HOW WE BREATHE - SO WE LIVE

2024 Author: Harry Day | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 15:43

Everything "breathes", and there is no need to be afraid that the inhalation is followed by the exhalation. The worst thing is to try to stop or block your breathing. Then you will inevitably suffocate.

B. Verber

Breath is a gift from God who breathed life into human bodies. It is known from the Bible that in creating man, God took a lump of clay and breathed life into it. Breathing is synonymous with inspiration (Latin spiro, spirare - to breathe).

To "inspire" means to fill someone with a quickening, quickening, or stimulating influence, and this is exactly the effect that breathing gives. Sometimes it is possible to breathe life into a person with the help of mouth-to-mouth artificial respiration, just as, according to the Scriptures, God did it with Adam. The right to be ourselves is realized with our first breath, says A. Lowen. How strongly a person feels this right can be seen in his breathing. Most people breathe shallowly and tend to hold their breath.

By the type of breathing and its leading disturbances, one can recognize the main psychological conflict of a person or his dysfunctional psychological attitudes. In the process of psychotherapeutic work, the peculiarities of breathing tell the specialist in which direction to move. Whether psychotherapy is progressing successfully is indicated by changes, including in the client's breathing.

Breathing delivers oxygen to tissues to maintain metabolism, the body does not store oxygen in any significant amounts, therefore, when breathing stops for more than a few minutes, death occurs.

Breathing is one of the aspects of the bodily rhythm of expansion and contraction, which is also expressed in the pulsation of the heart. Moreover, breathing is an expression of the spirituality of the body.

Breathing is directly related to the state of arousal. When a person is calm, his breathing is free; in a state of strong arousal, breathing becomes fast and intense; experiencing fear, people breathe sharply and hold their breath; in a state of tension, breathing becomes shallow. Normal breathing can be heard and heard best during sleep. People who breathe almost silently harm their breathing and health.

In stimulating situations, breathing increases and energy increases. Natural breathing, since a child or an animal breathes, involves the whole body in this process, although not all of its parts work actively, but each of them is influenced by breathing waves passing through the body. When we draw in air, the energy originates in the depths of the abdominal cavity and rises up to the head. During exhalation, the wave moves from the head towards the feet. These waves can easily be seen, as well as interference with the breathing process. A frequent hindrance is the delay of the wave at the level of the navel or pelvis. This prevents the pelvis and abdomen from being involved in the breathing process and leads to shallow breathing. Deep breathing involves the lower abdomen, which bulges out on inhalation and retracts on exhalation. This may seem somewhat misleading, as air never actually enters the abdominal cavity. However, during deep abdominal breathing, the expansion of the lower abdomen allows the lower lungs to expand more easily and more fully, which deepens breathing. Young children breathe this way.

With shallow breathing, breathing movements do not go beyond the chest and diaphragm. Downward movement of the diaphragm is limited, which forces the lungs to expand outward. This causes unnecessary stress in the body.

To breathe deeply means to feel deeply. With deep belly breathing, this area comes to life. By holding back deep breathing, some of the feelings associated with the abdomen are inhibited. One of these feelings is sadness, as the belly takes part in deep crying.

Having a flat stomach may seem aesthetically pleasing, but a flat stomach also indicates a lack of fullness. By defining something as flat, it means that this thing has no taste, color or originality. Lack of sensitivity in this part of the body also means a lack of sexual warmth and dissolution in the pelvic region. In such people, sexual arousal is limited mainly to the genitals. This problem is a consequence of the inhibition of sexual feelings during childhood. In these cases, deep abdominal breathing is necessary to bring life and sensitivity back to that area of the body.

If a person realizes that he is breathing shallowly, he needs special exercises to activate such breathing. You can, for example, breathe against the pressure of the palm on your stomach.

If you deepen your breathing and feel it in the depths of your pelvis, the result is a feeling of sadness and sexuality. If you accept these feelings - especially if you cry deeply - the weight of the body will joyfully come to life.

In other breathing disorders, the chest moves little, breathing is mainly diaphragmatic, with some expansion of the abdominal cavity. In this case, the chest is too swollen. This appearance may seem masculine, but it can lead to emphysema. Constantly filling the chest with too much air stretches and tears the delicate tissue of the lungs, as a result of which there is insufficient oxygen in the blood, despite painful efforts to inhale more air. Even if this condition is less pronounced, it poses a health hazard, since the immobility of the chest is a great burden on the heart.

For most, symptoms of hyperventilation occur when breathing deeply while lying down without moving. Physiologically, this can be explained by the fact that this kind of breathing lowers the level of carbon dioxide in the blood too much, which leads to such a reaction. This can be dealt with by breathing into a paper bag, because in this case some of the carbon monoxide is absorbed again. The concept of "hyper" is comparative in relation to the previous depth of breathing. In other words, symptoms of hyperventilation appear when we breathe deeper than we are used to. As soon as the body gets used to deep breathing, such "hyperventilation" ceases to be "hyper".

