Breath

Breathing to

Breathing exercises to find balance

Four breathing exercises where what goes in lasts as long as what comes out. They aren't meant to energize you or put you to sleep: they're for staying in the middle for a while. They work as a daily practice, any time of day.

Breathings to start with

Coherent breathing 5-5

Five seconds in, five seconds out: six breaths a minute. The most studied of the four, and a good everyday practice.

5 min Gentle Breathe

Qigong abdominal breathing

In for 6, out for 6, slow and low, with your attention below the navel. A little slower than coherent breathing, for once that one feels easy.

5 min Gentle Breathe

How to use them

Sit tall, or stand with soft knees if you pick the qigong one. Breathe through your nose, without filling your lungs to the top. Five minutes is enough. What matters is that the two halves feel equal: no pushing the air, no running out of it.

For alternate nostril breathing, close one nostril with your thumb and the other with your ring finger, without pressing hard. If your nose is badly stuffed up, save it for another day. Don't do it while driving.

What the studies say

Something measurable happens at around six breaths a minute. Your pulse rises as you breathe in and falls as you breathe out, and at that pace the swing gets wider. Lehrer and Gevirtz explain it through the baroreflex, the automatic adjustment between blood pressure and heart rate, which has a rhythm of its own close to one cycle every ten seconds. They call that point the resonance frequency, and it varies a little from person to person.

Does it matter that the two halves are equal? A 2014 study of 47 college students compared equal ratios with longer exhales, at 6 and at 5.5 breaths a minute. The highest heart rate variability showed up at 5.5 a minute with an equal ratio, and every pattern increased how relaxed people felt.

Alternate nostril breathing has studies of its own, nearly all small. A 2017 review gathered 44 trials and cautioned that each one used a different variation. The idea of balancing two sides comes from yoga, which calls the right nostril the sun and the left the moon. That's tradition, not anatomy.

The ones that ask more

Two exercises in this same family are more demanding. Alternate nostril breathing with holds adds a 4-second pause and an 8-second exhale. Ladder 5-10-15-20 is intense: its phases reach 20 seconds. Do it sitting down, never in water or while driving, and don't start with it.

If you feel dizzy, tingly, or short of breath, stop and breathe normally. If you're pregnant or have a heart, lung, or blood pressure condition, check with your care provider first, especially before doing breath holds. None of these exercises is a treatment.

Frequently asked questions

What is balanced breathing?

Here it means exercises where the inhale and the exhale last the same amount of time, with neither one taking the lead. Yoga calls it sama vritti, equal breathing. It isn't a medical term.

What's the difference between coherent breathing and equal breathing?

Both are even. Equal breathing runs at 4 and 4 seconds, about seven or eight breaths a minute. Coherent breathing runs at 5 and 5, six a minute, which is the pace studies have measured most.

Does alternate nostril breathing balance the two sides of the brain?

It's a claim you'll see everywhere, and one we won't make. What exists are small studies on heart rate, blood pressure, and attention, with widely differing methods. Yoga tradition speaks of clearing channels, and that's the language of a tradition.

How long should I practice each day?

Five minutes is a good start, and the qigong one or coherent breathing can stretch to ten if they feel comfortable. Practicing often matters more than practicing a lot.

Sources

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