BREATHING
A lot of times we forget to breathe. How many times has your mind been racing, and all of a sudden when you take a deep breath, it catches up to you. This is because you’re not breathing correctly; you’re taking shallow breath instead of taking slower deep breaths. You’re holding your breath unconsciously. Shallow breathing limits the diaphragm from expanding and the amount of oxygenated air that you take in. According to Harvard Medical, people with chronic high blood pressure can lower it just by incorporating breathing exercises and techniques. Most people have developed poor breathing habits, thus further restricting oxygen intake. The resulting oxygen deficiency is having a negative effect on our health and our overall performance. Oxygen deprivation can be associated with all kinds of chronic diseases.
Breathing can be both conscious and unconscious. The respiratory center of the brain controls a person’s normal breathing rate. A normal breathing pattern is automatic so you don’t have to consciously think about it. Both voluntary breathing and automatic breathing both serve the purpose of getting oxygen into the bloodstream. Oxygen’s main role in the blood stream is to transport oxygen into your cells. Our cells utilize this oxygen to produce ATP through a complex reaction called Cellular Respiration. ATP is your body’s energy. Oxygen is also important for many other functions such as cellular repair and other biological reactions. So as you can see, without it we cannot sustain life. Knowing this importance should give us a better understanding of why we should put more emphasis on our breathing and begin to incorporate more breathing exercises into our daily routines.
Most diseases will not thrive in an oxygen-rich environment, according to Dr. James Balch, the author of The Super Antioxidants. If there is enough oxygen in our cells, degenerative disease cannot exist and metabolism functions more normally.