Some times, when I give the instruction « breathe » to my client, I receive the answer « of course I’m breathing, otherwise I would be dead ». This situation brings always both of us to laugh a lot, what is good for the breathing exercise !
Respiration is a basic function: we have to breathe in order to live. It’s an automatic function too: it means we don’t need to be attentive to that, breathing happen by it self (our vegetative system takes care of the automatic breathing).

The problem is that because this need can happen automatic, we tend to limit this function to a minimum.
It seems innocent – we can survive even if we breathe only a minimum – but the consequences on our body are not at all innocent.
That provokes, mainly, that we use also our muscles and circulation at the minimum. So we get used to hold our body in a certain way, with a reduced circulation and we perceive our self less.
Indeed, the minimum breathing “serves” primarily this: to feel less, to reduce the volume of our physical and emotional sensations.
Sometimes the breathing is so blocked that trying another option becomes very difficult. The muscles are not flexible enough, the feelings that go with a different way of breathing may be experienced as uncomfortable, the head feels dizzy. We have builded an automatic pattern.
So to breathe, not only to survive but to live, means to feel the air filling the body, the chest expands as a result of the inhalation and reduce with the exhalation. But also to pay attention to how we are in our body when we breathe deeply and perceive more the emotions and physical sensations.
It is also more difficult to ignore the small signals that require our attention and tell us that our presence is requested within us! The head becomes calmer, it is easier to let go of the tension. Breath becomes the bridge to be in the present moment.
With my work through the body, I teach you to find a deeper breath, to reconnect with yourself and understand the signals that the body communicates to you … because you are alive.

Picture taken from Internet