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This Change Calms Your Body in Minutes

Every human being in the world who has an active and healthy nervous system, who has never done any inner work or training will be by default, subject to three things. They will be in a state of being braced which is a state of readiness to respond to threats. Danger on any level, including defending one’s name, reputation, being corrected, feeling their ego is threatened, being challenged or argued with. Everybody holds a state being braced for readiness.

Secondly, everybody is in a state of impulse to some degree. Some people can’t control their emotional impulses or their excitement and get it done energy that rises inside them.

And the thirdly is compulsion, urges to do something that could even be negative or harmful to themselves or others. Everybody lives with braced, impulse and compulsion by default. And each person’s engagement in these things differs to their own unique personality.

Most people walk around and travel in everyday life slightly on the edge, just at that edge and don’t know or realise it. Generally, there’s no obvious or expected anxiety or no racing thoughts, nothing is urgent or dramatic going on. But underneath it all, just beneath the surface the human body, is running tense, more tension than it needs to hold. And is always centred around fight or flight and a readiness to respond. This process has evolved to protect us and keep us alert.

Body slightly tense, shoulders slightly raised. Just notice where your shoulders are now as you read this and let them drop. Did they drop? That’s my point. Breath is a bit shallow and maybe awareness is just a touch too alert. There’s a difference between vigilance and clarity. Do we need more clarity? Yes. Doe we need more fight or flight awareness no. Especially when it’s not needed in safe scenarios.

Breathing

My point being, a large part of this comes down to how we actually breathe. Breathing indicates what environment or surroundings we are in relation to our inner automatic monitoring processes.

As most people are in a state of readiness or braced. This is called a survival state and most people in this state are actually breathing from or into the upper chest area. This is supple, very supple. And it keeps the body in a mild state of readiness. Upper breathing sends out a signal about what environment we’re in.

A readiness for action, self-defence, fight, freeze or flight and so on.

We have evolved over hundreds of thousands of years to escape predators and danger. We are designed or we have evolved to breathe from the chest area as it’s fast and sudden and it’s immediate. Whatever the environment dictates to us. To understand this, think in terms of cave person or Neanderthal human.

This breathing from the chest is not panic or anxiety. It’s just a slight quiet sense that something might or could just happen suddenly. And overtime this becomes the default or the baseline way of breathing.

To move away from this baseline way of breathing is very simple and it doesn’t take much to enter into what’s called the parasympathetic nervous system way of breathing often called belly breathing, abdomen breathing, which is also known as breathing from the navel or the hara. So instead of breathing from the chest area, your breath drops lower into the body into the abdominal area and you take your concentration or focus to that place.

We’re not forcing anything when we make the change and nothing is exaggerated or dramatic. You just keep a natural flow, a natural movement where the belly gently rises on the inhale and falls on the exhale and by doing this it sends a different signal or message through the body, back to the fight or flight part of the mind that is always monitoring us, that part that’s always looking out for threat and danger. That’s the reflex response part.

When you’re breathing settles into the lower region, your nervous system also begins to settle and your heart rate reduces, muscles relax slightly and your mental readiness becomes less reactive. For example, someone might correct you, but you don’t care to correct them back because you are now very relaxed. Your thoughts don’t disappear, they just lose that edge, that energy and your awareness widens and becomes more considerate instead of tightening.

By moving away from shallow chest breathing, practicing a dedicated meditation training course will help you easily trigger the parasympathetic nervous system to instantly calm your entire body.

Relaxation!

And what you’ll find is the speed at which this can happen. It will be surprising that you’ll just notice a noticeable softening and a relaxation within your awareness for you to be less defensive, less argumentative and less confrontational. And even if you are feeling those things, you’ll engage more positively or more thoughtfully than normal. And the point being, you’re becoming more relaxed, less automatic in your energy and more settled and more considerate in how you expand your energy.

By concentrating on your breathing and changing where you’re breathing from, while you’re walking, washing your dishes at the sink or sitting at your desk or even waiting in a waiting room or standing in a queue at the post office. These are the exact moments where the human body usually falls back into tension and readiness around, strangers in the public domain and it usually happens with us just noticing it. So, bringing the breath lower down into belly breathing during these times has a very powerful effect and also helps concentrate your attention in the right place. Instead of having your mind flitting off all over the place.

