Healthy Breathing

“If I had to limit my advice on healthier living to just one tip, it would be simply to learn how to breathe better,” naturopath and healer Andrew Weil writes in the epilogue to James Nestor’s Breath.

Nestor believes breath can improve most bodily functions and recommends “belly breathing” as well as breathing through the nose—notably by taping the mouth shut at night—to improve sleep.

Breathing is more than just something we do to stay alive,” says neuroscientist Micah Allen at Cambridge and Aarhus Universities. Observing that breath is “closely intertwined” with the brain, Allen studies “new ways to realign the rhythms of the brain and body” to help prevent and treat mental health issues. While sensitivity to the outside world is greatest when inhaling, he explains, the exhale is the moment of least engagement. This is why “professional marksmen are trained to pull the trigger at the end of exhalation.”

Purposefully extending the exhalation can relax the body—“an easy way to hack the vagus nerve [and] combat stress responses,” according to Psychology Today. (The vagus nerve, traveling from brain to gut, controls involuntary functions known as rest-and-digest.) Lengthening the inhale, by contrast, stimulates the sympathetic nervous system—known as fight-or-flight—for keeping alert and awake.

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Our breath is always on hand to help with either alertness or relaxing, notes Jon Kabat-Zinn, developer of the Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) program that has helped tens of thousands of people since its development in 1979. To reduce stress, Kabat-Zinn suggests focusing attention on the inhale and then on the exhale, as well as performing mental scans of the body.

Exclusively breathing in and out through the nose can improve oxygen circulation by activating the lower lungs and increasing carbon dioxide levels in the blood. Nose-breathing also releases nitric oxide, which can speed blood flow and lower blood pressure, USC pulmonologist Raj Dasgupta told The New York Times. While aiding relaxation, nose-breathing can also stave off dry mouth—especially at night when taping can help to keep the mouth shut.

While nose-breathing during exercise feels more difficult and may increase stress on the heart, a small study of runners at Colorado State showed nose-breathing decreased respiratory rate (number of breaths per minute), meaning it took less work to take in the same amount of oxygen. And increased blood CO2 levels can lead to better endurance, while simultaneously reducing stress reactions by way of the parasympathetic nervous system.

Practicing “belly” breathing also increases lung efficiency, with most people engaging as little as 10% of their diaphragm with each breath. But benefitting from belly breathing requires practice—five to 10 minutes, three to four times a day, which can be exhausting at first, according to the Cleveland Clinic.

Begin sitting or lying on the back with one hand on the upper chest and the other just below the rib cage. Inhale through the nose until the stomach moves outward, while the hand on the chest remains still. To increase the difficulty when lying down, place a book on the abdomen.

To end the belly breath, tighten abdominal muscles and exhale through pursed lips. Pursed lip breathing alone can keep airways open longer, most helpful during the difficult part of any physical activity. While optimal slow breathing may be close to 5.5 breaths per minute, techniques such as “box breathing” take four seconds for the exhale and inhale, along with holding the breath for four seconds between each.

Like most bodily functions, the diaphragm and lungs are in the use-it-or-lose-it category. The lungs lose about 12% of capacity by age 50 and more after that, according to Nestor. But people can increase their lung capacity by 30 or 40%—with record-setting free divers able to remain underwater longer than 24 minutes and dive deeper than 800 feet.

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Another use of breath—called holotropic breathwork or neurodynamic breathing—is fast and noisy like hyperventilation and accompanied by music of specific vibrations. Usually performed in group sessions over several days, holotropic breathers take deep gulps of air into the abdomen, quickly push the air out in loud exhales, and immediately inhale again—creating effects similar to those of psychedelic drugs.

By reducing CO2 in the blood, holotropic breathing can “modify emotional states,” UCLA neurobiology professor Jack Feldman told Cosmopolitan. People report feeling less anxious or describe greater “connectivity and ego-dissolution” associated with long-term improvement in well-being. One study of 11,000 inpatients doing weekly holotropic breathing sessions in a Missouri psychiatric clinic found “significant benefits in terms of emotional catharsis and internal spiritual exploration.”

Lengthening the exhalation is my best means of relaxing. I also have an almost-daily brief (three to 15 minute) MBSR routine — though that often becomes a nap. And nightly mouth-taping has helped with dry mouth problems and led to deeper sleep.

After hyperventilation, hallucinations, and tears at a holotropic breathing workshop in Joshua Tree National Park, I felt “floaty” (a popular breathwork adjective) and relaxed—though I’m not sure how much to credit the breathwork or the intensely sparkling stars in a dark desert sky and those otherworldly Joshua trees.