Dr. Don WoodResolving Your Trauma-Based Challenges So You Can Unlock Peak Performance

Hack 02: Breathing Technique To Calm Down Your Nervous System

5 Dec 2025 · 0 min

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Dr. Don Wood teaches a breathing pattern: exhale fully, then inhale through your nose for five seconds, hold for six, exhale for seven. Do it three to five times to activate your parasympathetic nervous system and boost nitric oxide.

Questions this video answers

Inhale through the nose for 5 seconds, hold for 6 seconds, exhale through the nose for 7 seconds.

Do the 5-6-7 cycle anywhere from three to five times.

Yes — fully exhale all air from your lungs first so current air doesn't interfere with new intake.

So here's a hack for breathing. So this is to calm down your nervous system. So when you find yourself getting a little frustrated, a little anxious, here's a quick thing to do. Number one, you want to exhale all the air in your lungs first. The reason why that's important is you don't want any of the current oxygen and current air that's in your lungs to be interfering with what's new coming in. So what you do is you go.
Breathe it all out and then breathe in through your nose for five seconds. So it's.
Counted off. One, two, three, four, five. Then hold that breath for one, two, three, four, Five, six. And then exhale through your nose for 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7. Do that anywhere from three to five times. What that does is it activates your parasympathetic nervous system. When you breathe through your nose, you're actually bringing in more nitrous oxide, which is going to be beneficial in calming the nervous system down. So breathe in through your nose for five, hold for six, breathe out for seven, and do that anywhere between three to five times, and you'll feel the difference. The system will calm down. Your parasympathetic system is designed to calm you down. And there it is.