Your Respiratory Landscape
Most of us are not aware that we are in the throes of active respiration unless we are in the middle of a yawn, a hiccup, a coughing fit, actively experiencing nasal congestion, or are submerged in water. On an intellectual and practical level, we are remotely aware that we are indeed breathing, innately knowing that it is a mandatory requirement of being upright and vertical, mildly alert, and…alive. Since it is a built-in feature to our basic physiology and we do not have to directly stoke it with water or food, (well, maybe a Tic-Tac) why all the fuss about “breath-awareness?”
I do know about you, (it’s 2025 - let’s stop saying “I don’t know about you, but I…” and flip it, because we are all basically the same when it comes to human experience and feelings) and like me, yesterday had its moments where you found it hard to breathe. Or we stopped breathing for a few seconds altogether and then caught ourselves before passing out. Our stress levels regulate how effectively we breathe. Moving forward, rather than our stress levels being in command of the ship, we need to learn how to regulate our breathing to prevent our stress levels from spiking in the first place.
Even if you have never wielded an oar to row a boat, kayak, or paddleboard, you can imagine accidentally dropping the oar into the water and watching it float away. That oar is your mind, and the boat, kayak, or paddleboard is your body. In this scenario, you do not have a second oar (mind), so what are you going to do? You are either going to sit there and hope the wind blows in your favor as you watch your mind slowly drift away, or you are going to get your hands wet and start dogpaddling your body toward your mind.
There are a few physiological events that happen when we begin to observe our breathing. Exhalations become longer as we relax and let go of stress. Our breathing slows down and becomes regulated through the nose during both the inhalation and exhalation. Now let us flip it and phrase it as measuring our state of relaxation instead of measuring our level of stress. Let us say you are settled at your desk to begin work for the day - you have your music playing, hot coffee close by, and an excellent window-view. To measure your state of relaxation, you would use a breath observational technique.
You do not need the help of an app to close your eyes and count the length of your inhalations and exhalations. Nor do you need an app to imagine the steady click-clack tempo of a metronome as you do this. The exhalations should be a higher number of clacks than the number of clicks you count on your inhalations. For example, you might observe a breath ratio of 3:4 - three clicks for the inhalation and four clacks for the exhalation. This is good - it means that you are breathing calmly.
After a few hours, check in with yourself and do this again. If the ratio goes from 3:4 to 3:3, that means you are experiencing a bit of stress, but nothing to worry about. However, if it flips from a 3:4 to a 4:3, this indicates either reverse breathing or high stress, so it is time to take a moment to lie down and get your legs up the wall or take a walk to shake it off. I call this tempo-counting of the inhalation/exhalation to create a breath ratio tracking a breath.
Another breath observational technique is to simply time your breaths. Kudos to those of you wearing a watch with a second hand. But for those of you not that hip and cool, use your phone. Time 60 seconds while you count your inhalations. Why not your exhalations? Yes, you could count those instead - but flip the coin and pick one. Let us say you count 12 inhalations (or exhalations) during that minute of time. A few hours later, check again. If it is 12 or lower, you are good. If it is higher, drop down and get your legs up a wall or go for a walk to shake it off. Drink some water and get a grip. Contemplate the vastness of the universe for a moment. I call this technique of timing breaths timing a cycle of breaths.
There are six observational breathing techniques that we practice in my Restorative Yoga classes as indicators of relaxation: simply observing your normal breath pathway, observation of the five breath centers - nose, throat, chest, ribs, and belly; tracking a breath (the metronome technique), timing a cycle of breaths (counting breaths per minute), breathing into a specific area of the body like the lower back or belly, and watching the bottom of the exhalation while in meditation. These observational techniques are tools in toolbox of Yoga and meditation. Grab one and keep paddling.
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