Welcome.
Thanks for joining me today.
My name is Katie and today we'll be doing a breathwork practice that's great for when we're feeling activated.
We can experience activation in many different ways.
We might notice different body sensations like our heart might be racing or we might notice that we are breathing quickly and in a shallow way.
Or we might experience nervous system activation as a busy mind like racing thoughts,
Repetitive thoughts.
And we might describe this in all sorts of different ways.
We might notice and say that we're anxious or stressed or we feel wired or worked up.
And however we experience it or choose to describe it,
This is nervous system activation.
We're a little over activated and we want to tone that down.
And the breath is a really powerful tool that we have to modulate our own nervous system.
Whether we need to bring ourselves up or bring ourselves down,
The breath is a great tool for that.
So the extended exhale breath that we'll do today,
Our exhale is longer than our inhale.
These longer exhales work to help tone down nervous system activation because they cause the vagus nerve to send a signal that helps engage our parasympathetic nervous system,
Our rest and digest system.
And as this engages our sympathetic nervous system,
Our fight,
Our flight,
Our freeze starts to release its grip,
It disengages a little bit,
If not entirely,
But a little bit goes a long way.
So let's explore this extended exhale breath together.
Find a comfortable position,
Noticing what you're inclined towards.
When we work with breath,
We want to ensure that we have the ability to fully inflate our lungs.
And so I usually recommend not slouching forward,
But being in a position where you're either upright or standing or even fully lying down all straight out.
So that you can notice the collarbones,
The ribcage,
The belly as you breathe.
We'll start by just noticing what the breath is right now at the beginning of the practice.
And maybe noticing if just drawing our attention there already is causing us to change it,
To try to slow it down or make it deeper or whatever.
And we don't need to change anything just yet.
We're just noticing that inclination if it arises.
We'll start to make our inhales just a little bit deeper.
And our exhales a little bit deeper.
Taking a few cycles of breath here,
Letting those deeper breaths settle in.
I'll guide a few rounds of this extended exhale breath.
We'll start,
We'll take one inhale together.
And one exhale,
Just to get our breath in sync.
We'll do that one more time and inhale together.
And an exhale.
And we'll inhale for one,
Two,
Exhale,
Two,
Three,
Four.
Inhale,
One,
Two,
Exhale,
Two,
Three,
Four.
Inhale,
One,
Two,
Exhale,
Two,
Three,
Four.
Inhale,
One,
Two,
Exhale,
Two,
Three,
Four.
Continue on using either this count and pace if it feels good to you.
Or you can adjust it to make it feel accessible to you.
It might go a little faster or slower.
There's no right or wrong count or speed.
You want to make sure that you're keeping your exhale about twice as long as your inhale as you breathe in and out.
And whatever your count,
Whatever your speed,
Your breath should not feel like a struggle.
This is not a go to your limit practice.
Work with discernment here.
Give yourself permission to do what feels good here within the parameters of this extended exhale.
Just noticing if the mind drifts away.
If you lose count,
Starting over again.
No matter how many times the mind drifts away.
Or if you find yourself counting too far,
Holding or anything else.
Just let it go wherever you are.
Start again.
And making whatever round of breath you're on your final round of counted breath.
When you've completed that round,
Just release the counting.
Letting your breath return to whatever it wants to be right now.
Just noticing what that is,
What that means.
What is the natural speed of the breath when you let it go?
Is it deep or shallow?
Is the speed changing?
And noticing if anything has changed in your breathing,
In the state of your mind,
Since the start of our practice together today.
We're not striving for a specific change here.
Even if in the back of our mind,
We really just did this because we want to feel better.
This is just a practice of noticing if and what has changed when we practice,
If anything.
And knowing that no particular change is better than another.
Just noticing what is.
Keeping track.
Gently allowing your attention to expand,
To include your whole physical body,
The space around you.
Allowing the eyes to open if they had closed.
Getting ready to transition from this practice back into the rest of the day.
Thank you for practicing with me today,
And thank yourself for tending to your nervous system,
And for spending time doing something nice for yourself.
