Every morning I do stretches (some yoga-based, some just basic stretches) while also doing a breathing exercise. The exercise is called Ujjayi and the variation I do is seven seconds of inbreath through the nose then seven seconds of outbreath through the nose. Each breath is into the belly, not the chest and, in some ways, it’s much harder than it sounds. In fact, I started with a shorter interval, and worked up to the 7/7. Now I do 50 of those, mostly while also doing deep stretches. Takes just under 12 minutes. I follow up that practice (usually) with a formal sitting mediation.
I got into the idea of doing formal breathing exercises after reading Breath, by James Nestor. He was on Fresh Air with Terry Gross at the start of the pandemic and also on the 10% Happier podcast; I found his work fascinating. In his book, he discusses just how poorly we humans in modern society breathe, generally, and how that affects our bodies and (importantly) our minds.
Backing up a bit… I’ve had anxiety issues since, oh, birth practically. Probably all of us, especially those of us with those issues, have experienced someone telling us to slow our breathing when we’re upset or panicky. Generally good advice, but often difficult in the moment. I mean, it’s one thing to be told to slow down and breathe deeply, but how to do that when your brain is set to 11, that’s a trick!
Nestor, in his book, really gets into the science of breathing and the breath. For a nerd like me, that was incredibly helpful. He experimented on himself with all sorts of techniques so he writes about how doing something might have felt awful (especially at first) but really it was better for the body. The science proved it up, even if it felt like he wasn’t getting enough air.
After reading the book the first time (I’ve read it twice now), I got the app iBreathe to coach me through different breathing techniques. It’s the app I use every day now for my 50 breaths. I also practice the 4-7-8 technique sometimes with that app. 4-7-8 breathing (in for 4, hold for 7, out for 8) helps activate the parasympathetic nervous system which is what helps us relax and calm down. The parasympathetic nervous system is the counter to the sympathetic nervous system, which is the seemingly wrongly named system that rather than calming us is what puts us on alert or in fight-or-flight mode.
Anyway, I use 4-7-8 to get through things like scary medical appointments and procedures and really think it was a huge part in how I survived my surgery and its pre- and post-op pain with minimal medication. Whenever I get upset or anxious, I do 4-7-8 and it helps very quickly.
The 7/7 breathing I do is more about training my breathing generally. 7/7 makes me very conscious to breathe into my belly rather than chest-breathe and to breathe through my nose (both ways), both of which are what my body wants to do by default. Breathing through the nose is much better for us and what our bodies are designed to do, and yet we are a bunch of unconscious mouth and into the chest breathers, as Nestor points out.
Since I’ve started doing the 7/7 training, I find I become breathless when exerting myself much less than before. I’m just starting to run again, after the surgery, and it feels like I am not struggling with the breath the way I have in the past when running. I attribute that to the training. I also take fewer breaths, overall. In slowing my breathing, the anxiety doesn’t hit the way it used to or at least nowhere near as often.
In Buddhist meditation, we often use the breath as an anchor of focus. Rather than controlling the breath, we simply notice “inbreath…outbreath” or maybe count them, as they come naturally. So, breath is a regular part of the practice. Training the breath has, for me, been an obvious outgrowth of that simple practice. Along with traditional mediation, learning to breathe longer, slower breaths, through the nose (7/7) and techniques like 4-7-8, increase my being in the present moment and generally made my life better. I hope this information may help you as well.