BREATHING: AN INTRODUCTION

"The single most effective relaxation technique I know is conscious
regulation of breath."
Dr. Andrew Weil   (Book recommendation: SPONTANEOUS HEALING /SPONTAN HEILUNG  ISBN3-572-00921-9)  

In many languages - the words for spirit and breath are one and the same
(Sanskrit prana, Hebrew ruach, Greek pneuma, Latin spiritus). Native Americans,
among others, believe that life enters the body with the first breath, not at
the moment of birth or of conception. In this view the fetus and newborn have a
kind of vegetative life, uninvested with spirit until the breath cycle begins.
Breathing is the bridge between mind and body, the connection between
consciousness and unconsciousness, the movement of spirit in matter. Breath is the
key to health and wellness, a function we can learn to regulate and develop in
order to improve our physical, mental and spiritual well-being.
Breathing is special in several respects: it is the only function you can
perform consciously as well as unconsciously, and it can be a completely
voluntary act or a completely involuntary act, as it is controlled by two sets of
nerves, one belonging to the voluntary nervous system, the other to the
involuntary (autonomic) system. Breath is the bridge between these two systems.
Most people do not know how to breathe so as to take full advantage of the
nourishing, health-giving properties of the act of breathing. Knowing how to
perform simple breathing techniques can help lower your blood pressure, calm a
racing heart, or help your digestive system without taking drugs. Breathing has
direct connections to emotional states and moods - observe someone who is
angry, afraid or otherwise upset, and you will see a person breathing rapidly,
shallowly, noisily and irregularly. You cannot be upset if your breathing is
slow, deep, quiet and regular. You cannot always center yourself emotionally by an
act of will, but you can use your voluntary nerves to make your breathing
slow, deep, quiet and regular, and the rest will follow.

BREATHING: BASIC HOW-TO'S

At the very center of our being is rhythmic movement, a cyclic expansion and
contraction that is both in our body and outside it, that is both in our mind
and in our body, that is both in our consciousness and not in it. Breath is
the essence of being, and in all aspects of the universe we can see the same
rhythmic pattern of expansion and contraction, whether in the alternating cycles
of day and night, waking and sleeping, high and low tides, or seasonal growth
and decay. Oscillation between two phases exists at every level of reality,
even up to the scale of the observable universe itself, which is presently in
expansion but will at some point contract back to the original, unimaginable
point that is everything and nothing, completing one cosmic breath.
Breathing is a natural object of meditation. By putting attention on your
breath, you will change your state of consciousness, begin to relax, and detach
from ordinary awareness. Many systems of meditation use focus on breath as the
main technique. In the Buddhist and yogic traditions are many examples of
people who reached enlightenment by doing nothing other than paying attention to
the rising and falling of their own breath. In this sort of meditation you can
try to experience the dimensionless point between inbreath and outbreath and
to glimpse enlightenment in that space. You can come to know reality itself as
an eternal oscillation between being and nonbeing. All this is possible from
experiencing breath, which is the mystery of being unfolding right in front of
our noses, connecting us to the universal rhythm.
If today you can be aware of breathing for 10 seconds more than you were
yesterday, you will have taken a measurable step toward enlightenment, will have
expanded your consciousness, furthered communication between mind and body,
become a little more whole, and so improved your health. While diet and exercise
are important, they are not the sole determinants of health. People who eat
excellent diets and exercise faithfully are not always healthy, but the
likelihood of being a healthy person who does not breathe well is slim.
When learning how to breathe, begin by closing your eyes for a few minutes.
Practice moving your breath. Keep your back straight. Begin with a deep,
audible sigh, then quietly inhale and see how slow, deep, quiet and regular you can
make your breathing and still have it feel perfectly comfortable. You should
feel that you are getting enough air with no sense of not getting enough air.
Do this for at least eight breaths, then open your eyes and breathe normally.
This is a simple exercise but an effective one, and you should do it whenever
you can.
Next, pay attention to your exhalation. If you watch people breathe, you will
see that most of them use effort to inhale but none to exhale. Exhalation is
usually passive and takes less time than inhalation. When you breathe this
way, you do not move nearly as much air in and out of your lungs as you can. The
more air you move, the healthier you will be, because the functioning of all
systems of the body depends on delivery of oxygen and removal of carbon
dioxide. To get more air into your lungs, concentrate on getting more air out of them
by attending to exhalation.
At the end of a normal breath try squeezing more air out. You will be using
your intercostal muscles to do this, and you will feel the effort as they
compress the rib cage. Try to make your exhalation as long or even slightly longer
than inhalation. Whenever you think of it, practice this technique of
extending exhalation and developing your intercostal muscles.