Learn Diaphragmatic Breathing and Change Your Life
Updated: 7 days ago
Diaphragmatic breathing is the foundation to pranayama, breathwork practices. It is the most important breathwork to practice and master. Before trying other pranayama practices, diaphragmatic breathing needs to be automatic. Ready to reclaim your calm by shifting from flight-fight-freeze mode to the rest, restore, relax side of your nervous system?
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Learn Diaphragmatic Breathing and Change Your Life
Why does diaphragmatic breathing matter and what are the benefits? Grab a cup of herbal tea and find out now.
Conscious Encouragement of Healthy Breathing
"Bottom line—when we’re chest breathing, we’re in flight-fight-freeze mode. When we’re breathing diaphragmatically, we're calm and focused. Breathing diaphragmatically is how nature designed us to breathe. To feel grounded and centered , we need to breathe diaphragmatically. It’s the most important thing we can to do change our lives.
If we haven't shifted from chest breathing back to diaphragmatic breathing, all the yoga techniques and relaxation practice will be ineffective. This is why job number one with my clients is to learn diaphragmatic beathing--because it does change their lives.
To re-learn to breath diaphragmatically is simple, easy, and life enhancing, and we need to replace chest breathing with diaphragmatic breathing by consciously encouraging it through awareness and the daily guided practices, so it becomes automatic, natural, once again."
-Veena, Saumya Ayurveda
“I feel greatly improved with your Ayurveda consultation. Stress fell off like a hairy old coat. I’m just not anxious anymore. Depression is way decreased. I was haunted by anxiety my whole life and it’s just gone. I’ve regained hope. WOW. This is so cool. Something wonderful is taking place. You and your knowledge come to me after a lifetime of searching and prayer. I am forever grateful Veena.” -Mark Hughes, Minnesota
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Chest Breathing Versus Diaphragmatic Breathing
The basic practices of yoga are the most significant. The first thing to learn about breathwork, about life, is diaphragmatic breathing. When we're born, we breathe diaphragmatically naturally. Over time, for most people, this healthy breathing pattern becomes disrupted and even disturbed which directly impacts both mind and body. Chest breathing is shallow, rapid, and anxiety producing, and many people's breathing pattern is disrupted to the point of even holding, clenching the breath. When that is our habit-we feel awful.
Three of the most common concerns clients have are anxiety, fatigue, and poor sleep. Learn Diaphragmatic Breathing and Change Your Life. When we chest breath, the lungs are not fully utilized. Why does that matter? It makes us feel anxious and tired because the gas exchange between the air we breathe, and our blood is not optimal. When we breathe diaphragmatically, we breathe more efficiently, the gas exchange is better, and we feel calm and relaxed.
Sounds too simple to be true, but it's not.
What Is So Important About Diaphragmatic Breathing?
Simply put--breath is the only vehicle that links the body and mind. It's how we become calm, focused, energized, vital, and balanced. Breath is prana. Prana is the very lifeforce itself. The more we pay attention to breathing by way of a gentle awareness, the more we relax effortlessly, and our mind becomes still and focused. This is where diaphragmatic breathing exercises come in. (More on that below.)
Change my breath and it changes my life? You bet! It may seem an overly dramatic claim, yet it is not. Without breath, where is life? There are many sayings in English about breath: we lost our breath, we catch it, we hold it, we take a deep breath--yet the breath of life--meaning something one depends on, is among the most profound saying. Breath is not something we tend to connect with consciously, yet is foundational in Ayurveda, yoga, and to life itself.
Ayurveda and Yoga are Sister Sciences
Ayurveda and Yoga are sister sciences, they go hand in hand. We often think of Ayurveda as a traditional natural system of medicine, and that is an important part--as we all benefit from a stable, balanced, healthy body and mind--yet it is one point in the vast tradition of Ayurveda.
Ayurveda is a way to know--through direct experience--the very nature of life. Breath, diaphragmatic breathing, and meditation are vehicles for that exploration of our expansive interior.