This is certainly not about doing it all the time and controlling every breath you make. It’s just something you do on and off a few times a day or a week to start with. Such as concentrating on your breath while you’re standing in that post office queue and relaxing while you’re standing there. And it is moments like this where you start belly breathing, which will have a positive knock-on effect throughout the rest of the day, for hours after which has been scientifically proven to lower your whole nervous system responses to the world.

Regular breathing from the lower abdomen area changes how your system interacts with your environment and the positivity can help lift you for the rest of the day.

Just concentrating on where you’re breathing from and relaxing your body just a few minutes here and there, on and off throughout the day will have a significant positive effect on you and allow your body to relax enough for the breath to move naturally through you.

In the following instruction I’m going to show you how to do this in a simple way and naturally safe. And once you can do this in one scenario, you can apply it to other scenarios in your everyday life. You can start off small, Just 5 minutes here and there and then a couple of days later, you’ll find another moment and just do another five or 10 minutes and build up slowly.

Walking Breathing!

Let’s take for example. You’re walking down the street, now just let your body walk normally, just slightly change your attention to your navel area, bring your attention to below your belly button area and keep your breathing through the nose if possible, not your mouth and notice, dropping any tension from your body as you’re walking and allow shoulders to drop, to hang and your belly to stay relaxed and soft and allow the in breaths to settle lower in the belly area.

Your belly gently rises and gently falls in alignment with your steps as you’re walking, now focus on breathing in, through your belly area. Obviously, you’re not breathing through your belly area, but you allow your imagination to imagine YOU ARE breathing in through your belly area. Inhalations three to four steps and then exhale 4 to 5 steps.

Or if you can’t do that, just count inwards three- or four-seconds breathing in and four or five seconds breathing out or slightly longer breathing out. There must be no forcing, no purposeful, deliberate or exaggeration, your attention should rest lightly on each movement in the lower abdomen area while the rest of your awareness stays relaxed and open to your surroundings.

By the way, under no circumstances do this whilst driving or operating any form of machinery. Just do this while you’re working or walking safely.

You’re not shutting things off and you’re not blocking the world out, you’re just offering your mind, your awareness, something steady to focus on, instead of flying around jumping from one thought to the next. You’re now just focusing your awareness on the breathing in and out of your belly area and how you are relaxing while you’re doing it.

It’s important also to point out that your mind will wander, all minds wander and it’s completely normal to drift off onto other thoughts. Each time bring your attention back to your breathing in your belly area and the longer you exile this prompts the body towards a calmer state. It also signals to your mind that your breathing is becoming calmer, so you must be in a safe environment because we only breathe like that when we’re in a safe environment, we only breathe like that maybe when we are relaxing or asleep and through repetition the mind provides a simple repeatable pattern.

And over time this reduces that background edge, that background tension and braced for action-ness. This is not about stopping thoughts or emptying the mind or forcing anything. It’ll happen all on its own, just do this once a day if you’re walking and then you can increase it as it feels comfortable. You can also introduce this to other tasks, chores and places you go to as long as it’s safe to do.

What’s Taking Place When We Are Breathing!

Upper chest breathing generally stimulates alertness and produces mild stress if excessive or overdone.

Abdominal breathing, sometimes called belly breathing or breathing from the hara, activates the parasympathetic nervous system which produces slower heart rate, calmer mind and less mental activity along with more clarity!

Lower breathing fully engages the diaphragm and the vagus nerve becomes stimulated and the body signal reads safe environment or becoming a safer environment, which in turn produces more steadiness, less anxiety related awareness, less intrusive thought!

Less impulsiveness, less compulsion, less rushing and less mithering, less worrying, less caring about the unnecessary!

Ultimately, this is very supple. I’m not saying this is a dramatic change. This is very supple. But over time you’ll notice the difference. And some people can notice the difference in hours!

Try this once today or tonight, don’t judge it, just stay in noticing it. Just notice how your body relaxes and softens. You’re going for 5% change – just 5%

Do not force your abdomen out or pull it in because you will be adding tension and that works against what you are achieving, instead, just notice the relaxation, the resting of the stomach. And don’t be bothered about whether you’re doing it right or wrong, the important part is you’re actually doing it and your attention is going there when you’re sitting comfortably in your chair or lying on your bed you can become more in tune with this process and you’ll have a moment where you’ll identify your sweet spot. You’ll see the lower belly breathing taking place all on its own!

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