Buteyko Breathing Exercises: Learn how to Breathe Light

🫁 Learn Buteyko Breathing with Neil on Zoom: This is a Guided Buteyko Breathing Exercise for Beginners. In this video, we will be doing the Breathe Light exercise, which is also known as Reduced Breathing or Breathe Light to Breathe Right, and this is the most important of the Buteyko Breathing exercises. 00:00 Intro 00:40 About Breathe Light & Safety 04:03 Guided Exercise Stage 1 - Awareness Of Breathing 07:03 Guided Exercise Stage 2 - Breathe Light Central to the Buteyko Method is the concept of Air Hunger. Air hunger is the feeling of not getting quite enough air. Like you would like to take a deeper breath but don’t. That feeling that you get when walking up a hill or swimming under water. How do we generate this air hunger? Well in this particular exercise, the focus is on breathing softly, quietly and slowly through the nose so that we breath in less air. We aim to breathe about 20% less air than we would normally do, and this results in an increase in C02 (Carbon Dioxide) in the blood which our body interprets as air hunger. And when we breathe in this way, we gain a variety of benefits: -By slowing down the breath, we stimulate the Vagus Nerve which calms and repairs our nervous system. -By breathing less air, we allow the gases of CO2 (Carbon Dioxide) and NO (Nitric Oxide) to accumulate in the blood and this results in increased blood circulation and improved oxygen delivery to the body and brain. So paradoxically, even though we are breathing less air, we actually end up supplying more oxygen to the tissues in our body and brain. This is a really powerful exercise, and when practiced regularly, it can reduce stress and anxiety as well as improve your sleep. It can also help to reduce symptoms of a whole host of chronic health conditions including asthma, anxiety, systemic inflammation, brain fog, long covid and panic disorder. The exercise comprises of 2 stages: In this first stage, we just focus on awareness of breathing without changing the breath. This is valuable in itself because for you to change your breathing, you first need to be aware of it. In the second stage, we then begin to soften and slow the breath and this creates the air hunger which provides many health benefits. About Neil: Work with Neil on a 1-2-1 basis from anywhere in the world over Zoom: Safety: Breathwork is powerful. It can change your heart rate, your blood pressure and even the PH of your blood. Although this exercise is suitable for most people, please don’t use it if you are pregnant or have any serious health conditions without first consulting your doctor or therapist. Most importantly, listen to your body and take a break or stop if you need to. Also, please don’t listen to this recording while driving or operating machinery. Music: DEX 1200/ My Halo Orbit / courtesy of #buteykobreathing #buteyko #breathwork #breathingexcercises #breathingtechnique