
Diaphragmatic Breathing Exercises and the Vagus Nerve (2017) - walterbell
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/the-athletes-way/201705/diaphragmatic-breathing-exercises-and-your-vagus-nerve
======
nsouth
Yoga (proper yoga, not the gymnastics they do in most gyms) is all about
stimulating the vagus nerve and several others. The "locks" (bandhas) and
various breathing exercises (pranayama) all work on it in different ways and
stimulate different parts of the nerve. If you really want to juice it up add
in some breath retention.

Eventually you reach a sort of homeostatic state where your breath just
naturally suspends, and that's when the doorway to the inner world opens.

There's more about the nerves in The Accidental Yogi's ebook (free online),
and more about breath retention in Kundalini Exposed (on Kindle). The "Supreme
Kriya Fire" technique in that book is the absolute real deal, but definitely
not for beginners. Beginners may want to start with Yogani's free lessons at
aypsite.org.

Remember - Kundalini is not a game. Work up slowly to avoid negative side
effects.

~~~
gerbilly
As someone who has been programming for 20 years, and experienced a lot of
stress from it, it seems to be like I have been unwittingly practising 'anti
yoga.'

When I code difficult problems, my breathing becomes light and shallow and
from the chest: almost the way you would breathe if nervously anticipating
some outcome.

The physical posture is more often than not slumped in a chair, and locked
into a narrow range of motion, due to needing to use the keyboard and mouse.

The mental experience is often one of stress due to time pressure, or due to
the confusing and often frustrating nature of the work.

The physical body reflects the mental state, when frustrated or confused or
even angry, the body tightens, especially in the neck and shoulders.

I'm sure it's possible to program and not to fall into these traps, but for me
more often than not this is how it seems to go.

~~~
nsouth
Apart from practicing deep breathing periodically, you might want try getting
a lacrosse ball and using it for deep point massage. I was able to release a
lot of tension from my neck and shoulders with one. Also, a theraband was
recommended to me by a physio so I could do flys to help pull my shoulders
back into proper alignment.

I'd recommend seeing a physio - one did me the world of good and was able to
suggest exercises and make me aware of what good posture looked like. I've had
to do a lot of core strength work to fix bad habits and now I feel much
better.

~~~
portofcall
I do this a lot too, and just one word of warning from personal experience:
don’t overwork one spot, or apply steady pressure to one spot for a long time.
The former is going to cause a feedback loop of swelling and irritation,
leading to more overwork, and so on. The latter just hurts, and impinges on
circulation.

For the lower back, I recommend a “foam roller” although it hurts at first, my
god does it help.

------
tomcooks
A technique I used to learn to breathe with my diaphragm:

\- stand tall like you're the batman (open up chest, don't slouch shoulders)

\- place your hand on your belly, pinky on navel and thumb touching the tip of
your sternum

\- inhale from nose

\- let jaw loose and make the deepest "oooohm" note you can produce, look at
the hand on your belly getting closer to your spine as you exhale

\- inhale and look at the hand on your belly rise

\- repeat, always inhaling from your nose only, keep lips closed and jaw loose
(no need to make any sound once you get it)

This technique immediately drops high stress bpm's from 120/140 to ~68.

~~~
tandav
One note: fresh and clean airflow is important, don't do this indoor with high
co2 ppm (high co2 is basically poison)

~~~
jackhack
Unless you're locked in an _airtight_ space (or small closet, etc) high CO2
should not be a concern whatsoever.

Any normal living space is going to be fine. Even a relatively "tight" super-
efficient modern home changes air over several times per hour (and have fresh-
air injectors on the heating/cooling systems to introduce fresh air and
prevent staleness). Even there, a house full of people wall-to-wall could not
significantly alter the CO2 levels to a degree there is a health risk.

If you need something to worry about in the air, be concerned about diesel
particulates in filthy city air.

source: former HVAC tech.

