Take a Deep Breath
(By Gerd Lange, Director InBreath, the Institute for Breath Therapy and Transformational
Healing)
Breathing is one of our most important body functions. You can survive without food for
2 months, without water for two weeks but without breath you will only live a few
minutes. Let us spend a few minutes exploring the physical, energetic and emotional
aspects of our breath – the key to health, abundant energy and emotional freedom
What actually happens physically, when you take a breath?
On the in-breath, the diaphragm (a large dome shaped muscle located at the bottom of
your ribcage), straightens out, the bottom ribs are pulled up and out by the intercostal
muscles, and air gets sucked into the lungs. On the out-breath, the diaphragm relaxes,
returning back to dome shape, thus squeezing the air out of the lungs.
When the breath is pulled in through the mouth or nostrils, it flows down the trachea into
the bronchi at the top of your lungs. From there the air travels down the bronchioles
which are becoming smaller and smaller the deeper they extend into the lungs (the whole
structure resembling the root system of a tree) till it finally reaches the alveoli. These are
tiny little bubbles of one-cell thick membranes, through which the exchange of oxygen
and CO2 with the blood takes place. Oxygen rich blood now travels to all organs and
eventually every cell in the body, nourishing and fuelling all life functions and assisting
the elimination of body waste products. One fact that always fascinates me is, that all
alveoli put together would cover an area the size of a tennis field, which makes the lungs
the largest organ of our body.
If you are feeling tense and stressed out, focusing on the breath for five or ten minutes
will calm you down immediately and help you cope with the day-to-day demands of our
busy life style. Taking deep conscious breaths helps to reduce the negative effects of the
stress hormones adrenaline and cortisol. Breathing this way alkalises and re-energises the
body, aides digestion and brain function, lowers stress levels and induces a feeling of
calmness and relaxation, even encourages deeper sleep.
Energy aspects of the breath
According to Taoist and Yogic views the breath carries a vital bioelectric charge called
Chi or Prana. They consider the nutrition provided through the breath even more
important to health and longevity than food and water. Western science has now also
acknowledged its existence, identifying it as negative ion – a tiny highly active molecular
fragment that carries negative electrical charge. Negative ions are in higher concentration
in clean unpolluted air, on mountaintops and near the ocean and we experiencing them as
invigorating and energizing. Deep breathing also increases the amount of negative ions
taken into the body, exerting a powerful therapeutic effect on all cells and tissue, helping
them to detoxify and recharge.
The breath is our constant companion, yet mostly goes unnoticed.
By the time you will be 80, you are likely to have taken around 630 million breaths, based
on people normally breathing around 15 times per minute. Each breath is a moment of
life, a renewal in every sense, a miracle in action. But how often are we actually
conscious of our breath? Maybe only when- after strenuous exercises- we are “out of
breath” - or, at an especially hectic time, suddenly remember to take a deep breath and
immediately feel a relaxation, an instant grounding, a sigh of relief.
Take a moment for yourself right now. Take a few deep breaths - a few conscious
breaths! ………..Listen and feel inside yourself for a moment. ………….What is
happening while you are breathing? …………How does it feel? ………Are you noticing
some tension in your body, a holding in your shoulders or tummy maybe? ………A
pressure in your chest? ………….Maybe a stirring of emotions? ………..Relaxing slowly
or feeling a bit calmer?
Breath is a language
Every thought, every emotion can be detected in your breath. When you get agitated,
mentally or physically, feel fear, anger or sadness, your breath will change. It may
become deeper or shallower, increase in speed or slow down when you relax again.
We have 2 respiratory centres in the brain, which control the in- (sympathetic) and out-
(para-sympathetic) breath. These centres respond to physical or emotional stress, which
determines if the body’s psychophysical system either functions in a free and relaxed
manner or is put on “red alert”. Any type of stress (emotional or physical) puts a pressure
on this system to get you ready to act. After the incident, relaxation or release of emotion
is required to bring the system back into balance. But that often does not happen
(circumstances, social pressures etc) therefore the body stores the accumulated energy for
a possible release at a later time (a process called “gating”). But “later” often never
comes, so the trapped energy stays in the body, slowly accumulating, becoming denser
over time, which eventually results in psycho-somatic illness or dis-ease.
