I recently hit a plateau with breathing. I had been practicing my principles and reading everything I could find. I was doing everything “right.” However, my breath holds and CO2 tolerance had become stagnant. I felt good, but I had just stopped progressing. I thought, “this must be where I’m supposed to be.”
Then something awesome happened. And it had nothing to do with breathing.
I started adding a couple hours between dinner and bedtime. Eat dinner at 5:30 or 6:00 PM, then go to bed around 8:00 PM. Almost overnight my CO2 tolerance increased by ~20 seconds. My old “normal” seemed crazy. It wasn’t normal at all.
I share this story because I had a minor epiphany: everything is integrated. Obviously, that phrase seems pretty obvious. But, this experience gave it a whole new meaning for me.
I was so focused on using “breathing” to improve my breathing that I did not even consider other aspects of my life. But that’s exactly where I needed to look.
I do believe breathing is the foundation of good health. However, to achieve optimal results, it needs to be integrated with other aspects of our health, including things like nutrition, exercise, sleep, and work.
If you’re ignoring any of these, ask yourself how breathing might help out. On the flip side, if you’re ignoring breathing, consider how it might support you in achieving all of your other health-related goals.
You might also ask yourself if anything you think is “normal” right now might not be normal at all?
In good breath,
Nick
P.S. Sleep?