How we breathe can change the flow of prana (energy or vital force) throughout our being and when prana is balanced, we notice that change in our life. When we breathe diaphragmatically, we experience increased vitality, good mental and physical health, clarity, peace, relaxation, focus, calm, increased energy, better sleep--we feel good! Fatigue, stress, overwhelm, burnout melt away as we begin to heal our nervous systems and rejuvenate our tired minds, and balance the doshas.
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--Michelle Cheuk, USA
Now we understand how breathing diaphragmatically is key to feeling good. Let's learn how to do it. Here are tried and true traditional breathwork practices.
Diaphragmatic Breathing Exercises
Diaphragmatic breathing can be practiced in several positions including standing, sitting, corpse posture (Śavāsana), or in crocodile (makarasana) pose. When working with clients, I suggest using crocodile pose because the sensation of engaging the diaphragm is easy to detect and connect with. You'll see when you try it—when you inhale, you’ll feel your belly pressing into the floor, and upon exhaling, you’ll feel the abdominal muscles relax. This rhythmic movement is so easy to feel, you’ll appreciate makarasana for changing the way you breathe--and live.
So, when possible, it's easiest for most people to learn diaphragmatic breathing in makarasana and follow the guided practices.
Learn Diaphragmatic Breathing: 3 Traditional Practices
Lie on your belly with your legs a comfortable distance apart. Your toes can be pointed outwards, but if that creates tension or discomfort in the lower back, try turning them inwards. Fold your arms in front of your body and gently rest your head on your forearms. This is important—position your body such that the chest does not contact the floor. You’re not doing a back arch, but you need to have the chest slightly off the floor so the diaphragmatic muscle at the very bottom of the rib cage is what contacts the floor.
2. Sandbag Breathing
Think of it not so much as weightlifting for your diaphragmatic muscle though it will help strengthen it, but more of an awareness facilitator. The weight of the bag cultivates conscious awareness of the movement of your diaphragm and its cooperation with the lungs.
Lie on your back in shavasana, corpse pose. Gently tuck your shoulder blades so they are flat on the floor, which facilitates opening of the front of the body. Use the guided practices. Relax your body from head to toe. If you notice tension, invite it to release. If you still feel tension, don't worry about it, in time and with consistent practice, your body will relax. Now, gently place a five-pound sandbag on the lower part of abdomen near the bottom of the rib cage.
Please Note: If you have blood pressure irregularities, heart, or lung problems, place the sandbag below the navel, but entirely avoiding the pelvic girdle.
Now, gently let your eyes close and just breathe. Here’s where to let your focus rest—when you inhale feel the sandbag rise up and as you exhale, it drops back down. Inhalation is an active process, but exhalation is passive and it just sort of happens. It’s that letting go-ahh feeling.
Practice sandbag diaphragmatic breathing for about 3-5 minutes. Learning to breathe diaphragmatically is about quality. Remove the sandbag and continue to relax in shavasana for a few more minutes. Gently massage your face, cup your palms to your eyes, and slowly, with awareness, open your eyes to the palms of your hands. Slowly release your palms. Move with awareness, a softeness as you move from the stillness of your interior and re-engage with the world.
Consistent practice, preferably performed at the same time each day (trust me, your whole being will start looking forward to this experience), is key. You may slowly increase weight every two or three weeks and always, always, be comfortable. This is not a no pain no gain process. This is a gentle, re-learning of the precious gift of breathing diaphragmatically. (Keep it under 15 pounds if you do decide to increase the weight. Increasing the weight is not necessary nor is it a goal to achieve.)
Note: If you don't have a sandbag, you can use a book or even placing one hand on the diaphragm and another on the chest will help facilitate learning how to breathe diaphragmatically. This can be a useful approach when traveling.
3. Śavāsana
Lie on a firm flat surface with your head, neck and spine aligned in Śavāsana (corpse pose-see image below). You may cover yourself with a thin blanket or a shawl. If you need, place a thin cushion under your head and a bolster under your knees. Be comfortable.
