“Why do we put so much emphasis on breathing?”
Breathing is something that we all take for granted. We do it every single day, often 16 times per minute, more if we’re exercising. It just happens, right? You just take it for granted. As you are reading this you are breathing. This has to happen for your body to function and to get oxygen around your body we need to breathe.
Offer: Book a free consultation with West Chiropractic >
Why is it important to our overall health?
If you look at a baby breathe, you see that tummy goes up and down. They use all of their abdomen, their diaphragm. And if you look at adults now breathing, they breathe with their shoulders. Their breathing tends to be shallow and we use what are called the accessory muscles. So those are the small muscles around the neck to try and increase the lung capacity.
We actually forget to breathe with our abdomen and our diaphragm. So when we breathe in, really what should happen is the diaphragm should contract. It should pull everything down towards our pelvic floor and core. Our core is that belt of lovely muscle all around the base of the spine.
It’s so important we get this right because it’s going to help to stabilise the back and help with lower back issues longer term. So a big nice inhale helps that abdomen to contract, to pull everything down. On the way back up, everything relaxes. It pushes all of that carbon dioxide out and helps the lungs increase the volume as well.
How Can I Improve My Breathing?
So a couple of things you can do to help with your breathing. Just to be conscious about when you’re doing it. So even just a minute, two minutes, just to help with that overall abdominal pressure.
You take some nice deep breaths in through your nose and all the way out through your mouth and try and really slow that breathing right down. Not only for your mental health it’s brilliant but also for your physical health.
It helps just to increase that lung capacity. You get lots more air through the lungs and it helps to engage that lower core as well. When you get better at this, you can start doing this more throughout the day. It’s going to help with your sitting position by activating that pelvic floor and help take pressure off your back but also when you’re doing exercise as well.
Offer: Book a free consultation with West Chiropractic >
You’re more efficient in the way that you breathe. It helps you to obviously last longer when you do more exercise.
It takes off from some mindfulness as well. So mindfulness, they’re trying to concentrate on the breath, trying to really focus. It’s amazing for mental health but also helps with the physiological health of your lungs and your breathing, your respiration system.
So if you want more advice on that, give us a shout. Drop a comment in below as well and obviously if you know anyone that is struggling with their breathing, who has a very shallow breath, please share this blog with them as well and enjoy the weekend.
Offer: Book a free consultation with West Chiropractic >
If you would like to have a chat with us contact us here >
