This was one of the nominees for the 2021 Royal Society Science Book Prize. By a nice coincidence I happened to open it a few days after I started on E01 of Chris Hemsworth’s Limitless, which briefly recommended breathing techniques to help deal with stress.
Anyway, this book — Nestor, J. (2020). Breath: The new science of a lost art. Penguin — was an eye-opener in that I never understood that breath was THAT important. As with most folks I thought breathing was simply about O2 in and CO2 out, that’s it.
Sure I’ve seen the odd kungfu movie where the monks or masters displayed stellar breathing and of course who hasn’t watched Incredible Hulk (2008) where a martial artist Rickson Gracie taught Bruce Banner how to breathe as a means of controlling his anger. But I never imagined, qua Nestor, that I have been breathing “wrongly” and “poorly” my whole life(!).
In this sense, Nestor’s book isn’t simply the literary analog of a TED Talk which shares ‘profound’ information (eg, “In a single breath, more molecules of air will pass through your nose than all the grains of sand on all the world’s beaches — trillions and trillions of them.” p. 43) it’s also very practical. Ok, so TLDR, here are some insights which were entirely new to me (as at, uh, last week):
1. Breathing is best done via the NOSE, not the mouth
The nose has a lot of “equipment” (turbinates, nasal erectile tissues, etc.) which help to both extract more oxygen per breath and release nitric oxide which impacts everything from immunity, to weight, circulation, and mood to sexual function.
Also, nose-breathing fights sleep apneas and snoring (which is a, uh, bad thing it seems).
Nestor discusses some research done with native tribes from Missouri whose kids are taught how to breathe through the nose from young — and they all look like supermodels haha. The Native Americans attribute these qualities to breath; “breath inhaled through the nose kept the body strong, made the face beautiful, and prevented disease.” (p.45)
Note: As I scan thru the book, I find many references to exhaling thru the mouth. So my guess is that nose-breathing is focused more on inhalation.
2. EXHALING is more important than inhaling
In the Hemsworth series, the breath guru taught him the “box-breathing” method. You can google it but the thing which stood out for me (even before I read the book) was Hemsworth was asked to exhalate longer than he inhaled.
What was up with that? The TV series didn’t explain but the book does. Something to do with how exhalation is the process whereby oxygen is transported to the rest of your body i.e. it is exhalation which constitutes the ‘nurturing’ or ‘building’ part of breathing. Inhalation is simply the taking in of the O2 cells.
This chapter also talks about Carl Stough, a choir conductor who (miraculously?) healed hundreds of people just by teaching them how to breath/exhale properly.
Apparently, it we can train our diaphragm to rise and fall in greater capacity, it does wonders.
“A typical adult engages as little as 10% of the range of the diaphragm when breathing, which overburdens the heart, elevates blood pressure, and causes a rash of circulatory problems. Extending those breaths to 50 to 70% of the diaphragm’s capacity will ease cardiovascular stress and allow the body to work more efficiently. For this reason, the diaphragm is sometimes referred to as “the SECOND HEART,” because it not only beats to its own rhythm but also affects the rate and strength of the heartbeat” (p.54)
This is also what Gracie taught Bruce Banner. Check out the auto-biography Gracie, R., & Maguire, P. (2021). Breathe: A life in flow. Dey Street Books (quite a fun read in itself, lots of wild stories of Gracie’s life and fights in Rio De Janeiro). From p.63-ish:
“These breathing techniques would become especially important in the coming years, because they made it much easier for me to gauge and control fear, adrenaline, panic, and claustrophobia. For example, if I want to control my adrenaline when I’m nervous, I breathe at a slower pace until I get my emotions under control. If I want to increase my pace, I don’t use my mind to tell my body to speed up; I just breathe deeper and faster. During high exertion, exhaling becomes more important than inhaling. To enjoy a good deep breath, you must consciously empty your lungs.”
Put simply, powerful breathing requires intentional and controlled breathing through the belly and the diaphragm. We must treat this ‘second heart’ the way a body-builder treats his muscles; it must be nurtured, trained and utilized well.
