The Tao of Natural Breathing (3 page)

BOOK: The Tao of Natural Breathing
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SOME PERSONAL HISTORY

In my own case, breathing took on a special, historical significance for me long before I understood why. As a child I had a tremendous fascination with holding my breath. Lying in bed, I would often hold my breath for two minutes or so before finding myself gasping for air. As a young adult, the moment I started wearing suits I realized that I was troubled by the sensation of a tight collar or a tie around my neck. It was only later, when I was in my early thirties, that my mother told me I had been a breech baby, and that the doctors had fully expected me to come into the world dead, strangled by the umbilical cord wrapped tightly around my neck. Indeed, it was wrapped around my neck, but I was still able to breathe, still able to take in the precious nectar that we call air.

It is obvious to me today, however, that my 30-hour struggle to reach light and take my first breath left deep impressions in my body and nervous system, and laid the foundation for some of the fundamental fears and insecurities that have often motivated my behavior as an adult. It is obvious to me today also that this deeply entrenched belief that only through persistence and struggle could I somehow find meaning and happiness in my life—a mode of behavior which served me well during birth, as well as during my childhood and teenage years—became an obstacle to my health and psychological growth as I grew older. All of this has become clearer as my breathing has begun to give up its restrictive hold on my sensory and emotional awareness, expanding into more of the whole of myself.

THE NEED FOR CLARITY AND MINDFULNESS

What is the relationship of our breath to our experience of ourselves and to real health and well-being? What is the relationship of our breath to our quest for self-knowledge and inner growth? To begin to answer these questions in a way that can have a long-lasting, beneficial impact on our lives, it is not enough to go to a weekend rebirthing or breathing intensive, or to simply start doing exercises from a magazine or book. Because of the intimate relationship between mind and body—the many subtle yet powerful ways they influence each other—any lasting, effective work with our breath requires
clear mental knowledge
of the mechanics of natural breathing and its relationship to our muscles, our emotions, and our thoughts. The clarity of this picture in our mind will help us become more conscious of our own individual patterns of breathing. It is through being “mindful” of these patterns that we will begin to sense and feel the various psychophysical forces acting on our breath from both the past and the present. And it is through the actual observation of these forces in our own bodies that we will begin to see how we use our breathing to buffer ourselves from physical and psychological experiences and memories too difficult or painful to confront. And, finally, it is through this entire process—the integration of mental clarity with sensory and emotional awareness—that we will begin to experience the extraordinary power of “natural breathing” and its ability to support the process of healing and wholeness in our lives.

THE ANATOMY OF BREATHING

For most of us, our cycle of inhalation and exhalation occurs at an average resting rate of 12 to 14 times a minute when we are awake, and six to eight times a minute when we are asleep. A baby breathes at about twice these rates. Our breathing rates can change dramatically in relation to what we are doing or experiencing. Under extreme physical activity or stress, for example, the rate can go up to 100 times a minute. For those who have worked seriously with their breath, the resting rate can go down to four to eight times a minute, since they take in more oxygen and expel more carbon dioxide with each inhalation and exhalation.

The Chest Cavity and Lungs

The process of breathing takes place mainly in the chest cavity, the top and sides of which are bounded by the ribs (which slant downward and forward) and the attached intercostal muscles, and the bottom by the dome-shaped muscular partition of the diaphragm (
Figure 1
). Inside this cavity lie the heart and the two lungs. Shaped somewhat like pyramids, the lungs are divided into three lobes on the right and two on the left. The lobes are composed of a spongy labyrinth of sacs, which, if flattened out, would cover an area of approximately 100 square yards. The lungs are covered by the pleura, a double-layer membrane lining the inside of the ribs, and are supported by the diaphragm. Extremely elastic, the lungs are free to move in any direction except where they are attached through tubes and arteries to the trachea and heart. Though the lungs have a total air capacity of about 5,000 milliliters, the average breath is only about 500 milliliters. Though, as we shall see, we can learn to exhale much more air than we normally do, no matter how fully we may exhale, the lungs always hold a reserve of about 1,000 milliliters of air to keep them from becoming completely deflated. It is easy to see that most of us use a small percentage of our lungs’ capacity.

