you impose on yourself is just as likely to be a limitation as an opening.”
Slow breathing promotes optimal blood circulation, and mindfulness promotes optimal psyche circulation. Used together, they restore each of us to better physical and mental health and well-being.
Since achieving a calmer mind and living more in the moment are almost universal outcomes of breathing and meditation, here’s a beautiful passage to contemplate as more motivation to practice:
In The Mindfulness Solution , Ronald Siegel, Psy.D., presents a conceptual equation for suffering:
Practicing slow breathing upon waking is like taking an extended-release calm pill each morning.
“It may be helpful to receive advice from more experienced artists, but as information, not as prescription…
“Clouds never truly disappear. They change form.
And fortunately, we’re always expressing ourselves through our breathing; the state of our body, mind, and spirit are articulated in every breath. When we tune into it, it helps us discover who we are.
“As we delve into specific breathing patterns, we can begin to discern that our breath has the power to influence how we experience life and even transform the course of our existence and our experience of everything…
“The artist actively works to experience life slowly, and then to re-experience the same thing anew.”
“In the body, laughter serves an important purpose. It quite literally tickles the adrenals.
A paper recently published in Nature may seem to suggest that slow breathing doesn’t work over a “placebo.” However, when analyzed carefully, it actually showed that controlled, nasal, diaphragmatic breathing works…
1. Breathing saves your life 20,000 times a day; mindfulness helps you appreciate this truth.
“Just as our bodies are born to breathe air, we are born to love. That's why although it's good to address our fear, it's even better to focus on our love.
“If we commit to a twice-daily practice and give it some time to work, the benefits will be there. The beauty in this is that no matter which of the benefits we have come looking for, we will receive all of the…
“Breath is life. It sustains us and it is an expression of the life force within us.
“The result is not the point; it is the effort to improve ourselves that is valuable. There is no end to this practice.”
“Importantly, rain washes away the vestiges of pollution. Air is always cleaner during and immediately after a downpour…As rain tumbles through the atmosphere, each drop attracts hundreds of pollutant…
“Rather, I think the power of breathwork to change the function of the nervous system can be compared to the way water cuts a canyon through rock. It’s the constant stimulus, the constant pressure, that produces huge…
“I would actually say that the sauna at MIT was probably my first and most powerful meditation teacher. And I used to go with some of my graduate student friends and sit in the sauna and crank the heat up as far as…
Imagine if we tried to understand ocean waves by studying the internal makeup of the water (without first examining the winds).
“Previous systematic reviews and meta-analyses have shown that mindfulness interventions are effective in improving glycemic control in people with type 2 diabetes. The reduction in HbA1c levels is approximately 0.3%”
“Cultivating mindfulness is a way to pour energy in the form of attention, awareness, and acceptance into what is already right with you, what is already whole , as a complement to, not a substitute for, whatever…
“Our bodies get worn down more quickly under chronic stress, and chronic uncertainty is the most ubiquitous form of chronic stress.”
“How does it feel to be like this? Does it feel natural?
“Breathing exercises can improve the main biological indicators of OS [oxidative stress] toward the direction of antioxidation and improve the OS state by increasing the levels of antioxidants and reducing those of…
“Moreover, breathing is not exclusive. Living beings differ in appearance and behavior.
“These analyses demonstrated the potential therapeutic role of laughter-inducing interventions as a complementary strategy to improve everyone’s well-being and highlight the need for further research aiming to…
“There is no such thing as an involuntary system if the student learns to regulate the motion of the lungs. For by doing so, a vast portion of that system is brought under his voluntary control.”
“By inducing stress resilience, breath work enables us to rapidly and compassionately relieve many forms of suffering.”
“[T]he more intensely you are attending to the present moment, the more temporary freedom you gain from regrets about the past and worries about the future. Furthermore, the more intensely you practice, the longer…
“In sum, we show that a relatively short period of mindfulness practice…significantly changes brain dynamics related to the internal monitoring of response conflicts and related errors.”
