21 Breathwork Tips and Techniques for Preventing Burnout

I'd like to share with you some of the points that we cover in the Stress and Breathing, Burnout and Breathwork Seminars. This is a body-mind-breath approach to preventing burnout and for recovering from it. In the Chinese tradition we would say that we "regulate body, regulate mind, and regulate breath." 
 

At the seminars, we go more deeply and into more detail with each of these points; and we explore the practical exercises and techniques related to them. If you apply any one of them, be assured you will experience a benefit. Master a good number of them as many seminar participants have, and like them, you will find that burnout is a thing of the past!

 

21 Breathwork Tips and Techniques for Preventing Burnout:

1. Question the idea of scarcity and drop your sense of limitation. One of the laws of nature and existence is "abundance." You are part of that nature and existence.
2. Awaken to the source of your energy and learn to breathe in a way that strengthens your connection to it. Be conscious of that connection in all that you do, especially when working with others.
3. Know that in reality the more you give, the more you receive. (This is not just a pretty philosophy: it's how energy works.)
4. Re-awaken in yourself the unmanageable spontaneous energy that you had as a child. Only adults (adulterated children) suffer from burnout!
5. Learn to use your breathing to generate energy at will. Be an ever-flowing source of aliveness. Fill yourself up and overflow with energy. (Don't just draw in energy from around you; draw energy up from within you.)
6. Master the art of taking "minute vacations." (With practice, you can get more out of a few minutes of spiritual breathing than many people get from a weekend in the Bahamas!)
7. Learn to use your breath to draw energy into your body and release tension at the same time. Learn to breathe in a way that both charges and relaxes you, that both strengthens and soothes you.
8. Be more playful in life and relationships find a way to bring some playfulness to your work. (If you must be "serious" on the job, then at least balance it with a huge dose of playfulness and fun after work!)
9. Establish breathing habits and patterns that automatically recharge and restore you. (Nothing works better than this at making you immune to burnout)
10. Learn the "full yogic breath" and how to infuse every cell in your body with breath energy. (This is an art that will serve you to no end!)
11. Master "De-Reflexive Breathing." Learn to mentally inhale while physically exhaling, and mentally exhale while physically inhaling. (Read that again. It is the essence of this ancient breathwork exercise, meditation, technique… also called Krishna's kriya yoga)
12. Right livelihood: make sure that what you do is aligned with your purpose. (Burnout can be a wake up call to make changes in your life.)
13. Drop energy suckers like judgment, resistance, and attachment. (these are big proven contributors to stress and burnout, and yet people insist on holding on to them!)
14. Realize that everything is love, and that we live in an infinite ocean of love. (Begin to acknowledge and appreciate expressions of love: smiles, small gifts, friendly advice, even criticism… all expressions of love!)
15. Free up blocked and stuck emotional energy by practicing forgiveness and gratitude. (Nothing will burn you out more than generating and holding on to negative emotions! Do the opposite and liberate yourself!)
16. Don't resist your down cycles: they are a natural and necessary part of life and growth. (Don't waste precious life energy fighting your rhythms and cycles!)
17. Identify and eliminate habitual muscular contractions—chronic physical tension. (On the most direct and practical level this eats up life force that you could be using in much better ways!)
18. Learn to release your breath—master the skill of letting go of your exhale. (When you master this, you can let go of many other things, like pain, tension, anxiety, fear, disturbing thoughts, and the past!)
19. Do your inner work: free yourself of guilt, shame, anger, resentment, etc. (Breathe these things out of your body and mind, out of your life… forever!)
20. Learn the cleansing breath—the "coming home breath." (This is built on a natural reflex: the sigh of relief. This single skill can set you free in a moment. Master it!)
21. Practice faith and trust. Remember that you are always already safe and free! (Don't let that toxic fearful doubting voice in your head lead you to believe anything else!)

I hope you take some of the tips to heart! And I hope you put some of them to work in your life!

 

I love getting comments and questions from my readers, so feel free to send me yours at: dan@breathmastery.com

 

Good luck in your practice.
Love and blessings to all,
Dan

PS: The audio recording together with a full transcript of the "Burnout Prevention Seminar" held in Johannesburg is available. Contact me for information.

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For more information about Breathwork, please go to www.breathmastery.com.

