Upbeat Living: How to Exhale Stress!

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Breathwork, deep breath, exhaling stress, Kebba Buckley Button, oxygen, pH balance, stress, stress relief, Thich Nhat Hanh, UpBeat Living

© 2014 Kebba Buckley Button, MS, OM.  World Rights Reserved.

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Almost everyone has stress stored in their bodies.  And asking people to “take a deep breath” to cut their stress is very popular.  But we need to change that!  Think about it.

When you go for a physical, doesn’t the doctor always ask you to “take a deep breath now”?   The doctor generally asks for a deep breath, to expand the lungs, so s/he can hear various sounds that may be good or not so good.  Seems reasonable.

In situations of conflict, how many times have you heard this advice:  “OK, now, everyone, let’s  just take a deep breath.”  The person suggesting it is talking about taking a momentary timeout from the issues at hand, to shift the stress people are naturally holding in their bodies, using breath.  And if you do take a long, deep breath, you will probably drop your shoulders and relax, as you reflexively exhale.  But wait!  Here’s better advice!  Exhale first.

Every breath we take, every step we make, can be filled with peace, joy and serenity.

~Thich Nhat Hanh

Hands up, everyone who is currently breathing!  Oh good.  You brought your breath with you.  Breath allows life.  And if you’ve ever held your breath too long, you know that feels bad.  About 6 times per minute, we breathe in oxygen, which is distributed into little collectors in the lungs, where the air and the blood actually meet, across a respiratory membrane.  The oxygen, from the air you’ve inhaled, goes into the blood, and the carbon dioxide comes out of the blood, into the breath.  That way, we can and do breathe out carbon dioxide.  Then it takes only seconds for the oxygen you’ve inhaled to start circulating to the brain and body, through the blood system.  The oxygen/carbon dioxide balance is crucial to your body chemistry. So this matters WHY?

I have so much chaos in my life, it’s become normal. You become used to it.  You have to just relax, calm down, take a deep breath and try to see how you can make things work rather than complain about how they’re wrong.

~Tom Welling

This matters because you can only inhale, and get that good oxygen, if there is room in your lungs.  So exhale first.   Here’s a way to get a perfect exhale:  sing “ha” on any note you choose, and keep going until you completely run out of breath.  At the end of your breath, you’ll naturally gasp, quickly taking in a wonderful gulp of new air.  Terrific!  And how much did you take in?  That full exhalation emptied the bottoms of your lungs, pushing out all that stale urban air and pollution you don’t usually get to, in normal breathing.  Now when you inhale, you are inhaling into much more space, and you’ll get much more oxygen.

In about 30 seconds after you force an exhale and allow the gasp, you’ll notice a rush up the back of your head.  This is oxygen!  The stranger it feels, the more stale air you know you were storing in your lungs.  And now your brain and body are working much better.  You can think more clearly now, and all systems are more vital. You may have a “humming” sensation all over your body. And more oxygen will keep your cells young, maintain your acid/base balance, and make you naturally more resistant to diseases.  And do you notice how much more relaxed you are?

This trick is absolutely free and the equipment is always with you.  So don’t take the regular advice!  Exhale first, for your perfect stress relief and health!  Now that’s Upbeat Living!

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● Kebba Buckley Button is a stress management expert.  She is the author of the award-winning book, Discover The Secret Energized You (http://tinyurl.com/b44v3br), plus the 2013 book, Peace Within:  Your Peaceful Inner Core, Second Edition (http://tinyurl.com/mqg3uvc).  She also has a natural healing practice and is an ordained minister.

● Liked this article?  You can buy Kebba’s books:  just click the links!

• Discover The Secret Energized You (http://tinyurl.com/b44v3br). 
• Peace Within:  Your Peaceful Inner Core (Second Edition) (http://tinyurl.com/mqg3uvc)             

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UpBeat Living: 8 Crisis Quickies

Tags

Breathwork, crisis, Pray, Prayer, stress, Stress Management

© 2013 Kebba Buckley Button.  World Rights Reserved.

Photo by Microsoft

UpBeat Living supports you in being happy, healthy, and on-the-go, cocreating the life you want.  That said, sometimes even the UpBeat Living office has challenging days.  In a couple of project areas, things are stuck on personality issues. We had to fire a major vendor, and today they got the word; we also need to replace them, which is a process. Wanting never to hurt anyone, if possible, made the vendor firing thing very intense.  The bank made an error, I drove over to get them to fix it, a secondary effect popped up, and I drove back to get them to fix that.  Plus, the Moon has been full, which intensifies everything.  For several days, it has seemed the opposite of peaceful.  It has seemed like crisis time.

So what does UpBeat Living do when it’s crisis time?  We use the crisis-level stress management tools, the “Crisis Quickies”.  Try some of these, and let us know how they work for you!

