Improve your health...one breath at a time

Have you ever wondered what the most powerful intervention is for your health? Well, I've been seeking that for many, many years. And over my career I've discovered so many things that can be helpful in helping somebody achieve better health. Whether it's their metabolic health, whether it's energy, whether it's weight loss, whether it's balancing blood sugars or improving sleep. I've been searching far and wide and the last few years have led me to the zenith of both simplicity and sophistication. And that is the breath. Now, breathing is something that's pretty easy for us to ignore. It's something that we take for granted because we've been doing it, frankly our entire lives. It's one of those things where the answer to our health situation is literally right under our nose. And. And as someone who is always looking for simple, fast, effective and safe solutions, I'm so grateful that I've come across the breath. Now, my journey started in breathing many years ago when I was able to experience my first transformative breathwork session. And I actually took a WIM HOF training and it was truly enlightening. I was able to hold my breath for about three and a half minutes. And after that I was able to jump in a ice cold pool of water and stay there for 90 seconds and then completely dry myself off using my body and my breath to warm up my body to evaporate all the water off of me. Then I've experienced transformational breathwork ceremonies and I've also experienced how our facial structure is impacted by the way we breathe. When my son went to the dentist and and three out of four dentists wanted to pull his teeth, it came right around the same time that I learned about the powerful work from one of my favorite authors and human beings, James Nestor. He wrote a book called Breath. And this book literally changed my life because it helped me understand the way we breathe not only affects our facial structure, it affects our dental health, it affects our physiology internally, it impacts our nervous system, it affects our sleep, it affects how we digest, it affects how we move our lymphatics, it affects how we support our cardiovascular system. It literally is connected to virtually every single thing that you can think of. And it's one of those things that is really simple to change. And when you make the changes, you notice the benefits almost immediately. Now, there's literally no amount of time that I could speak about this topic that would do it justice. However, I have recorded several videos, keynotes, and I have several tools that I share with my clients. And today, what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna give you some of the highlights, and then I'll point you to the resources that you can access. So first, one of the ways that we can use breath is to help us manage our stress better. Slowing down our breath, breathing in and out through our nose, with our tongue gently placed at the roof of our mouth. Six seconds in, six seconds out, is what we call coherence breathing. This form of breathing will almost instantaneously calm you down. An interesting fact is that the average person over breathes, and that leads to excess calorie expenditure. It zaps our energy, and it actually is less effective. Breathing less and more intentionally is actually better for our body. The other thing that breathing correctly will do is it will improve your focus and clarity. So when I'm trying to do focused work, one of the first things I tap into and pay attention to is how am I breathing? Because if I'm breathing in a calm, gentle way intentionally, that's gonna set the stage in my nervous system for me to be focused and have clarity. But if I'm breathing with my mouth open, short, shallow breaths, I'm telling my nervous system that I'm under stress, and it's having the exact opposite effect of what I'm trying to do. My mind is going to be anxious and I'm going to be scattered and not able to focus. The way we breathe while we sleep also impacts the quality of our rest. For example, the upper limit of your metabolic system and your metabolic health and recovery is how you breathe while you're sleeping. As a recovering snorer, somebody who's corrected this with some snoring exercises, positioning, mouth taping, et cetera, I can tell you that I have way more energy when I wake up. I wake up way more refreshed, and my clients report the same thing. So how we breathe while we sleep is crucial and vital to our overall health. This is one of the reasons I created a Stop Snoring Guide. I show people how to stop snoring in seven days or less by doing specific swallowing exercises, tongue exercises, and using things like mouth tape and nasal strips and nasal oils and rinses to help them open up the airways. When we're breathing correctly, especially through our nose, we perfect the air versus breathing through our mouth. About 66% of people breathe with their mouth open at night, which means we're creating the stage for frequent urination while we sleep. We're creating the stage for reduced healing capacity while we sleep. We're setting the stage for cavities. In fact, mouth breathing is the number one cause of