At least for me, when I think of shounen, I think of, for lack of a better phrase, the
rule of cool.
In uncomplicated terms, essentially, the rule of cool states that the audience is willing
to suspend disbelief, if and only if, the end result is… just plain awesome.
Why I connect this to shounen is because the genre, (and yes, I know it’s not a real genre)
is associated with power-ups, and along with power-ups come
power systems.
I’m a little embarrassed to admit it, but as a young lad, I did one day dream of being
able to “go Super-Saiyan,” whatever that means.
But that’s the thing with a lot of these power-systems, they’re obviously fantastical.
You cannot find a Gum-Gum fruit out in the wild, there is no Nen for you to manipulate,
and contrary to what young me thought, you can’t draw out your ki just by trying real
hard.
But you know what you can do?
You can breathe.
Which is why Demon Slayer’s power-system made me curious.
Here was this thing that anyone can do, in fact, everyone does do, most often unconsciously,
and yet characters in Kimetsu no Yaiba were using it to perform great feats—slicing
boulders in half, displaying mastery of the elements, and rapidly healing wounds.
The question is, are any of these things actually possible?
Kind of!
For example, let’s start with the elements thing.
You will not be surprised to hear that you cannot literally conjure water or fire by
breathing differently.
But well, neither can the Demon Slayer characters!
An omake page from the author themselves states outright that this isn’t happening.
“Note: Swordsmen don’t actually unleash water attacks.
People who see this just think they see and feel it.
When we think about it, there is no way ordinary humans can create water or butterflies and
so on just by swinging a sword.”
This makes sense, Tanjiro, his enemies, and their surroundings never seem drenched despite
throwing water everywhere.
Alright, so if the claim isn’t that breathing can lead one to generate water, and it’s
just that they’re so skillful that it seems like that’s the case, I guess the actual
question is—can breathing improve physicality and swordsmanship?
The answer is yes.
Scientists have long been interested in the science of breathing, and through experiments
and case studies, have made some, sometimes unintuitive, discoveries.
Dr. John Doulliard ran an experiment with a number of cyclists, and the only variable
he changed was whether or not they breathed through their noses or from their mouths.
But the results from this one small change were drastic.
The athletes somehow needed to breathe at a considerably less rapid pace from their
noses compared to their mouths, with one cyclist experiencing a 70% reduction.
Their heart rates remained the same, but when they scored their perceived exertion, it dropped
from a whopping 10 when mouth-breathing, to a comfortable 4.
There are other ways small changes in breathing technique can improve athletic performance.
If you’ve ever weight-lifted, or watched weight-lifters, you are familiar with this
motion.
It almost looks like they’re trying to eat the air!
Rather than having a voracious appetite for empty atmosphere, what they’re doing is
performing the valsalva maneuver.
To do so, you take a big breath deep into your abdomen, making sure to engage your diaphragm.
And then you simply hold it during the concentric, or exertion, phase of the exercise, making
sure to flex your core in the process.
It seems like a small thing, but the valsalva maneuver not only increases performance, by
increasing intra abdominal pressure your spine straightens, you give yourself a little safety
buffer, and your heart doesn’t work as hard.
These are only a couple of examples, but considering all of the breathing training Demon Slayers
go through, I have no problem believing focusing on their breaths could *possibly* lead to
the insane control and acrobatics we see in the show.
But, as an aside, there *might* be merit to the “control of the elements” thing after
all.
One breathing technique claims to give mastery over the cold.
Named “Tummo,” or “Inner Fire Meditation,” the technique originated from Tibetan monks.
But the man who popularized it in the west is named Wim Hof.
Nicknamed “The Iceman,” he’s set multiple world records involving withstanding the cold,
including farthest swum under ice and longest direct, full-body prolonged contact with ice.
He credits all of this to breathing.
The science is mixed on this, but the results themselves are compelling enough.
One explanation is that through breathing, one can reverse the arrow of causality so
to speak.
The common phrase “fight or flight” refers to the activation of the sympathetic nervous
system.
Your body senses danger is here, so your heart rate increases, your pupils and blood vessels
dilate, and your liver begins to breakdown glycogen for easy energy.
All of this is outside of our control.
But there is one thing that happens during a sympathetic response that *is* in our control.
You breathe faster.
Tummo practitioners attempt to access the sympathetic nervous system, which normally
is beyond our control, through breathing.
The belief is that it triggers nerves in our lungs and elsewhere that activate the sympathetic
system, and puts our body into overdrive.
Monks used this technique to weather through freezing temperatures up in the mountains—when
asked to meditate while connected to temperature probes, the temperature in their extremities
rose as much as 17 degrees Fahrenheit, and stayed there.
What advocates for Tummo breathing claim is this—teaching yourself to relax is all well
and good, but moments of stress can be just as beneficial.
By purposefully driving yourself into a state of stress, triggering “fight or flight”,
you teach yourself that it’s all under your control.