Breath - the link to the emotions
One of the first emotional impacts on the breathing apparatus is birth itself. Consider for
a moment. After nine months as aquatic life form (our lungs are actually filled with water
while in the womb) we finally are born- a strenuous, dramatic, often traumatic event.
Ideally the transition from aquatic to airborne should happen slowly and voluntarily,
instigated by the baby’s own curiosity to breathe, getting adapted slowly to outside, nonumbilical
breath. Unfortunately, due to ignorance, time pressure or habitual practise, the
umbilical chord often is severed immediately or very quickly, thus forcing the baby to
take a full emergency inhale. As the baby’s lungs have not yet been unfolded completely,
the first full breath of oxygen stretches and burns painfully. This forms the base message
that breathing isn’t safe but painful, leading to limited breath volume and establishing
lifelong breath holding patterns. These intensify and solidify as we habitually hold our
breath when encountering painful, upsetting or frightful experiences while growing up -
resulting in a greatly diminished breath volume. At the same time we are “gating” the
emotional content of these experiences, as they are often too painful in the moment to be
processed.
Breath - the bridge between the conscious and the unconscious
Whatever happens to you during your life, the brain is storing every detail in your
memory (including colour, sounds and smells). Every thought carries an emotion, a
physical sensation and vice versa. Although we actually cannot forget anything, we don’t
have conscious access to all these memories. On one hand this is fortunate as it would be
difficult to live your daily life through this chaos of minutely detailed memories, but to
our disadvantage we also carry a vast storehouse of subconsciously held, trapped
emotional energy to which you have no conscious access.
Breathing is the only body function that is voluntary as well as involuntary. You can
regulate it if you wish, but it still functions even if you don’t think about it for a whole
day or week, thus building the bridge between the conscious and the unconscious. Using
a technique called “Conscious Connected Breathing” or “Circular Breathing” it becomes
possible to access these subconsciously stored memories, unexpressed emotions or any
other material that is held in the body’s psychophysical system. Relaxing and deepening
the breath in this way dissolves the tension in the body and helps to reveal and release the
emotional holding patterns and trauma held in body/mind. Re-experienced, expressed and
integrated these experiences and memories cease to have an emotional grip on your life
expression, allowing you to live more conscious and empowered.
Breath and breathing is a science.
Volumes have been written on this subject and you can find numerous books reflecting
Taoist, yogic or medical views on breathing techniques and their health benefits for body
mind and soul (Booklist available). Whatever aspect of conscious breathing fascinates or
interests you though, one thing is sure. As soon as you put conscious awareness on and in
your breath, your stress levels will reduce, your health will improve and your thoughts
will become clearer.
Take a deep breath and enjoy!
If you would like to find out more about Breathwork or Integrative Breath Therapy
please give us a call on 0845 1294 958 or check out our webpages www.inbreath.info and
www.breathoflight.co.uk
Gerd Lange is Founder and Director of InBreath- the Institute for Breath Therapy and Transformational
Healing which offers a multitude of transformational weekends, a Life Mastery program and a part-time
Diploma training in Integrative Breath Therapy.
Integrative Breath Therapy is a unique holistic body oriented therapy using conscious connected
breathing. It combines the healing power of the breath with a strong foundation of psychotherapeutic skills
and facilitates physical, emotional and mental freedom. It allows you to dissolve holding patterns held in the
body; thus facilitating freer breathing, which leads to numerous health/longevity benefits. If you are
interested in finding out more about this amazing field of complementary therapy, please contact:
InBreath, the Institute for Breath Therapy and Transformational Healing on 01424443 742, email:
gerd@inbreath.info or check out www.inbreath.info.
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