~~~
csours
What about a dancehall/disco packed with people dancing?

~~~
jackhack
Oxygen consumption increases with activity, obviously. Air handling is rated
on square footage, structure design and intended purpose. A home is going to
carry a very different set of requirements than a factory floor or a
restaurant (which often has high CFM exhaust hoods and requires a large amount
of fresh-air infiltration to make up for exhausted air). Max occupancy permits
as based on these factors, and often limited by egress (exits) plus a safety-
factor is added to that. But that's about the limits of my expertise. Beyond
this lies architects & permitting inspectors.

The calculation of human heat load and perception of temperature
(sensible/latent heat, and psychrometrics in general) is a big part of system
design. I'd have to break out the software and start asking specifics to get
you an actual number but my gut feel is that a dance hall is going to easily
pass the air quality tests.

Of course, somebody could pack 100 people into a low-ceiling windowless 200
ft^2 room without forced ventilation and have a problem with not just air
quality but also heat (each person is approx 20W at rest, 200W w/vigorous
activity), but I'm speaking in generalities about properly used residential &
commercial space.

~~~
beamatronic
Are you implying that a responsible club DJ should be modulating the crowd’s
activity level based on the rated CFM of the air handler as well as the
current CO2 PPM?

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DiabloD3
So, when do we start discussing the scientific research of Wim Hof? The "Wim
Hof Method" combines breathing exercises that stimulate the vagus nerve with
cold exposure to release cold shock proteins.

~~~
discussedbefore
Last week:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16573571](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16573571)
Study Reveals Brain Mechanisms That Allow “Iceman” Unusual Resistance to Cold

[https://hn.algolia.com/?query=Wim%20Hof&sort=byDate&type=com...](https://hn.algolia.com/?query=Wim%20Hof&sort=byDate&type=comment)

------
Nokinside
Polar (heart hate monitors) did pioneering work with HRV in the late 90's and
their heart rate monitors have have a mode that HRV to to determine best heart
rate limits for each exercise period for almost two decades.

Heart rate itself is a good indicator of stress. Aerobic training using HR
limits helps to avoid overtraining (and undertraining). If you are stressed
out in one day your HR is up and you exercise slower. HRV gives even more
detailed information. HRV is high during a rest and starts to decrease when
the heart works closer to maximum. Measuring HRV change during a rest and
gradually increasing the level of exercise gives more info than HR alone.

Validity of the Polar V800 heart rate monitor to measure RR intervals at rest
[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4751190/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4751190/)

------
rootbear
I am a lifetime choral singer and during a recent medical exam I was asked to
take a series of deep breaths. So I took my usual singer's diaphragmatic
breath and was complemented on my "yoga breathing"!

~~~
portofcall
Trumpet player here, and I’ve had similar experiences. A longtime friend of
mine is an operatic soprano, and she can practically break a spirometer!

~~~
milesward
Tuba player here: suffice to say, I'm a calm guy.

~~~
portofcall
Tuba! I’ve always been impressed by the dual demands of breath control and
lugging around a tuba. You can probably snuff a candle at a quarter mile.

------
agumonkey
Before I read this, I also read that improved oxygen saturation has long
distance effect on arteries (vasodilatation maybe ?) and probably other parts
in your system. So deep breathing might improve oxygen intake thus relax you
too.

One thing I realized over time is that my lungs don't open linearly, there's a
resistance period after the first second on intake, if I keep sucking air in
after 3 seconds my whole chest opens. After that I can feel my lungs full. I
also try to keep air in for ~2 seconds, thinking that it might help keeping
pressure in deep into all alveolis and cleaning / exchange more oxygen.

All this is Sample of One guess fest. If anybody knows it's useless or could
be improved, feel free to reply.

------
mark_l_watson
As someone who has practiced yoga for 40 years and started qigong a few years
ago, the advice in the article seems fairly obvious. Still, great to see the
article in the front page of HN!

