Day 18: Breathe
The chances are if you’ve got this far you’re already doing this. In fact if you’re not doing this then I doubt you’d be reading this blog! So why suggest it and what makes us think it’s going to help us be happy? Breathing is something we do all day every day without even thinking about it. We’ve been doing it all our lives but it may come as a surprise to know that in this day and age not many of us do it properly. Quite often we are taking short, shallow breaths sometimes to do with our racing thoughts and busy lives or the stress pulsing through our veins or it can be to do with our posture, too much sitting there are many reasons and because we do it without thinking we barely notice.
However we do notice when we breathe properly. Let’s try it now. Take 3 slow, deep breaths in and out through your nose, steady and even and as long as you can, now how to you feel? Maybe a bit light headed because it’s not often these days we get all that oxygen into our lungs. Breathing slowly helps slow down our heart rate, therefore calm our nerves. It helps manage our emotions, reducing our impulsive actions (like when we’re angry and do something in the heat of the moment) not to mention the physical benefits of getting more oxygen into the blood stream.
When we breathe fast our stress levels increase and the opposite is true. When we breathe fast we get less oxygen into our lungs impacting on the performance in our body, so getting more oxygen helps us not just emotionally but physically too. It’s good for our health and our happiness.
There are other ways to practice breathing that will also have the above effects and it’s incredibly calming as well. Why not give some of these a try?
Follow the breath as it comes into your nostrils, down into the lungs and even into the pit of the stomach, then pause as you reach the end before following it all the way back out again, pausing before the next in breath.
Ujjayi breathing popular in yoga, it's an audible breath from the back of the throat that feels like the same action as fogging a mirror with your breath but your mouth is closed
Count your breaths as they go in and out trying to make it longer each time. Try and exhale for a slightly longer count, although not so it's uncomfortable, strained or you feel dizzy
Try taking those 3 breaths again but this time in through the nose and out through mouth
Laying down imagine portioning your lungs into thirds. As you breathe in over a count of 6 fill each compartment with 2 breaths from the top to the bottom and then breath out evenly in the same way by compartments.
If you start to feel light headed though have a rest and return to your normal breathing, don’t overdo it, especially at first. Whether it’s something you resolve to do at the start of every day or a tool you use when things get heated or the stress levels rise, this short 30 second activity can pay dividends in many ways contributing to our happiness levels.
