Breathing your way to health:
An overview
How is breathing related to health?
Is "breathing your way to health" possible? We breathe all
the time... is there a problem?
To answer the question "is breathing
your way to health possible?" let's look at some facts:
-
The purpose of breathing is to take oxygen
into the body by inhaling air, and to expel waste and
toxins through exhalation.
- The body must have oxygen to
operate and survive at all. Oxygen is the most
important nutrient
(anything that nourishes) that we need for health and
well-being.
The first thing a baby does when it's
born is to take its first breath - breathing is that essential
to health and living!
We could survive for a few weeks without
food, for a few days without water, but deprive us of
air for only a couple of minutes and... well, I'm sure
you got the picture.
- We obtain oxygen by inhaling
air into our lungs. The quantity of oxygen
that we get into our lungs depends on how we breathe
and on the quality of the air that we take in.
About one-fifth (20%) of air
contains oxygen, and that amount is decreased
as air pollution increases.
- Breathing out, or exhalation,
is one of the main ways that the body eliminates wastes
and toxins.
- Physical problems can occur
if we don't breathe in or out fully, or the quality
of the air we're breathing is poor - or both.
- Although breathing is automatic, you
can consciously improve the way that you breathe
as well as improving the quality of the air that you breathe.
So we can conclude that breathing
your way to health is possible, but let's clarify that.
Good health depends on a few key factors - proper nutrition,
physical activity, rest and stress management.
Those factors need to be addressed in addition to your breathing
if you really want to improve your health and energy.
For example, if you live on Twinkies
and soda, sit at a computer most of the time and only
get 2 hours of sleep a day, it would be unreasonable to
think that breathing your way to health was reaslistic,
unless you learned about and worked on improving the above
factors as well.
But breathing your way to health would
be an excellent place to begin improving how you feel physically,
since good breathing is related to all the other factors
of good health and it's pretty easy to do!
We aren't generally aware of how we're
breathing until we put our attention on it, and the good
news is that we can modify how we breathe. By getting the
information in this article, you're already increasing your
awareness and understanding of how breathing your way to
health is really possible.
Breathing and metabolism
If you check out this article on metabolism,
you will learn how the body uses oxygen to create energy
and why oxygen is essential for health. It complements and
enhances the information in this article on breathing your
way to health.
The amount of oxygen available
to the body has a significant impact on health and wellness.
Since the body must have enough oxygen to work at its optimum,
a deficiency of oxygen contributes to many, many physical
ailments.
Breathing your way to health, by improving
how you breathe and the quality of the air you take in,
can help you by:
- Enabling your body to create more energy,
reducing tiredness and exhaustion
- Helping your body to eliminate waste
products and toxins, which helps your metabolism
work better and your energy levels to improve
- Helping you sleep
better
- Improving your circulation and the
delivery of oxygen to all parts of your body. This is
especially beneficial to your heart and brain, which require
a lot of oxygen and nutrients!
- Improving muscle and joint health and
flexibility by providing them with plenty of oxygen to
build and repair and the energy for movement
- Improving blood sugar levels
- Managing weight (see article on metabolism
for further information)
This is a very small list of things that
you could improve by breathing your way to health.
So what gets in the way of good
breathing?
Breathing
your way to health
How posture and stress affect breathing
Stress
and poor posture both reduce amount of air you can inhale
and exhale by creating tension and tightness in
the muscles around the lungs that power your breathing.
Your lungs are protected by your rib cage,
and there are muscles between the ribs. A large muscle called
the diaphragm, located at the base of the lungs, moves up
and down and actually makes breathing in and out possible.
Stress
and "tight muscles" go together. When the muscles around
the lungs are tight from stress and lack of physical activity,
the lungs cannot expand enough to take deep breaths.
Think of it like having a tight belt around your lungs!
Improving the flexibility of the muscles
around the lungs is key to breathing your way to health.
The lungs can expand and contract to a greater degree with
healthy, flexible muscle action. The lungs themselves will
become more elastic as you improve the ability to breathe
more deeply.
Improving posture also increases
your ability to inhale and exhale deeply. No rocket
science here - if you're slouching over, you're straining
your muscles and squishing your lungs, thereby limiting
the amount of air you can breathe in and out.
Breathing
your way to health
Shallow breathing and deep breathing
Our lungs are pretty big and can take
in a lot of air. One of the main reasons that "breathing
your way to health" is possible is that we generally only
take in a minimal amount of air and don't fill up our lungs
completely. Less air, less oxygen.
This is called "shallow breathing"
or "chest breathing." It occurs when we only take
air into the upper part of our lungs, into the chest area.
Shallow breathing is fast and tends to increase heart rate
and blood pressure.
Breathing in through the mouth
instead of the nose contributes to shallow breathing.
