The only intervention they had them do was slow down their breathing and
their symptoms were rapidly reduced by a profound level.
Even within a year later, after four weeks of this training.
So, this is what happens when the body comes into a state of homeostasis,
where it's able to do what it's supposed to do.
Just look at the top 20 maladies affecting the mass population right now.
Metabolic problems, diabetes, anxiety issues, hypertension,
I mean I can keep going, gut problems, gird, anxiety, panic, asthma...
They're all related to the ways in which you breathe.
That's not to say that all of these conditions are caused by improper breathing,
but the reason why we have them has been a contributor to poor breathing,
especially in sleep apnea, which we know can cause
metabolic problems like diabetes, which to me just completely blew my mind.
But if you think about breathing as the anchor to all of the different systems to the body,
especially inflammation, and if you think that you're doing
that improperly 25,000 times a day, your body is gonna compensate,
cause we're really good at doing that. You're gonna stay alive, but you're not
gonna stay healthy. And that's exactly
what's happened to us right now. I mean just sleep apnea and snoring alone,
people think it's cute that there's an infant snoring or that,
"ah, my husband's snoring, I gotta sleep on the couch!"
This is someone who's struggling to breathe during a third of his or her life.
If you don't think that's gonna have a downstream effect on their health, you're crazy.
And so much science is now coming out showing that.
Even though we've known it for 50 years. You'd be hard-pressed to find a researcher
who says that's not
gonna affect your health in some big ways. You get a book on Pranayama, there's 300 different
ways of breathing, all of these crazy names, like, "where do I start?"
Just try to focus on the umbrella items here. You're gonna want to breathe slowly.
You're gonna want to breathe through your nose. You're gonna want to breathe less.
Many of us are gonna want to breathe less to get more.
And you're gonna want to chew your food, that's a whole other thing, because
that can help open up your airway. Patrick McKeown, pretty well-known
breathing therapist, told me this which totally blew my mind.
He found studies where people who breathe at a rate of about 20 breaths a minute,
so the average what's considered normal is 12-18 breaths a minute,
so 20 breaths a minute is maybe even on the low end for populations with anxiety and asthma.
All they’re doing is bringing air here and getting it out.
That means they can only use 50% of that air. Because they're filling up their throats,
they're filling up their mouths, they're filling up the bronchus,
all of these areas can't participate in gas exchange.
So, they're just wasting air. Bringing it in, bringing it out.
Only 50% at that rate when you're taking it 6l a minute.
If you slow that down to 12 breaths per minute, you're taking in 70%.
That's how much more efficient you are. 20% difference, incredible!
If you breathe at a rate of 6 breaths per minute, you have an 85% efficiency in your breathing.
So, that's how much more oxygen you're gonna be able to get,
which means you can breathe less while getting more oxygen.
Which again, that's the key whether or not you're sitting on a couch and wanna recover,
or whether or not you're really working out, because if you're breathing in lines with your
metabolic needs, that means you're gonna have
that much more energy to go even further. If your heart rate is lower at states
of zone 3, zone 4 or whatever, then you can push your heart rate,
even more, go further and farther. I say 5.5 cause it's easy to remember.
5.5 inhale, 5.5 exhale, 5.5 breaths a minute, that's how it all works out.
So, when we do this, we are allowing just the right amount of oxygen
to come in at just the right amount of time, with least effort. So, that's why the heart
rate will slow down, that's why circulation will increase.
And our bodies want this. To constantly be pushing our bodies,
especially in states of recovery is a bad idea. So, I think that that general gauge,
and we've seen this in studies where they've taught people with panic and asthma
who traditionally breathe way too much, I'm talking off the charts, 20 breaths a minute,
through the mouth, the only intervention they had them do was
slow down their breathing and their symptoms were rapidly
reduced by a profound level. Even within a year later,
after four weeks of this training. So, this is what happens when the body
comes into a state of homeostasis, where it's able to do what it's supposed to do.