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"nine qualities of an effective person"
Breathing: The Real Secret To Stress Relief
Author: Abbas Abedi
It has never occurred to most people that something they do everyday,
every night - continuously - can be a source of powerful stress relief.
I remember when my father's friend was doing an awards presentation. For
entertainment he said he was going to test how observant we were. He then
told us NOT to look at our wrist watches and asked questions about the
color, the type of watch is was, were the numbers Roman Numerals or
regular English numbers and so on. NO ONE was able to answer all the
questions.
Another, better known, story is about Christopher Columbus. When Columbus
arrived in the new world and landed on his rowboat...the natives could not
see his ship out at sea! Their familiarity with their environment and the
ocean in particular was such that they couldn't perceive the ship. An
elder medicine man who had the flexibility of perception had to describe
the ship to his fellow tribesmen before they could see it.
This same familiarity applies to how we perceive our breathing.
Our breathing is something that we have become so familiar with that we
are almost completely unaware of its effects. Consider this, our breath
bridges our conscious and unconscious i.e.
unconsciously we are always breathing and at any time we can consciously
focus on our breathing.
This is important to remember because all our emotional states are
reflected in our breathing. If we are stressed our breathing tends to be
shallow and focused in our upper lungs.
In fact jerky breathing itself will actually increase anxiety and stress.
While when we are relaxed we tend to breathe fully into our belly.
Practicing belly breathing (diaphragmatic
breathing) can be extremely beneficial.
Simply knowing this can make a big difference like remembering to breath
deeply if you are stressed to feel better. In other words, you had an
unconscious shallow/jerky breathing pattern when you were stressed and by
consciously taking control you can choose a breathing pattern that is
better for your mind and body.(which would be diaphragmatic breathing)
In Yoga, breathing is considered to be so important that before any task a
yogi first prepares his/her breathing. Proper breath control is considered
the key to healthy living. In fact, learning to do proper diaphragmatic
breathing has been shown to reduce stress and anxiety permanently.
Diaphragmatic Breathing Sit or stand with your back straight, put your
hand on your belly and breath in a slow and deep pattern. Don't try to
overfill the lungs or empty them - just breath softly - expanding your
belly on the inhale and contracting on the exhale. Keep your attention
focused on your breathing. You will find that your mind will tend to
drift. That is normal. Simply return your attention to your breath when
you notice you got distracted. Allow the relaxation from this breathing
pattern to spread through your body and just enjoy yourself.
Practicing diaphragmatic breathing on a regular basis will alleviate
stress and give you the ability to manage your stress better. All because
of some deep and slow breathing.
About the author:
By Abbas Abedi Learn how to reduce your stress in 2 minutes, remove stress
with a thought and more from my free e-course "4 Days to Break Free From
Stress". Join now by visiting,
www.instantstressmanagement.com Free e-Course
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