5 Minutes Deep Breathing

Debbie Williams
November 29, 2015
5:08 pm

A Challenge Of The Week

5 Minute Deep Breathing

Start with minimum of 5 deep breathes. It will help to de- stress your nervous system. If you practice doing this before a meal you will eat more mindfully.

Also if you smoke it can help you quit as when you first had a cigarette your body didn’t go “this is great” it coughed and spluttered. You had to train yourself to get enjoyment from your cigarette.

You maybe surprised that actually most of that enjoyment comes from giving yourself permission to have a few deep, deep breaths – to take a breather.

When you do exercise before you eat you will transform your brain chemistry and create for yourself awareness and a deeper sense of calm within.

This simple strategy can transform your appetite and your relationship to your food. So decide this week you are going to take up the challenge and go for it.

Here is the exercise;

Step 1

Sit down somewhere comfortable.

Close your eyes and just have an awareness of sounds outside and then let them go into the background.

Breath in through your nose slowly counting 1 – 2 – 3 – 4 – 5.

Hold to a slow count of five 1 – 2 – 3 – 4 – 5.

Breath out to the count of five 1 – 2 – 3 – 4 – 5.

Do 5 breaths to start and see if you can build it up to 5 minutes over time.

Please don’t say you have not got time – if you had diarrhoea you’d find the time to get to the loo (we hope) you can even practice doing this with your eyes open at your desk on the train to work.

Help For Anxiety & Smokers

The rewards from this simple exercise will start to spread over the rest of your day and you will be drawn to want to do more of it. When Debbie works with anxious clients and smokers, she sets a task to do 10 deep breathes 4/5/6 times a day to start.

For the smokers she advises do it whenever you have a craving take 10 deep breathes and for the anxious clients she asks them to have an awareness of their breathing and where the air is going.

Typically Anxious People Have Forgotten How To Breathe !

As a baby, we all would breathe deeply filling up and expanding our tummies.

As we grow up some of us stop breathing when alert to something and then forget to return to our natural relaxed state of breath after the event has passed. The chest breathing becomes the default way of breathing which means anxiety will be triggered more often.

A vicious cycle which can be reversed with awareness and regular practicing deepening your breathing. Taking up yoga and meditating will also help. Also when you listen to your hypnosis you can practice deep breathing then too.