Note: This past year I’ve had (minor) chest tightness which has led to do a few ECGs’ tests and also caused me to inhale sharply very often (esp during lectures). It’s simply never occurred to me to focus more on my exhaling (which, thankfully, I now do). The results so far have been helpful not only to curb my chest irritations but also calm my nerves as a care-giver, as exhalation also also activates our parasympathetic nervous system (i.e. biospeak for the chillax function in our system).
3. SLOW breathing is good breathing
This principle combines with the next one in that it prioritizes CO2 over O2. Yes, fancy that.
I didn’t know that CO2 was important for providing the equilibrium which ensures sufficient amounts of O2 (more below), and also to dilate blood vessels so more O2-rich blood can flow. So, whilst our body doesn’t “use” CO2 the way it uses O2, it 100% “needs” CO2 just as urgently.
Fast and panicky kinds of breathing purges CO2 which in turn leads to poorer blood flow to our organs, muscles, tissues, etc.
Note: ‘Soft’ breathing is also important because if you breathe too aggressively you risk damaging alveoli and tissues — we’re not steam engines.
So how slow is slow enough?
“5.5-second inhales followed by 5.5-second exhales, which works out almost exactly to 5.5 breaths a minute. This was the same pattern of the rosary.” (p.69)
Nestor also makes a (breath-taking?) point about how breathing slow corresponds to many forms of prayer among the world religions.
“Japanese, African, Hawaiian, Native American, Buddhist, Taoist, Christian — these cultures and religions all had somehow developed the same prayer techniques, requiring the same breathing patterns (all requiring about 5.5 to 6 seconds to inhale and exhale). And they all likely benefited from the same calming effect.” (p.69)
Whoah. So those Shaolin monks in old Jackie Chan movies were on to something after all eh?
4. Breathing LESS can help!
This was quite a shocker, esp to someone like me who — over the past 2 or 3 years — had developed the habit of GULPING in tons of air (during workouts, after over-eating etc). But Nestor talks about modern culture as a culture of over-breathers and how we need the “respiratory equivalent of fasting” (p.72).
Alright, sure, but what did all this mean?
Nestor talks about how breathing less INCREASES the amount of CO2 in our blood and this is necessary because too little CO2 in our body means that O2 molecules are unable to dislodge and get to our vital internal body parts.
The analogy used in the book is that CO2 is like the divorce lawyer which helps separate O2 molecules from the hemoglobin molecules; if there are too FEW lawyers then, alas, there will be fewer O2 released unto our bodily cells.
This principle — that more CO2 equates to greater health — aligns well with the 3rd principle that exhalation is key because when we inhale less and exhale more that raises CO2 levels which in turn gets more O2 circulating through our insides.
Another argument for breathing less (and thus raising CO2 levels) is that CO2 is needed to maintain a certain level of acidity in our bodies. “When we breathe too much, we expel too much carbon dioxide, and our blood pH rises to become more alkaline; when we breathe slower and hold in more carbon dioxide, pH lowers and blood becomes more acidic. Almost all cellular functions in the body take place at a blood pH of 7.4, our sweet spot between alkaline and acid.” (p.82)
All the above is available in the first section of the book, what I consider the more practical portion.
In the second section Nestor discusses some ‘advanced’ breathing methods. These include breathing crazy-hard to induce quasi-psychedelic life-changing experiences and/or produce temporary stress so your body can handle stress in the future and inhaling carbon-dioxide to simulate panic. Techniques here incl the Tibetan approach known as Tummo, the Wim Hof method, hypoventilation, pranayama and numerous other approaches.
I gotta say I found this second section to read more like some National Geographic article. On one hand, the writing sounds credible, on the other stops short of fully validated science.
Finally, in case anyone’s tempted to suggest that breathing is a super miracle cure for everything, Nestor throws some realism in.
“Breathing fast, slow, or not at all can’t make an embolism go away. Breathing through the nose with a big exhale can’t reverse the onset of neuromuscular genetic diseases. No breathing can heal stage IV cancer.” (p.146)
Still, I think everyone can benefit at least a little by reflecting on how we’re breathing. Listen to the man himself on how to improve:
