Breathe for Stress Relief

"One of the most important tools you can incorporate into your daily life to effect not only the longevity of your life, but the quality of your life, is a deeper, slower breathe practice. "The exercises in Healing Rhythms do just that."
Dr. Andrew Weil

A deep conscious breath in is the first step to Stress Relief, replacing stress breath with the breath of calm awareness .

*Breath is the connection between the mind, the body and the spirit. 

Stress is created by thoughts in the mind about past events projected into the future, creating afflictive emotions like fear and uncertainty.

*Each emotion has a breathing rhythm associated with it.

Stress is the bodies reaction to afflictive emotions. Breathing occurs in the present moment and it reflects the body' s reaction to emotional content of that moment. Conscious breathing allows you to use breathing rhythms associated with relaxation to replace breathing rhythms associated with the afflictive emotions like fear or that cause stress.

*Conscious breathing is the first step in learning to control you body' s reaction to stress.

Take this simple test to determine your breathing method

Try this Easy Meditation: Whenever you have time just focus attention on the breath, nothing else - no need to relax the whole body. Just relax the breathing system. Let it be as when it is functioning naturally. Close the eyes and watch the breath going in, coming out going in....Do not try to concentrate, do not try to control the breath just watch it. Tell your breath to relax a couple of times to create the intention to relax, then just remain silent and watch. On the in breath say in your mind "I breathe in", on the out breath say "I breathe out". You can do this anytime you need to relax.

*Mind and body are not separate, they are deeply entwined. Neither can exist without the other.

Watch a child. Its mind and body react as one. If the child is happy you know it, if it's not you know that.  As we grew and became trained Humans we lost the ability to listen and respond to our bodies. Relearning that skill as adults brings us closer to conscious management of our bodies response to the people, events and circumstances in our lives that are stressful.