Why Should You Breathe through Your Nose instead of Your Mouth?

The tongue is the strongest muscle in the body. If it is not properly positioned, it strains the cervical muscles, which affects the neck and shoulders. The tongue should be in a relaxed position and touch the roof of your mouth, the tip of the tongue should touch the back of the upper front teeth, this is based on the ancient wisdom of TCM.Mouth breathing can significantly impact your sleep quality and make you feel tired and irritable the next morning. Many studies have linked poor sleep quality to weight gain and increased appetite. Breathing through the nose helps you engage your diaphragm and increase oxygen intake throughout your body.
Did you know that the number one cause of oral cavity is mouth breathing? It affects the oral microbiome and pH levels in your mouth. Breathing through the nose also prevents dry mouth. Nose breathing can improve the oral microbiome and help increase nitric oxide production. Nitric oxide is a colorless, odorless gas produced by nearly all types of cells in the body. It is a vital molecule produced in your body that impacts many aspects of your health. It helps blood vessels dilate to promote proper blood flow, other health benefits include improved exercise performance,
managing diabetes, lowering blood pressure, and better brain function. It can boost your heart function by making blood platelets less sticky. It also has antiviral and antibacterial properties.

Did you know that the breath-holding technique in breathwork increases the production of mitochondria? Which is the fountain of youth and the source of energy for the body.
When your breathing is shallow, it can lead to an 80% reduction of blood flow to your gut and only 5% of blood flow to your liver, as you can see your breathing pattern can significantly impact your gut health and liver detox. Diaphragmatic breathing or belly breathing stimulates your parasympathetic nervous system. Your parasympathetic nervous system is responsible for your relaxation and healing response.

It helps lower stress, boost immune function, reduce blood pressure, promote sound sleep, reduce anxiety and panic attacks, etc. Engaging the diaphragm through breathing allows you to bring more oxygen into your belly and optimize oxygen levels and it also helps you digest your food more efficiently and strengthen your gut health. When stress is managed through breathwork, this empowers you to make healthier food choices and break the vicious cycles of emotional eating.
Let’s talk about the benefits of emotional well-being. Breathwork helps nurture your soul at a deeper level and provides emotional balance and resilience. Regular breathwork practice can help you stay grounded, motivated, focused, and overcome challenges in life. There are many health benefits of breathwork besides weight loss, here are a few examples.

• Alkalizes the PH levels in your body
• Provides anti-inflammatory effects
• Reduces stress and boosts your mental health
• Improves your sleep quality and heart function
• Relieves PTSD and emotional traumas
• Strengthens your lung capacity and boosts your immunity
• Raises your consciousness and enlightens your soul

Did you know that grounding can significantly improve your mental health, sleep quality, and heart health? You can incorporate grounding techniques into your breathwork. Let’s dive into common breathwork techniques.

Alternate Nostril Breathing is a form of Pranayama, it involves blocking one nostril at a time as you breathe through the other, alternating between nostrils regularly. This breathwork helps relieve anxiety and calm the mind.
The best way to practice this type of breathwork is in a seated position to maintain your posture. Here is how to do it. Position your right hand by bending your index and middle fingers into your palm, leaving your thumb, ring finger, and pinky extended. This is known as Vishnu mudra in yoga.

• Close your eyes or gently gaze downward.
• Inhale and exhale to begin.
• Close off your right nostril with your thumb.
• Inhale through your left nostril.
• Close off your left nostril with your ring finger.
• Open and exhale through your right nostril.
• Inhale through your right nostril.
• Close off your right nostril with your thumb.
• Open and exhale through your left nostril.
• Inhale through your left nostril.

You can continue this breathing exercise for 20 to 30 minutes a day to make it a part of daily practice and see how your reality starts to shift in a few months.

Deep Abdominal Breathing is a long deep breath technique. You can imagine your belly is like a balloon in an expanding and contraction motion. As you breathe, you can visualize your breath filling up your chest and abdomen. Your belly and chest should both expand when you inhale. When you exhale, your chest relaxes, and your navel pulls back in toward your spine.This type of deep breathing exercise trains your body to relax. Let’s start this breathing exercise.

• Allow your belly to relax, without forcing it inward by squeezing your muscles.
• Inhale slowly through your nose. The air should move into your nose and downward so that you feel your stomach rising.
• Exhale slowly through your lips and you feel that your belly is pulling back toward your spine.

You can practice this breathing exercise for 20 to 30 minutes a day especially early in the morning when the sun is rising, this will help calibrate your circadian rhythm as well when you face the sun. This breathing exercise can help boost your productivity during the day and improve your sleep quality at night.

4-7-8 Breath adds in counting numbers as you breathe in and out as a way to quiet and focus your mind. Breathe in for four beats, hold your breath

for seven beats, and then exhale for eight beats. A longer exhale helps you empty your lungs and get the waste out of the body. Let’s dive into this breathwork.

• Place the tip of your tongue against the ridge of tissue behind your upper front teeth during the exercise.
• Close your mouth and inhale quietly through your nose to a mental count of four.
• Hold your breath for a count of seven.
• Exhale completely through your mouth, making a whoosh sound to a count of eight.

This breathing exercise helps you focus on your breathing and brings your attention to the present without allowing your mind to drift off to the past or future, which is a great way to keep worries and anxiety at bay.

Box Breathing, also known as square breathing or 4-4-4-4 breathing, is a technique that focuses on taking slow and deep breaths. Box breathing was developed by Mark Divine, a former Navy SEAL commander,

who has been using the technique since 1987. It is commonly used by people in high-stress environments due to its ability to turn off the fight-or-flight mode. Here is how to do it.

• Sit up straight and attempt to push the oxygen out of your lungs by breathing slowly out your mouth.
• Breathe in slowly through your nose for a count of 4. Focus on the air filling your lungs and abdomen.
• Hold your breath for another count of 4.
• Breathe out through your mouth for a third count of 4. Pay attention to the sensation of the air leaving your body.
• Hold your breath again for a final count of 4.

Continue to repeat these steps as you practice this breathing exercise until you achieve the desired outcome.

Pursed Lip Breathing helps strengthen your lungs with regular practice. This technique focuses on slowing your breath and emptying your lungs, which can benefit those struggling with chronic lung disease and other conditions. A 2018 study showed that pursed lip breathing exercises improved lung function among patients with COPD.

This breathing technique involves slowly breathing in and out through pursed lips, which gives you more control over your breath and makes your breath more impactful. Here’s how to do it:

• Sit up straight or lie down with your body relaxed.
• Breathe in through your nose for a count of 2 and feel the air moving into your abdomen.
• Purse your lips and breathe out slowly for a count of 4. For this step, you should always breathe out for twice the length that you breathed in.

You can repeat these steps until you achieve the desired result.
These are just a few breathing techniques, choose what is suitable for you and consistency is the key.
Your lung can produce the most DMT in your body. Conscious Breathing is psychedelic. Breathwork is a state-shifting practice for deep self-exploration that harnesses the power of your own body to expand your consciousness and reveal your inner healer, which is YOU.