“Literally anything you can do to augment your enjoyment of training will facilitate a process focus and lead to better performance. If you will enjoy a given workout more in location A than in location B, you'll get…
“To our knowledge, this is the first demonstration that the alteration of respiration is sufficient to induce emotion.”
“The information presented is interesting and inspiring. The power of conscious breathing can't be overstated.
“It is intriguing that a mental exercise that ‘merely’ entails the voluntary focus on a simple object, such as the sensation of one’s own breath, combined with a non-reactive and accepting awareness of concurrently…
Don’t do 5 minutes of breathing. Consciously take one breath, over and over, until your 5-minute timer goes off.
The greatest skill in breathing (like in life) is knowing when to go with the flow, and when to deliberately change it.
“Breathing is about much more than simple gas exchange or even cardiorespiratory fitness. We exhale and inhale more than twenty thousand times per day, and the way in which we do so has tremendous influence on how we…
Want a complete research-based breathing system for anxiety? The Anxious Person’s Breath Manual synthesizes 454 studies into one practical guide.
Doing a deliberate slow nasal breathing practice first thing every morning is like putting on joy contacts to start your day.
“ To know that the mind is the root of everything is to realize that we are ultimately responsible for both our own happiness and our own suffering. It is in our hands.” – Sogyal Rinpoche
Full Catastrophe Living : Teaches the power of mindful breathing, which is the starting point of all breathing practices.
Would you walk into every room, try each electronic, and then act surprised every time they didn’t work? “ The coffee maker won’t start!
“Comparing each to a nonmeditator of the same age and sex, the meditators were breathing an average 1.6 breaths more slowly. And this was while they were just sitting still, waiting for a cognitive test to start.
“As far as we can tell from the published literature and ClinicalTrials.gov searches, this study provides the first evidence of a behavioral intervention that reduces Aβ levels (measured with plasma, CSF or PET)…
P.S. I had a few nights of poorer-than-normal sleep and noticed that my morning breathing was nowhere near as enjoyable or effective.
“The emerging scenario strongly suggests that the effects of SNB [slow nasal breathing], beyond the relative contribution of vagal stimulation, are mainly ascribable to olfactory epithelium stimulation.”
“[I]f you come away from this book with anything, I want it to be a clear sense of how important this is. We’re busy.
When you regularly practice slow breathing, you store its power away as potential energy in the form of vagal tone. It’s kind of like a bank account for slow breathing.
“The breath accompanies you the full length of life’s road: you learn about the body, feelings, mental formations, the mind itself, and, finally, the lawfulness of impermanence and emptiness of a substantial self.”
“This new way of inducing a respiratory bodily illusion, called “embreathment,” revealed that breathing is almost as important as visual appearance for inducing body ownership and more important than any other cue…
“Each time a gust of wind blows over the ocean, ripples and waves cause movement and agitation on the water’s surface. However, when the air is calm, so is the water.
“In view of the close association between respiration, ANS activity, and emotions presented, it is apparent that individuals possess the ability to alter emotional states using the voluntary control of breathing and…
“Vagal activity is enhanced during the postinspiratory period and inhibited during the postexpiratory period.” - Kromenacker et al. (2018)
“…the upper respiratory tract is able to warm and saturate inspired air so that in climates as cold as minus 100°C [-148°F] air entering the alveoli has attained body temperature and is saturated with water vapor.”
“Breathing really fast and heavy on purpose flips the vagal response the other way, shoving us into a stressed state. It teaches us to consciously access the autonomic nervous system and control it, to turn on heavy…
“Finally, at the applied level, these findings may have implications for individuals looking for a quick and easy method to alter their executive functions, for example, to better execute cognitively demanding tasks…
Breathing is self-love: It increases vagal tone and helps us feel safe, allowing us to experience more love-love. Experiencing more love, then, will reshape our lives for the better, triggering an upward spiral that…
“Pranayama may be helpful for improving sleep disturbance, anxiety, and mental QOL [quality of life] among patients undergoing chemotherapy.”