Download your free copy of my book, "Shut Up And Breathe!" http://www.breathmastery.com/shutupandbreathe

PS: If you are ready to get onto the Path of Breath Mastery right now, you can enroll in the 60-Day Online Course: "21 Lessons in the Art and Science of Breathwork." Visit: http://breathmastery.com/onlinecourse

Or, join my Breath Mastery Inner Circle, and freely access almost 40 years of breath and breathing research, articles, essays, audio/video files, seminar transcripts, workshop handouts, and even complete training manuals! 

Visit:http://www.breathmastery.com/breathmastery-inner-circle-membership

The Two Basics Aspects of Breathwork

This month I start a series of articles on Breathwork, beginning with the two basic aspects of the practice: Breath Awareness and Conscious Breathing. You can think of these as yin and yang aspects, active and passive practices.

Breath Awareness means simply observing the breath, watching the breath, noticing the breathing… witnessing it. This is the passive aspect. You don’t breathe in any particular way: the breaths come and go by themselves.

The Awareness we are talking about is meditative awareness. It is not thinking, not judging, not comparing, not analyzing: it is a soft open state of alertness or presence. Breath Awareness is a “mindfulness” practice, with extraordinary benefits.

As you observe your breathing moment to moment, you are looking for details: sense the breath, listen to it. How do you know you are breathing? What are the feelings and sensations that occur? Where do you notice those feelings and sensations? What muscles do you use? Where does the breath go in you? What does it touch? What moves when you breathe?

As you become more aware of the breath, you naturally become more aware of other things in your mind and body: thoughts, feelings and sensations, and emotions. You become aware of your self-talk, your physical tensions, energetic contractions, habits, patterns, urges, reactions. Witness these things. Don’t make them important.

When your mind wanders, when miscellaneous thoughts or things around you distract you, simply return your attention to the breath. This practice of awareness comes without attachment, resistance or judgment. It is pure conscious awareness.

Nothing is happening to you: it is just happening. You are the witness.

The second aspect is Conscious Breathing. This is where you come in. You give the breathing a certain quality or pattern. You breathe with a certain intention. You control and direct the breath in some way. With Breath Awareness the breath is breathing you. With conscious Breathing you are breathing the breath.
There are countless conscious breathing exercises and techniques. For example there is a practice called “Square Breathing” or “Box Breathing” used by warriors, martial artists, Navy Seals and Special Forces personnel.

To do Square Breathing: inhale for a count of 4; hold for a count of 4; exhale for a count of 4; hold for a count of 4.

Another example of Conscious breathing technique or exercise is called “Mother’s Breath”: inhale for a count of 7; hold for a count of 1; exhale for a count of 7; hold for a count of 1.

Conscious Breathing or “breath control” could mean practicing alternate nostril breathing, inhaling thru the nose and exhaling thru the mouth, doing pursed lip breathing, or employing breath sounds. It could mean combining breath and movement, or visualization or affirmations.

We move forward in our breathwork practice by going back and forth between these two aspects: active and passive: doing the breathing and letting the breath breathe itself.

An important part of Breathwork practice is integrating these two aspects into our daily lives. Become aware of your breathing at different times; tune into your breathing in different situations. Notice how you breathe during various interactions and activities.

Breathe consciously from time to time when you are walking: perhaps in rhythm to your footsteps, or when listening to music. Breathe consciously when you are taking in a sunset, when you are listening to someone. Learn to use conscious breathing to relax yourself, to energize yourself; to prepare for things and to recover from them.

We go thru life in a similar way: sometimes with paddle our boat, and other times we let the river take us. We sometimes take charge and we sometimes get out of the way. Sometimes we control, and sometimes we surrender. We live our life, and we let life live us.

When we practice an active conscious breathing technique, it’s a good idea to practice Meditative Awareness before and after the active exercise or technique. Track the changes in your mind and body, in your energy. Keep a journal. Share your notes and experience with other Breathworkers.

In the Inner Circle Members Area, there are a number of recordings and transcripts of Guided Breath Awareness and Conscious Breathing sessions. I invite you to become a Breath Mastery Inner Circle member.

Right now, you can become a Lifetime Member for less than the cost of a single year membership! This offer will not last long, so I suggest you take advantage of the opportunity while you can!

