Guided Breathing: Belly Breathing And The 3-6-5 Method

Please join me for two guided breathing exercises to help calm the nervous system. Use these exercises when you need to reset or when you want to practice breathing with mindfulness and intention. While you practice, I invite you to be fully present with yourself and kind to yourself.
Notice if these are easy or hard for you. Does it change depending on the circumstance or the day? Be curious. Try not to judge. See if you can enjoy breathing in these ways.
Take care and be well, Amanda

Transcript

So this week I'd like to talk a little bit about stress,

Which is present in all of our lives in its many forms.

We know it can be a good thing sometimes,

But chronic stress is not such a good thing and it can be harmful to our bodies but also to our brains.

So chronic stress,

That sort of underlying,

You can't really put your finger on what's causing it,

Just kind of that feeling of anxiety or dis-ease,

If it goes on too long can actually have some pretty detrimental effects for our bodies,

Our minds,

And our brains.

Especially our prefrontal cortex.

Stress can actually shrink the prefrontal cortex and increase the size of the amygdala.

Now this is chronic,

Ongoing,

Toxic stress,

But we don't want that.

And increasing the size of the amygdala sort of creates this unfortunate feedback loop,

Which makes the brain even more receptive to stress.

The good news is that we have some say in the matter,

So we can develop habits and practices that can kind of cut that off at the pass.

Slow deep breathing can increase the activity of the vagus nerve,

Which is a part of the parasympathetic nervous system,

And that's really what we're working on here.

So the vagus nerve controls and measures the activity of many internal organs.

When it's stimulated,

We get this nice sense of calmness in the body,

Heart rate slows and becomes more regular,

Blood pressure decreases,

Our muscles relax,

So the parasympathetic nervous system is the rest and digest system in the body.

And when the vagus nerve communicates all of this,

These changes to the brain,

It too relaxes,

Which increases the feelings of peacefulness.

So that's a positive feedback loop.

And so the technique is working both on a neurobiological and psychological level.

So let's practice some of that right now.

So one technique that I like to use,

And I especially like to do this one with children,

Because it's tactile and they really are connected to their mind-body systems.

So begin by putting your dominant hand on your belly,

Just below your ribs,

And your other hand on your chest,

Anywhere you like,

In a comfortable spot.

With your eyes closed,

If you like,

Take a deep breath in through your nose and let your belly push your hand.

And when you're ready,

Exhale and feel the hand on your belly go in.

And use it to help push all the air out.

Again,

Breathing in,

Feel your hand moving out as the belly expands.

And exhale,

Feel your hand moving inward as the belly contracts.

And once more,

Inhaling and then exhaling all the air,

Every last drop of air,

And then relax.

You can put your hands down if you like.

Belly breathing is a really good one to do,

Especially when you're feeling very activated.

You know,

Just really tuning into feeling the breath coming all the way in,

Taking the biggest exhalation you can,

And then exhaling all the way back out.

It has the effect of slowing your breath down,

Activating the vagus nerve and the parasympathetic nervous system,

And also just making sure you're not holding your breath.

You know,

It really lets you know that the air is moving in and out.

You get that nice physical sensation.

The next breathing exercise is the 3-6-5 technique.

You may have heard of this before.

So the idea is at least three times a day,

So this could be one of your goals for the week,

At least three times a day,

Breathe six times per minute,

Inhaling for five seconds,

Exhaling for five seconds each for five minutes.

So let's practice the inhaling for five seconds and exhaling for five seconds.

We'll just do that a couple of times together.

So just at your own pace,

Inhale,

And when you're ready,

Exhale.

One more time,

Inhale and exhale.

And if it helps to keep your hand on your belly for this one,

You can do that as well.

But let's do this one.

I'll set a timer.

Do it for about five minutes.

If you find that your mind is beginning to wander off,

You can always just begin again.

Your next inhalation,

Count to five,

And on your exhalation,

Count to five again.

And when you're ready,

You can open your eyes and come back to the room that you're in.

Just take a moment to check in and see how you're feeling right now.

Has there been any change from when we began?

Okay.

Thank you guys for joining me today.

And once again,

I invite you to just set an intention for yourself to bring some mindfulness to the activities of your day or set aside some time to deliberately practice either one at least a couple of times in the coming week before we meet again.

And I hope you have a great rest of the day.