cavities because it dries out our saliva, changes the PH in our mouth, and creates dysfunction. The other thing that happens when we breathe through our mouth is we reduce the amount of nitric oxide that's being produced. And nitric oxide is one of our most important signaling molecules, because one of the things that it does is, is it helps us kill viruses and bacteria on contact. It dilates our blood vessels, thus lowering blood pressure, and it helps increase microcirculation. So microcirculation is important for sexual health. It's also important for neurological and brain health as well. Now, another thing that you may not necessarily think about when you think about breathing is detoxification. So our lungs are one of our primary detoxification organs. We remove CO2 from our lungs. Interestingly enough, the breath that we breathe out is heavier than the breath that we breathe in, because CO2 is a heavier molecule than oxygen. So for every 10 pounds of body weight that we lose, 8.4 of those are actually through the lungs. Kind of an interesting fact when you think about it. The other 1.6, in case you're wondering, is removed through the body through liquid. So it could be sweat, it could be urine, and some of it's obviously going to be removed in the feces. So the byproduct of metabolism is CO2 and water. So when you think about it, our lungs play such a crucial role in our metabolic function, they also play an important role in detoxification, because here's why. When we breathe, especially when we breathe correctly, our diaphragm moves up and down with each breath. The diaphragm is referred to as the second heart. It's assisting our heart with every breath to pump more blood. What also happens is every time our diaphragm moves up and down, it's also gently massaging the abdomen. It's acting like a piston, moving up and down, creating pressure in the abdomen. And the biggest lymph nodes in our body are underneath our diaphragm, thus moving the lymph. So not only are we removing waste products with every breath that we exhale, we're also moving waste throughout the body, enhancing digestive function, enhancing detoxification, enhancing liver and lymphatic stagnation, or removing that stagnant factor and moving things around as we should. Disease starts when there's stagnation. So movement is one of the key essentials for life. You know, we take about 23,000 breaths a day for most people. The majority of those breaths are unintentional or unconscious, as they were for me for many, many years. But when I discover the power of breathing, I quickly realized how powerful this tool is in helping us move and shift our health in the right direction. Now, like I said, I could talk for hours and I still wouldn't be doing this topic justice. So one of the things that I suggest that you do is grab a copy of James's book. It's one of my favorite books of all time. I also suggest grabbing some mouth tape so you can tape your mouth at night. And this will keep your mouth in a nice closed position. You're not trying to seal your mouth. What you're trying to do is just gently place a piece of tape like this over your lips like that. And it looks silly while I'm doing this, but that's all you need. And that's going to keep your mouth in a closed position. Another thing I suggest is something called nasia oil. And nasia oil acts as a lubricant for your sinuses, so it makes it easier for you to breathe in and out through your nose. It also cleanses your sinuses and creates a great environment in them for them to be healthy. Lastly, what I recommend is some nasal strips. Now, there's off brand and brand name nasal strips that you can get, and what they're going to help you do is open up your nostrils. So it just makes it easier for you to breathe. There's less resistance which allows you to breathe more comfortably at night. Now, we talked about a lot of things in this video, but again, I'm just simply scratching the surface. So I'll point you to some additional tools that I have, including my notes from James Nestor's retreat that I went on a Stop Snoring guide. And I've also got some additional notes and breathing signatures that you can do to shift your physiology. So literally, when you learn how to breathe correctly and you override your breath, you can shift your body into the appropriate state that you want to be in. So if you want to have more energy so you can be athletic, there's a breath for that. If you want to calm down and be focused, there's a breath for that. If you want to fall asleep faster, there's a breath for that. If you want to feel a sense of relief, there's a breath for that. We can use our breath to change our physiology, our neurobiology, our chemistry, and of course our nervous system uses our breath in certain situations to do that automatically for us. Without us even realizing it. So Breath is my favorite and most powerful tool. It's something that I continue to learn more and more about. And I'm grateful that I'm able to bring this to you because I know that you're going to love this information. So go ahead, grab some of those additional tools and resources, and here's to your continued health and happiness. I'll talk to you soon. Bye for now.