Richard Bach

Breath & Anxiety, One Person, and How to Ease Your Troubles


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Reading Time: 1 min 31 sec

I hope the next 23’ish breaths are the most nourishing of your day.



4 THOUGHTS

1. Breathing Helps with Anxiety: a Meta-Analysis

“Anxious individuals who are unable to withstand the anxiety that accompanies the possibility of something bad happening in the future may experience respiratory interventions as a means by which to control their physiology. This may generalize to a greater sense of anxiety control and self-efficacy in managing symptoms.”

- Leyro et al. (2021)

This meta-analysis found that breathing significantly improves anxiety, both immediately and over the long term, providing effects similar to the gold-standard treatment of cognitive behavioral therapy.

Check out the paper here or sign up for the Breath Learning Center to get my review and takeaways 🙏

2. It Takes Just One Person (each of us)

“Pressure is contagious, but so is good will. Just one person slowing down, one person not putting others under pressure, helps everyone else to relax too.”

- Eknath Easwaran, Take Your Time

Here’s a great reminder that when we use slow breathing, meditation, and other contemplative practices to slow down, we help those around us relax, too 🙏

3. The Effects of Focused Attention on the Body & Mind

“When one-pointed attention is strong, the nervous system kicks into a relaxed mode. Heart rate slows, metabolic rate declines, digestion picks up, and brain activity associated with worry and agitation goes into neutral. It was a major surprise for Western scientists to find that something as simple as concentration could have such profound effects on the body.”

- Mark Epstein, MD, Advice Not Given

👏👏👏

4. How to Ease Your Own Troubles

“Sharing another person’s feelings of distress need not be a downer. As Dr. Aaron Beck…has said, when you focus on someone else’s suffering, you forget your own troubles.”

— Daniel Goleman, Ph.D. & Richard Davidson, Ph.D.


1 Quote

In addition, the mental component of breath is a sense of rhythmic expansion and contraction. And I think that connects us to every other living thing because all living organisms breathe. So that same rhythm is at the center of the heart of all life.”
— Andrew Weil, MD

1 Answer

Category: The Nose

Answer: The bone & cartilage separating your two nostrils (which sometimes gets displaced) is called this.

(Cue the Jeopardy! music.)

Question: What is the nasal septum?


In good breath,

Nick Heath, T1D, PhD
“Breathing is the compound interest of health & wellness.”

P.S. beyond meditation

Breath Science & Wisdom Meditations for a Well-Lived Life

Learn to think, speak, and act in alignment with the person you want to be.

Start Today.

The Breathing App for Diabetes

This is the first program specifically made for people with diabetes to help manage their stress through breathing and mindfulness practices. In addition to the amazing program inside the app, we have some really neat things coming up, so sign up now!

Learn more here.


Amazon Associate Disclosure

I’ve been recommending books for almost 6 years. Yet somehow, I just discovered that I could be an Amazon affiliate [face-palm]. In any case better late than never. Now, any Amazon link you click is an affiliate link. As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases. So, if you’d like to support my work, buying books through these links is helpful : )

* An asterisk by a quote indicates that I listened to this book on Audible. Therefore, the quotation might not be correct, but is my best attempt at reproducing the punctuation based on the narrator’s pace, tone, and pauses.


 

Smell the Flowers, a Test, and How to Pacify the Mind


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Reading Time: 1 min 33 sec

I hope the next 23’ish breaths are the most nourishing of your day.



4 THOUGHTS

1. There, I Have Pacified Your Mind

This passage comes from Advice Not Given by Mark Epstein, MD. It’s a Zen story about Bodhidharma, a famous Buddhist monk, and Huike, who was intent on learning from him:

“Huike says to Bodhidharma, when finally given a chance to speak to him directly, ‘My mind is anxious. Please pacify it.’

To which Bodhidharma replies, ‘Bring me your mind, and I will pacify it.’

Huike says, ‘Although I've sought it, I cannot find it.’

Bodhidharma then says, ‘There, I have pacified your mind.’”

2. Wherever You Find Yourself

“The breath accompanies you the full length of life’s road: you learn about the body, feelings, mental formations, the mind itself, and, finally, the lawfulness of impermanence and emptiness of a substantial self.”

– Larry Rosenberg, Three Steps to Awakening

This is a wonderful reminder of the far-reaching utility of the breath. No matter what you’re currently interested in—the body, emotions, the mind, the self—the breath can be a metaphor or direct tool for studying it. As Rosenberg reminds us: “Wherever you find yourself, the breath is present.” 🙏

3. Smell the Flowers; Blow Out the Candles

“Just as emotions like worry and fear can trigger the body’s stress response, what we experience physically in the body can affect our emotions. Because of this, we can often begin to quiet our worries and calm the symptoms of anxiety simply by controlling one critical body function: breathing.”

– Jennifer Tucker, Breath as Prayer

Tucker provides a simple way to apply this: “Smell the flowers; blow out the candles.” Breathe in through your nose, into your abdomen, as if smelling flowers. Then, exhale slowly through pursed lips as if blowing out candles. Use it as needed today 🙏

4. A Test for You

“Here is the test to find whether your mission on Earth is finished: if you’re alive, it isn’t.”

– Richard Bach


1 Quote

The breath is not only a source of support for the physical body; it is also a support for mental, emotional, and spiritual well-being.”
— Anyen Rinpoche &Allison Choying Zangmo

1 Answer

Category: Circulation

Answer: After being inhaled, it takes oxygen about this long to circulate throughout the body.

(Cue the Jeopardy! music.)

Question: What is around one minute?


In good breath,

Nick Heath, T1D, PhD
“Breathing is the compound interest of health & wellness.”

P.S. 1890s guy

Breath Science & Wisdom Meditations for a Well-Lived Life

Learn to think, speak, and act in alignment with the person you want to be.

Start Today.

The Breathing App for Diabetes

This is the first program specifically made for people with diabetes to help manage their stress through breathing and mindfulness practices. In addition to the amazing program inside the app, we have some really neat things coming up, so sign up now!

Learn more here.


Amazon Associate Disclosure

I’ve been recommending books for almost 6 years. Yet somehow, I just discovered that I could be an Amazon affiliate [face-palm]. In any case better late than never. Now, any Amazon link you click is an affiliate link. As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases. So, if you’d like to support my work, buying books through these links is helpful : )

* An asterisk by a quote indicates that I listened to this book on Audible. Therefore, the quotation might not be correct, but is my best attempt at reproducing the punctuation based on the narrator’s pace, tone, and pauses.