Place one hand on your abdomen just below the rib cage. You will see the abdomen rise and fall with each breath from the movement of the diaphragm. Contacting and relaxing, expanding. In this reclined posture, there is very little movement in the rib cage.
Allow a gentle awareness to develop about the five qualities of diaphragmatic breathing. If the qualities are not present, there is nothing you need to do. Simply observe how the breath is now and in time, with practice, these qualities will emerge naturally.
So often on the path of yoga, it is not about doing, but about letting go.
Whichever traditional breathing practice we choose, the benefits and qualities are the same.
Benefits of Diaphragmatic Breathing
Provides a gentle massage to internal organs
Supports healthy functioning of the entire body
Creates a deep sense of relaxation and ease
Produces a calm, focused mind
Reduces stress
Bolsters the immune system
Facial expressions soften and open
Voice tone becomes softer and sweeter
Supports healthy blood pressure
Encourages circulation
Naturally removes toxins (ama)
Rejuvenates body tissues
Calms Vata in the nervous system
Enkindles agni (digestive fire) and promotes healthy digestion
5 Qualities of Diaphragmatic Breathing:
Deep. Relax abdominal tension and let the breath flow deeply.
Smooth. The breath flows without jerks.
Even. About the same length of inhalation and exhalation.
Without sound (no forceful exhalations or inhalations.)
Without pause. At the end of an inhalation the abdomen rises and relaxes, expanding and flows into the exhalation. At the end of the exhalation the abdomen falls and flows into inhalation. Inhalation is active, exhalation is passive. Your breath will begin to weave one breath into the next, flowing without pause.
How Many Times A Day Should You Do Diaphragmatic Breathing?
The Cleveland Clinic advises, “At first, practice this exercise for five to 10 minutes about three to four times per day. Gradually increase the amount of time you spend doing this exercise, and perhaps even increase the effort of the exercise by placing a book on your abdomen.”
"From the Ayurvedic and Yoga perspective, in time, with these practices, breathing diaphragmatically becomes how we breathe all the time. Be patient and consistent and in time it will happen."
--Veena, Saumya Ayurveda
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Pranayama and Diaphragmatic Breathing
Let's look at pranayama and diaphragmatic breathing in more detail. Today, the word pranayama is familiar to many – yet its meaning may not be. The word “pran” is the prefix “pra” and the verb root “an.” Think of words such as animate and animation. The prefix “pra” means forth and perfectly. Prana is the animating force. Today, pranayama is widely taught as exercises of the physical breath, and as preparations for meditation, but it is actually a vast exploration of depth and subtleties.
There are many pranayama breathing practices. Some practices are generally balancing, and others specifically affect different doshas (Vata, Pitta, Kapha), tissue layers (dhatus), organs and channels (nadis). It is important to know, with certainty, your current state (Vikruti) and your original constitution (Prakruti) before beginning pranayama breathwork. It's important to know if one has doshas imbalances.
How Do I Know If I Have a Dosha Imbalance?
Peruse these comprehensive and convenient lists of signs and symptoms of dosha imbalances
Peruse these comprehensive and convenient lists of signs and symptoms of dosha imbalances. As we are comprised of all Vata, Pitta, and Kapha, there can be an imbalance in any of the doshas, or a combination of dosha imbalances. Read all three lists and see if anything looks familiar.
Pranayama practices are powerful, and it is imperative to perform the practices that are correct for you, as well as to perform them correctly. (Incorrectly performed pranayama can create disturbances.) The first step, prior to pranayama, is to have diaphragmatic breathing well established – and this typically takes six months to a year of daily practice.
Meditation and Diaphragmatic Breathing
All systems of meditation begin with the observation of the breath. No matter what culture--all begin with the process of observing the flow of the breath. What is so important about breath? This universal focus tells us breath has a connection to our nervous system.
When we are aware of the flow of breath, we stimulate the part of the brain that helps us make choices—versus the flight-fight response. When you observe the breath, and use diaphragmatic breathing, that relaxation system begins to operate under your control, at your will. Who doesn’t want that?
