what slow breathing actually does to your brain and body

transcript - What slow breathing actually does to your brain and body

Take a deep breath. That's probably one of the most common pieces of advice that we're given when we're stressed, isn't it? And so intuitively, we know that working [00:01:00] with the breath can be calming. But why? Why does deliberately slowing your breath calm you down? What does it actually do to your brain and your body?

Breathing is really interesting because most of the time you don't have to think about it. Your nervous system keeps you breathing automatically, but then as soon as you want to take control of it, you can.

and this is a almost like a little hidden backdoor to working with your own nervous system

So did you know your heartbeat doesn't actually beat at one perfectly steady speed? In fact, your heart rate tends to beat slightly quicker as you inhale and slightly slower as you exhale This is called respiratory sinus arrhythmia. When we deliberately slow the breath, those [00:02:00] fluctuations can become more pronounced.

And slow breathing can also affect something called the baroreflex. This is a system that's involved in the moment-to-moment regulation of your blood pressure. So all of this to say, when you change your breathing, you're changing more than just that movement of air in and out of the lungs, you are actually changing physiological systems that are continually being communicated between your body and your brain

Now, sometimes this can be over-reduced to long exhales activate your vagus nerve or slow breathing switches on your parasympathetic nervous system These statements aren't wrong, but the physiology is more complicated than that. And what that kind of reduction can mean is that if slowing your breath down actually makes you feel more anxious, then [00:03:00] you might feel like you're doing something wrong or that you are broken, and that's really, really unhelpful.

So let's look at it, and any practice that we do is gonna be very slow, very steady, and very mindful. It's really, really important for me to say here, don't just go full steam ahead and try and breathe as slowly as you can at all times. Fast breathing in and of itself isn't bad, right? You'll breathe faster when you are stressed, when you are exerting yourself, et cetera, et cetera.

There are some problems when this faster breathing rhythm becomes stuck, and we lose the ability to adapt the rate of breathing to our metabolic demands. So any work that you do with your breath rate ideally will be done with someone who's really experienced and who understands respiratory physiology, [00:04:00] and it will be done at a time and in a place where you feel relatively calm and safe.

So I mean, don't try and practice this for the first time in a new place after a ridiculous day. But doing it, like, nice and calm at home when you're not in a rush, for example. And secondly, when working with the breath, I would personally always, always, always say work within your comfort zone. When you do anything that feels like it's stressful or there's a strain or you're feeling even slightly panicked, ditch the practice and return to it when you feel ready.

That is non-negotiable for me. I know that there are famous breath practices out there that say, "Look, working with this kind of breath will be really hard, but that just means it's working and you've just gotta keep going and keep pushing through it." But, [00:05:00] you know, we know that the breath and the nervous system, the stress responses are so closely connected.

I worry that that pushing through discomfort could end up with you feeling much more anxious and all sorts. So my two P is just, just don't, don't push through. Listen to how you're doing. Any sign of stress or strain, ditch the practice and return to it when you feel right Okay, so anyway, your brain is continually receiving information and it processes that information about what's happening inside your body.

This has a name, which is interoception. And interestingly, there could be a virtuous cycle here, and by that I mean that something good has a good knock-on effect, which means that something else good happens. And this virtuous cycle could be that slow breathing could [00:06:00] potentially support interoception, because when we consciously attend to the breath, we're paying attention to one of those very important internal signals from the body.

And by doing that, we can deepen our skill in interoception and slow the breath down more. And with that sense, understanding how we are internally even more, and then we understand our stress levels even more, and then the breath slows down even more. And so it goes on

Okay, let's summarize all of that because there's a lot there with a few tangents. Sorry so if you see someone who looks like their head's about to explode, you might say, "Take a deep breath." But why does this work? Well, through slowing the breath, the heart rate slows down, and both of these send messages to the brain to say, "Everything is okay now.

There's no need to be on high alert." [00:07:00] Working with this, as in slowing the breath down, is ideally something that you do when you're already calm-ish, so that the neural pathway, the skill, and that interoceptive ability is there for the times when you need it. And if you'd like some guidance here, I would absolutely love to help.

This is a main focus of many of my therapeutic clients, and the benefits are absolutely endless. And if you'd like to work more on your understanding of how you are, go and check out my Nervous System Regulation: A Practice of Listening meditation on Insight Timer. I've linked to this in the show notes.

It's something that you can practice daily to connect with how you are really, really doing

I really hope that you found that useful and interesting. I'm absolutely fascinated by the breath, but you know, that's just me. I hope you have a wonderful [00:08:00] day, and as always, happy practising