The Power of Breath – Breathing Exercises for Stress and Overwhelm

One of our most underutilized healing tools is with us at home, in meetings, when we’re trying to fall asleep and at the grocery store. If you haven’t guessed it yet - it’s our breath! 

But we've become a society of shallow breathers, taking quick, choppy breaths that don’t reach our belly or fill our chest. When we're constantly in that fight-or-flight mode - managing work deadlines, family schedules, and everyone else's needs - our breathing naturally becomes restricted and shallow and we lose its power for healing.

Think about our breath in a time of true fear or acute stress, like when we nearly get in a car accident, or receive bad news. This shallow breathing sends a signal to our nervous system that we're in danger, or something is wrong. Our body responds by ramping up cortisol production, which is helpful when we’re in a situation we need to escape from or solve.  

More often than not, we’re probably in this shallow breathing state without a threat to our lives. We may just be writing an email (there is an actual term for this called email apnea)! Long term, this increases inflammation, disrupts digestion, and keeps our cortisol elevated. It's like having our foot on the gas pedal of stress all day long, even when we're trying to sit still.

The good news is: The moment we shift our breathing pattern, we're literally rewiring our nervous system in real time. Our body immediately starts to understand that it's safe to heal, safe to digest, safe to rest and repair and can calm down nicely.

Your Always-Available Stress Reset Button

What I absolutely love about breathwork is that it's the one tool we can always count on. We can't always control our schedule, our environment, other people's demands, or whatever is thrown at us, but we can always control our next breath. Whether we're in a stressful meeting, dealing with a family crisis, or lying awake at 2 AM with our mind racing - our breath is right there, ready to help us shift from chaos to calm.

I tell my clients to think of conscious breathing as our emergency brake for stress. The moment we notice tension building - whether it's in our shoulders, our jaw, or that familiar knot in our stomach - that's our cue to come back to our breath. Just three deep, intentional breaths can begin to shift our entire nervous system! It’s more powerful than you would imagine.

Simple Breathing Techniques That Transform Health

Let me share some of my favorite breathing techniques that I use with clients and in my own daily routine:

Belly Breathing (Foundation for Everything) Place one hand on your chest, one on your belly. Focus on breathing so that only your bottom hand moves. This helps retrain your body to breathe deeply into your diaphragm instead of shallow chest breathing. Start with just 2 minutes a day - maybe while your morning coffee brews or before you get out of bed.

Box Breathing (My Go-To for Busy Days) This is perfect when you need to calm your mind quickly. Inhale for 4 counts, hold for 4, exhale for 4, hold empty for 4. Repeat this pattern 4-8 times. This is a fan favorite of many of my clients. See the image below.

The Physiological Sigh: Quick but Powerful A physiological sigh is a breathing technique to quickly reduce stress and promote calm. It involves two inhales followed by a long exhale. First, inhale deeply through the nose until you feel like you are full, then take another, shorter, quick inhale through the nose without exhaling in between. Finally, exhale slowly and fully through the mouth and make a sighing sound. It has been shown to lower heart rate and blood pressure, promote relaxation, and enhance alertness by increasing oxygen intake. 

The Wim Hof Method: Advanced Breathwork for Resilience

For those ready to take their breathing practice deeper, the Wim Hof method combines specific breathing patterns to build incredible resilience in our nervous system. The basic technique involves 30-40 deep breaths followed by breath retention, repeated for 3-4 rounds.

What fascinates me about this approach is how it literally trains our body to handle stress better. We're essentially doing controlled stress - through the breathing pattern - which builds our capacity to stay calm during real-life stressors.

The research on the Wim Hof method is pretty remarkable too - studies show it can actually influence our autonomic nervous system and immune response in ways we once thought were impossible. You can find guided Wim Hof Breathing on youtube or they do have an app.

Making Breathwork Part of Your Foundation

Here's the thing about breathwork - it's not another item to add to our already overwhelming to-do list. Instead, think of it as the foundation that makes everything else in our life flow more easily. When we're breathing deeply and consciously, we are literally flooding our body with the life giving power of oxygen. It helps our digestion work better, our sleep improve, our immune system functions more optimally, and we show up as a better version of ourselves in our relationships.

I encourage everyone to start small - maybe just focusing on three deep breaths when they wake up, or taking a few conscious breaths before each meal. How about at a red light? The goal isn't perfection; it's progress and consistency. If we can unwind and deepen our breaths even a few times a day, the impact could be profound. 

Your Breath as Medicine

Our breath is medicine that's always available, always free. In a world where we often feel powerless over our health, our breath reminds us that we have more control than we realize. We just need to remember to use it (which is the hardest part for me!!)

So take a moment right now - put your hand on your belly, take a slow, deep breath in through your nose, and let it out with a gentle sigh. Feel that? That's our healing capacity in action. That's the power of our breath.