When we use diaphragmatic breathing, some interesting things begin to happen, it switches on the parasympathetic relaxation response--the rest-restore-relax part of the nervous system. This relaxation system requires a choice, (versus flight-fight-freeze that kicks in ever so easily) and we exercise that choice each time we observe the flow of breath. How do we benefit from that? It switches on the relaxation response which lowers blood pressure, slows the heartbeat, increases focus and creates a sense of deep peace.
Through breath awareness, we learn to remain relaxed, focused, less stressed, and overwhelmed. In a word, resilient. Diaphragmatic breathing also helps to reprogram our habits and the judging and shaming voices we may hear in our head. Put simply, breath awareness brings the quiet to the mind that we seek.
One practice that is foundational for everyone, and is always beneficial, is diaphragmatic breathing. Diaphragmatic breathing is one of the simplest yogic practices and one of the most powerful natural remedies.
How so? Diaphragmatic breathing provides a vehicle for managing stress, negative emotions, (remember, “take a deep breath”?), physical pain and it has a positive influence on sleep. As we practice diaphragmatic breathing, it creates a state of balance that leads to relaxation of the nervous system and a sense of safety and comfort internally.
What Is the Difference Between Belly Breathing and Diaphragmatic Breathing?
According to the American Lung Association, “Belly breathing, also called diaphragmatic breathing, is a breathing technique that helps individuals living with asthma or COPD when they experience shortness of breath. This technique helps to slow down your breathing so you can catch your breath and use less energy to breathe.”
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What Influences Our Breathing? What Can We Do About It?
According to Harvard Medical School, "...it (diaphragmatic breathing) works well as a tool to help ease anxiety and garden-variety stress. Regularly engaging in belly breathing (or trying the mini strategy described below) can help you turn a fight-or-flight response into a relaxation response that's beneficial to your health."
There are three influences on breath.
First, is automatic breathing, primarily the need for oxygen. This breathing occurs all the time and we don’t often pay attention to it.
Second, is voluntary breathing such as when we speak. Ever feel tired after a day of meetings or teaching? Our breath is constantly adjusting to speak or to sing.
Third, is the influence of emotions, pain, stress, anxiety, grief, trauma, we feel in our mind and our emotional heart.
These influences create a different breath. That breath may be held, (even working on the computer may change our breath, check in and see for yourself.), it may be jagged and shallow and chest breathing. When we do the guided practices we notice these influences, in fact, we may notice them before and that positively drives us to do the practice.
When we practice diaphragmatic breathing, we notice that we relax and these influences on our breathing begin to soften, to become less intense, and therefore less overwhelming and stressful. Through diaphragmatic breathing, we create a sense of calm within that we can learn to carry with us throughout the day. To learn that practice, use our Two-Minute Meditation daily.
Think of the diaphragmatic breathing practices as training, or more accurately, re-training the mind and nervous system. The breath, prana, links to both to the mind and the body and when that connection is made, and there is an awareness, and then things change in a profound way for us.
Now as you begin to relax, something remarkable and subtle occurs. You will see that you are not the breather. Your body is in Śavāsana, diaphragmatic breathing is present, and you now sense your body breathing.
The fact is that you are the witness of your relaxed, automatic, diaphragmatic breathing. As you allow your body to breathe, the mental effort that was present is relaxing more and more. Simply let the breath flow.
If the five qualities of diaphragmatic breath are not perfectly present all the time, that’s perfectly ok. Any disruptions in breath will naturally resolve in time. Anxiety, grief, sadness, that influence breathing are part of life, but they need not disrupt your breathing.
Diaphragmatic breathing helps you to relax, restore and feel safe and secure when these influences are present in life. Diaphragmatic breathing calms your body, soothes your nervous system, and relaxes the mind.
“All is well here thanks to Veena and my Saumya Ayurveda plan which has been gently integrated in my daily routines. Your 2-Minute Meditation throughout the day helps a lot as well. Being gentle with myself is such a great help.”
