Breathe Deeply, Live Fully

Syncing the breath with body movements can lead to transformative results. Here’s a simple exercise to illustrate the point:

Stand with your feet shoulder-width apart and perform the following movements in slow motion. 

• Bend your knees and bend at the waist slightly to gather a mound of invisible flower petals in your arms. 
• Straighten your legs and raise the flowers over your head, releasing them. 
• Hold this position for a few seconds and visualize the flower petals falling through the air around you. 
• Repeat the movement two more times.

It's a simple movement and, without conscious awareness of your breath, it's nothing more than bending slight and then lifting the arms overhead. The magic lies in synchronized breathing. 

Perform the exercies again but this time, take a full normal  breath--not a deep breath--to begin

Then, as your knees bend and your arms scoop the petals, exhale fully

 Next, breathe in as your legs straighten and your arms raise over your head. 

Pause for a moment at the top of the movement before bending your knees and breathing out again. 

The sequence is: breathe out, breathe in, pause; breathe out, breathe in, pause. Notice that the pause occurs between breathing in and breathing out but not between breathing out and breathing in. Pausing with full lungs is powerful, while pausing with empty lungs can be distressing.

Conscious breathing activates the parasympathetic nervous system—a term that describes a complex system responsible for calming emotions and the physical body by suppressing stress hormones such as adrenaline and cortisol. When breathing is synchronized with body movements, we maintain our focus and equilibrium.

Modern life can sometimes become a pressure cooker of stress and anxiety. The best hope for maintaining concentration and equanimity lies in our resilience under pressure. Remembering to breathe regularly and evenly is a helpful--and sometimes necessary--skill for success.

Incorporating conscious breathing into everyday activities isn’t difficult, but it does take practice. A simple way to begin is by matching your breath to your walking stride: inhale for a comfortable number of steps, then exhale for the same number of steps plus one additional. For those seeking to become truly proficient, consider enrolling in yoga or qigong classes.