I had not thought of deep belly breathing helping calm and relax me during
meetings - will try that.

~~~
leg100
Yup, I do this as part of tai chi and qi gong (referred to as 'dan tian'
breathing).

Seems to be a thing of the west to take elements of yoga, tai chi, daoism et
al, and distill them - mindfulness comes to mind - and as devices they're
good, but together they amount to so much more than the sum of their parts,
hence the eastern penchant for a 'holistic' approach.

------
montrose
My yoga teacher always says this is the most important part of yoga. She says
it's why she rarely gets sick. She was delighted to hear it was one of the top
stories on HN.

~~~
maxerickson
Make sure to tell her that I also rarely get sick, without the bother of doing
yoga.

~~~
koonsolo
I used to be like that, until I got kids that went to school.

It's possible that you're just not coming into contact with a lot of viruses
(maybe the same for the yoga teacher).

Funny story of a friend of mine: had no kids, and started dating a pre-school
teacher. First year they dated, he was sick 50% of the time.

------
HillaryBriss
FWIW, Andrew Weil took what he calls the "4-7-8" breathing exercise from
ancient India. Video demonstration: [https://www.drweil.com/videos-
features/videos/the-4-7-8-brea...](https://www.drweil.com/videos-
features/videos/the-4-7-8-breath-health-benefits-demonstration/)

It bears some resemblance to the breathing exercise described by the author of
the Psych Today article.

------
jehlakj
I’d like to add that a lot of people do diaphragmatic breathing incorrectly.

The ultimate goal for utilizing the diaphragm is slow and steady breathing in
a controlled manner. I see too many people taking in big gulps of air and
exhaling out with no sign of control. Even when think they got it, it’s still
too fast. You must keep the rib cage expanded on the exhale in order to expel
the air. There is no pushing, just allowing the air to escape slowly.

This may vary from activity to activity, but there needs to be a reasonable
amount of control during exhalation.

------
rishirishi
Breathing through your diaphragm is desirable all the time and not only during
a conscious exercise. Many years ago, I would breathe through my chest which
made for shallow breathing. Look at how babies breathe; through their
diaphragm/stomach.

It took several months to shift my breath to the diaphragm. The exercises
certainly help with lengthening the inhale and exhale, maximizing both oxygen
intake and carbon dioxide excretion.

~~~
preparat
About 3 years ago I started martial arts training. One of the first things I
had to unlearn was shallow chest breathing. Imagine that, 40yrs old and having
to relearn how to breathe properly. It took me probably close to 6 months to
adjust.

~~~
rishirishi
Yeah, I was surprised how long it took me to realize the error in my
breathing. In hindsight, my athletic life before 21 could have benefited
greatly from breathing "right".

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mistrial9
People! please be careful with these casual references to breathing exercises
and other mind-body techniques. Breathing changes _can_ hurt you. Please seek
an experienced teacher.. for example, another post mentioned a cessation of
breathing rhythm as a gateway.. BS, and dangerous too. Blood pressure, cardiac
rhythm, mental balance, are all deeply effected. thanks and take care

~~~
nsouth
The key word is _spontaneous_ breath retention. Google "kevala kumbhaka". Not
BS at all, in fact it is a primary aim of the breathing exercises known as
pranayama and is very widely documented within yogic texts, both old and
current.

~~~
djtriptych
While breath retention is part of pranayama techniques, they are NOT beginner
techniques, and misuse certainly does have the capacity to do damage.

Consider the inner breath as a pneumatic tool. Can you imagine holding in a
powerful sneeze or cough and hurting yourself? That’s the power of the
diaphragm. Getting it under control cannot be done overnight, and retention
techniques increase the risk of accidental injury.

------
meganibla
Also, vagus nerve can be stimulated by anal penetration. Some people might
also recognize the feeling of having a very relaxing poo.

------
ada1981
I'm curious if the converse is also useful.

In holotropic Breathwork breath is made faster and deeper in order to access
and release old trauma (including PTSD).

I imagine this uses a mechanism of conciously activating fight or flight to
confront whatever psychological material is available and recontextualize the
self as safe.