All the information is here: http://www.breathmastery.com/breathmastery-inner-circle-membership/

Next month, we will explore the two core techniques or exercises used in Transformational Breathwork or Spiritual Breathing Practice. Until then, good luck in your practice and many blessings on your path!

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For more information about Breathwork, please go to www.breathmastery.com.

Download your free copy of my book, "Shut Up And Breathe!" http://www.breathmastery.com/shutupandbreathe

PS: If you are ready to get onto the Path of Breath Mastery right now, you can enroll in the 60-Day Online Course: "21 Lessons in the Art and Science of Breathwork." Visit: http://breathmastery.com/onlinecourse

Or, join my Breath Mastery Inner Circle, and freely access almost 40 years of breath and breathing research, articles, essays, audio/video files, seminar transcripts, workshop handouts, and even complete training manuals! 

Visit:http://www.breathmastery.com/breathmastery-inner-circle-membership

In Praise Of The Diaphragm And Why It’s Called A Spiritual Muscle

At the Breathing Seminars in Russia this month, we have been focusing on relaxing and releasing the biggest muscle in your body: the diaphragm.

Fairuz Bikayev, a Bashkir businessman who deals in precious and semiprecious stones and gems, is also a seasoned martial arts practitioner. On the 3rd day of a recent 5-Day Breathwork Intensive, he shared this:

“I finally got what it means to completely release and relax my diaphragm. And something remarkable has happened: the chronic back pain I have been dealing with for more than ten years just disappeared. It melted away. I amamazed!” 

He said: “In my spiritual practice, I have been struggling lately with what felt like a deep split or a conflict in myself. During the breathing session today, I had a powerful insight and I was able to mend that split and end the conflict.”

He also said: “As I was meditating on my diaphragm, feeling into it, I relaxed beyond a point I was never able to go, and I was suddenly filled with a peace I have never known. This peace is now affecting everything I do, and I know in my heart that it will never go away.”

No wonder the diaphragm has been called a spiritual muscle!

“Diaphragm” comes from the Greek word meaning ‘partition’. “Dia” means ‘through, apart’, and “phragma” means ‘a fence’. And here’s an interesting point: the Greek word “phren” refers both to the diaphragm and to the mind or brain.

The diaphragm is a very unique muscle. It separates—or one might better say—it connects the chest and the belly. It forms the floor of the thorax and the roof of the abdomen.

When the diaphragm contracts we automatically breathe in, and when it relaxes we automatically breathe out. A healthy relaxed diaphragm takes a dome shape, like an open parachute or umbrella; and as it contracts, it flattens downward.

The movement of the diaphragm naturally massages all the abdominal organs that lay beneath it, and it also massages the heart that sits on top of it. That’s why the greater the excursion rate (up and down movement) of our diaphragm, the healthier we are.

The diaphragm is hard-wired to the respiratory center in the medulla and pons in the brain stem—which is the most ancient and primal part of our brain. It is also wired to the limbic system—the source of our emotions; and it is wired to the motor and pre-motor cortex—areas responsible for conscious control of our movements.

In a way, the diaphragm is where emotions meet rational thinking, where body meets mind. It’s where conscious and unconscious processes meet. Not only is the diaphragm connected to the left and right hemispheres of the brain: it is also where the oldest part of our nervous system interacts with the newest part in a creative and practical way.

No wonder the diaphragm has been called a spiritual muscle!

Like all skeletal muscles, the diaphragm is attached to bones, although it does not directly move any joints. But unlike other skeletal muscles, it never stops working. And in addition to being the primary breathing muscle, it also helps us maintain posture and balance.

The diaphragm is structurally attached to the body in a number of ways. It is tied to the 12th thoracic vertebrae, to the upper lumbar vertebrae, and also to the six lower ribs.

One way of looking at what might be called optimal structural alignment in terms of the diaphragm and rib cage, is the analogy of a “ball and socket” joint. When relaxed after an exhale, the diaphragm should fit nicely up into the rib cage, like a ball fitting perfectly into a socket.

When the diaphragm contracts, the muscles between the ribs (intercostal muscles) also contract, lifting and separating the ribs. This decreases pressure and increases the space inside the chest cavity, which causes air to rush in.

When the diaphragm relaxes, it returns to its dome shape, the intercostal muscles relax, and the chest cavity shrinks. This increases pressure, which causes air to rush back out again.

