Breath Work: A Surprising Tool To Help You Release Emotions and Enhance your Wellbeing

If you’re into personal development, you have probably heard or even tried breath work. Many health, wellness, and self help experts use breath work as a tool to reduce stress, release emotions, detox the body, and bring about new insights of one’s life.

Because of its multiple benefits, breath work is a powerful tool that can help heal and restore your body. Not to mention, doing breath work costs nothing so it is accessible for almost anyone to do at anytime. So, if you’re looking for ways to enhance your wellbeing, breath work is an effective modality that you can add to your routine.

In this article, you will learn what breath work is, how it impacts the body, different breath work styles, and my personal experience in a recent breath work class.

What is breath work?

Breath work is the intentional act of manipulating the breath into patterns or sequences for a desired response on the body. It is controlling the breath in a certain way for a duration of time to promote health and healing in the body.

There are several styles of breath work that range from quick, forced breath rates to slow, steady breath rates. Generally, speeding up the breath produces an energizing and cleansing effect, while slowing down the breath produces a relaxing and soothing effect. Therefore, breath work is a dynamic tool that can help in any given situation.

At a physiological level, breath work aids in the excretion of toxins and waste in our body. When we take a breath in, we bring oxygen into the lungs. Here, the oxygen enters into blood capillaries and pushes out carbon dioxide on an exhale. In this process, oxygen is being exchanged for carbon dioxide so that the body can be circulated with new, oxygenated blood.

With that being said, breath work can be intense. When manipulating the breath with rapid breathing techniques, the body may experience uncomfortable visceral sensations. Things like dizziness, tingling in extremities, feeling hot/cold, and light headed are some common symptoms of rapid breathing techniques. It’s helpful to be aware of these so that when you practice breath work you can anticipate these body sensations.

*Please note: If you have certain health conditions like high blood pressure, cardiovascular disease, osteoporosis, panic attacks, are pregnant or are unsure if breath work is safe for you, please consult with your doctor before doing breath work.

How does it work?

In these cases, higher rates of oxygen create more energy in the body for movement, cellular repair, detoxification, and immunity. Stimulating the body with more oxygen turns on the sympathetic state. This state is the “fight, flight, or freeze” mode that allows us to use energy voluntary reactions like moving.

On the other hand, there are breath work techniques that are more gentle. Slowing down the breathing rate stimulates relaxation in the body. It is helpful to do gentle breathing techniques when feeling overwhelmed, anxious, or stressed to calm down the body and mind. With slower breathing rates, one can experience a drop in heart rate, body temperature, lethargy, and calmness.

With slower breathing rates, the body receives less oxygen and moves into parasympathetic state. This state is the “rest and restore” mode when the body puts energy towards involuntary reactions like digestion, blood pressure, cell activity, and heart rate.

Breath work is on a spectrum of intensity from rapid to slow breathing patterns. When considering breath work, it is important to decide on the intensity of your practice for your specific and conditional needs.

For example, if you are feeling stressed out before a big presentation, five minutes of slow breath techniques may help calm down your nerves. Whereas, if you are feeling tired or unmotivated, a few minutes of rapid breathing may give you more energy to do something.

What are some different styles of breath work?

Knowing a few styles of breath work can help you decide what is best for you.

Some examples of different styles of breath work are boxed breathing, diaphragm breathing, relaxation response technique, alternate nostril breathing, breath of fire, holotrophic breathing, and Wim Hoff technique. With the descriptions, I have including links to YouTube videos that you can watch to learn and practice each technique yourself.

1.) Boxed breathing. Boxed breathing is a gentle, slower breathing technique that helps calm the body down. This is where your breathing mirrors a “box” with four equal parts. Imagine tracing a box with your breath. First, you breath in for 4 seconds. Hold your breath for 4 seconds. Breathe out for 4 seconds. And then, hold for 4 seconds. This is one cycle. You repeat this sequence matching your breathing durations and holds for 4 equal parts.

2.) Diaphragm Breathing. Diaphragm breathing is focused on relaxing the body as well. This is where you focus on breathing into your diaphragm located under your lungs to take in oxygen. To practice, breathe in and out of your belly and try not to move your chest. Practice slow and equal breathing in and out of the belly for several cycles to strengthen the diaphragm and promote relaxation.

3.) Relaxation response technique. Similar to diaphragm breathing, this is a general term used to describe slow, intentional breathing for eliciting relaxation. One common form of relaxation response technique is 4-7-8 breathing. This is where you breathe in to your bell for 4 seconds, hold for 7 seconds, and slowly exhale for 8 seconds. Repeat this cycle as many times as needed to feel more relaxed.

4.) Alternate nostril breathing. This technique is common among yoga practitioners because of it’s abilities to balance the yin and yang, left and right, masculine and feminine energies. For this, you close one nostril as you breathe in to the other, then you open the nostril, block the other and breath out. Inhale into the nostril, then breathe out of the nostril. This is helpful for restoring balance and bring oxygen to body parts of the body and brain,

5.) Breath of Fire. This technique is higher on the intensity scale due to its rapid and forceful breath to promote heat and energy. It is done by forcefully exhaling air out of the belly through the nostrils while contracting the abdomen wall. This inhale is soft and natural. Imagine painting like a dog, but doing it with your mouth closed. After several rounds, you may experience visceral sensations from the increased oxygen.