Let Go of Expectations: I get so excited about these thoughts, so I just have to remind myself it's just a newsletter, and I have no clue what will resonate with you, the reader.
“Research on breathwork could be likened to that of meditation, which received an unprecedented surge in scientific exploration two decades ago. We may be at a similar cusp with breathwork and anticipate considerable…
“Bibliotherapy is based on the assumption that the simple act of reading can produce healing of various health conditions , including depression. The definition of bibliotherapy has broadened over the years to…
“ High vagal tone, then, can be taken as high loving potential . … Compared to people with lower vagal tone, those with higher vagal tone experience more love in their daily lives, more moments of positivity resonance.”
“There’s nothing mystical or abstract about it. It’s physical.
In his new book, Never Finished , David Goggins says that the first freezing wave that hit him in Hell Week almost sent him home:
“ A certain mind body treatment may help hypertension, depression, or insomnia. At the same time, this treatment will counter the overall physical and mental manifestations of stress through the calming of brain…
“ We here show that arterial oxygenation is improved in healthy awake subjects during nasal breathing as compared with mouth breathing. ”
“ …our results lead to the hypothesis that slow breathing may exert some antioxidant effect, possibly via parasympathetic stimulation. ”
“ Remarkably, the regularity of breathing seen during recitation of the Ave Maria or of the mantra was similar to regularity during controlled breathing at 6/min, indicating that these methods could stabilise the…
“ What I do for stress is one minute of humming and breathing. This always works for me.
When you remove habitual mouth breathing, it’s like removing ultra-processed foods. You’ll feel amazing, and everyone will agree it was a good call.
Would you mind taking a quick survey? I try to avoid stuff like this, but it will genuinely help me with a project I’m a part of.
“ Think of mindful meditation as a smart investment of your time, offering such returns as being less reactive, less stressed, and more alert, grateful, and content. All of these will help you optimize the rest of…
“ This is the deepest paradox in all of meditation: we want to get somewhere—we wouldn’t have taken up the practice if we didn’t— but the way to get there is just to be fully here. The way to get from point A to…
“ Your body has numerous major systems, including the endocrine (hormone), cardiovascular, immune, gastrointestinal, and nervous systems. If you want to use the mind-body connection to lower your stress, cool the…
“ [B]reath is the animated, nonphysical aspect of your being. So that when you look in the direction of breath, when you focus your attention on your breath, you are really looking at your spiritual self.
I usually include blog posts as an extra, but I’m super excited about this one, so I’m including it as a full thought. It’s a short 5-min read, but here are the key takeaways in case you don’t have time right now:
Practicing low & slow nasal breathing is like eating a nutrient-dense, whole-food meal. We get more with less and always feel nourished afterward.
“ Over thousands of years of evolution, fast and powerful pathways between the respiratory system and the brain have been established. If breathing stops, death occurs within minutes, and so the brain prioritizes…
Here’s a more eloquent way to say, “extend your exhale,” which applies to all aspects of life: Give more than you receive.
“ I realized then that to recover from our loss of attention, it is not enough to strip out our distractions. That will just create a void.
“ Noradrenaline is also released, though in different amounts, during times of intense focus, curiosity, or passion, promoting the growth of new connections in the brain. Researchers…found that slow, controlled, deep…
State Breathing: How your breathing changes during and immediately after an experience (e.g., breathwork, yoga, a stressful event, etc.).
“ Taken together, our results suggest that slow-paced breathing performed before sleeping may enhance restorative processes at the cardiovascular level during sleep. ”
“ The key to high-level success is to pick one thing to change—yes, just one—and master it. ”
Last week , I shared a great quote from Andrew Weil, MD. Here’s another one, this time from Wayne Jonas, MD, in his outstanding book How Healing Works :
“ Breath work—learning how to change breathing habits and practicing specific breathing techniques—has remarkable effects on physiology. It cannot cause harm, requires no equipment, and costs nothing.
