A five-minute guided breathwork session that cycles through deep inhales, breath holds, and full-body squeezes to release chronic tension. The practice activates your sympathetic nervous system to surface stress, then balances it with the parasympathetic response during exhales. Practice seated in a safe place, not while driving or swimming.
Alright, welcome all of you beautiful breathing people to another guided breathwork session. So with the breath, there are a few different ways to feel less stressed, less anxious. One of them is extending our exhales focusing on down-regulating breathing. And the other is to consciously build up this stress that we've been holding onto in order for it to be released. So in this session, we're gonna be practicing the latter. So we'll take 3 deep breaths in through the nose filling your entire being relaxed exhale out of mouth. And then after 3 of these breaths, we're going to take the biggest breath possible so we'll inhale— will inhale— Inhale. We'll inhale and we'll hold our breath at the top and we'll squeeze your entire body as hard as you can for about 10 seconds. And then we'll release, we'll exhale, and we'll hold at the bottom for a few seconds. And then we'll repeat that for about 5 minutes. So a lot of us walk around in our day-to-day life with chronic stress. We're so used to it that we don't even realize that we're stressed, that our body is holding on to a lot of tension. So this exercise, the inhale hold and the squeeze, is going to activate the sympathetic nervous system. This is going to bring up the tension and stress that we're holding on to. And then we balance that out by exhaling, relaxing, releasing, and hold. So it's a combination of ancient breathing, pranayama, mixed in with modern-day progressive muscle relaxation, or PMR. So find your way to a comfortable seated position. And please, let's all use our brain here. Don't do this while driving or in the water or anywhere dangerous. Do it in the comfort of your own home, or even better, out in beautiful nature like me. Beautiful. So let's start with that first inhale in 3, 2, 1. Ahh. Inhale. Inhale, fill the belly up to the heart. Relax, exhale. Breathe a bit deeper into the belly, to the ribs, to the heart. Let it go. Now take an inhale. Another one, another one until you're completely full. Hold and squeeze your entire body. Squeeze your pelvic floor muscles, your abdominals. Relax, exhale. And hold. Fully relax. Let's go into round number 2. Inhaling. Let it go. Full breath in. Let it go. One more full breath. Alright, now we're gonna take a big inhale all the way in. Another sip, another sip. Holding your breath, squeezing your fists, your face, your pelvic floor muscles, your abdominals. And now exhale with a sigh. Relax. Round number 3. In 3, 2, 1. And now, now an inhale as big as you can. Take a little more and a little more. Hold, squeeze everything as hard as you can. Relax and exhale. Holding your breath, feeling the shift. Alright, final round. 3, 2, 1. In and out. In and out. Alright, full breath in. Take more in. Another breath. Hold. Squeeze your pelvic floor muscles. Pull your abdominal muscles in. Squeeze your face, your shoulders, everything. And now exhale. Holding your breath. Feeling this release of tension. Inhaling through the nose, another sip, bigger breath, and hold. One last Last hold. And now exhale with the sigh. Yeah. Allow your breathing to return to in and out of the nose. Staying in this moment. Stay with whatever you're feeling. Much love to all of you. Remember to breathe. Remember to laugh. Peace.
