We are all trying to find ways to cope with the Coronavirus. We see people operating out of fear. Many of us are ‘holding our breath’ not only in fear of the disease but in fear of ‘what’s next’? None of us have ever experienced anything like this before and our coping mechanisms are not operationally functional. We feel out of control. All understandable reactions. But not productive or healthy. There are some things we CAN do that are in our control and one of the most basic is to BREATHE! Really, breathe. Deeply, fully and correctly.  I’ve asked a friend of mine, Steffani, who is a trained Transformational Breath facilitator and trainer to shed some light on the importance of breathing and provide some assistance into practicing this everyday occurrence.

I met Steffani a little over 20 years ago while working at Microsoft. We’ve been friends ever since. Steff is by far one of the most interesting and passionate people I know. Her desire to help others find a better and healthier life is what she leads with. She has a strong desire to do the best thing for her family, friends and the world at large. These passions of her heart have led her from technology to healing.

Steff’s factual approach coupled with her humorous irreverence allows her to present the Breath in an accessible fashion for anyone desiring to live a more conscious and fulfilling life. Her intuition and energy work and honoring the spirit within each individual, allows people the sacred space to transform themselves. Trained 12 years ago as a Transformational Breath® facilitator and trainer, Reiki Master, and Hypnotherapist, Steff seeks to combine breath, energy, and sound healing to create the space for a powerful self-healing experience. Her clients come to her through word of mouth when they are ready to embark on their powerful healing journey.  The information below is geared for both adults as well as children. (Please make sure you read the article titled “The Day the Germ Threw a Party” with your children. It’s a wonderful complement to the breath work Steff outlines here.)  Take a deep breath and continue reading.

Breathing. We do it all day, every day. Without it we’d perish in just a few short minutes. But how often do we really think about our breath? Let alone how it affects our health?

Since our breathing is largely automatic, meaning it happens whether we are thinking about it or not, most of us just let it do its thing. We have enough going on right?

Well, what if I told you that most people only use 30% of their diaphragm to breathe and 70% of our toxins come out through our breath? Or that cancer can’t live in an oxygenated environment? Or that shallow breathing keeps you in a “fight or flight” response and exacerbates stress?

Turns out our breath is key to both our physical and mental/emotional health, and one of the cool things about breathing is that it’s also something that we can choose to control. And in our current environment, being able to control just one thing, let alone something with major health benefits, is a pretty big deal. Consider Breathing your new best practice!

So how the heck does this breathing thing work anyway? There are a couple of key components for basic understanding of how our breathing affects our body. Our autonomic nervous system, which, for the most part, unconsciously (automatically) controls many of our bodily functions such as heart rate, digestion, and respiration, has two subdivisions: sympathetic and parasympathetic. Our sympathetic nervous system (SNS) prepares our body for “freeze, fight or flight”. Ever notice how when we encounter stress or trauma we either hold our breath or breathe shallowly? That is our sympathetic nervous system. When we inhale in short, shallow breaths it speeds up our heart rate and gets us ready to react. Conversely, our parasympathetic nervous system (PNS) restores our body to a calm, relaxed state, also known as “rest and digest”. Slowing and relaxing our exhale engages this response, in turn slowing our heart rate and relaxing other systems in our body.

How does this wonderful miracle occur within our bodies? Why the vagus nerve of course! The vagus nerve is the longest nerve in our body, running from our brain to all of the important organs in our body. It essentially “listens” to our breathing and adjusts our body responses accordingly. We can indirectly stimulate the vagus nerve by taking deep, deliberate breaths into our low belly, also called diaphragmatic breaths. Vagal tone is the measurement of the heart rate between inhale and exhale. Having a higher vagal tone (bigger difference between the two numbers) means our body can relax faster after stress.  The stronger the vagal tone the better our body is at regulating blood glucose levels and reducing the likelihood of a stroke or cardiac arrest.

So now that we know the basics of how our body processes our breath, how do we use breath for health and well-being and what if my vagal tone isn’t so great?

Well, the good  news is that Breathwork is an easy, accessible, free, self-healing tool we take with us everywhere, and with practice we can improve our vagal tone, thus improving our overall health. Breath as a healing tool, can be used in many different ways; to quell panic attacks, heal trauma, relax, and reduce anxiety, to name just a few. And there are just as many different breath practices for each of these. What you use will depend on what you’d like to accomplish as well as the amount of time you have. Start wherever you’re at, with whatever time you have, and do what feels right for you. Here are a few of my favorites:

Box Breath: This is a great breath practice. It’s quick, easy, and incredibly calming. If you can only grab a few minutes here and there and need to relax, if you’re having a panic attack, want to clear your mind and improve focus or just want to start with something simple. It consists of 4-4-4-4 (inhale, hold, exhale, hold) thus it’s like a box or a square with four equal sides. You could even envision this if it helps.

