Why You Need Breathwork In Your Life
When you think of breathwork, your mind likely goes to yoga. That’s the case for most people. Breathwork is automatically associated with yoga because it is what yogis use in order to really get deep into their practice and connect their body with their mind.
But did you know that breathwork can play major roles in your life outside of your yoga class? Breathwork has been scientifically proven to help with stress, anxiety, therapy, and self-healing. The pros of breathwork are endless, and there are no cons in sight.
What we really love about breathwork is that you can do it anywhere, at any time. You don’t need any tools or equipment. Just your body and your mind.
If you are new to breathwork, we are here to guide you through some of the basics. Because the sooner you adopt this practice into your life, the sooner you will start to feel a whole lot better.
Why breathwork is good for your body.
You may not have stopped to think about what happens when you breathe, so let’s take a moment to do that. Breathing involves your entire body. Your chest, your stomach, your back, and your brain are all working together when you breathe.
When you breathe deeply (as one does in breathwork), you active your parasympathetic nervous system. This causes your heart rate to slow down, causes you to relax and helps to lower your blood pressure. This is why you feel a wave of calm come over you when you are stressed and take a few moments to breathe.
Deep breathing is a great way to reverse the way your body handles breathing when it is in stress mode. When stressed, your body speeds your breathing up and increases your blood pressure as it puts you into fight or flight mode. This mode is essential in matters of life and death, but when it comes to daily stress, this fight or flight mode does not need to be activated. And breathing is the best way to calm it down.
Why breathwork is good for your mind.
We don’t just think that breathwork helps with issues such as depression and anxiety – there is scientific evidence that it does. A study done showed that breathwork helped ease severe depression in a group of people who were not having luck with antidepressants. In addition to that, because breathwork slows down your breathing, it can help battle anxiety.
In addition to that, breathwork can help you get deeper, beneath the surface where you may be able to unearth in your body and mind emotions, traumas, and more. This opening up of these internal issues can help you to work through them and rid of them completely.
Intro to breathwork.
Anyone can master breathwork. It just takes practice. And there is no better time to start on that practice than now!
Here’s how to do it.
- Inhale through your nose for 5 seconds
- Exhale through your mouth for 5 seconds
- Repeat this cycle for at least 2 minutes, but go for longer if you can
The longer you practice your breathwork, the more you will be able to slow your inhale and exhale and make them last even longer.
Stay tuned for our next post where we will dive into our favorite breathwork method!