Breathing For Relaxation

This guided breathing exercise will help you to slow down your breathing. When we breathe slowly, we can settle into our parasympathetic nervous system. When we are in this state, we tend to feel calm, clear, and content. | This session is part 4 of "Breathing for Beginners" | Part 1 - Find your Comfortable Meditation Seat | Part 2 - Mechanics of Breathing for Beginners | Part 3 - Belly Breathing | Part 4 - Full Diaphragm Breathing

Transcript

Hello and welcome. Today I'm going to guide you through a short exercise to start to slow down that pace of your breath. We're going to create a little bit more length to the breath that we've already been working with. Without changing anything, I want you to bring your awareness to how slow or fast the breath is moving today. So one of the ways you might feel this is that the breath is short or long, Or perhaps if there's a space between each breath. Especially if our awareness is not on the breath, It can often start to pick up and pace to meet us wherever we are in our day. I want you to take three slow, Deep breaths here. Breathing in, Breathing out, Breathing in, Breathing out, Breathing in, And breathing out. From here we're going to start to find that comfortable upright seat. Placing your feet on the floor, Pressing yourself up into that straight, Long spine. You'll stack your head over your chest, Your chest over your hips. You'll feel yourself grow a little bit longer in the waist. Find that slight tuck of your chin towards your throat. Relax your tongue from the roof of your mouth. And start to take a couple of breaths through the nostrils, Down into the belly, The ribs, And up into the chest. As you breathe like this for a couple of rounds, I want you to feel that the breath is moving in 360 degrees. So as the breath moves bottom to top, You're fully inflating the torso. And as you exhale top to bottom, You're fully emptying the breath. And take a couple rounds here just to notice what that's like. We're going to continue breathing just like this slow, Smooth in three parts. We're going to add a count to the breath. What we're going to do is breathe in for four, Hold the breath for four, And breathe out for four. To start, You'll take a full breath in and a full breath out. We'll breathe in together for four, Three, Two, One, Holding for four, Three, Two, One, Exhale for four, Three, Two, One, Inhale for four, Holding for four, And exhale for four. I want you to continue on like this for a couple of counts, Breathing in for four, Holding for four, And emptying your breath for four. As you continue like this, What you're noticing is that perhaps there's a little bit more space between each breath. Not like it's being rushed or forced. It starts to create a little bit more length and creates a sense of ease as well. You'll take three more breaths like this in your own time. At the bottom of your next exhale, We're going to start to transition into a little bit of a longer exhale breath. We're going to do a couple of rounds together again, And it's going to be a breath in for four, Holding the breath for four, And breathing out for six. Let's take a nice deep breath in together, And a full breath out. We'll start the count, Breathing in for four, Three, Two, One, Holding for four, Three, Two, One, And breathing out for six, Five, Four, Three, Two, One, Breathing in for four, Holding for four, And breathing out for six, Breathing in for four, Holding for four, Breathing out for six. You're going to try three more breaths like this in your own time, Breathing in for four, Holding for four, And breathing out for six. You might like to bring the visualization of a flame in front of your nose into your mind's eye. You imagine that you don't want to disturb that flame with the breath. This is going to help you to create that long, Soft breath without too much force. You have just two more rounds here. At the end of your next exhale, You can let go of the counting and focus. I want you to keep taking full breaths and bring your awareness back into the speed of your breath. You'll notice if your breath feels long or short, And you'll feel how the slow breath that we worked with today helps you to release some of that tension. You might sense more space in your shoulders, Jaw, Neck. When there's less tension in your muscles, It starts to create a little bit more ease in the mind. This breathing practice might be challenging. For you, It might be a practice that you do a number of times to start to become comfortable, And that's totally okay. With repetition comes ease. I hope you enjoy the sense of ease you've created in your body and mind today, The deeper breaths you're hopefully able to experience for the rest of your day. I look forward to seeing you back here soon for your next session.

Reviews

A short but really effective way to enhance your breathing technique.

I do this practice a few times a day and my anxiety levels have dropped dramatically ! Brilliant many thanks 😊

Starting to connect with you to directions
Thank you!