At the recent Breathwork Summit put on by The Shift Network I was extremely privileged to hear many gifted and wise breath “experts” share their particular expertise and stories. It was actually a delight!
Among those who spoke were Deborah Rozman and Rollin McCraty of HeartMath. Since it is only days before Valentines Day I thought it appropriate to share some of their findings and practices here on BreathingSpaces.
The bottom line is that the heart rhythm is affected by our breath. The heart then sends neural information to our brain on how to react based on how we are breathing. The more shallow and faster the breath the more emotional response. As we continue in the “fight or flight” or sympathetic nervous system response pattern the hearts more chaotic rhythm will send more input to the brain that then keeps our breathing stuck in the quick and shallow pattern. As you can see this could be a vicious cycle!
If our heart rhythm is out of sync, as happens when our breathing rate is faster and more shallow when we are under stress of any kind, then we are out of what HeartMath calls “co-herence”. This heart rhythm of co-herence is one that is natural and in balanced alignment with all systems of our body, mind and emotions. It turns on the parasympathetic system – our natural restful state.
Here is a Heart Focused Breathing practice that you can use in times when stress hits and you feel your breath rhythm change:
1) Focus your attention in the heart. (you can place a hand there as well)
2) Pretend the breath is going in and out of the heart. Count to 5 with each inhale and 5 with each exhale. (A rhythm of co-herence)
3) While you are doing this breath rhythm, focusing on breathing in and out of the heart, bring a positive feeling like gratitude, appreciation, and compassion – or imagine a beautiful scene out in nature that makes you feel good.
In a short period of time you will come back into a heart rhythm of co-herence through focusing your breathing towards the heart. All systems will come back into alignment. This only takes minutes and can be very effective. (HeartMath also has a biofeedback device called EmWave that can actually show you when you come back into a smooth and life enhancing rhythm)
On this Valentine’s Day share a heart-focused breath with someone you love!
Happy Birth-Day to the long awaited book that has many of your favorite posts from BreathingSpaces within the pages!! My heart is wide open as I deliver this book into your hands, hearts and souls. My deepest wish is that this book will be of service to those who read it and that it will encourage pauses in life to simply be with the breath and the sacredness of this life we have been given.
Here is some advance praise as well as links where you can purchase one of three options – Downloadable with beautiful formatting and the ability to print out each week’s focus for a daily reminder; e-book for Kindle, iPad, etc; and soft cover spiral bound to place in your library as a treasured resource. For a SNEAK PREVIEW go to: http://resonancewithlife.com/daily-breath-book/ or the Our Daily Breath tab on this blog.
A Road-Map to Living an Inspired Life!
Richard Cawte, Ph.D.
That says it all.
Life has become so hectic for so many of us, with so many things to do every day (and never enough time to do them!). In Give us this Day our Daily Breath, Gaye Abbott gives us a clear, easy-to-follow guide that helps us find places of calmness and deep ease from which the day can emerge in a fresh, vibrant way.
We tend to pay attention to peripheral things in our lives and yet so often the very thing that sustains us – the act of breathing – is something we barely pause to consider. What I love about this book is that it brings the act of breathing to the forefront, allowing the reader to explore his or her relationship with the world through the breath itself. It’s an inspired piece of writing, flowing from the heart.
Giving us weekly practices is a stroke of genius, because it makes it easy for the reader to experiment and adopt new ways of breathing bit-by-bit. That’s why I love the book so much. It’s more than just a book. It’s a road-map to living an in-spired life, a step-by-step manual that invites us to align ourselves with the rhythms of the natural world – and then shows us how.
Life throws up many challenges, but as Gaye says: “the breath is a tool to anchor you. Allow it to be the constant thread around which you weave your life.” Wonderful advice.
Truly a book to read, delight, rest and reflect in!
Richard Cawte, Ph.D., International Business & Author of the Natural Wealth Course, www.ResonanceWithLife.com
*************
Give Us This Day Our Daily Breath is a wise, graceful, kind and gently humorous guide to awakening more fully through weekly explorations of breath.
By relating the natural breathing rhythms to the cycle of the seasons, Gaye Abbott invites readers to reconnect with a sense of being at home on Earth and in our bodies. This fresh perspective combines with personal story and observation to offer valuable new insight into the healing and transformational power of breathing.
Lea Bayles, M.A., transformational coach, speaker and author, creator of the Replenish Your Soul series of guided meditations lea@leabayles.com, www.leabayles.com
**************
Give Us this Day our Daily Breath is a wonderful book born from Gaye Abbott’s decades-long practice of yoga, meditation, awareness, mindfulness and joy, celebrating the breath each and every day like the gift and prayer that it is. Inspirational, creative, healing and practical, Gaye offers insights, exercises and easy-to-follow practices that allow us to fully appreciate and embody this act of breathing and all it contains. Gaye writes, “When we come together with another life form, we share the breath in the air that surrounds us. We take of the same breath, so to speak. Down through the millennia this has continued. In fact, we are breathing and sharing the recycled air of the dinosaurs, the very first humans, the dolphins, and the trees…In many of the classes, workshops and retreats, I often have people sit back to back and feel their own breath first, then connect with the breath rhythm of the other without attempting to change theirs. Almost everyone noticed, in a short period of time, that the breath would synchronize and become one.
