Your Breathing Matters

How you breathe is important when it comes to stimulating your nervous system to either fight/flight or rest/digest. When I work with clients who are stressed I encourage them to meditate because of what it does for the autonomic nervous system which regulates your sympathetic and parasympathetic branches.

Inhale – slight sympathetic response – fight or flight.

Exhale – slight parasympathetic response – rest and digest.

This is why in mediations that are guided you have a long exhale than inhale. Usually the one I go with is inhale 4, hold 4, exhale 4. This I do all the time and is probably a key reason I score more green recovery days on my Whoop and my HRV is in a good spot. Before bed is money too as it helps chill you out and allows your always running brain something else to focus on.