~~~
zentiggr
Would that be a strong effect on an uncontrolled basis? (I.e., fast irregular
shallow and/or interrupted breaths tending to reinforce anxiety etc.?)

~~~
ada1981
I'm not entire sure I understand your question. Maybe I can clarify what I
said and that will help.

Holotropic Breathwork was created by Dr. Stan Groff as an alternative to LSD
Therapy after prohibition.

His thesis was that symptoms were just a half expressed cure. Meaning, if you
have anxiety, the trick is to actually "make it bigger" \- in this case using
breath work, to release whatever trauma was at the core of it.

Holotropic Breathwork is usually "faster and deeper" breath.

After 20 minutes or so (combined with Rythmic music) you end up in a space
very similar to classic psychedelics. However this space is much more
controllable in that if it gets too intense you can always slow your breath
down.

Much in the same way people find relief from PTSD, anxiety, depression, etc.
with the classic psychedelics, they have similar results with Holotropic
Breathwork.

Once these sessions are over, often whatever it was that was the issue is
resolved for good or at least dramatically diminished.

I've found HB to be very useful in conjunction with more classic Psychedelic
therapies.

Does that help? If not, please rephrase for me and I'll try to answer.

~~~
09bjb
Where did you learn? There seems to be a large divide between the training,
time, and money required to become certified, and the one-off Saturday event.
I'd like to use it but I'd also like to understand how it works. Grof's book
doesn't contain a how-to and the knowledge seems a bit cloistered...too much
so given that it's hard to hurt yourself in this method.

I'm already "sold" on the healing potential of these modalities: psychedelics,
float tanks, Lucid Lights, etc...HB would be good to add to the list, mostly
because it's probably a great gateway for others to direct spiritual practice
and more healing. Thank you!

~~~
ada1981
Are you based in NYC? I'm actually going to a day long session this Saturday -
it's about $150 for the day including lunch and dinner. You get an intro
session for an hour with someone who trained with Grof; then you either
breathe or sit with someone for 3 hours; lunch; switch and sit/breathe; dinner
& integration.

I love it and have been going every few months.

email me if you like and we can chat more.

A@175g.com

Ps, while it's simple enough to put on a Breathwork playlist and turn up the
volume and to breathe faster and deeper for a few hours, having a trained
sitter to hold the space is useful for getting at and working with material
you may not allow yourself to confront on your own. Also, can be a little
risky if, say, your deep abandonment terror comes up and you are all alone.

~~~
09bjb
Thank you! I'm not in NYC but these are great guidelines. Something I'll be
scheduling for myself in the near future.

~~~
ada1981
Check out rebecoming.org for some more info and I'm happy to talk anytime.

------
propman
Don't do it while sitting when first getting started, stand up or lie on your
back. Hand on belly and chest, only let belly move and feel your back and ribs
expand too, not just belly. Go slow and you'll find truly how large your lungs
are.

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ggm
could this work to calm breathing in freestyle swimming? I try using 'box'
breathing exercises and they seem to work a little (in-count-4, hold-count-4,
out-count-4, hold-count-4 cycle)

~~~
chillax
Not a direct answer, but I've found this helpful:
[http://www.swimsmooth.com/exhalation.html](http://www.swimsmooth.com/exhalation.html)

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truculation
Is there any benefit to taking a deep breath and holding it for a while
_before_ commencing the diaphragmatic breathing?

------
amelius
Does anybody here have experience with the VNS devices mentioned in the
article?

~~~
codeulike
Usually they are implants, a control unit with battery embedded under the skin
in your shoulder and then a wire up to the vagus nerve in the neck. They are
used to control epilepsy among other things. I think there may be external
versions too but they are newer and I'm not sure how effective they are.

