Breathing 101

My Personal History in Consciously Breathing

My very first encounter with breathing techniques, occurred while I was taking a singing class during the mid 90s. Learning how to breath may have or not helped my singing abilities, but I believe something more important as a consequence of this happened. During the same time period, I had started to turn into a mellower person from my more hyperactive initial nature. I’m not sure how much of it was due to the natural hormonal transition as I was leaving my teenage years, and how much of it was due to me learning how to breathe. One thing is certain, I did change and become a calmer person. I also went from mostly playing and listening to Trash and Heavy Metal to Post-Rock.

Consciously breathing was brought to my attention again, not long ago during a Yoga class I took with Fabio Filippi. Prior to the Yoga class, when we first met in the Bains des Pâquis in 2016, we had a little conversation about detoxifying the body. I remember him saying something like “Detox is all about breathing”. It did not make much sense to me back then, but today with the knowledge I have accumulated on how our sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous system work, I understand better what he probably meant.Continue reading