And so breathing is actually a divine play of air and energy, of internal and external spaces and pressures.

To bring ourselves into conscious harmony with this divine play of space and energy, we often practice this Spiritual Breathing Exercise: We meditate on “opening and expanding” ourselves. We create a sense of spaciousness in the body, allowing the breath to ‘pour’ into us, rather than the familiar experience of ‘pulling’ the breath in.

Here’s an interesting tidbit: Do you know the “side stich” that runners often get—that sharp pain just under the ribs? This happens when the diaphragm doesn’t sit high enough in the rib cage. As a result, it rubs up and down against the lower ribs as we breathe. This common problem can be permanently eliminated with just a few hours of focused breathwork training.

Our relationship to the diaphragm is more than just physical. The diaphragm contracts in response to threats—real or imagined. It responds to pain—actual or anticipated. It expresses and reflects our stress responses. Contraction of the diaphragm is part of the body’s emergency response system: fight, flight, or freeze.

When a feeling comes, the diaphragm responds. When we relax into the feeling—when we surrender to it—the diaphragm releases, and we experience a felt sense of deep peace.

When the diaphragm swings freely, the ego relaxes and expands. When it does, our sense of separation dissolves a bit and we feel a natural loving connection with everyone and everything around us. We feel a unique sense of peace and “oneness,” of coming home to ourselves, and to God or universal love.

On the other hand, stressful, anxious, angry or fearful states and reactions create tension in the diaphragm that we may not feel; and that tension remains in place during the exhale. Just when the diaphragm is supposed to physiologically relax and rest, giving us a sense of peace and ease, we get a stress signal instead.

This sets up an internal feedback loop: Tension in the diaphragm acts as an emergency signal, causing a vague sense of systemic anxiety and stress. That anxiety and stress creates tension in the diaphragm. That tension feeds the anxiety, and on and on it goes, until…

Focused awareness and breath release techniques interrupt and break that vicious cycle, producing a unique sense of peaceful energy that can be very surprising—even to people who feel that they are already relaxed and calm.

Remember, no matter how relaxed you are you can always relax more. And when you do, a certain peace that passes understanding will come to you! We are renewed and recharged in those precious moments of total relaxation.

There is so much more to breathing and to the diaphragm and its workings than we realize. I hope you will begin to meditate on this spiritual muscle, and that you will practice more breath awareness and more conscious breathing.

I especially hope that you will learn to release and relax your diaphragm, as my friend Fairuz the gem dealing martial artist from Ufa has done!

I invite you to attend a breathwork seminar, workshop, or training, or to schedule a private individual session. Check my schedule and meet me on the path! Or come to Mexico between November and March for one of our 21-Day Breathwork, Healing Arts, and Life Skills programs.

Visit: www.bajabiosana.org to learn more about our Los Cabos paradise and the community there.

I also invite you to enroll in my Online Course: 21 Lessons in the Art and Science of Breathwork.

All the information is here: http://breathmastery.com/onlinecourse

This month, you can take advantage of my subscriber’s discount and save $300. Enroll right now for only $150! (Regular tuition is $450)

Here is a Breathing Technique that will bring you a myriad of benefits: 

1. Blow all your air out, exhale completely.

2. Hold your breath.

3. Move your diaphragm up and down ten or twenty times.

4. Relax and let the breath come and go by itself.

5. Meditate on the feelings and sensations of energy on your body.

Here is another exercise that you can practice right now:

Simply slow your breathing down. Let your exhale be more full and complete. Don’t rush into the next inhale before giving your diaphragm a chance to rest and re-set itself before continuing on its never ending life giving service to your health and wellbeing!

You can also get a lot of information from my new book:

Shut Up And Breathe! Exploring the Art And Science of Breathwork.
You can download it here FREE: www.breathmastery.com/ShutUpAndBreathe

Good luck in your practice, and many blessings on your way!

Dan

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For more information about Breathwork, please go to www.breathmastery.com.

Download your free copy of my book, "Shut Up And Breathe!" http://breathmastery.com/onlinecourse
Or, join my Breath Mastery Inner Circle, and freely access almost 40 years of breath and breathing research, articles, essays, audio/video files, seminar transcripts, workshop handouts, and even complete training manuals! 

Visit: http://www.breathmastery.com/breathmastery-inner-circle-membership

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