7 Breathing techniques to enhance your Meditative practice
and bring Inner Peace, Love and Happiness.
by Robert Kendall
The Quickest way to find Peace - is to Breathe
How do you breathe when you are stressed? How do you breathe when you are relaxed?
Your brain uses over 20% of your body’s oxygen supply. The mechanism that controls breathing is situated
at the back of your brain around your occipital area. The brain’s chemical balance is so important that the
brain controls your breathing, not by the oxygen level but by the carbon dioxide level. The brain can’t afford
to allow the carbon dioxide levels to build up so it will do whatever it takes to make you breathe. Even if
you’re under water the brain will ignore all the other signs just to make you breathe. The strongest desire in
the world is the desire to breathe.
To say it another way How long does it take a body to die of starvation? - about 8 weeks
How long does it take a body to die from thirst? depends on the temperature, anywhere from 1 to 5 days.
And the most important question - How long does it take a body to die from lack of oxygen? 3-5minutes, not
hours, not days, not weeks, just minutes. After 5 minutes the brain becomes badly damaged. Breathing and
the brain are deeply linked.
The Brain’s survival, it’s actions and reactions are directly linked to our breathing. So if the brain can
regulate the breath, can we regulate the brain by the breath? Yes.
All we have to do is breathe how a relaxed person would and our brain will begin to calm down
and relax. No matter what your senses might be telling you, you can make your brain & nervous system
change it’s rhythms by how you breathe.
Breath is Life and Life is Breath.
7 Breathing Meditations
Concentration & Mind Calming Exercises
1. The Full Breath or Complete Breath
Take a deep breath, slowly fill the abdomen, then expand the ribs out sideways, then expand the upper
chest, hold for the count of 5, then reverse the order slowly, empty the chest, then squeeze the ribs inward
and finally slowly empty abdomen. Hold for the count of 5 and begin the cycle again. Lower - middle
- upper; upper - middle - lower.
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2. Alternate Nostril Breathing
This involves alternating inhalation and exhalations through the left and right nostrils as indicated below.
You may either close the opposite nostril with your thumb and index finder or simply focus on the one
nostril at a time.
Do not force or hold the breath, simply allow it to flow deeply, slowly and at a natural rhythm.
Breathe in the left nostril, close it off.
Breathe out Right nostril.
Breathe in Right nostril, close it off.
Breathe out left nostril.
This is one round; do 20 rounds.
3. Once the alternate nostril breathing becomes easy to
practise create a rhythm of counting it out and holding
the breath full and empty.
Breathe in for 6.
Hold for 6 (closing off both nostrils)
Breathe out for 12.
Hold empty for 6 (close off both nostrils).
As you improve you can change the length of time for each section.
Always double the time to breathe out to the time you breath in.
4. The abdominal breath is simply to breathe out slowly into and out of your abdomen. Expanding
the navel out and contracting slowly in. Keeping your chest still. This way you are expanding down and
out using the diaphragm muscle at the bottom of your rib cage. Abdominal breathing is to help centre the
mind and calm the emotions. In Traditional Chinese Medicine all emotions are processed through the
Intestines. If they gurgle it’s a good sign, something is moving.
This is a great exercise to practise when you are stressed or feeling overwhelmed.
5. Breathing Easy
Sit comfortably and relax. As you breath out naturally, breath out a grey mucky colour. dissolve and let
go of all the negative energy. Say to yourself ‘dissolving, melting, releasing or letting go. Feel the tensions,
thoughts, cares and painful states of body, mind, flowing out of you and melting away.
Emphasize the long, slow exhalation, then allow the inhalation to come nautrally, effortlessly.
As you breathe in, allow the breath to naturally and effortlessly fill you with your favorite colour that
you would like to be energized with, gold is an excellent colour to revitalise all of you cells and nervous
system. Allow the breath to fill you as a natural reflex to the deep exhalation. Think of a word that reflects
the quality you wish to be fill with. Say to yourself - relaxing, harmonising, balancing, energising, peace,
love, joy or patience. See the particular quality as luminous energy that as you inhale, rises within you, fills
you and flows through you, completely permeating your bodymind, entering to dissolve or resolve all your
negative states of mind, tension or pain. Allow the natural vitality of Life to awaken within you.
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6. The Zen breath - Focusing
In Zen meditation the 3 things to observe are Posture, Breath and Mindfullness.
a) Sit comfortably with your spine straight. Establish a proper motivation for beginning the session.
b) Bring your attention to either the sensation of breath flow at the tip of your nostril or to your abdomen
as you inhale and exhale naturally.
c) Take a few deep breaths then allow the breath flow to find its own natural rhythm. Allow the body to
breath without interference. Allow the inhalations and exhalations to come and go, effortlessly keeping a
keen awareness of the process.
d) Gently and unwaveringly allow your attention to float on the changing rhythms of your in and out
breath.
e) When ever your attention wanders or becomes diffused - and it often will - gently but firmly, bring
your awareness back to the breath.
f) Initially, it may be helpful to count your breaths with each exhalation up to 10, and then start again. If
you become distracted begin at 1.
g) The aim is not to arrive anywhere but to develop the capacity to be fully present in each moment, one
after another. By accepting all our mental states through observation we are able to create a deeper sense of
oneness with all of life. This develops a mind that is illuminating and
penetrating.
7. The Om Breath - A great way to start or finish any meditation
This Sacred sound exercise calms and quiets the mind and invokes a
feeling of oneness with the Universe.
Sit in a meditative posture, close your eyes, inhale deeply, slowly
through your nostril, doing the complete
full breath. Exhale slowly making the sound Om. Start with the mouth
fully open, an ahhhhh sound, then
ahhh to ohmmmmm and finishing with the lips together making the
‘mmmmmm’ sound.
This sacred sound covers all the sounds that the human mouth can
make - the full extent of the mouth
open to fully closed. Allow the Om sound to vibrate through your whole head and body. Do as many Om’s
as you need to. It’s great to do in groups. Om may be used as a Mantra and it may be used while counting
your breath, 1 Om, 2 Om, 3 Om, etc
:::ooOoo:::
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