Basic Yoga Breathing - Diaphragmatic Breathing

Welcome to part two in my basic yoga breathing series.

This lesson or meditation is focused around diaphragmatic or belly breathing.

It's a great way to get in touch with our most natural way of breathing,

Our most relaxed way of breathing,

And a way of breathing that is pretty foreign to most of us.

So to begin,

You're going to find a comfortable position either sitting or lying on the floor.

If you're sitting,

Maybe you want to sit tall in a traditional meditation posture.

Maybe you want to sit with your back up against a chair for a little more support.

But I really recommend getting on the floor for this meditation.

Lying on the floor,

With your knees bent,

Your feet flat on the floor,

Maybe a little bit of support under your neck or head,

But just letting your back fully relax against the floor.

And as we begin,

You're going to close your eyes and start to tune in to what's happening inside your body right here,

Right now,

Particularly focused on what's happening with your breath.

Noticing how you're breathing,

Maybe starting to breathe in and out through the nose.

If it causes tension to breathe out through the nose,

You can always breathe out through the mouth instead.

But see what it feels like to breathe in and out through the nose.

This tends to slow our breath down and helps get us into a more relaxed state.

So the first thing we'll do is we'll focus on where the body is moving as we breathe.

So go ahead and place one hand on your chest,

One hand on your belly,

And just notice as you breathe the movement under those two areas.

Noticing as you inhale the rising of the body,

Maybe the chest rises,

Maybe the belly expands,

And as you exhale,

Things soften back in.

And as you start to notice that movement under your hands,

Maybe seeing what happens if you allow your chest to stay relaxed and let your inhales just bypass your chest and move right down into your lower rib cage and belly area.

So that as you inhale,

The belly and the lower ribs will expand,

As you exhale,

They soften back in.

The diaphragm muscle is this large,

Powerful dome-shaped muscle that lives underneath our lungs at the base of our rib cage.

And when we breathe in,

That diaphragm pulls downward to allow our lungs to fully expand.

And along with that expansion,

The belly moves out of the way.

So that's why it looks like our belly is doing the breathing.

The belly moves out of the way so that the diaphragm can drop down so that we can draw air into the lower parts of our lungs.

It's a great way to breathe because our lungs are bigger on the bottom.

They've got more blood vessels on the bottom.

And so it's a more efficient way of breathing.

We get the air right to the part of the lungs that can most efficiently exchange oxygen and carbon dioxide with the rest of the body.

This might be happening naturally,

But notice now the timing of your breath.

And maybe your breath has already started to slow down,

Particularly the exhalations,

Allowing your exhales to just take up at least as much time as your inhales,

If not a little bit more,

Slowing down the exhalations.

And when we breathe in this way,

When we get the breath low down into those lower lungs,

When we slow our exhales down,

It triggers our body's natural parasympathetic nervous system or our rest and digest reflex,

Which is the opposite of fight or flight.

So it's a great way to decrease stress.

Noticing if there's tension lingering in your neck and shoulders,

Maybe using these long,

Slow exhalations to let that tension melt out of the body.

Just focusing on nice,

Slow,

Deep belly breaths.

If you've ever watched a baby breathe or a cat or a dog breathe,

They have these beautiful natural breaths.

They breathe right into their belly.

And feel free to pause this meditation if you want to stay with this breath for longer.

And know that this is something that you can do anytime,

Anywhere throughout your day.

It's always accessible.

It's a great way to relieve stress.

It's a great way to increase overall vitality and health in the body.

And it just feels good.