03/10/2021
Learning to breathe more effectively is the fastest way to improve your health.
Better breathing is often referred to as belly breathing.⠀
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Breathing is more complicated.
Look at the amazing 3D dome shaped diaphragm muscle.
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When your belly expands because you are sending the air pressure of your breath down towards your feet. Ideally, that means that your diaphragm is engaging, pulling down, and creating a vacuum that pulls air into your lungs. ⠀
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This allows them to expand fully and gives you all the oxygen you need. Healthy movement of the diaphragm also stimulates the vagus nerve, which helps with heart health, anxiety, digestion.⠀
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But, you can expand your belly without taking a deep breath. Try it. Hold your breath and expand your belly. ⠀
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So good breathing isn’t just the belly moving forward.⠀
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When we breathe, we need to engage all three parts of our lungs. We need to breathe into the chest, the ribcage, and into the belly. Breathing into all three parts is a full body breath.⠀
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Here are some exercises to feel a full 360 degree breath:⠀
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Chest breath
Fill the upper chest. Make sure you’re not lifting the shoulders to breathe. The breath should come into the upper chest right under the collarbones and expand 360 degrees. Encourage them to keep the shoulders relaxed and the neck long. ⠀
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Rib breath⠀
Your ribs are quite pliable and expand 360 degrees. You can breathe into the ribs and feel them expand. Using this breathing, it allows the diaphragm to descend naturally without pushing down on the pelvic floor too hard.⠀
1. Place hands around rib cage⠀
2. Take a breath in feeling the hands move outward as the ribs expand.⠀
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Back breathing ⠀
Instead of breathing just by pushing out their belly you can breath into the lower back and the sacrum. This means your lower back will expand.⠀
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1. Place one hand on belly and one hand on low back to feel the backwards expansion.⠀
2. Feel expansion in forwards (belly) and backwards (lower back) on inhalation.⠀
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A full breath should activate each of these areas of the respiratory system.⠀
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Could you breathe in these three directions?