These symptoms can also be explained by the fact that breathing energizes the body. If the body of a given person is accustomed to a certain level of energy or arousal, then it will be charged more than necessary, which manifests itself in a morbid state. If this increased charge is not discharged, the body will contract and the symptoms described above will appear. When a person can tolerate a high charge of energy, the body will feel more alive.

If a person is inclined to suppress their feelings, cannot cry, then, most likely, he will have breathing problems. And if a person retains feelings, then the chest will also retain air in itself. And it will probably be bloated.

In the interest of our own health, it is important that we become aware of our breathing style. The exercise below can help. It should also help deepen breathing. First, pay attention to the size of your chest and see if you are sucking in air deeply and how long you are holding it in. If so, then you may not only have trouble breathing completely, but also expressing your feelings.

In a sitting position, best of all on a firm chair, say in your usual voice "ah-ah", looking at the second hand of your watch. If you are unable to hold the sound for at least 20 seconds, it means that you have breathing problems.

To improve your breathing, repeat the ego exercise regularly, trying to prolong the duration of this sound. Exercise is not dangerous, but you may be short of breath. Your body will respond with vigorous breathing to replenish the oxygen level in your blood. This intense breathing releases the tense chest muscles, allowing them to relax. This process can end in crying.

You can do this exercise by counting aloud at a constant rhythm. Using the voice in a continuous manner requires maintaining a continuous exhalation. This exercise will have the same effect as the previous one. With fuller exhalations, you will breathe in deeper.

In this, as well as in other exercises, it is important not to try to achieve results at any cost. Like all natural bodily functions, breathing just happens. When you stop straining and surrender to the mysterious strength of your body, you get grace and health.

And what about people whose chests are free and weakly filled? It is normal for breathing to reach deep into the abdomen. In this case, the breathing wave travels through the entire body. Often, a poorly filled chest is flat and narrow, and breathing extends beyond it. It is more difficult for people with this structure to breathe in than to breathe out. They do not suppress feelings in themselves, but separate themselves from them. This is especially true for feelings emanating from deep within the abdomen, such as sadness, despair, and desire. The injuries sustained in childhood were very severe. Their desire for contact was completely consumed, which led them to feel that they had no right to joy and self-realization. Hence their deep despair.

In children, the desire for close contact is most often expressed in the desire to suckle the mother's breast. An adult will most likely be able to suck easily with his lips when inserting his thumb into his mouth. A newborn baby or animal will suck with its entire mouth, pressing the nipple with its tongue against the palate, while the throat opens, creating pressure, and the newborn can draw as much food from the breast as possible. At the same time, bottle fed babies mainly suck with their lips. Most of the work for them is done by the force of gravity. Thus, sucking food from the breast is a more active and aggressive form of action.

M. Ribbly showed a clear connection between sucking and breathing. If a newborn is weaned early, during the first year of life, his breathing becomes shallow and irregular. The infant experiences breast loss as the loss of his world. Since the baby cannot get intimate contact with the breast, he has to suppress his breathing in an effort to avoid pain. Babies do this by tightening their throat muscles, a skill often retained in adulthood. To breathe aggressively, you need to feel the throat working during breathing, just as babies need to feel the action of their throat in order to suck aggressively. One way to activate the throat muscle is to moan while inhaling. You can use this while exhaling, combining with inhaling sound, as shown in the following exercise.

Take the same sitting position as in the previous exercise. Breathe normally for one minute to relax. Then, as you exhale, make a sound that continues for a full exhalation. Try to make the same sound as you inhale. This may be difficult at first, but it can be achieved with a little exercise. Do you feel the air being sucked into the body? Before sneezing, the body draws in air with a relaxing force. Have you ever felt it?

Lowen used this exercise to help people burst into tears if they have a problem with it. Nothing improves breathing like a good cry. Crying is the main stress relieving mechanism and the only one available to an infant.

When a person is engaged in some physical work that requires effort, he usually breathes through his mouth, since the body requires more oxygen. The same applies to strong emotional states such as anger, fear, sadness, and desire. In situations like this, closing your mouth and breathing through your nose is a way to maintain control. There are situations when control is necessary, but there are also situations when you need to release all the brakes. The way of breathing should depend on the situation, and not on how you "should" behave. The body knows the right reaction and needs to be trusted to do the right thing if it is allowed to.

Breathing characterizes the features of human interaction with the world. People with shallow breathing lack a basic sense of the right to life. One gets the impression that the person was born, but did not breathe. These are people who, at the earliest stages of development, were exposed to traumatic circumstances. Such people are worried about disorders of the cardiovascular system, violation of psychological boundaries, the inability to relax and enjoy life. In psychotherapy with such a client, the main emphasis is on teaching a person full breathing, with which he lets life into himself.

People who consider themselves not entitled to have something and in many ways deny themselves, with a violation of the ability to build full-fledged relationships with others, are characterized by a disturbed breath, which is a sign of inability to let life into themselves, to accept the world around them and relationships. In psychotherapeutic work with them, provocation of a full-fledged inhalation becomes essential.

People characterized by total control in everything, combining the desire for independence with the desire to merge with other people, are not able to surrender to feelings and share them with others. Psychotherapeutic work with such a client is aimed at developing a full exhalation.