Body & Breath Practices

Modern lifestyles have caused many of us to lose touch with our bodies, leaving us feeling like we exist only in our heads, identified entirely with our thoughts and ideas about the world. Over time, that disconnection can leave us feeling ungrounded, anxious, and scattered.

The practices in this section work with the mind, breath, and body together. They can help you create space throughout your body, release built-up tension, regulate your breath, and calm your nervous system. With time, these practices help slowly pull us out of our heads and into our bodies, opening a new world of sensation, experience, and presence that many of us have unknowingly been cut off from throughout our lives.

Breathwork

Throughout history, the breath has been used as a powerful tool for transformation, from yogic breath practices in India and Qigong in China, to spiritual and healing ceremonies in indigenous cultures around the world. These cultures all had a deeper understanding of how conscious breathing can affect the body and mind.

Most of us spend our days breathing in short, shallow patterns, which can keep our body and nervous system in a heightened and tense state. Breathwork practices help us break out of this cycle by bringing awareness to the breath, expanding the lungs, sinking the breath down into the belly, and regulating our breathing. This helps shift the body out of fight or flight, reduce stress and anxiety, and create a calm foundation for meditation or daily life.

The practices I’ve included here are focused on regulating the breath and calming the nervous system. There are more forceful breathing techniques out there like the Wim Hof technique or various yogic breath practices, but without proper technique and guidance, they can leave you ungrounded and scattered. If you’re new to breathwork, stick with the gentle practices here and use them before your meditation practice or whenever you need a reset throughout the day.

Breathwork Practices

Physiological Sigh

The physiological sigh is a technique popularized by neuroscientist Andrew Huberman. You start with a deep breath filling the lungs, then a second shorter breath, followed by a long, slow exhale through the mouth. This breathing pattern helps our body regulate stress and oxygen levels, and it can quickly shift the nervous system from a state of fight or flight to calm. A slight variation of this practice, which is how I was taught, involves adding a third breath to help fill out and expand the lungs before the long exhale. This practice should be done for about 5-10 minutes to get the full benefits.

Box Breathing

Box breathing is another simple but effective breathing practice that helps calm the mind and regulate the nervous system. It involves inhaling for four seconds, holding for four, exhaling for four, and holding again for four. This practice can be really useful before meditation or anytime you need to reset and ground yourself. A slight variation of this practice, which is how I was taught, is to use a count of 7 seconds instead of 4. Similar to the physiological sigh, you can practice this for 5-10 minutes to get the full benefits.

Anchoring the Breath

Anchoring the breath is a foundational practice for Qigong and other internal training systems. It works with the mind, body, and breath all at once by slowly working from the nose down to your abdomen and resting your attention on specific areas as you go. The key is to listen and observe without trying to change the breath. Over time, this slows down your breathing, allows it to naturally sink deeper into the belly, and creates space within the body, which helps develop a stronger internal awareness. All of this helps pull you out of your head and grounds you in the body.

Below, you’ll find two videos. The first is an overview of the practice, and the second is a 39-minute guided session. Once you learn the technique, you can practice on your own for a shorter duration.