  1. Sit comfortably, close your eyes, relax your jaw and shoulders and remove your tongue from the top of your mouth (all signs of stress being held in your body). Breathe in while counting to four slowly.
  2. Hold your breath while counting slowly to four and keeping your jaw and shoulders relaxed.
  3. Slowly exhale to count of four.
  4. Hold your breath while again counting slowly to four.
  5. Rinse and repeat ideally for at least 4 minutes, but even a quick Breath Break for 2 is better than nothing!

If you can’t make it to four counts that is totally fine! Start where you’re comfortable. Maybe that’s 2-2-2-2 or 3-3-3-3. If you can go longer then do 6-6-6-6! Nose or mouth, in my opinion it doesn’t matter with this one. The goal is to elongate a relaxed exhale to shift your body into “rest and digest” mode.

Chanting: Wait, what? You never mentioned having to make noise! Well, just hear me out on this. In the last twelve years of teaching and facilitating Breathwork, the breath has been the foundation, with vibrational healing, Reiki, and Hypnotherapy layered on as needed. Our voice is one of the most healing things we have as its vibration is tuned to us. Not only that, when you do chanting work you are essentially slowing down that exhale, so bonus of both breath and vibration! You can also turn the breath into a box breath or a triangle breath or whatever you choose. It’s deeply relaxing and cathartic and really helps improve vagal tone. You can choose to tone “ohm” or “ah” or you can create your own Life Song (I’ll include the link below to the book written by an Oncologist who taught this to his patients with great success). I like to use Ruach Elohim, which is Hebrew for Breath of God and is pronounced roo-aaahh-aaayy-lo-heem. You can actually feel the vibration of the different syllables in different places in your body. I also choose to use a bell I received as a gift from Tibet to ring after each exhale. You could choose to play a crystal or Tibetan bowl or drum throughout or on the exhale or whatever. Again, you do you!

  1. Sit comfortably, close your eyes, relax your jaw and shoulders and remove your tongue from the top of your Breathe in slowly.
  2. If you want to make this more of a box breath style, hold your breath while counting slowly to four and keeping your jaw and shoulders relaxed.
  3. Chant or tone as you exhale.
  4. Again, you can choose to hold your breath while counting slowly to four.
  5. Rinse and repeat ideally for at least 10 minutes.

I usually lose all track of time when I do this and open my eyes 20-30 minutes later feeling incredibly relaxed, blissful, and at peace.

Conscious Breathwork: This type of Breathwork is helpful for integrating trauma and letting go of thoughts and patterns that no longer serve us. It is deeply healing self-work that accesses subconscious patterns that often hold us back in life and works on the physical/mental/spiritual levels. When we encounter stress or trauma in our life, we store that lower vibration in our cellular memory, which changes our breathing pattern. Our breath is like a fingerprint and no two people breathe the same. How you breathe is how you live your life: belly breather/chest breather/pausing after inhale or exhale/depth of inhale/relaxation of exhale/etc. all represent our subconscious beliefs and how we move through this life. This Breathwork is deep, healing work leading to incredible changes in how you respond to life. Because this can come with big emotions or body sensations, this is a style of Breathwork that I’d encourage people to start in a group or 1:1 with a trained facilitator. It’s incredibly powerful and the crux of the work I do. Once you’ve had a couple of sessions and are familiar with this specific pattern of breath and the tools to manage the emotions and body sensations that may come up, then it’s a great breath to do on  your own daily for 10-15 minutes or a full session for an hour.  If you want to get a feel for the difference you can do a short 10 minute session to just let go of some things. The process is below. Don’t be surprised if you automatically start to cry as you connect with this breath pattern, it’s common and it integrates what comes up. Just keep breathing into your belly or tone on the exhale. If anything becomes too overwhelming, know that you can stop and it will all settle down.

  1. Sit comfortably, close your eyes, relax your jaw and shoulders and remove your tongue from the top of your
  2. Inhale through your mouth all the way into your low belly, letting the breath then rise into your chest.
  3. Exhale through your mouth in a relaxed way, like fogging a mirror, no control or pushing, just nice and relaxed – a letting go.
  4. Make sure you remove all pausing between inhale/exhale/inhale, keeping the breath constantly moving – like breathing around a circle.
  5. Rinse and repeat ideally for about 10 minutes.


Breathwork for Kids: There are lots of different breathing practices for kids. It helps them to center themselves, just like an adult, but by using fun images or sounds to elongate that exhale and bring them back to “rest and digest” calm. Here are a couple I enjoy:

  • Blow Out the Candle Breath – Imagine a Birthday candle. Inhale deeply through the nose, then exhale slowly through the mouth to “blow out” the candle.
  • Snake Breath – Inhale slowly through the nose and exhale through the mouth with a long, slow hissing sound.
  • Bumblebee Breath – Inhale through your nose and then, with your fingers in your ears, hum while exhaling. Bonus with this one is that you get the vibrational healing from your voice as well, just like with chanting.

Most of us breathe unconsciously and shallowly, thus most of the time we are in a stressed and unhealthy state of being. By using different types of Breathwork to address different goals, we can access our own innate healing processes for better mental/emotional/physical/spiritual health, becoming an even better version of ourselves. I wish you much love, joy, and enlightenment on your Breath Journey!

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