Cyndi / benefits nose-breathing
A Breathing Session in Downtown Chicago
In this story, you will read about functional nose-breathing. At the end (after the pictures) you’ll also find a nose-breathing exercise: one that is useful when you have a blocked nose (which can happen often this time of year).
Some of you have already heard of Cyndi. A few weeks ago, I posted a picture on Instagram of the beautiful view from her apartment in Downtown Chicago. When I was in Chicago earlier this year, I took a picture of the building she lives in, imagining what it must be like to live so high in the sky with such an amazing view, not knowing that five months later I would meet a woman who actually lives in that building and do a breathwork session with her😃.
Cyndi is a mother, a wife, a healthcare professional, and a manager of a team of 30 people at a hospital. She works full time, 10–12 hours a day, and often spends her weekends volunteering — a cocktail for stress, I can imagine. In her life, she is always ‘switched on’. Always being switched on, and never switched off, causes stress; there’s no time to recharge your system. I’m glad she made room in her calendar to experience a breathwork session.
We first looked at functional breathing. In the previous story about Grace, I wrote about abdominal/diaphragmatic breathing and the benefits of ‘breathing low’. For many people who are not consciously aware of their breathing and who are constantly ‘switched on’, this can be quite a challenge — and it was for Cyndi too.
We also explored nose versus mouth-breathing. Under normal circumstances (so not when you’re sprinting to catch a train, for example), nose-breathing is the most functional. Not mouth-breathing — your mouth is designed for eating, tasting, talking, kissing, things like that. Or for breathing only when you physically can’t breathe through your nose.
The nose functions as:
1. a filter — it keeps out things we don’t want in our system
2. a humidifier — it moistens the air
3. an air conditioner — it adjusts the air to the right temperature before it enters the body
4. a producer of nitric oxide — a molecule that helps widen blood vessels, making it easier for oxygen in the blood to reach your organs and muscles.
One of my breathing trainers compared it to drinking clean tap water (nose-breathing) versus drinking water from a heavily polluted pond (mouth-breathing). Until I heard that, I had never really thought about the difference between nose and mouth breathing — but it really made me think… and the choice was easy for me: I’d rather drink clean tap water😊.
We often cannot control what we breathe. We breathe the air around us, which contains: circulating viruses, tiny plastic particles that we can’t see but that are everywhere these days, exhaust fumes when we’re outside, and so on.
The air we breathe is often not healthy. So, when we can’t control WHAT we breathe/inhale, it is all the more important to know HOW to breathe. Under normal circumstances: through the nose.
Back to Cyndi😊: after the nose versus mouth check, we started the connected breathing part of the session (connected means that there is no pause between the inhale and the exhale). There was an active breathing part– in which she followed my instructions and I helped her in her process – followed by an integration and relaxation part. In one of the next stories I’ll explain more about the process of it.
For Cyndi it was her first connected-breathing experience. At the end of the session, during the final moments of the integration and relaxation phase, she took both my hands and said, with a warm smile: “You can’t go away, I want you to stay.” I always feel happy when people are touched by the power of their own breath. My flight back home to the Netherlands was just a few hours later, so I had to leave, but I assured her: “I’ll be back next year, and then we can do a longer session — and maybe even a group session.” “Yes, I would love that” she said, followed by “and when there is also a group session I’ll be the first one to sign up, put me on your list!”
When our mutual friend (who came to pick me up to drive me to the airport) heard this, he said: “Impossible that she’s the first one on the list — I’m the first. She’s number two!” Well… already two enthusiastic people without even having planned a groupsession yet😃.
Breathing exercise for a blocked nose:
1. Sit in a vertical position and take a few calm breaths. If possible try to breathe gently through your nose during and after the exercise. When your nose is completely blocked breathe through pursed lips.
2. Breathe in for two seconds and out for three seconds.
3. After the exhale: hold your breath, gently pinch your nose and keep your mouth closed. Slowly nod your head while you hold your breath.
4. Hold your breath for as long as is comfortable. Then release your fingers and resume very gentle breathing through your nose.
5. Try to maintain nasal breathing after doing the exercise.
This exercise helps to clear the airways, so your nose-breathing becomes easier. You can repeat this exercise a few times (with about 30 seconds in between).
Next story in two weeks, about a breathing session with Jeff: an experienced breather who lived with Buddhist monks in Thailand for quite a while. And an exercice that helps breathing ‘low’. Till then!