Perhaps it was always one to begin with. Through this interconnected basic biological process we can feel each other, and with acute knowing understand what is within the other – even if we do not consciously acknowledge it. What if each one of us joined another – or others – in sharing a peaceful breath rhythm. Would the world change?”
Yes it would, and with Gaye as our guide, it is bound to. And what a joyful and transformational journey it will be. Thank you Gaye for giving us this day our daily breath and reminding us of the incredible beauty, grace and power of this thing called breath that we too often take for granted!
Leza Lowitz, #1 bestselling Author of Yoga Heart: Lines on the Six Perfections www.lezalowitz.com
OFFERINGS: Downloadable (Instant PDF Download Below) with beautiful formatting and the ability to print out each week’s focus for a daily reminder OR through LuLu – e-book (EPub/iPad, Nook, Kindle etc); and soft cover spiral bound or regular soft bound to place in your library as a treasured resource!
“We meditate on the glory of that Being who has produced this universe; may He(She) enlighten our minds.”
~Swami Vivekananda/translation of the Gayatri Mantra
As we in the Northern hemisphere experience the transition of moving from the darkest day of the year and turning into the gradual return of light, our interconnected global neighbors in the Southern hemisphere are experiencing the opposite. This turning is felt in the deepest reaches of our bodies, minds, hearts and souls.
I ask of you today to stop. Stop and take a transition breath from business to stillness, from stress to absolute relaxation, from moving into the future or holding on to the past – to being present in this moment only. Find a moment of rest and simply being to take in the exquisite images and hauntingly beautiful voice that are part of the video below.
Breathe….and remember why you are here. Simply to love and be loved.
ANNOUNCEMENT!! I invite you to go to the Natural Wealth website to see a Sneak Preview of my upcoming book: Give Us This Day Our Daily Breath expected out in e-book and soft cover by 12/1/11!! Got to right hand column and click on Be Breathed – Our Daily Breath.
Would love your feedback as the book is not quite finished yet…and your comments would be most welcome! Also check out the video that took me so many takes….and laugh along with me.
REMEMBER – Laughter is a series of exhales expressed with uninhibited joy!
Thank you for taking the time to take a peak at the Sneak!
Recently I was taken by the insight that being in balance is not a state to cling to. We all know that when we are “out of balance” in our lives that it can affect many things in our body, mind and emotions. However, I question whether that is because we are “attached” to being “in balance”? The better question might be, do we have something to learn in the territory of imbalance?
We are told by culture, our parents, and our ever-present egos that we must “maintain” and not be taken over by feeling or emotion, get angry, be sick or out of sorts, be different, or go too far from mid-line. The fact of the matter is that we will always go in and out of balance. It is part of being alive as a human being, just as natural as our inhale and exhales from moment to moment.
An opportunity to explore within a yoga class the concept of moving from balance to imbalance for an entire 90 minutes brought for me great awareness on how the control of ego gets in the way of a full breath. The breath was the barometer that informed me whether I was attached or not, which translates to whether my ego was invested in being in balance or not.
It was transparently simple! Every time my ego became involved in maintaining “balance” – in this case within yoga poses – the results were predictable. Struggle, effort, and breath holding or significantly diminished breath.
The most surprising result of attachment to whether I was in balance or out of balance – and we were given multiple attempts for both experiences – was that when I completely let go of what state I was in I felt more grounded and rooted and my breath was full. In other words, balance became innately easy and falling out of balance had no ego centered judgement attached to it. In fact falling out of balance was fun and became just another “dance step” in life.
What happened with the breath? Every single time I was attached to a certain outcome my breath diminished, was held, or stopped all together. With surrender to whatever was happening in the moment it all became a part of living life and savoring whatever experience unfolded itself as free of self judgement as possible. In fact, my balance improved within letting go of the resistance to falling out of balance!
We often are so busy living life ahead of ourselves. A diminished, held or shallow breath will clue you in to this very pattern. Even something as simple as leaning forward when you stand or walk affects the quality of your breath. Watch and learn!
Be willing to learn from the places of imbalance in your life and remember these 3 things: (Courtesy of Keith Kachtick, Dharma Yoga, Austin, Texas)
*Release attachment to being in balance. *Surrender to gravity *Root down into the Earth as if your breath was digging deeply down into the ground
From this place – no matter what happens in your life – you will find that the breath remains full and rooted to your Source. A state of being to return to over and over again. Allow yourself to play with the imbalance and marry it to balance. What a delightful dance that is!
At the recent Breathwork Summit put on by The Shift Network I was extremely privileged to hear many gifted and wise breath “experts” share their particular expertise and stories. It was actually a delight!
Give Us This Day Our Daily Breath Book: http://resonancewithlife.com/daily-breath-book/
BREATHING SPACES 