Overlooked But It Can Do Wonders: Breathing Exercises for Anxiety

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A very effective method of calming oneself is through proper breathing exercises. Breathing exercises can certainly be very effective in producing anxiety relief.  

Breathing is one of the most overlooked things, probably because it’s one of those things that needs to be done on a regular basis, as opposed to being done once and then you’re cured.  

What do I mean?

I previously alluded to the notion of follow-through and consistency in previous newsletters.  To be clear: I’m talking about really sticking to doing something on a consistent basis.

To put it another way, in previous newsletters I’ve encouraged you to give my suggestions a very serious try, not just once, but to consistently give them a try so they become a routine.  That’s when real change takes place!

Please allow me to relate to this on a very personal level.  I remember when I was overcoming panic attacks; the real breakthroughs occurred when I not only took things seriously, for example, breathing exercises, but when I actually followed through on a consistent basis, for example, with the breathing exercises. 

The reason you might dismiss the effectiveness of breathing exercises is because you have not had a chance to see the results of incorporating these exercises into a regular routine.  I am confident that you’ll find an improvement once this takes place.

I’m not saying that breathing exercises will cure all your anxiety, but I am saying that if you incorporate breathing exercise into a part of your daily routine, you’ll likely see a marked improvement and make you feel better. 

Techniques such as proper breathing, and the other things mentioned in this continuous newsletter series, can become part of the real change that you make in your life to overcome the inhibitions caused by anxiety. 

Obviously from this newsletter you’ll see I have stressed (and will continue to do so) a number of techniques and suggestions that if done consistently can really help you overcome panic, anxiety and agoraphobia.

I will provide a sample breathing exercise you can start doing right now, and for any of you who have doubts about the effectiveness of proper breathing exercises, I will discuss some more compelling reasons to do so. 

One of the problems with breathing exercises is that people can actually stress themselves out over their breathing at times.  We certainly don’t want this.  There is, however, a way to access the advantages of proper breathing without the stress of counting, which is what I will discuss. 

I must say it is a quite simple but effective suggestion.   Once you understand proper breathing you can then use it on a regular basis, and use it any time you feel yourself stressed.

I cannot take credit for this one.  I actually read it in a Reader’s Digest.  It was written from a medical doctor.  The title really caught my attention because it mentioned the notion of coming stress through proper breathing.  It was one of those “as ha” moments when I realized this could be a very helpful technique in combating my own anxiety. 

Here were go:

The trick is to breathe using your stomach not your chest.  Breathing through your chest is a form of very shallow breathing which you don’t want to do.  This is in fact what many anxiety suffers do.

Let me explain it another way:

Imagine that you are trying to take in air through your stomach rather than your chest.  In other words, take a nice deep breath and watch your stomach rise.

You might try lying flat on your back for several minutes (or as long as you wish) and putting a pillow on your stomach and focusing on trying to raise the pillow (which is now on your stomach) as much as you can.  The more the pillow rises, the more air you take in.  This is proper breathing. 

If you’ve ever observed newborn babies breathing, they understand proper breathing.  They breathe by raising their stomachs as opposed to the chest.

If you become accustomed to focusing on this proper breathing, taking deep breaths, when under stress or feeling anxiety, you’ll notice the calming feeling you can bring about.  You cause your physiology to relax instead of enter “fight or flight.”  As we know “fight or flight” is the process your body undergoes when you have a panic attack.  

Over time as you become more accustomed to proper breathing, you can then feel free to begin counting the seconds on the inhale and exhale which most approaches stress, but I’m of the opinion that if you focus on proper breathing, you’ll find that smooth and harmonious breathing takes care of itself without having to focus on how many seconds you breathe in and out.

As I said, a medical doctor really introduced me to this technique.  This doctor talked about a lung cancer patient he was treating. 

At one point the patient became very agitated and distressed because he felt he couldn’t breathe.  The doctor suggested to the patient that he give this proper breathing technique a try and the doctor put his hand on the patient’s stomach and told him to breathe into his hand. 

Well it wasn’t very long before the patients O² stats (indicators of the amount of oxygen circulating in one’s bloodstream) and other physiological indicators had normalized and the patient was no longer anxious over his breathing. 

I tell this story because it shows you just how powerful proper breathing is, both mentally (by reducing one’s anxiety) and physically (as we can see the effect his had on normalizing this man’s physiology). 

Additionally:

- Effective breathing can help the body better remove toxins and detoxify.    

- Effective breathing can help to maintain healthy energy levels

- Effective breathing can of course result in anxiety reduction

- Again, proper breathing provides something else to focus on and, in and of itself, this can actually take your mind off of your anxiety.

As you control your breathing, through proper breathing as above, you control (reduce) your anxiety. 

You’ll recall from a previous installment that I discussed the idea of reversing a panic attack by doing the opposite of what you’d normally do during a panic attack.  (Click here if you do not remember)  Well by doing proper breathing this is the opposite of the shallow breathing that can occur when you’re anxious or having a panic attack.

I closing, I urge you to really give proper breathing a serious try and incorporate it into your daily routine, any time you’re feeling stressed.

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