“ By considering the importance of the PNS for health-related issues, … these results encourage the implementation of voluntary slow breathing exercises in health-related contexts , given the low-tech and low-cost…
For breathing, we don’t need artificial intelligence. Instead, we can tap into a much more powerful AI: Ancient Intelligence.
“ What are tools? Tools are practices, simple techniques that bridge the gap between insight and action.
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.
“ It’s all about attention, says anesthesiologist Sam Sharar ... If we focus on a painful sensation, it will increase our experience of that pain.
“ 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…
This is a complex topic I get a lot of questions about. I made a 40-min class on it, but attempted to put the most critical information into this free post:
“ With eight hundred thousand new medical articles being published every year, by 2020 medical knowledge is estimated to double every seventy-three days. ”
“ Diaphragmatic breathing has the potential to offer a readily available and inexpensive treatment to help manage stress on a daily basis. ”
“ 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…
“ As such, DSB [deep and slow breathing] represents a practical, low-cost exercise that can be performed anywhere in order to promote successful aging. ” <—sounds good to me 😊
“ 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.
“ Values are ‘desired qualities of ongoing action.’ In other words, your values describe how you want to behave as a human being: how you want to act on an ongoing basis,
“ Try stopping, sitting down, and becoming aware of your breathing once in a while throughout the day. It can be for five minutes or even 5 seconds…Then, when you're ready to move, moving in the direction your heart…
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.
“ There is always a mental posture, an alignment for your mind, as well as for your physical body. ”
Want a complete research-based breathing system for anxiety? The Anxious Person’s Breath Manual synthesizes 454 studies into one practical guide.
“ 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…
“ Mindful low-and-slow breathing (Chapter 2) activates the parasympathetic (relaxation) nervous system and is therefore almost always helpful in reducing physiological arousal, including bringing down skin…
“ 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.
“ [Breathing] allows you to function at peak energy, yet without the physical and psychological costs of anxiety and adrenaline overload. In other words, being calm and energized is not only possible through the…
As rock climbers ascend a mountain face, they periodically clip into a new anchor higher on the wall. But no matter how high they get, they still take heavy falls and get slapped into the mountainside.
After reviewing tons of scientific papers, reading books, taking classes, and on & on, here’s the best breathing advice I’ve ever read:
1. “When you practice mindfulness of breathing, then the breathing is mind.” - Thich Nhat Hanh
Want a complete research-based breathing system for anxiety? The Anxious Person’s Breath Manual synthesizes 454 studies into one practical guide.
“ When researchers at Harvard, Yale, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology scanned the brains of experienced meditators, they discovered increased thickness in regions of the brain's cortex, or grey matter,…
“ If you watch anyone on the verge of starting something that matters, you'll see them settle into the moment by taking a deep breath in and exhaling….It's the body rolling up its metaphorical sleeves and saying,…
“ So what is the fastest way to achieve well-being? It is so close to you that it can easily be overlooked.
1. Demonstrations of breathing are small compared with the great thing that is hidden behind them.
“ Hence, through pranayama, one attempts to do away with the effort of respiration; rhythmic breathing must become something so automatic that the yogin can forget it. ”
“ 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. ”
“ Demonstrations of love are small, compared with the great thing that is hidden behind them. ”
“ ‘Very subtly’ means that when the nose draws in the outside air, it should draw it very subtly so that the ear should not hear it. Being subtle and fine is the gate to life.
In Heart Breath Mind , Leah Lagos discusses a fascinating study where a group of people were instructed to only exhale about 70% of their air with each breath.
“ They [breathing patterns] thereby constitute an easy but potent avenue to manipulate the whole physiological state of the organism. ”
“ But this doesn’t have to be all at once. Start by starting.
Here are 5 different exhales you can try during your slow breathing practice. Give them a shot and see which one brings you the most relaxation.
