A quick and easy way to lower anxiety

Hi, I'm Dr. Don Wood of the Inspire Performance Institute. During these times, we're looking for ways to try to help reduce stress. So what I'm going to do is I'm going to give you a little technique that you can sort of practice. And you want to do this several times. You can do it a number of times during the day. The key is to basically get your more oxygen into your system that helps relax. It actually stimulates the ventral side of the vagus nerve, which is going to prompt relaxation. So this technique, I call it 5, 6, 7. What you want to do is it's going to be five breaths, five seconds breathing in, six seconds holding, and seven seconds releasing. So that's the five, six, seven. So how it starts is you don't actually start by first taking a breath in. I want you to release all the air first. So you push out whatever is in your lungs. So it's a.

And then once you've done that, then you're going to breathe in through your nose for five seconds, like.

And then hold that breath for a count of six. So when you're breathing in, you want to count like 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. Then hold for 1, 2, 3, 4,. 5, 5, 6. And then when you release, I want you to release through your lips, but make a whooshing sound like.

Now if you find that the 5, 6, 7 is too much, then cut it down to 4, 5, 6. Write whatever you can. The key is to start building up your lung capacity. Get more in there. You can even extend it to 6, 7, 8. The idea is when you start breathing like that, you. You stimulate the vagus nerve, the relaxation side, the ventral side of the vagus nerve, which then starts to calm everything down. You want to do that four times in a row. So the five, six, seven. Do it four times and then practice it periodically. You can do it. It really helps you go to sleep as well. So you can do it before you go to sleep and practice it. The more you practice it, the more you're going to train your system to stay relaxed. Hope this is helpful and good luck. Take care.