It’s a common expression when someone is getting a little stressed out.
But in the midst of a situation that’s serious enough to put us under pressure, this advice can seem frustratingly trivial and inconsequential. Nothing more than an old wives tale.
Actually, it’s far from it.
Deep breathing has the power to diminish the physiological effects of stress.
We can’t stop the stress but we can stop the suffering
Okay so we’re not going to miraculously blow away all of our troubles.
The stresses we face have no fast and simple solutions. They’re likely to be features of our life to some degree or another.
That’s the thing with modern stress – it’s chronic.
It’s not the short-lived physical threat of times gone past, like a predator chasing you for their dinner.
The problem is, our body has evolved to deal with that kind of short-lived stress and not the long-term, if not endless, stress we now experience.
So any long-lasting stress overloads our body and affects our health.
But not all is lost.
Although we can’t eradicate the sources of stress from our lives, we can limit their health impact.
We can protect our body from the physiological ravages of stress. And it’s as simple as taking a deep breath.
Stress disrupts breathing
When our body is stressed, our breathing becomes shallow and rapid. We inhale tiny sips of air that fill only the top portion of our lungs. And we take lots of them.
If we think to an extreme instance of stress – a panic attack – the person’s breathing becomes exceptionally short, shallow and rapid.
The reason for this is our body’s fight or flight response to stress.
Our body’s sympathetic nervous system is activated by stress and it works to shift everything up a gear or two in order to fight or flee that threat.
It’s like an accelerator because it triggers an increase in heart rate, respiratory rate, blood pressure, muscle tension, pupil size, sweaty palms and dry mouth – all of the unpleasant symptoms we associate with feeling stressed.
If we’re making a mad dash from the claws of a predator, this would be of no concern. In fact it would be enormously useful in getting us to safety.
It would also be temporary. It would provide the quick shot of energy that’s required and then switch off so things could return to their normal, relaxed state.
But with constant modern stress, we stay in that fight or flight mode for weeks, months and even years on end – far beyond the design of this system.
It’s like we’ve got our foot flat on the accelerator and doing nothing but spinning our wheels – and becoming exhausted and unwell.
And unfortunately that’s only half of the sorry story.
Bad breathing increases stress
If ever there was a vicious cycle, it’s the one that exists between stress and breathing.
As we now realise, stress makes us breathe poorly.
But in an added twist, breathing poorly actually creates stress.
Unfair huh!
When we take those shallow breaths that fill only the top portion of our lungs, we further stimulate the nerves of our sympathetic nervous system.
What’s more, we tend to take slightly longer inhalations than exhalations, which also creates greater sympathetic activity.
So if left unchecked (and without knowing this, we’ve been leaving it unchecked), we allow our breathing to perpetuate our stress, if not accentuate it.
Tragically, this probably describes how many of us are operating on a daily basis.
The chronic nature of life’s stresses has meant we’ve been chronically breathing this way. It’s become the norm.
And it’s left us floundering in this vicious cycle.
So we have to intervene and take action to protect our body against the harmful effects of chronic stress.
Better breathing reduces stress
While all of this is happening to us automatically, breathing is in the special position of being something that we can also control.
Unlike other automatic functions like heart rate and digestion, breathing also has a manual mode.
We can take control over how we breathe. And when we do, we also take control over our general stress level and the physical symptoms of stress.
We can change the length of each breath and our rate of breathing.
When we take deeper inhalations, we fill our lungs entirely. And this means we activate nerves at the very base of our lungs to switch on our parasympathetic nervous system.
Deeper inhalations also tend to be slower and are followed by slower, longer exhalations. This is also a trigger for our parasympathetic nervous system.
If the sympathetic system is like an accelerator, the parasympathetic system is like the brake. It puts us into a state of resting and digesting.
But unlike a car, you can’t have a foot on each. Either our sympathetic system is preparing us for action or our parasympathetic system is chilling us out.
So when we activate our parasympathetic system with some slow and deep breathing, we diminish physiological stress by not only switching on the calm but also switching off the crazy.
How to breathe better
Use your nose:
That’s why you’ve got one.
Whilst our mouth can be used for breathing (and is by far too many of us), it’s not what it was designed for. Our nose, on the other hand, provides a host of unique benefits to breathing.
Firstly, it enforces slower breathing. We can’t take a quick gulp of air like we can through our mouth. Nose breathing is slow and settled.
Our nose also serves to warm, humidify and filter air, which protects our delicate and precious lungs.
And finally, breathing through our nose triggers the release of a chemical that improves circulation so that 15-20% more oxygen is delivered to cells.
Go big:
Take full inhalations that fill the furthest depths of our lungs. And just as importantly, make sure exhalations are full so as to expel every last drop of air.
We don’t tend to do the full exhalation so well. We tend to keep an “old” portion of air in our lungs after each exhalation. So prepare to be surprised at just how much extra we can exhale.
As you breathe deeper, be sure to engage your ribs and diaphragm (stomach) rather than passively breathing with a slight raise in our shoulders as we do when we’re stressed.
A simple recipe – 5.5:
Ideally we want to breathe 5.5 times each minute. Whereas we tend to breathe about 12-20 times per minute, and probably more when we’re stressed.
In order to achieve this, there’s a simple recipe. Breathe in for 5.5 seconds in then out for 5.5 seconds.
This conveniently adds up to 5.5 breaths per minute. And if you want to get a bit deeper, it equates to about 5.5 litres of air per minute.
And don’t stress about making all those 0.5’s happen!
Things don’t have to be perfectly precise to be effective. The main point is, you’ve taken charge of your breathing, and made it slower and deeper.
Having said that, counting is actually a useful part of the process. It helps to focus your mind on the breath, which not only keeps you in time but makes it less likely to dwell on the source of stress.
However, if you don’t want to count, you’ll find most of those online breathing bubbles/circles are set to this magic formula.
The right ratio:
According to the above recipe, your inhalations and exhalations are even. You have a 1:1 ratio and a balance between your sympathetic and parasympathetic systems rather than an overactive sympathetic system.
But we can take things further and tip the balance of power toward our parasympathetic system by creating a 1:2 ratio. By exhaling for twice as long as we inhale, we can manifest greater calming effects.
We want to at least maintain that ideal 5 breaths per minute rate, so try starting with 3 seconds in, 6 seconds out.
From there you can keep the ratio but lengthen the durations to 4 and 8 seconds respectively, or more as you really get the hang of it.
Just need to have a play and see what feels best for you.
Repeat:
A moment’s attention to our breathing in the face of stress can instantly relieve our suffering and make us feel better. But it’s more of a band-aid fix.
To enjoy the full benefits of breathing well and maintaining relative calm amid life’s stress, we need to make this a habit.
With consistent attention and repetition, we can make breathing slow and deep the normal.
We won’t miraculously rid stress from our lives but we’ll reduce its impact on our body.