You can harness the power of fire.
Okay, so breathing can have an effect on physical activity.
That might make logical sense, after all, other than food, breathing is a main source
of energy.
But, several times in Demon Slayer, gruesome wounds, sometimes even seemingly fatal ones,
are magically healed through what seems to be simple concentration.
Surely you can’t just take a deep breath and “direct” it towards injuries and expect
them to be fine and dandy… right?
In fact, breathing can have massive influence on the immune system.
Remember that guy, Wim Hof?
Skeptical of his claims, some researchers brought him into their lab, and they injected
him with endotoxin from E. coli, you know, that bacteria that made them recall all the
romaine lettuce?
After being injected, they expected Hof to experience vomiting, headache, fever, and
other flu-like symptoms.
Instead, after some heavy breathing, he showed no symptoms and simply walked off.
Years after, they brought him in again to train a dozen random volunteers he’d never
met, and injected *them* with endotoxin.
It was the same result.
By tapping into the stress response, Hof (supposedly) was able to flood his bloodstream with various
remedies—endorphins, opioids, adrenaline, all self-produced and ready to tackle the
threat.
However, one doesn’t have to provoke a stress response to accelerate healing.
The opposite has been shown to produce results that are just as promising.
Towards the end of Kimetsu no Yaiba, Tanjiro goes through a bit of a final training arc.
While recovering from his injuries, he is informed that he must also master Total Concentration
Breathing, specifically learning how to maintain the state constantly, all day, and all night.
They measure his progress through gourds, starting with little mini ones, up into mammoth
gourds fit for a giant.
What bursting a gourd measures is Tanjiro’s lung capacity.
And lung capacity has been directly linked to good health.
The fact of the matter is, many of us today don’t use our lungs to their fullest potential.
And like fruit that doesn’t get picked, unused functions wither away and eventually
become lost.
Carl Stough, a choir conductor, sought to address this sad turn of events.
He first started with teaching his students how to properly exhale, and slowly built up
their lung capacities.
His work was so notable that hospital administrators in New Jersey recruited him to see if he could
help their patients.
He poked and prodded, massaging various areas of their chest and neck, trying to help develop
a renewed mind-body connection that had withered over time.
All the while paradoxically trying to get emphysema patients to breathe deeper and deeper.
But surprisingly enough, he succeeded.
Those who were bed-ridden got up and were able to walk for the first time in ages.
Some patients stopped requiring supplemental oxygen.
Stough had retrained them how to use the full range of motion of their diaphragms to breathe
deeply and properly, and as a result rescued some pulmonary function.
Moving from emphysema patients, Stough began to teach runners these same techniques, culminating
into the 1968 Olympics where the U.S. running team would win medal after medal and set record
after record.
What Tanjiro learns is deeply rooted in practice, and it’s no wonder the power Hashiras can
demonstrate considering they don’t just practice this breathing technique in battle
like he once did.
It’s in the name, Total Concentration Breathing — Constant.
They always exist in a state of the utmost physical ability—and they do it effortlessly.
There’s a final component to breathing that I haven’t mentioned yet, but is also immensely
important to Tanjiro’s character-arc.
And that is the component of spirituality.
Breathing has been the focus of some Eastern religions for quite some time, and is the
most common form of meditation.
If you ever wanted to start, the usual instruction is to find a nice quiet place, sit down, and
focus on your breath.
However, calmly focusing on your breath is by no means the only form of meditation.
There is loving-kindness meditation, wherein you radiate “metta” or positive energy
out into the world.
And, there’s also styles of meditation utilizing breath that are anything but calm, like Tummo,
but also Holotrophic Breathwork.
Holotrophic Breathwork was created by a psychiatrist called Stanislav Grof.
He was one of the first participants in a clinical trial for a new exciting drug—one
that would shortly be banned by the US in the 1960s.
It was LSD.
Chasing the experience he received from LSD, Grof and his wife developed a breathing technique
to try to induce the same sort of hallucinations and euphoria they got from the drug.
It involved lying on the floor in a dark room, with noxious loud music blaring, and breathing
as hard as possible for upwards of three hours.
Eventually one reaches a breaking point, and the mind can no longer take all of the stress.
People who undergo this often describe spiritual awakenings, mystical visions, and out of body
experiences.
Some have taken to calling it a journey through “the dark night of the soul.”
Much like how contrary to popular belief, a defibrillator is designed to *stop* the
heart, to reset it back into a working rhythm, Holotrophic Breathwork attempts to reset the
mind—forcing the practitioner into death and rebirth.
It has helped many, including those who suffer from mental illness like schizophrenia and
depression.
All of this, at least to me, seems to perfectly describe what Tanjiro goes through while training
with Urokodaki.
At this point, his mind and body have been pushed to the breaking point.
He’s failed to cut the boulder for 6 months now, the Final Selection and the fate of Nezuko
looming over him.
