I invite you to close your eyes and listen to your breathe right now. You may of noticed that when you’re anxious you tend to end up taking shallow breaths into the chest. In fact most of the population don’t realise that they tend to use their chests to breath when the natural way, the way we start when born is through the abdomen.
By taking deep breaths we influence the parasympathetic nervous system which is in charge of the flight or fight response. By taking deeper breaths and breathing into our diaphragm we can easily and quickly calm ourselves down.
In this blog post I’m going to go through my favourite 3 Breathwork techniques for general anxiety. The first time I did one of these I felt the benefits instantly but I found that the real gain came from coming back to them again and again. Now I do breathwork nearly everyday and my anxiety has reduced significantly.
My first Breathwork ever learnt, which is also a type of Pranayama was Alternate nostril breathing (nadi shodhana) and this is the perfect calming breath that also balances the left and right hemispheres of our brain. Just a few minutes of this a day and you’ll feel super relaxed.
- You want to hold your fingers in the Vishnu Mudra.
- Start by covering your right nostril your right hand thumb and inhale through left nostril
- Hold at the top of your breath and cover both nostrils for at least a second
- Release your thumb from your right nostril and exhale completely followed by a full inhale.
Cover both nostrils again and repeat for about 7 minutes for best results.
Box breath is up next and this is great for that just before a meeting anxiety. It resets the breath and mind plus It’s super simple to do in public without drawing attention. All you do to remember this one is imagine a square, as it is equal amount of seconds per breath. The recommended amount of counts per second is 4 but you can choose any amount as long as you keep it equal. Here’s how you do it;
Breathe in for 4 seconds, hold at the top for 4 seconds, Exhale for 4 seconds, Hold at bottom for 4 seconds.
Repeat this for 4 minutes for optimum results but just a few rounds for a quick reset is beneficial too.
Lastly is the 4-7-8 Breath also known as relaxing breath. Apart from the obvious name for it being super relaxing this is also great for if you struggle with getting a good nights sleep.
Basically you inhale for 4 seconds, hold at the top for 7 seconds and exhale for 8 seconds. Repeat until relaxed.
I’ve started creating free videos on Youtube for Breathwork and meditation and I’m posting a new one every week. Just click on the link below for more.
(This video contains two of the above techniques including an extra called Kundalini breath of fire which is a great energy booster.)
Earthly Luna Wellbeing 