Longevity Breathing Questions

[Anonymous]

Greetings,

In the Energy Gates book, it says in Lesson 1 of longevity breathing: “Push your belly out to draw in air.” We are used to intentionally drawing air in via the lungs through the nostrils, but here we are being told to move the belly. Does this mean that we do not breath in the normal manner but that we specifically utilize the pushing of the belly to establish breathing?

Also, because the belly can only be pushed so far, I’m curious how the breath can be extended much longer than 15 seconds inhalation without creating strain?

Your feedback is most welcome.

[Anonymous]

Hi James,

We may think that we use the nostrils to draw breath into the body but it isn’t actually true. There is no muscle in the nose that you can tense or relax in order to pull air into the body. Give it a try, play around with your nose. Scruch it in every direction you can think of and notice that it won’t help you breath.

The way you draw breath into the body is with your diaphragm muscle
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thoracic_diaphragm

The way that you make your breath longer is by slowing down the rate at which you breath in and out. You could breath very rapidly and expell 100 milliliters/second. Or you could slow your breath down and expell 50 milliliters of air a second. Gradually, with practice you can slow it down, little by little.

Hope this helps,
Janak

[Anonymous]

Thanks for clarifying that Janak. I would however like to refine my question then because there appears to be a slight difference between pushing the belly out to draw in air and drawing air in through the usual manner. When I begin to extend the belly, air is drawn in very slightly without having to ‘pull’ it in, whereas the usual manner involves a feeling of pull air in.

Are we meant to draw air in by only extending the belly, by pulling it in via diaphragm, or a combination of both?

Thanks again,
James

[Anonymous]

I’m not sure if I understand exactly what you’re saying but here’s my best guess

I think we want to draw air by using the diaphragm. And when we breathe in we want to relax the belly so that it naturally expands without any sense of force or holding

One great role model to think of is an infant. If you watch a baby breath, you’ll notice that they don’t have any sense of holding or tension. They are extremely relaxed. And when they breath, their belly naturally moves in coordination with their breath

Hope this helps,
Janak

[Anonymous]

I see. So the comment by Bruce to push the belly out simply means that as we draw air in with the diaphragm we direct the process to the belly and so forth rather than expanding the chest.

[Anonymous]

Exactly!

[Author]

Posts