The power of the breath

Sometime in your life you may have heard of the sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous systems. To keep it simple and non-scientific the sympathetic nervous system is our fight or flight response. This part of the nervous system can induces stress, anxiety or states of depression. I think of it as never turning off the lights, electronics, and anything with power in the house. The parasympathetic nervous system on the other hand is our rest or digest system. When you meditate you are basically telling your body to relax or shift down to a lower gear like in a car or when you fall to sleep.The objective of this post, is to show you as the reader how to do a quick meditation in order to relax your parasympathetic nervous system. Your focus is on your breath not any external influences. This easy meditation will teach you how to relieve stress in your body by consciously listening to yourself breath in and out. Most people I’ve encountered tell me that they can’t meditate because they can’t quiet their mind, or they don’t have enough time to commit to it, or they need to be more active and meditation is too slow for them. The purpose of meditation is to connect with your mind, body and spirit and by doing this you have to tune everything else out. Meditation slows your mind down relieving stress a major cause of anxiety and depression, which can lead to other forms of disease within the body. Meditation teaches you to listen to what your body needs amounts other things.

I believe that meditation is an essential process that everyone should consciously undertake in their daily lives. The power of the breath opens a doorway into the mind, body and spirit. This meditation will help to relieve stress when you’re on the LRT (Light Rail Transit), grocery shopping, experiencing anxiety attacks and or depression, high blood pressure, or insomnia. Below is a summarized quote I found describing the affects that meditation has on the internal functions of our nervous system, immune system, organs and tissues from the author of “The Blood Sugar Solution: – 10 –Day Detox Diet”, by Mark Hyman, MD.

“The trigger for the relaxation response is your breath. When you take a deep breath, you stimulate the vagus nerve – a very special part of your nervous system that helps you calm your mind and turn on a cascade of healing. The vagus nerve runs from your brain through your chest cavity into all your organs, like an octopus stretching out its tentacles to every cell in your body. Your immune cells, your stem cells, and all the other organs and tissues in your body are connected to this nerve.

Stimulating the vagus nerve signals the production of hormones that calm your nervous system, reduce cortisol, help you metabolize your food, boost your brain function, and naturally regulate your appetite. Simply by breathing deeply and activating the vagus nerve, your body starts to boost metabolism and increase fat burning.

You can literally change your heart rate, brain cells, brain waves, and weight just by shifting your breath. It’s that powerful.

Other forms of active relaxation that helps reboot your parasympathetic nervous system are yoga, meditation, tai chi, qigong, biofeedback or playing relaxing music. Watching TV or reading is not included as part of the active relaxation technique.

Meditation not only stimulates the vagus nerve and activates the relaxation response-it has also been scientifically shown to make our brains bigger and better. Stress shortens our telomeres (the little caps at the ends of our chromosomes), and this directly impacts our longevity; meditation reverses that. For all these reasons and more, I encourage you to develop even a five-minute daily practice.”

Two minute meditation

Step 1.) Where every you may be (driving your car, on the LRT, in a meeting, with your children, etc.) take a deep breath in and listen to it as you breathe in through your nose and into your belly.

Step 2.) Listen to your breath as you exhale through your mouth, or you can exhale through your nose if you choose.

Note: As you engage in this meditation allow your body to release stored tension (i.e. you may feel tension in your shoulders, jaw, legs, etc.), but remember to retain your focus on your breath.

Once you’ve connected to your body and mastered this technique you will be able to consciously feel a shift like a light switch being turned on.

To learn how to meditate or do a guided meditation refer to my blog post “Learn how to meditate“.

Sources:

“The Blood Sugar Solution: – 10 –Day Detox Diet”, by Mark Hyman, MD (page 176, 177)