In shallow breathing, the muscles around the ribs are used
more than the diaphragm muscle.
This causes the diaphragm to become weak
by lessened activity, thus making it even more difficult
to breathe deeply.
Deep breathing occurs when we
are taking air into our lungs fully, by using the
diaphragm muscle instead of just the muscles around the
ribs. Breathing in through the nose helps you breathe more
deeply and take in more oxygen.
It is more natural and healthy
to breathe through your nose for many physical reasons.
One reason is that your nose is designed to filter incoming
air (a natural air purifier!) and the nose passages warm
the air entering the lungs if necessary. When you exhale
through your nose, it expels the trapped stuff.
When I started focusing on breathing more
deeply, naturally and without force and effort, I really
noticed how tight my muscles were and how my lungs didn't
expand a lot.
But little by little, they have become
more flexible and I can breathe more deeply naturally. It's
important to improve how you breathe in a natural way without
force! Feels better that way too.
Breathing
your way to health:
How breathing helps digestion and other
parts of the body
The muscle action of breathing contributes
to your health by stimulating the digestive system, the
elimination system and all the organs in the abdomen. It's
like giving your insides a nice, gentle massage!
The lymphatic system also benefits by
good, deep breathing. The lymphatic system is a key part
of the body's ability to handle "foreign particles" that
can cause colds, flu and other illnesses (it's part of the
immune system).
A fluid called "lymph" circulates through
the body mainly through the action of surrounding muscle
activity. This aspect of breathing your way to health would
include less chance of colds and such illness by improving
the strength of your immune system.
Breathing
your way to health
Effect of exercise on breathing
Exercise and physical activity
increase the body's need for oxygen. Physical activity
requires more energy, which the body creates by combining
oxygen and certain molecules broken down from nutrients.
Physical activity also strengthens
muscles, and so assists us to breathe more deeply
by strengthening the muscles used in breathing plus requiring
more oxygen. Kind of a natural combination!
One form of physical activity that you
might consider looking into is yoga. Breathing deeply
is developed during yoga practice, and the positions
and movements improve the strength and flexibility of the
muscles used in breathing and posture.
I am no yoga expert. I simply practice
the physical positions and movements at a beginner's level.
I can say from experience, however, that I feel refreshed
and can breathe more deeply even after a short 15 minutes
of practice.
I use a home DVD called "You Can DO
Yoga" with Leslie Sansone that is simple and enjoyable.
I could not do all the positions at first, but little by
little have increased my ability to do them.
Another activity that
I found out about and have been doing for several months
now is mini
trampoline exercise... not only does it improve
muscle strength, flexibility and improve heart and lung
function, there are numerous "rebounding"
benefits (mini trampoline exercise is known as "rebpunding")-
including being fun and easy!
Breathing
your way to health
Laughter, the best "medicine" for breathing
and health
Laughing increases the amount of air we
take in, exercises the breathing muscles and goes a very
long way towards handling stress and loosening those tight
muscles.
Have you ever laughed so hard that you
gasped for air? My point exactly! There are even groups
and clubs and a form of yoga that is based on laughter for
health. Look it up for yourself! Or at least laugh hard
because this sounds so nutty, heh heh heh...
Breathing your way to health by improving
air quality
I haven't even talked about the quality
of air in this article, but it's probably fairly
obvious that if the air isn't very clean, there is less
oxygen in it. Less oxygen, worse health.
Air pollution is far more than
industrial pollution or car pollution. It includes pollution
in our own homes from household cleaners and personal care
products, for example.
We won't go into air purification here,
but it is most definitely related to breathing your way
to health. Anything done to improve the quality
of the air that you breathe is going to improve the body's
ability to function and for you to enjoy better
health.
This site, Air Purifier Solutions has a
tremendous amount of useful information about all the different
types of air purification methods and what actually works
and what's a waste of your time and money! There's even information
on "personal space" air purfication. It's pretty
cool.
Many people love the beach or the mountains
or desert. I'm personally a beach lover. I always feel "refreshed"
after I've been at the beach - or to the mountains or desert
for that matter. Do you suppose that one of the reasons
is because the air quality is better? Good reason to go
to the beach!
Plants and breathing your way to health
We inhale air to get oxygen and exhale
to get rid of carbon dioxide, which is a byproduct of metabolism
that our bodies don't need.
Plants are the exact opposite. They need
carbon dioxide for their life, and let out oxygen as an
unnecessary element. So one way that you can get more oxygen
and discover the benefits of breathing your way to health
would be to increase your exposure to live plants. Silk
plants don't count.
There are numerous books and web sites
that offer specific programs and exercises that can help
you develop better methods of breathing and will help you
to further explore the points I've outlined in this article
on breathing your way to health.
Cheers!
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your way to health
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