It is where he is at his most depleted, ready to give into his exhaustion and quit, that
he has his mysterious experience with Sabito and Makomo.
Tanjiro’s journey through the dark night of the soul involves continually losing to
Sabito, but being rehabilitated by Makomo upon awakening.
It is through this constant death and rebirth that eventually he accomplishes his goal,
albeit completely unknowingly.
With that being said, you don’t have to huff and puff for 3 hours to get the benefits
of breathing.
Total Breathing Concentration seems to be what it says on the tin, a form of mindfulness
meditation, which brings us around to focusing on the breath.
But why the focus on breath?
Have you ever been say, driving, and instead of going to the place you originally set out
to visit, you accidentally ended up at your work or house instead?
Or, you started out listening to somebody, but halfway through the conversation you realize
you don’t know what they’re talking about?
These are examples of mind wandering, and mindfulness meditation seeks to have you conquer
your so-called “monkey mind,” that wants to focus on a million other things rather
than the present moment.
You see, our brains are sometimes a little too smart for their own good, and it turns
out the act of hearing—processing what sounds mean—takes little effort.
Paying attention however, does.
So, we have to give our minds something to do, something to focus on so it doesn’t
wander.
And what’s always there for you to focus on, a constant safety net you can return to
when you notice your mind wandering?
It’s your breath.
If you constantly concentrate on your breathing, and return to concentrating on it when you
notice your mind wandering, you become someone entirely aware of the present moment.
Every sensation, every little movement around you, and every emotion you have become separate,
things that just arise and go as they please.
The common analogy is that you become a mountain, and your thoughts are just clouds passing
by.
The mountain needs not concern itself with clouds.
I imagine being hyper-focused on the present moment is a remarkable boon for the Demon
Slayers.
They’re not in fights randomly thinking about what they’re going to have for lunch
while trying to behead some demon.
It means they’re always ready to take action, only a breath away from snapping out of their
daydream to deal with the problem.
Here, if you’ll bear with me, we can try this out real quick.
Close your eyes and sit in a comfortable position.
Bring your attention to the touch of your body on your seat.
Feel the weight of your body on your chair.
Make sure that your back is straight, and that you’re comfortable.
Take a few deep breaths.
While you’re breathing deeply, relax your shoulders, your stomach muscles, the muscles
in your face, your hands, and your legs.
Let go of all the tightness in your body.
Now bring your attention back to your breath.
Notice what it feels like as it enters through your nose, goes down through your throat,
filling your lungs and back out through your nose.
Notice your stomach and chest rise and fall each time you breathe in, and each time you
breathe out.
And just allow your breathing to be natural and relaxed.
When your mind wanders, or if you become distracted, just notice what’s going on in your head,
and then gently bring your attention back to your breath going in and out.
Leave behind your stress, or whatever you’ve been worrying about.
Notice instead, how easy breathing comes to you.
It just happens naturally.
Notice the little space between when you inhale, and exhale.
Focus on the feeling of your breath and allow thoughts and feelings to come and go in the
background.
Now, gently bring your attention back to the touch of your body on your seat, and open
your eyes.
How did that feel?
Either you feel a little more relaxed than when you first started this video, or you
think this is all woo-woo nonsense.
Hopefully you got a little taste of the former, and the next time you feel a little stressed
or need to recenter yourself, you now know how to channel Tanjiro and the other Demon
Slayers.
Because, as we’ve seen through this video, the idea that breathing is not just an unconscious
fact of existing, but rather a powerful tool to be harnessed, is not woo-woo nonsense—and
Demon Slayer, despite exaggerating for effect, is at least along the right path when it comes
to real-world accuracy.
Breathing *can* give you more energy, improve your athletic ability, and maybe even allow
you to perform acrobatic feats of pure swordsmanship.
It can allow you to release your inner fire, literally melting away the cold and closing
up your wounds.
And it can provide for moments of serene introspection, leading you to the answers you desperately
seek.
How have *you* been breathing lately?
Thanks for watching!
I haven’t made a video this long in a while, and I hope it was an entertaining romp all
the way through.
I did have some help though, most of the inspiration and substance of this video come from the
book Breath: The New Science of a Lost Art by James Nestor.
What you’ve seen is just the shallowest of what this book has to offer, and I highly
recommend reading it for yourself.
Nestor pushes his body to the limit to discover what breathing can do, and really, you just
have to read it, I don’t want to spoil it more than I already have.
I’ll put a link in the description.
If you made it this far, you probably liked the video, and if so please click the like
button and share it around!
It’s the best way to support the channel and tells YouTube this is a video worth watching.
If you want to support me further, you can donate to my Patreon.
Special thanks to JawGush, Jorgen Potter, Theodosia, Yo ho fiddle dee more, Uanimestuck,
Ta lu un, QuakeSlayer632, and Clear Qualms for their support.
And of course, if anything I said was wrong, I’m sorry.
I must’ve stuttered.