A week ago, we started on our breathing journey. We looked at a basic ‘out-breath’. We began with an explosive breath out while in a yoga cat, pulling our belly buttons through to our spines before translating this to a standing position. Today, we can finally breathe in!
I guess the natural order would be to breathe in first, then breathe out, but I specifically chose to address the topics this way around since I believe in placing more emphasis on breathing out than in.
Having spent years grappling with whether I’ve taken a big enough breath, I’m convinced that we only need to concentrate on controlling the out-breath. If we do that, the body has an in-built sense of how much air it needs and it should simply drop into the lungs.
An Alexander technique teacher once gave me some very helpful imagery. She said that it’s like a plastic bag – open it and what happens? Air simply drops into the available space. You don’t need to do anything to help or to force it. So, as long as your airways and your vocal tract is clear and open, and as long as your abdomen and tummy muscles are relaxed, you should be able to picture your lungs like our plastic bag.
That’s all there is to it!
Well, there’s more I’d like to add and shall do in future blogs but in the interests of trying to keep my vlogs ‘bitesize’, get used to letting the air drop in and we’ll revisit the in-breath at a later stage.
Stay cheered, stay healthy and lots of love xx
Grace Lovelass 