Your rate and method of breathing can influence your level of relaxation and your ability to perform well during exercise and everyday activities. Deep breaths are relaxing, but you cannot maintain the same deep breathing during exercise as you would during meditation. Match your breathing to the goal you are trying to achieve, whether it is relaxation, efficient exercise or relief of particular symptoms such as asthma.
Deep Breathing
Commonly used for relaxation, deep breathing involves large inhalations performed in a comfortable position. Sit in a chair, keeping your back straight and your feet flat on the floor. Rest your hands in your lap. Inhale a deep breath, and then shut your eyes and relax your body while slowly exhaling. Imagine tension gathering in your body on the long, slow inhalation and then being released on the exhalation.
Yoga Breathing
The full yogic breath, or yoga breathing, is a method of reprogramming your breathing to increase your overall health and well-being. Lie down on your back with your hands and legs extended and your eyes looking toward the ceiling. Relax your body and close your eyes. Maintain a natural breathing pattern in which your abdomen moves with each breath, but your chest remains still. Exaggerate this movement by letting the abdomen rise to its limit during inhalations and fall completely during exhalations. Repeat for 20 breaths, then rest.
Next, focus on the chest's movement with each breath. Take deeper and longer breaths from the chest, lifting the rib cage and filling the lungs entirely on the inhalations and sinking the ribs as far as possible on the exhalations. Keep the abdomen still and only move the chest. Continue for 20 breaths.
Full yogic breathing is a combination of the above two methods. Inhale by filling the abdomen and continue inhaling by filling the chest. Then exhale, first from the chest and then from the abdomen. Repeat for 20 breaths, picturing the movement as a continuous wave.
Buteyko
Developed by the Russian doctor Konstantin Buteyko in the 1950s, Buteyko is a shallow breathing method that can relieve the symptoms of asthma. It is based on the theory that hyperventilation, or over-breathing, causes asthma by reducing levels of carbon dioxide in the blood so much that the airway narrows in an effort to conserve it.
Sit in a chair with your feet flat on the floor and your back straight. Keep your mouth closed. Hold a finger underneath your nose so that you can feel the airflow from exhalations. Five minutes at a time, with three-minute rest periods in between, practice breathing out as little as possible, so that you cannot feel the force of the exhalations on your finger. Practice this method for half an hour, twice each day, to relieve asthma. At other times, breathe only through your nose, and never through your mouth.
During Exercise
Maintaining proper breathing patterns during exercise can improve your performance. For maximum efficiency, breath with a 3-to-2 ratio of inhalations to exhalations. For example, when running inhale on your left, right and left foot strikes and then exhale fully on the right and left foot strikes. When weightlifting, exhale when you are pushing a weight away from you, and inhale when you bring it back. Making this pattern a habit during exercise will reduce your heart rate, and you might find yourself slowing down at first until you master the technique.
References
- Kansas State University; Deep Breathing Exercise; January 2008
- HealthAndYoga.com; Yoga Breathing; Arun Goel; 2006
- "The New York Times"; A Breathing Technique Offers Help for People with Asthma; Jane Brody; November 2009
- "Asthma-Free Naturally: Everything You Need to Know to Take Control of Your Asthma"; Patrick McKeown; September 2008
- Military.com; Breathing During Exercise; Stew Smith; 2011
