Intro To Breathwork
A simply and quick guided intro to Breathwork mediation for anyone just tapping into the benefits of conscious breathing. What Pranayama is, why it is important, and how it can allow us to aid in our holistic well-being.
Transcript
Welcome to Intro to Breathwork.
Alright,
So breathwork in the yogic terms is called pranayama.
Pranay means life force and yama means to lengthen or to work with that life force.
So really we're trying to lengthen our life force.
Makes sense?
Breath kind of equals us living a little bit longer.
The reasons that we do breathwork,
Why it's so important,
Why it's a little bit of a new age thing these days,
That it's been a new age thing forever,
Is one,
It can stimulate and help our immune system.
It boosts our immunity,
It stimulates ourselves,
It's regenerating ourselves faster,
It's helping ourselves become new again,
Getting that life force in their own little microscopic beings and then that's going to lead them to being able to fight disease,
Neurological dysfunctions that may be going on that we witness,
Migraines,
It can help reduce stress,
It can help reduce depression,
Anxiety,
It can bring us out of a negative space,
It can help us with emotional,
Mental deficiencies that we may be going through,
If we have frustrations it's easier for us to focus on those,
Get to the underlying problem,
Not just that surface issue and it truly can help us bring peace into our lives.
It boosts our happiness,
Our joy and it can make you feel like the weight of the world is off of your shoulders.
Those are really important things to breathing and when we don't consciously breathe we don't necessarily get those benefits.
When we consciously breathe 80% of the toxins within our body are able to be released or thrown out due to just properly breathing.
So as you know,
We have diaphragm,
It's in our belly and a lot of people think,
Okay well lungs,
Well what is the diaphragm?
Probably saying that wrong but the diaphragm looks like a balloon in your belly or like a flat pancake and it sits about here and imagine a balloon being blown up,
You can inhale and it's going to get bigger,
Exhale it's going to get smaller.
Well a lot of the times we don't necessarily breathe correctly so when we inhale you think that your diaphragm would come up and when you exhale it would come down.
You actually kind of want to do the opposite.
So when we're taking an inhale you're trying to draw the diaphragm down creating space between the rib cages it attaches to the rib 6 to 12 and you want to create that space for that balloon to be held.
When we exhale that diaphragm is going to get smaller,
It's going to push the air up through your windpipe and out through your nose slash mouth.
That's very important so keep that in mind,
Play with that right now and we're going to inhale,
Just do 3 to 4 seconds as you inhale try to draw that pancake down and you're going to feel the diaphragm move up to push that air out to get it out of the body.
Next,
After you go through that pause this video if you need to,
Do that get a little comfortable and play with it.
See if you can expand your belly really really wide out and big to emphasize what you're working on and then try to make it really tight and small as if you're pulling it to the back of your spine in a gentle comfortable manner.
The next little task I'm going to have us try is holding our hand up in front of our mouth as if we are about to fog up a window or a mirror.
I'm trying to draw a little smiley face.
I love doing that.
So you're going to put your hand in front of your face and I just want you to breathe in through your nose out of your mouth normal.
So,
1 you probably didn't really hear anything,
2 thanks for watching that because what we're going to get into is restricting or tensing our throat here.
There's muscles in the front of your neck.
We want to tighten these muscles as we inhale.
It's going to feel like the back of your neck is getting a little bit tight like it's hard to breathe but it's as if you're just flexing a muscle to lift up a weight or to ride a bike.
So you're going to inhale and it's going to sound a little oceanic maybe.
I'm going to do it really loud just so you can hear it.
Otherwise in a class this is how you would move throughout your entire practice with this kind of pranayama breath.
It's a little bit more restrictive.
It keeps you engaged.
It keeps you vitalized.
It's going to help move you through the practice.
It's going to keep you focused in the present moment.
So on the inhale.
You can do it again.
I'm going to breathe out of my mouth this time.
You might feel,
You should feel a hotness on your hand.
That's just the moisture coming out of your mouth,
The heat of your breath.
We're going to run through this for a couple different rounds.
We'll stop.
We'll take a couple normal breaths and then we'll do a one more round and then that will be our intro to breath work.
If you're having a little bit of trouble with that,
Pause the video,
Get comfortable,
Practice that a couple times.
We're going to remove our hand,
But it should feel like you're trying to blow on a mirror,
Fog it up.
I feel like you're a dragon and you have fire coming out of your mouth.
It's really fun to envision that by the way.
Bet y'all are beautiful dragons.
So you're going to put your hand up.
