Calm Your Nervous System: 4-8 Breathing

This simple breathing technique helps to slow the nervous system and reduce stress and anxiety in just a few minutes. By lengthening the exhale, the body naturally shifts into a calmer state. A great go-to breath-work practice, whenever stress or racing thoughts arise.

Transcript

OK, So we're going to do some counting breaths. So counting breath is when we come into the body and we're using the breath, But we're using numbers to count so that we've got a way of actually pacing the breath and moving the breath. This is what we're getting really into our breathwork side of things. So what we're going to be doing is four, Eight breath or four, Eight breathing. And basically what that is, Is we breathe in for four. We hold for a moment and then we breathe out for eight if we can. Now, Obviously, If that just feels as though this doesn't feel comfortable, This doesn't feel good, Don't force your body to do something that really doesn't feel good. But what I would say is don't be surprised that your body can do things that you might not realize it can. So if you're just simply maybe not used to breathing out for AIDS, You might not realize that your body can indeed do that. So let's start to practice together. Let's see what it's like to do this. So I'm going to close my eyes and as if I get into a comfortable position, Obviously I'm sitting up, I've got my legs crossed. You do not need to do that. You can lay down or you can just be sitting in a chair. It doesn't matter. So, When we found that plane, We're just going to ground into the body first. So I want you to just almost ground into your sit bones. And recognize yourself as grounded and planted on the floor. And then what we're going to do is we're going to simply breathe in through the nose for four counts. So breathing in. Two, Three, Four, Hold And then breathing out through the mouth. One, Two, Three, Four, Five, Six, Seven. And it's going to begin sort of breathing in through the nose. One, Two. Three four hold it for just a moment And then breathing out through the mouth. One, Two, Three, Four, Five, Six, Seven, Eight. And let's go again, So breathing in, Two, Three, Four, Hold. And then breathing out, Two, Three, Four, Five, Six, Seven, Eight. All right, Just straight away, I just want you to see if you can feel like, How is your body feeling with doing that? Can you already feel yourself feeling calmer? If so, Amazing. If it's feeling difficult, You can always change it around. You can always try different breath works. So we can do almost kind of going a little bit slower. Really, This is about seeing what it's like to breathe out for longer than what you breathe in. But this is what I mean by following this kind of 4A guidance so that you've got a specific way of doing it. So we're going to do this a couple more times and I'm not going to count you, But I'm just going to be doing it with you and just holding space for you to practice four, Eight. So again, Let's close the eyes and let's breathe in for four. Hold an Alpha A. Breathing in for four. Hold, Breathing out for eight. And breathing in for four. Now breathing out for eight. Well done. I definitely feel calmer just doing that. When I'm really getting into it, It's like I can feel it in my body, So I'm sure you can too. And so when, Again, You're listening to. . . The audios, You can hopefully really get a feel now of that 4. 8. And obviously we'll do so many other breath works here, Different paces, Different ways of doing it. But see how you go with that one.