How many times have you been told to take a deep breath? It turns out that breathing is an incredibly powerful tool! Adam Nugent and Kate Strong welcome Holly Semanoff to the podcast. She is a yoga and master breath work teacher, and the founder of Body of Light. Together, they discuss the importance of breathing to find the space needed to create your own connection to source. Learn more about how proper breathing can open doors into your unconscious and have you grow in ways that you never thought possible.
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In this week’s podcast excerpt, Holly Semanoff talks to us about the importance of breathing and how breathing impacts us mentally, emotionally, and physically. She shares how we can use breath work to help us achieve a better state of mind.
AN: From your perspective, breath is a big part of who you are, so let’s talk about breath for a minute.
HS: So breath is obviously one of my passions. A beautiful thing to do is to recognize the power of breath. It’s the first thing you do when you come into this world, and last thing you do when you leave. So, breath is really a bridge. Another beautiful, powerful thing with the breath is that it takes none of your awareness to function. It’s happening, whether you’re thinking of it or not. And when you consciously think of your breath, you can change it. So, it can really affect not only the physical systems in your body but literally into your conscious mind, the unconscious mind, subconscious mind, and the super-conscious mind. You can change your brainwaves just by the way you breathe.
KS: Why is it important to breathe in and out of your nose instead of through your mouth?
HS: Breathing in and out of your nose will naturally almost force you to take longer breaths. And the longer breaths you take, then physically, the more time your body actually has to assimilate the oxygen and to release the carbon dioxide.
And if you’ve noticed, if you take a deep breath in through your nose, the breath is going to be warmer. And if you take a deep breath into your mouth, the breath is going to be colder. So you can actually utilize that technique. If you feel really overheated, you can still breathe in and out like through your mouth, and notice how it will cool you down. That’s usually if you’re running, why are you breathing in and out through your mouth? You are in Beta. You’re using more energy, but you’re also cooling your body off, kind of like how a dog pants, right? So, breathing in and out through your nose is warming. So if you happen to be super cold, you can breathe in and out through your nose.
But if I were to give you a technique that is always super powerful, it’s breathing in and out through your nose. And if you ever feel like you need to reset, whether it’s physically, mentally, or emotionally, another beautiful practice is to inhale in through your nose and actually exhale out through your mouth three times or more. If you feel that’ll naturally reset you because when you exhale out through your mouth while inhaling in through your nose, you’ll move more into a Delta wave length. So if you have a hard time sleeping, even inhaling in through your nose and exhaling out through your mouth can move you into more of that Delta, which is going to sleep.
Read more about the importance of breath work and meditation in Holly Semanoff’s new book, Body of Light: Experience and Meditation or visit bodyoflight.com.
► You’ll also like: Episode 2: Greater Peace Through Gratitude and Generosity with Tiffany Peterson