Here’s a quick way to improve any breathing practice you do: Take 5-10 seconds to notice how you feel afterward.
If you’ve read any books on breathwork, or heard any podcasts, or taken any classes, you’ve inevitably heard some incredible stories of healing.
“ Therefore, it is widely accepted that emotions arise within the brain, which provides feedforward signaling … [But] The emotional and neurological changes that arise during pranayama and meditation illustrate the…
“ Long-haul creativity, Robinson believes, requires a low-level, near-constant sense of frustration. … It’s a constant, itchy dissatisfaction, a deep sense of what-if, and can-I-make-it-better, and the like.
“Unfortunately, to keep us safe, the amygdala is strongly biased toward negative information. …This crushes optimism and squelches creativity.
“ Our bodies are complex interconnected systems of biological processes that interact differently under the influence of the unique genetic coding and environmental factors that we each experience. ”
“ Ujjayi pranayama, which is performed by lightly tightening the glottis and breathing with a whispering sound and then exhaling out of either the left or right nostril, stimulates the vagus through massaging the…
I thought, “ I’m The Breathing Diabetic. I better be able to handle some altitude.”
“ It's helpful to extend your exhalations because the ‘rest and digest’ parasympathetic nervous system handles exhaling while also slowing your heart rate. So, longer exhalations are naturally relaxing.
“ The individual is of first importance, not the system. Remember that man created method and not that method created man, and do not strain yourself in twisting into someone’s preconceived pattern, which…
“ Consider what life would be like if we gave up the idea of healthy or sick, zero versus one, and replaced it with the idea of multiple continuum. One minute, for example, we might score 60% on one health dimension,…
“ Breathe deeply and regularly…Try to breathe through your nose, keeping your mouth closed if at all possible. The more you breathe through your nose, the easier you will find it to breathe through your nose.
Answer: Breathing comes first. Aligning your body correctly will come more easily once you have your breathing down.
“ Research in general tells us something about most people. Given that our concern is for what we, rather than what most people, should do, current medical practice alone cannot have a definitive answer…We need to…
Let’s synthesize some ideas on breathing for longevity and see how we can apply this knowledge in our own life today.
“ Over the years we've experimented with many different types of physiological and psychological measures. Heart rate variability (HRV) patterns… have consistently emerged as the most dynamic and reflective of our…
“ Inhalation causes an immediate rise in heart rate, followed (∼5 s) by increased blood pressure and baroreceptor firing. Exhalation results in an immediate decrease in heart rate followed (∼5 s) by decreased blood…
“ Resilience is the ability to return to normalcy, according to Jen Baker, director of athletics and recreation at John Hopkins University, a graduate of the US Naval Academy. It's your ability to bounce back and…
Phil Mickelson used controlled breathing throughout the PGA Championship. So, when he won, it was an exciting moment for the breathing community.
“ The answer starts with the noble intentions of engineers. Most technology and product design projects must combat feature creep, the tendency for things to become incrementally more complex until they no longer…
“ 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…
“ In addition to being aware of the hedonic treadmill, we should also be wary of the satisfaction treadmill. This is the double whammy of adaptation.
“ Knowledge is not know-how until you understand the underlying principles at work and can fit them together into a structure larger than the sum of its parts. Know-how is learning that enables you to go do.
Want a complete research-based breathing system for anxiety? The Anxious Person’s Breath Manual synthesizes 454 studies into one practical guide.
Group 1: Infants were able to control some dancing toys by turning their heads in their cribs. It made them really happy to see the toys.
“ The results of this review provide evidence that HRVB and PB at approximately six breaths per minute have positive effects on a variety of physical, behavioral, and cognitive conditions. ”
“ When oscillations of two or more systems are synchronised it increases physiological efficiency by enabling the functions of these systems to be coordinated. This prevents energy being wasted on non productive…
“ Breathe slowly and smoothly. A pervasive sense of calm descends.
