Whoooosa! Breathing Techniques with Sally
Sally Ng is a Trail Roots member and Austin personal trainer. She sends out a great email each week focusing on self improvement and also highlights a local business. We are sharing one of her latest write ups on the importance of proper breathing techniques. Here you go! Oh, and if you enjoy her post, make sure to Email Sally, and ask to get added to her email list.
“Last week, we talked about making workouts a consistent part of your weekly routine. I LOVED hearing back from you guys on how you implemented these ideas not only in your workout, but in your day to day life with work and other activities! Thanks for that feedback, yall!
This week, I'll be highlighting BREATHING. I talked about belly breathing in my first weekly wellness newsletter, but I know many of you guys might have missed it, or hadn't joined in on the fun yet. I'll recap this, and I'll also go over breathing during exercise.
First, why is it important?
Obviously, because we want to live, duh. But really, breathing does SO much more than supply your body with Oxygen. How we breathe tells our body to react in different ways. Our breathing patterns even changes our hormone levels!
How STRESS affects our breathing
When our bodies are tired or stressed, you're breathing becomes more labored and shallow. This tells our body to run like hell! It's your body's way of saying, "Don't stop, GO! Run for your life! Don't waste energy doing ANYTHING else, just GO!". This is exactly what we need when we are escaping a dangerous situation like a bear or if you're on your bike escaping a wild driver. However, most of us don't face these situations every day. Well, hopefully you don't! Stress from work, family, relationships, quarantine, etc, also triggers this Fight or Flight response, especially steady state stress over an extended period of time. Why is this a bad thing? This can cause heart issues, hypertension, fatigue, increased inflammation (especially if you already have any autoimmune disorders), depression, decrease libido, make it more challenging to lose weight, get strong, and decrease body fat. When our body is stressed, it makes our breathing less effective/efficient for everyday activities.
Shallow Breathing
Most of us do this on a pretty regular basis. When we shallow or chest breathe, we don't take in Full breaths of air, we use our intercostal (rib muscles) to pull air into the chest rather than really expanding our lungs from the diaphragm. Whether we do this to "hide or pull in your belly" or due to chronic stress, it sets off the Sympathetic Nervous System (SNS), and activates that Flight or Fight Response from above. We get in a bad habit of it, and we continue this ugly cycle of I'm stressed so I breathe shallow, but I shallow breathe, so I never get my SNS to shut off. Where and how can we stop?!!
Belly Breathing
Take a loooooong slow breath in and let it expand all the way down to your stomach, out the sides of your ribs, and even in your back. Try not to let your chest or shoulders move very much, just everything below it. You can practice this sitting down or laying down, with one hand on your chest and one on your belly. When you exhale, you should feel your stomach sinking back in or down. When you breathe deep, and your diaphragm pulls down, it sends signals to your vagus nerve that tells your brain to relax. This allows us to sleep better, digest food better, poop easier, lose fat easier. It tells our body that things are ok, we are not running from bears, and we can hormonally shift to a healthier place. Just by breathing deeper into your belly!
This is the strange thing, sometimes belly breathing can make you feel kinda... wierd, like weepy or something. That's ok, there's a lot going on with the chemicals in our body and your brain, and usually if we let these emotions out, we will feel better afterwards. It's similar to when you might have a hard workout or a race or something and you start getting weepy. It's wierd, but during almost every race I've ever done, if I'm really pushing myself, I want to cry at some point. Not just because I've been biking or running for forever, but because my body is reacting to every breath and every effort, and sometimes, it just needs to squeeze a tear or two out. It's ok, it's normal! And like I said, I feel great after it passes!
Breathing During Exercise
In general, EXhale on the EXertion. Breathe out on the hard part of the exercise, where you have to fight gravity or whatever resistance is added on. ie: exhale on the pushing up part of a pushup and inhale on the way down, or exhale on the stand up portion of the squat and inhale on the way down, exhale on the curling up part of the bicep curl, etc.
Now this can be different if you are lifting a heavy load like squats or deadlifts, or other big heavy movements. If you're doing a heavy squat, you can take a breath in and really brace your core before you start going down, hold part of that breath in, squat down holding that weight, and then exhale on the up or after you stand up. *If you have hypertension, this might not be safe for you. Please ask me if you're unsure if this breathing style is right for you.
How to Include Breathwork Into Your Day
Stacey Gesinger, LMFT, recommends taking 3 slow deep breaths before eating. Not only does that aid in digestion, it helps you to be grateful for your food and body. Repeating this breathing at your meals will develop muscle memory for your body. Breathing when you're stressed is great, but it's important to practice the deep breathing before things get stressful. If you were going to try to throw a shotput as far as you can, you should probably practice quite a bit before a big competition. By deep breathing every day, your body gets better and better at it, so when sh*t hits the fan, we know what to do. Those are my words, not Stacey's, she's more eloquent than I am.
Soooo try it out! Before you go on to your next email or task, put one hand on your chest and one on your belly and breathe deeeeeeeep. See, doesn't that feel nice? I challenge you to do this every day. Tie it to a habit you already do, like making coffee and breathing while it brews.
Also, here is a wonderful animation I think of on a regular basis. There's so much in life that you can't control. Instead of inserting yourself into these stressors that you have no control of, try to acknowledge that they are happening, without running out into the middle of it and trying to change them. This is from a wonderful free app called Headspace.
If you'd like to learn more on how health and wellness can help you deal with both high level stress, or chronic low level stress, Sally is offering a complimentary virtual consultation to give you some ideas, or chat about a plan going forward for you. Email Sally for a consultation or to join her newsletter!