-E.A., North Carolina
Saumya Ayurveda's Two-Minute Meditation
How Long Does It Take To Learn Diaphragmatic Breathing?
It takes less than ten minutes for diaphragmatic breathing to create a sense of calm—that is to say, for you to change your inner experience. You can create and carry this calm with you throughout your day and in every circumstance. Your capacity to heal, to be calm and to share your calm with others throughout your day, is present within you. Make use of our Guided Practices daily to change your breathing and change your life.
Be consistent and patient. Enjoy working with diaphragmatic breathing each day. It takes six to twelves months of daily practice to learn to breathe deeply, smoothly, and diaphragmatically. This phase of breathing is called Breath Training. After a good amount of diaphragmatic breath training, the next step is to introduce pranayama breathing practices.
Practicing diaphragmatic breathing ten times a day for two months, with a natural increase in the length of the inhalation and exhalation, is said to create a sense of profound relaxation and restoration that is considered more restful than deep sleep.
Part of what’s happening with diaphragmatic breathing is the shift from flight-fight syndrome to the nervous system becoming calm again, feeling safe, secure, and stable. Those close to you may comment that your face even glows. You've become radiant from the inside out.
There is a saying, "The mind is more in the body, than the body is in the mind." The Saumya 3 step meditation process shifts us from fight-flight-freeze mode, to rest-restore-relax mode. Give it a try for forty days and observe the changes. The more grounded and relaxed we are, the smoother life flows.
"The breath is the connection between the mind and body, so by training the breath, we become calm, focused, and grounded, we slow down the aging process by decreasing stress. These practices are so simple and easy to have as part of our daily life. We actually feel and look younger."
- Veena, Saumya Ayurveda
1. Learn Diaphragmatic Breathing and Change Your Life. When we re-learn to breath diaphragmatically, we move from the flight-fight-freeze mode, to rest, restore, relaxation mode from where we want and need to live.
2. Daily Guided Practices: 11 minutes in the morning and in the evening, as anchors of your daily Ayurveda routine.
3. Ayurveda Daily Routines: Ayurvedic Morning Routine | 6 Rituals for a Calm and Centered Day
"Choose a couple of practices from the routines that provide you with the greatest support. Perform them while applying our two minute meditation technique and your mundane tasks, just transformed into a mellifluous meditation. This is meditation applied to daily life." - Veena, Saumya Ayurveda
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Explore More: Ayurveda Breathwork Pranayama
Once you have established diaphragmatic breathing, it's time to explore nadi shodhana, or alternate nostril breathing.
Nadi Shodhana: Alternate Nostril Breathing Guide
This pranayama practice is suitable for most everyone and balances Vata, Pitta, and Kapha. It is a practice that is particularly helpful in relieving anxiety. It reduces emotional reactivity. It is a n effective way to quickly reach a state of profound mental and physical stillness.
Nadi Shodhana: Alternate Nostril Breathing Guide, click here.
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Breathing diaphragmatically decreases the breath rate and increases a sense of calm and focus. It’s foundational to all other pranayama, breathwork practices. First, we learn to breathe diaphragmatically, then we can be guided onto other breathwork practices and derive benefits.
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Veena is a Certified Ayurvedic Practitioner and meditation teacher, and monk.
She is President Emeritus and teaching faculty of the Meditation Center.
Veena fell in love with the traditional medicine used in her family’s home, learning herbal remedies at her grandmother's knee.
These childhood experiences were the seeds of a lifelong passion. For over 30 years, Veena has dedicated her life to the world’s oldest healing system: Ayurveda.
She draws on this ancient wisdom to help others find their compass to a healthy life – and support those left wanting by Western medicine.
An experienced Certified Ayurvedic Practitioner, Veena’s deep, intuitive knowledge of Ayurveda empowers her clients to reclaim their fullest, most vibrant lives –mentally, physically, and spiritually. Veena individualizes treatment plans to each person, rather than offering a one-size-fits-all approach, so it fits your life and becomes woven in your lifestyle, naturally.