Breath is such an important part of health that every practitioner and teacher at Kundalini House uses it to support the health of their clients and students alike:
Nasal breathing is particularly important and now that we are having to wear masks, it is important to make sure we are breathing correctly. So we wanted to spend some time focusing and remembering the importance of nasal breathing.
So why is simple Nasal breathing so fabulous and what does it do?
• Warms our air
• Humidifies
• Filters pathogens and allergens
• Increases our Nitric Oxide – an important molecule in our body!
• Regulates and tones our autonomic nervous system by the Nasal Cycle.
The natural ultradian rhythm of dominance of one nostril and then the other.
• Left nostril is controlled by and regulates the sympathetic nervous system
• Right nostril is controlled by and regulates the parasympathetic nervous system
• Improves our sense of smell.
• Creates clearer and more efficient airways
• Improves facial structure.
• Helps to calm us down
• Lowers blood pressure
• Increases vasopressin which helps our kidneys store urine during the night, so we don’t have to get up to go to the toilet!
• Better balance of O2 and CO2
***
And there are so many more reasons that Traditional Medicine, Traditional cultures and Yoga have known about for hundreds of years and we are learning about through studies and investigations from a biomedical perspective.
When we breathe through our mouth we tend to pant and our diaphragm strength and flexibility and lung capacity can decrease. We have attached a simple breath technique that you can use to increase your lung capacity.
Feel free to swap the counting with your favourite mantra, I find Sa Ta Na Ma works really well too. And breathe, breathe, breathe…through your nose.
Happy breathing.
Pip