We're going to inhale,
Count to four seconds.
We're going to pause at the top for one second.
We're going to exhale,
Blow on our hands for five seconds.
So inhale one,
Two,
Three,
Four.
Pause at the top.
Exhale one,
Two,
Three,
Four,
Five.
Inhale one,
Two,
Three,
Four.
Pause at the top.
Exhale one,
Two,
Three,
Four,
Five.
Inhale one,
Two,
Three,
Four.
Pause at the top.
Exhale one,
Two,
Three,
Four,
Five.
We're going to do these last two rounds with you.
Inhale.
Inhale.
Pause at the top.
Exhale.
Inhale.
Take a normal round of breath.
Relax the lungs as you inhale as big as you need to.
Fill them up all the way and gently exhale that breath out of the lungs.
Nice and easy.
We're going to do two more rounds of easy going normal breath.
Inhale.
Fill the lungs.
Feel any tension of the body begin to slip away.
Exhale.
Gently release that breath.
Release the toxins.
Release the emotions.
Release anything you're hanging on to.
One more time.
Inhale the breath all the way to the top of the lungs.
Fill up that chest cavity.
Exhale.
Release that breath out of the body.
Release any tension.
Release anything you're hanging on to.
Let's go in for one more round of five pranayama breaths.
Inhale one,
Two,
Three,
Four.
Pause at the top.
Exhale one,
Two,
Three,
Four,
Five.
Inhale one,
Two,
Three,
Four.
Pause at the top.
Exhale one,
Two,
Three,
Four,
Five.
Inhale one,
Two,
Three,
Four.
Pause at the top.
Exhale one,
Two,
Three,
Four,
Five.
Two more rounds.
I'm going to do these in a few more times.
Inhale.
Pause at the top.
Inhale.
Pause at the top.
Exhale.
Exhale.
Exhale.
Come back to a normal breath.
Fully inhale into the lungs.
Allow that exhale to release out of the body gently.
Nice and easy going.
And begin to come back to a normal breath.
Not trying to force too much.
And I hope that was helpful.
I hope that you enjoyed that.
That is the beginning of breath work.
So that's the most basic way that we can start.
If we're ever feeling stressed out,
If we're in a very anxious kind of moment,
Especially with how the world is right now,
You can do that kind of breath work within a minute,
Two minutes.
It doesn't have to be five rounds.
It doesn't have to be a certain amount.
It can be whatever you need in that moment.
I will stop whatever I'm doing a lot of the time,
And I will just turn my brain on away from what I'm already focused on.
And I will breathe consciously,
And I will notice how I'm feeling,
What that might look like in my body.
Do I feel that in my heart?
Am I feeling it in my mind?
Am I thinking about opinions or judgments too much?
Am I taking on someone else's emotions that I may be around?
Am I thinking of a situation that is not even going on around me?
These are all crucial moments to do pranayama,
Conscious breath work.
And it's only going to help our life force.
It's only going to make us feel better,
Feel released of those toxins.
And not even on the level of just immunity in our cells and the physical,
Or the literal science,
Excuse me.
But on a emotional level,
On a mental level,
On a stress level,
It's going to relieve us of tension that we're feeling because of external forces.
Our life force is what we can choose to cleanse.
We can choose to channel into.
We can choose to adapt to the situation we are presently in.
We choose that.
And if we choose to consciously deflate the situation in our minds,
We're going to deflate the situation in our hearts,
And we're going to be able to take our next inhale with more love,
More compassion,
And more stability for our own selves.
If the four second inhale was a little bit too short for you,
Definitely try a longer inhale.
I love to count up to five or six or seven,
Pause,
And then release for one second longer than what I inhale.
So it's important that you count when you're first starting off,
Just so you can get into that rhythm of,
All right,
This is what five seconds feels like,
This is what six seconds feels like,
Now I can exhale seven or eight seconds.
Be mindful.
If you get lightheaded,
Chill.
Take a moment and just stop breathing like that.
Just get back to normal.
You're going to be okay.
If you have water,
Drink some water.
If you have a little snack,
That's fine.
Eat a little snack.
But if you get lightheaded,
Just take a moment to yourself.
Take a moment away from that breathing.
It's a new kind of awareness in the body that can take adjusting to.
So don't beat yourself up on it.
Have fun with it and know that you are only benefiting yourself,
Your mind,
And everyone around you.
I hope that you have a great rest of your day.
I'm thinking about you.
I'm sending you all my love and my power.
And I am so grateful to be on this journey with you.
I'll see you soon.