“ However, a lightbulb also produces heat. Heat is not the function of the lightbulb, nor is it the reason we originally fashioned it […] It is an unintended by-product of the operation, not the true function.
One of my favorite stories is the “50 lbs = A” parable . I even kept a post-it of that phrase on my monitor during my post-doc.
“ This knowledge is spreading back to the West through disciplines such as yoga and mindfulness, but also through techniques aimed at improving endurance, and even intimacy. These practices demonstrate that the mind…
“ 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,…
" Breathing is one of the body’s critical functions. When its fundamental processes break down, the body will compensate, calling on structures such as the core muscles to help maintain respiration.
" When it comes to the process of scaling habits, there are two general categories: habits that grow and habits that multiply. "
As I have been making my way through Patrick McKeown’s latest book, The Breathing Cure , I’ve been reminded of just how powerful all this breathing stuff is. Patrick has sections on breathing for diabetes, epilepsy,…
Reading it now, I would change the "Healthy Paradox" section. At the time, I felt quite conflicted that I had become unhealthy on my mission to promote being healthy.
" With breathing interventions being relatively rapid interventions to implement and also demonstrating a wide range of positive clinical outcomes, breathing interventions warrant closer consideration from healthcare…
Last week we learned that breathing is the only true compounding health habit . However, I believe the real magic occurs when breathing begins improving other areas of our lives.
Many investors are better than Warren Buffet. But did you know he bought his first stock when he was 11 years old?
" World-class performers are less about complexity and more about optimizing simplicity…It’s about the fundamentals. But small, daily improvements on the fundamentals every day done with ridiculous consistency…
" Social psychologists now know that the truth lies in the opposite direction. People need to change their actions and their minds will follow.
" Wim Hof breathing doesn’t help with the cold; your belief that it helps with the cold is what helps with the cold. "
" For example, oral vitamin C is absorbed in the small intestine…but intravenous vitamin C bypasses the gut, achieving blood and tissue concentrations that are markedly higher than those achieved with the oral form.…
" Weak is he who permits his thoughts to control his breath; strong is he who forces his breath to control his thoughts. "
" We noted that the inhalation of NO led to a significant increase in nitrite and SNO-Hb. Nitrite peaked at 5 minutes and SNO-Hb peaked beyond 15 minutes, of discontinuing the NO inhalation.
But the skill of breathing is universal, applicable in every domain, available every second of every day.
People have been using breathing to modulate their autonomic nervous and immune systems for thousands of years. But Wim brought it to the world.
If you have a hole in your boat, a bigger engine or better fuel might keep you afloat longer. A more aerodynamic design might help you temporarily go faster.
" The problem in today’s corporate world, as well as in many other realms, is not hard work; the problem is insufficient recovery. "
" If you have a hangover…if you do 20 minutes of this breathing, then you have no hangover anymore. You are learning to detox yourself in 20 minutes.
For any situation you’re in, you can find a cliché to help you through. And as seen above, clichés are often contradictory.
I had to get a new computer recently. My Macbook Pro gave me 7 great years, but it was time to move on.
Breath Practice: Time you spend every day performing breathing exercises that are comfortable and beneficial to you. Think of it as self-care.
Last week, we talked about a powerful evolutionary advantage : Rather than evolving to breathe slowly, we evolved the ability to control our breathing .
There are non-breathing ways to improve your breathing. Here’s the easiest and most helpful one I’ve found: Add 2-4 hours between dinner and bedtime.
i. Carbon dioxide is your primary stimulus to breathe.
Not exactly breathing related, but a short article recently published in Medical Hypotheses proposed the following: Type-1 diabetics might be "spared" from the more severe complications of COVID-19 because we produce…
I recently finished the two-part interview with David Bidler on the Bravest Podcast . I highly recommend listening to both episodes.
James Nestor’s first "expert Q&A" episode has been released. It’s on sleep tape with Dr.