The Breathwork Technique That's Changing My Life

Breathwork is very trendy these days. Whether it's you've learned from Wim Hof or some other local practice that's making your hands go numb from breathing in and breathing out so rapidly. But in general, breathwork goes back for thousands of years. And in this video, I thought I would share a very simple breathwork technique that you can do when you begin to feel stressed. Hey guys, I'm Dr. Alex Hein, doctor of acupuncture and traditional Chinese medicine and author of the health book, Master the Day. So before we jump into this video on breathwork, I have two very important links right below the video. The first is that there's a free guide for daily rituals that can potentially help you at years to your life with traditional Chinese medicine. You can download that right below this video. And the second is if you'd like to learn about becoming a patient of mine locally in Los Angeles or virtually via telemedicine, there's a link below to contact my private practice. Now in my mind, a lot of the yogic practices and a lot of the qigong practices inherent to Taoism and Buddhism are probably the original forms of breathwork in the world. No doubt, every culture on the world had basically around the world, the shamanic practices have some closely, close ties with breathwork or altering breathing to alter one's state. But when it comes to the day-to-day person, of course, we all are seeking altered states. But in general, breathwork is one of the best ways to change your state, that is how you feel. It's one of the fastest ways to change your physiology without putting something in your body, without pharmacological methods. So even when you translate the term qigong, I mean, it literally means qi work. And in modern Chinese, I mean, you're basically talking about breath work. You can make it sound mystical, you can make it sound practical. I'll leave it up to the qigong masters to define that specifically. But breathing exercises, specific, in some ways unnatural, and in some ways very elaborate breathing exercises are an inherent part of qigong, which in many kinds of traditional medical lineages was always viewed as one of the essential practices to become a real Chinese medicine doctor or practitioner. But when it comes to you, day-to-day there's a simple breathing exercise that's not complicated, not mystical, it's not religious or pseudo-spiritual, and you can do it to feel better right away. Now, one final thing before we jump in, qigong is one of the best ways to improve your cardiovascular health and your heart health and your immune system without having the damage and the stress that, for example, intense physical exercise or excessive running will have on your joints. So for example, someone who has cancer or someone who is seriously ill or fatigued will feel worse from physical exercise, but they can do qigong hours a day and they will just feel more rested and will feel more rejuvenated with even less sleep. So one of the clear clinical benefits I see from it is that it is a way to build your reserves and build your energy without being exhausted and needing to sleep longer because you just did a hard workout. And one final, final note here is that the fastest way to change how you feel is via your breath. So when I have patients come in and they have clinical anxiety or clinical depression and they're experiencing an acute surging up of those symptoms, I tell them that the first thing they should do is if they are able, go physically exercise because short of putting a substance in your body, whether it's an herb or food or a medication, the fastest way to change how you feel physiologically in a real way is physical movement. Get your blood flowing, get your lymph moving and get your breathing, really change your respiratory rate. So one of the ways you can do that if you're stuck at your desk and you can't go really go work out or go for a walk or go for a run or do a yoga class is to do the following breath exercise. This exercise has been around for thousands of years. There's a very trendy modern name for it in the military called box breathing or tactical breathing. And it's one of the ways that has been studied clinically to lower your heart rate and lower your respiratory rate when you're experiencing an acute surge of stress hormones. So I'm gonna introduce you to this box breathing exercise and then we'll do it together and you can run with it and use it when you get stressed out. So the fundamental exercise for box breathing is just a basic breath count. So you're going to inhale to a count of four, hold to a count of four, exhale to a count of four and hold that exhale to a count of four. Drawing the box is often a helpful mental mnemonic, a reminder of in, hold, exhale, hold. So I'm gonna draw this box as we do this exercise because it tends to be a useful way to just visualize the breath holds and the breath count. So for this box breathing, close your eyes. You're gonna inhale to four. So one, 1,000, two, 1,000, three, 1,000, four. Hold, one, two, three, four. Exhale, two, three, four. Hold, two, three, four. So we're gonna do it again. I'm not gonna count it. So one, two, three, four. Hold, two, three, four. Exhale, two, three, four. Hold, two, three, four. And even just doing that box breath, four, four, four, four. Within two minutes, if you wanna do something interesting and you have an Apple Watch or using some kind of Oura Ring or biofeedback device, watch what it does to your heart rate in two minutes. And that will be the greatest evidence that this is the fastest way to get yourself out of the stress response. So for me, when I have a long day or a rough day, I'm very tired. Most often what I do is if I have more time than this, I'll do just 10 minutes of lengthening and lengthening my breath, my inhale, and lengthening my breath, my exhale. And I'll just do the standing the tree pose in Qigong and I'll just stand there for 10 minutes, just trying to lengthen how long my inhale is and lengthen how long that exhale is. And my complete state has changed. So try that box breath when you're noticing your heart rate's getting elevated, you're feeling stressed, you're not feeling great. And you'll notice that short of exercise and going to do a workout is the fastest non-pharmacological way you can change your state. And so it's really, really valuable. All right guys, so try it out. Check out those two links below, the free guide that I've put together. And if you wanna learn more about becoming a patient locally or virtually, the info to my private practice and clinic is right below.