6.) Holotrophic breathing. Another intense form of breath work, this technique has you breath in fast and deep through your nose, and out through your mouth. It is done rapidly for the purpose of increasing oxygen and releasing carbon dioxide out of the body. It is a technique used by many to increase mental alertness, consciousness, and self awareness.

7.) Wim Hoff breathing. Wim Hoff is a man who developed a breathing protocol that involved structured breathing patterns followed by breath holds. For his technique, it requires doing 30 rounds of holotrophic breathing, exhaling all the air, and holding breath for as long as you can. Then, another inhale for 10-20 second hold. This pattern is repeated several times and can have some powerful and profound impacts on one’s mental and physical wellbeing.

As you could imagine, there are several ways to do breath work and several reasons to add it to your toolbox for self help, health, and healing.

More evidence is showing the multiple therapeutic and heath benefits of breath work. It is known to build your body’s immunity, cell health, and mental resilience. Breath work is something that I use in my treatments with patients for stress and pain management. Also, I teach my patients with COPD diaphragmic breathing and pursed lip breathing to help them increase their oxygen saturation levels so they don’t get so fatigued during activities.

Regardless, breath work can be an essential tool to have on any health and healing journey…. That’s why I decided to go to my first breath work class in over two years because I knew it would assist me on my health journey and enhance my wellbeing.

I had been a while since I had done any intense breath work. On a day to day basis, I may use gentle breathing techniques to help me unwind at night or shake some nerves before work. But, the rapid and intense breathing wasn’t something I tried too often. So, I was a little anxious to give it a try.

What I Experienced During a Breath Work Class

I went to a breath work class with two friends a few weeks ago at the Yoga Room Hawaii. We rode there together and our casual conversation distracted me from thinking about the experience I was about to have.

So, after arriving to class and getting settled into my spot, I noticed how full the room was. I thought, oh gosh, this must be good if there’s this many people here….

The instructed started class by sharing a few updates about the studio but more importantly, he share things that we may experience during this class. He mentioned different emotions, sensations, or thoughts we might have. He said that our minds will want to stop because it's uncomfortable and unnatural. But, he encouraged us to surrender and to be open to the experience, and to allow our sensations to be present.

He explained the style of breath that we were going to do and assured us that he was going to be guiding us through it the whole thing. He called it Alkaline Breathing, which is similar to the holotrophic method but in this your breathing in and out through your mouth the entire time. We were going to do three rounds of this breath technique then, be in a savasana meditation.

Knowing what to expect made me feel a little more comfortable and confident…. but, no words could prepare me for the actual experience.

When we started, I immediately got dizzy. Then, I felt hot and my hands started to seize up and go numb. I wanted to stop but, just as we were told, I leaned into the discomfort.

As I continued and felt more out of my body, I started to get scared. I was going to places I hadn’t been before and was losing control of my body. But, having the guidance from the teacher helped me accept this as part of the process so, I kept going.

What happened next was unexpected. After a few minutes into the practice, I started crying. Not just crying, I was sobbing.

I felt this heat of rage, anger, and sadness move through me. I saw people from my past, my family, and even my younger self. I just allowed the tears to run down my face as I kept up with the breath and listened to the guidance from the teacher.

These emotions lasted for most of the three breath work phases. They would vary in intensity. But, when we entered into the savasana everything shifted. The grief, the sadness, the anger as dissipated and instead, I felt euphoric and at peace. And after several minutes of being there, we were slowly cued back into our body to integrate the session as a class.

It took me a few moments to get feeling back into my fingers and orient to the room. I felt hot, heavy and slow now. But, I knew that what just moved out of me was a lot of energy that I had been holding in for a while…. Emotions that I wasn’t allowing myself to feel and sensations I was denying in my body.

Despite the discomfort of the entire process, this breath work class was a permission slip for me to process this deep grief I had felt from past relationships. And, it ultimately helped me find peace.

For me, this was an experience I needed to heal. I needed it to let go of the wounds I carried from being betrayed, abandoned, and rejected. It helped detach from the people and ideas that no longer served me. And, it helped me feel more confident to move forward and on with my life. Its been several weeks since the experience and I feel less affected by the pain from the past.

Overall, this breath work class was transformative.

It is a powerful tool that can enhance your life experience and help release deep emotions. And while it was uncomfortable, it was so worth the clarity and peace I received.

I was so inspired by this class that I sat down with the co-owner and teacher, Eric Rosso to talk about this powerful method of emotional healing he facilitates at Yoga Room Hawaii.

Interview with Eric Rosso

I encourage anyone who is seeking holistic methods to enhance mental, emotional, and physical wellbeing explore different methods of breath work.

Because there are several different styles, it is best to seek out a practitioner to ask questions on what may be best for you and your journey.

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Reference Links

https://www.webmd.com/balance/what-is-breathwork.

https://www.healthline.com/health/breathing-exercise.

https://hbr.org/2020/09/research-why-breathing-is-so-effective-at-reducing-stress.