 

Figure 1

We seldom pay attention to the breathing process in the course of our daily activities, but when we do we can sense the chest cavity expanding and contracting, somewhat like a bellows. During inhalation, the rib muscles (intercostals) expand and elevate the ribs, the sternum moves slightly upward, and the diaphragm flattens downward. The expanded space creates a partial vacuum that sucks the lungs outward toward the walls of the chest and downward toward the diaphragm, thus increasing their volume as air is drawn in automatically from the outside (
Figure 2
). The air that we inhale is composed of about 20 percent oxygen and .03 percent carbon dioxide; the rest is nitrogen. During exhalation, the rib muscles relax, the sternum moves downward, the diaphragm relaxes upward (regaining its full dome-like curvature), and the old air is expelled upward through the trachea as the lungs recede from the walls of the chest and shrink back to their original size (
Figure 3
). The exhaled air consists of 16 percent oxygen and 4 percent carbon dioxide. It is saturated with water vapor produced by metabolic activity.

The Movement of Air through the Respiratory System

As air enters our nose, particles of dust and dirt are filtered out by the hairs that line our nostrils. As the air continues on through the nasal passages it is warmed and humidified by the mucous membranes of the septum, which divides the nose into two cavities. If too many particles accumulate on the membranes of the nose, we automatically secrete mucus to trap them or sneeze to expel them. In general, air does not move through the nasal passages equally at the same time. Usually when the left nostril is more open, the right one is more congested and vice versa. This occurs because the flow of blood shifts back and forth between the nostrils in a rhythm that takes approximately one and a half to two hours.
6

 

Figure 2

 

Figure 3

After passing through the nose, the air then flows down past our pharynx, the cavity at the back of our mouth where the nose and mouth are connected, and where swallowing and breathing are coordinated by the pharyngeal plexus (under the control of the lower brain stem). Here the air passes through the lymphoid tissue of the adenoids and tonsils at the back of the nose and throat, where bacteria and viruses are removed. The air then moves past the larynx, which helps the vocal cords use air to produce sound, and then continues downward into the tube of muscle called the trachea, which separates into two bronchi serving the lungs (
Figure 4
). The trachea and bronchi are lined with mucus-secreting cells that trap pollutants and bacteria. As the air flows through the bronchi, tiny hairlike lashes called cilia massage the mucus and any remaining debris away from the lungs and upward toward the trachea, over the larynx, and finally into the esophagus. When too many particles, chemicals, or clumps of mucus accumulate in the bronchi, they trigger a coughing spasm—a powerful muscle contraction and bronchial constriction which can generate a wind force stronger than a tornado—to expel this toxic material.

In the lungs, the bronchi divide into smaller and smaller branches called bronchioles. The bronchioles, which have muscular walls that can constrict air flow through contraction, end in some 400 million bubble-like sacs called alveoli. It is in the alveoli that the life-giving exchange between oxygen and carbon dioxide occurs—where fresh oxygen enters the circulatory system to be carried throughout the body by hemoglobin molecules in the blood, and where gaseous waste products such as carbon dioxide are returned by the blood for elimination through exhalation.

THE PHASES OF BREATHING

Depending on the demands of what we are doing at the moment (lying down, sitting, walking, running) and on our specific psychological state (peaceful, angry, stressed out, happy), our breath can range from fast to slow and from shallow to deep, emphasizing one or more of the three fundamental phases of the breathing process:
diaphragmatic, thoracic, and clavicular.
In deep breathing, for example—what is often referred to as “the yogic complete breath,” all three phases come into play. According to Alan Hymes, M.D., a cardiovascular and thoracic surgeon who is a pioneer in the field of breath research, this form of breathing “is initiated by diaphragmatic contraction, resulting in a slight expansion of the lower ribs and protrusion of the upper abdomen, thus oxygenating the lower lung fields. Then the middle portions of the lungs expand, with outward chest movement, in the thoracic phase as inhalation proceeds further. At the very end of inhalation, still more air is admitted by slightly raising the clavicles, thereby expanding the uppermost tips of the lungs. In sequence, then, each phase of inhalation acts on one particular area of the lungs.”
7
As we shall see, no matter what state we may be in, most of us depend mainly on chest and clavicular breathing, and have little experience of diaphragmatic breathing. Thus, we seldom draw air into the deepest areas of our lungs, where most of our blood awaits oxygenation.

 

Figure 4

BOOK: The Tao of Natural Breathing
3.24Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
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