1. Run in place for 2 minutes, if you can.
2. Divide the crisis or crises into pieces, and start on one piece.
3. If you feel like vomiting from stress, go ahead.  You’ll release a lot of tension and feel better fast.  Then seriously brush your breath, and everything will seem less serious.
4. If you have to be in meetings with those who are disrupting your peace, try to look calm.  This helps directly, signaling your body-mind system to calm down.
5. In those meetings, place the tips of the 3 center fingers of your right hand in the center of your left palm.  This looks calm and signals your central nervous system to go quiet.  Now you can deal with those people and issues more easily.
6. When you get home, take an extra shower.  Yes, you’re clean, but this one is for therapy.  Picture all the stress energy of the day flowing out of you, out of your head, off your scalp, and down the drain.  Sing loudly, any song that comes to mind; make up something that suits the issues of the day.  Blow your hair dry, which will also blow stress energy off your head.
7. Practice exhaling.  Forget all that advice about “taking a big breath”.  You need to empty your lungs before you can take that big breath.  Exhaling is especially powerful, because you can do it quietly without anyone realizing you are managing a crisis.
8. If you are a person of faith, pray!  If you don’t know what to pray for, just pray, “Help!”  You may be surprised at how crises ease up when you pray for help.

And all the best to you!  May you be back on your happy path, in your UpBeat Living, soon!

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● If you enjoy this post, please click “like” in the FB widget in the right hand column.  You’ll have our undying gratitude plus a huge rise in your Good Karma.

 

● Kebba Buckley Button is a Master’s Degree scientist, a minister, and the award-winning author of  the 2012 book, Peace Within:  Your Peaceful Inner Core (http://tinyurl.com/abd47jr), and also Discover The Secret Energized You (http://tinyurl.com/b44v3br).  She also has a natural healing and stress management practice and is a celebrated public speaker.

 

● Your comments are welcome!

 

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UpBeat Living: Don’t Wait to Exhale

Tags

Breathwork, Exhaling, peace within, stress, UpBeat Living

© 2013 Kebba Buckley Button.  World Rights Reserved.

Photo by Kebba Buckley Button

Today’s headline in The Arizona Republic, Phoenix’s main regional newspaper, riveted me.  It read, “BOSTON EXHALES.”  I was so riveted by the headline that I took a photo of it (here, to the left).  Everyone knows what this headline means.  It means the worst is over and Boston can now relax, with the first bombing suspect dead, and the second in hospital custody.

We have a number of expressions about breath, in this country.  We talk about “holding our breath” while waiting eagerly for something.  In a strong attraction, we may say, “[S]/he takes my breath away.”  After a big event, sometimes we say, “oh, now I can breathe easy, knowing it’s all taken care of.”  We sometimes talk about being “just a breath away” from some desired goal.  A Buddhist-oriented 12-Step program is called One Breath at a Time.

Many well-meaning people advise others who are stressed to “take a deep breath”.  A popular 1995 movie is called, Waiting to Exhale.  In that movie, the 4 main characters each reached points in life where they were now relieved that the suspense was over, and they were better able “to exhale”.  So during most of the movie, they were “waiting to exhale” as they were “up in the air” as to where their primary relationships were going.  And by the way, it was a great movie!

As a practitioner who teaches the power and practice of therapeutic breathing, I want to boldly suggest that you never wait to exhale!  You need to breathe, right?  So why not make your breath work well for you?  In a minute or so, your inhalation takes oxygen to your blood through the lungs, and the blood circulates the oxygen all around your body.  Carbon dioxide is picked up by the returning blood, and the process begins again.

At the bottoms of your lungs resides a build-up of residue from urban pollution.  So, while most people take only relatively shallow breaths, all can benefit from deeper breathing and expelling that residue.  To make more room for new air, exhaling is key.  Try this:  pick a note, and sing “haaaaaaaa…” out to the end of your breath.  You will know you have found the very end of your breath when you reflexively gasp as your inhalation.  Do this three times and then return to ignoring your breathing.  Notice how much better you feel.  You may feel a little “high” for a few minutes—that’s oxygen!  When you want to relax, don’t “take a breath”, have an exhale, and then inhale into the lungs that have made room for new air.

Do you want to live alert and energized?  Take charge of your breath.  See what happens.  And don’t wait to exhale!

 

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● If you enjoy this post, please click “like” in the FB widget in the right hand column.  You’ll have our undying gratitude plus a huge rise in your Good Karma.

 

● Kebba Buckley Button is a Master’s Degree scientist, a minister, and the award-winning author of  the 2012 book, Peace Within:  Your Peaceful Inner Core (http://tinyurl.com/abd47jr), and also Discover The Secret Energized You (http://tinyurl.com/b44v3br).  She also has a natural healing and stress management practice and is a celebrated public speaker.

 

● Your comments are welcome!

 

● Get these articles by email– just click the Subscribe Free option in the right column.

 

● Reach the writer at kebba@kebba.com .