Transcript for:
The Benefits and Practice of Breath Work

wo ultimate human hey guys I'm human biologist Gary Brea welcome to the ultimate human podcast where we explore everything that takes regular human beings and makes them ultimate human beings biohacking longevity anti-aging wellness and the entire category of making human beings superhumans and these podcast shorts are where I try to get give you quick practical things that you could put to work in your life as early as tomorrow morning that could very well change the trajectory of your life and not impact your budget one iota one of my favorites is breath work now you can go way down the rabbit hole of breath work there's shamanic breath work there's vivation breath work there's pranayama breath work there's transformational breath work um there's holotropic breath work there's all kinds of breath work principles they're all very very valid I encourage enourage you to go on the Journey of exploring breath work as a way of improving your emotional state longevity digestion handling anxiety depression improving your mood elevating your emotional state even increasing your body's capacity to digest nutrients and helping your biob bacteria um in your in your gut to better perform but before we go down this long winding endless Road of breath work if you're new to breath work then my favorite is a modified kind of um whm Hof style of breath work which doesn't really focus on which nostril you're breathing out of it doesn't focus on whether or not you're breathing through your nose or your mouth it is an introduction to getting your body used to doing breath work a lot of times when I post bre when I post breath work videos you know people get online in the comments and they're like well what about this type of breath work what about that type of breath work um shouldn't you tell them to breathe only through their nose shouldn't you tell them to breathe only through their mouth what about alternate nasal breathing and all of these concepts are very very valid but for you beginners at breath work to get addicted to breath work you need to feel the impact on your mood your emotional state your energy level your cognitive function your short-term recall right out of the gate so one of the best ways to do that is first thing in the morning within 30 minutes of waking find a quiet spot my preference is that you find a spot outside and yes if it's hot go outside if it's cold go outside if it's wind go outside and if it's raining go outside because aging is the aggressive pursuit of comfort and US deciding whether or not the environment is right for us to go out and do breath work is exactly what I'm talking about because we walk up to the door and we're like yeah there's a little bit of there's a couple of sprinkles on the window I'm just going to stay inside today or it looks like it's too hot or it's too cold or it's too windy guys please just get out there and do your breath work you're going to be outside for a total of 4 to eight minutes you're not going to die okay so every morning I go out to my balcony I do three rounds of 30 breaths with a very specific type of breath hold in between so let me explain uh what I do my suggestion is that you start with three rounds of five breaths and then every day add an additional breath so day two do six breaths day three do seven breaths day four do eight breaths and work your way up to where you're doing three rounds of 30 breaths with a breath hold in between let me explain remember that we can't just put gases into the human body just like we can't put nutrients into the human body and assume that the body is just going to use these you can't just eat a bunch of calcium and have strong bones you can't just take a bunch of protein and have strong muscles you actually need to tear a muscle and have the protein there to repair it we need to load a bone and have the bone ask for calcium for it to be absorbed breath work is no different we can't just hyperventilate and get the breath work benefits we need to actually get oxygen in get carbon dioxide out and have the body asking even begging for oxygen and so here's how we do it you start off with three rounds of five breaths now the way I Want You to Breathe does not concern you using your nose or your mouth just get the air in you can use both you can use your mouth if that's the easiest way if you prefer to just breathe through your nose that's also fine but I want you to find a quiet place um I would prefer you sit in a chair that has a back on it until you get used to doing breath work or even lay down because it is very normal for you to get laded it's normal for your fingers and toes to feel tingly that's a very normal feeling it's normal for you to feel the temperature change in your neck remember as we shift What's called the oxygen tension as we change the ratio of gases in our body we get these tingly sometimes numb sometimes laded sometimes temperature changing effects so Embrace those those breathe into those effects because they will go away and when you're done your breath work you're going to feel the benefit of having breathe through those kinds of Sensations so let's start by sitting comfortably a chair with a back or laying down put your hands on your knees and again I want you to breathe in the most obnoxious form possible I want you to think you've been underwater for a minute and a half you never thought you were going to get your bre head above the water and you just broke the surface of the water breathe like your life depends on it I'm going to get your diaphragm moving down um massaging your intestines I want to get air into the loes of the lung keeping it out of the apex of the lung I want us to use the entire lung and what's called all the muscles accessory muscles of respiration in order to breathe we're going to use our inner costals we're going to use our diaphragm we're going to use our loes of our lungs we're going to use the AP picks of our lungs we're really just going to flood the blood with oxygen and we're going to do three rounds of five breaths so they're going to look like this now notice I'm raising my shoulders trying to pull the Apex of my lung up and I'm also pretending like I have a string tied to my belly button and I'm pulling it out to the wall across in front of me so I want to pull my belly out to force that oxygen down into the loes of the lung to contract my diaphragm to actually begin to massage my intestines on the fifth breath you're going to Exhale and relax while you're relaxed I want you to take your tongue put it to the roof of your mouth I want you to close your eyes and I want you to get outside of your head and in other words I want you to find the noises in your outside environment find that truck going by on the causeway that bird that's in the tree nearby that airplane that's going overhead maybe a children's voice off somewhere in the distance and I want you to focus on the things outside of your head I do not want you to sit there while you're holding your breath and think about the fact that you want to breathe I want you to think about everything going on in your outside environment this will actually lengthen the amount of time that you spend before you draw in your next breath and the longer you go the better because we're creating this carbon dioxide deficiency that's going to have our body ask for that oxygen it's going to demand that vital oxygen that we're about to put in so as you sit there with your eyes closed get outside of your head find those noises picture them picture that bird flying by picture picture that police car going down the road picture that child that is making noise in the in the background you know listen for those things going on in your outside environment and try to form a mental picture of what they look like what are they doing where are they going what are they up to and then when you can't hold your breath anymore you breathe in press your tongue to the roof of your mouth and you're going to do the same thing get outside of your head into your environment when you can't hold your breath any longer let that breath out and start again do three rounds of five work your way up to three rounds of 30 breaths every morning make this the one thing that you never ever ever ever Miss don't ever miss this miss a flight miss work Miss coffee miss taking your kids to school do not miss breath work four minutes to eight minutes promise it will become your new drug of choice it will change the trajectory of your life it is free if you actually want to put fuel on the fire do it at first light exposing as much skin to first light as possible and you will get all the benefits of sunlight breath work regulation of your Cadian Rhythm mood enhancement emotional enhancement ridding the body of disease flooding the blood with oxygen and changing the trajectory of your life I hope you found this helpful because it's just science