belly breathing

[ethr23]

I am interested in getting into meditation. I have heard some people mention that you should breathe into your stomach instead of your chest. How do you do that? How do you know when you are doing it? What differences does it make?

I would appreciate help on this, thanks.

[dezhen2001]

from my limited experience...

if you breathe just using your chest, then your shouders raise and it makes your posture bad... it also means u don't use all the lungs as the diaphragm can constrict it. If you breathe making the stomach bigger for example, your chest (it feels to me anyway) that it moves more 'out' than 'up'. So i know my lungs can take more air

This also helps the body relax, as you are using your whole body, not just the chest to breathe. It can help posture and relaxation...
In the meditation we do, also the arms are in various different positions to 'open' the sides and chest to allow breathng more easier

For me i would say to just practise meditation, and breathe naturally... your body will do what it needs to do... The most important thing is to keep a good posture and to relax. Practise more and it will get better and easier

good luck,
david

[Walter Joyce]

As I understand it, reverse breathing is just that, expand on the exhale, contract on the inhale. Martially, this is done to create inner tension, aiding in establishing peng jin.

[No_Know]

There's chest, stomach, then belly. Breathe into your Belly.

How...? Imagine it.

[GeneChing]

I wasn't sure where to post this on the qigong forum but the belly breathing thread came up when I searched 'belly'. It's not really Feng Shui either but I'm posting it there anyway. If there's more news, I'll split it off into an indie thread because 'Beijing Bikini' is a hilarious thread topic.

Outlawing “Beijing Bikini” May Clash with Feng Shui and Qigong
BANNING EXPOSED MIDRIFFS CONFLICTS WITH OPEN QI PASSAGEWAY
July 23, 2019
By Jonny Lupsha, News Writer

A new law passed in Beijing forbids men rolling up their T-shirts in the heat, according to CNN. The popular method of combating high temperatures has earned the nickname “Beijing Bikini.” But qigong stresses the belly as a passageway of qi.


Chinese man in streets of Tangzhou, China sporting the "Beijing Bikini"

During hot temperatures, men in China have been rolling up their T-shirts above their bellies to cool off. Photo by Kristoffer Trolle / Flickr (CC by 2.0)
CNN reports that authorities in Jinan, a city of nearly nine million people, issued a notice earlier this month ordering all members of the public to keep their shirts on—and unfurled—in public places. The law is the result of a movement that hopes to label shirtless men, public bickering, littering, and some other social practices as “uncivilized.” However, in feng shui and qigong, the belly area is considered a center for qi, or natural energy, to be gathered and released again. So where do these practices stand in the “Battle of the Belly”?

Feng Shui and the Beijing Bikini
Qi is said to be a form of natural energy—not the kind that powers your house or car, but a flowing life force in nature that is often compared to wind and water. Both wind and water are light and almost intangible but they can erode mountains. Qi is said to be the same. So how could we hope to control such a thing?

“Wind and water in the Chinese language is ‘feng shui,’ which is also the name of an ancient Taoist science of manipulating or designing our environment so that wind and water and qi energy can flow in just the right amounts and in the most beneficial ways in our lives,” David-Dorian Ross, International Master Tai Chi Instructor, said. “Qigong [is] the ancient Chinese craft of manipulating the inner life force—the qi—for health, self-defense, and spiritual development. By learning certain breathing and visualization techniques, we learn how to improve the circulation of qi throughout all parts of the body.”

Much of qi circulation in the body revolves around the body’s center, the abdomen. The yoga-like qigong practice of tai chi is meant to encourage the flow of qi, and keeping the abdomen open and free is a major component of tai chi. Jinan’s new law, requiring the covering up of bellies in public, can easily be seen as being in direct opposition to that.

Five Element Theory
Another popular theory of balancing one’s qi is that of the five elements. “From the most ancient times, Chinese culture has imagined that the world is made up of five basic elements: wood, water, fire, earth, and metal,” Ross said. “In fact, the flow of qi is mapped as to when each element is most influential on the human body.” Here, Ross alluded to the fact that each of the five elements represents a different time of year. It’s little surprise that fire represents summer and heat. “But the five elements are also an expression of qi energy,” he said. “Fire, as the season of summer, is also associated with the sun, the color red, and the human organ of the heart.” Other examples follow for each element—for example, Ross mentioned wood’s association with growth, the liver, and springtime, but also with emotions like anger.

Like the rest of qigong, the Five Element Theory emphasizes balance and a harmonious relationship. “The five elements both create and destroy each other,” Ross said. “Water creates wood (you pour water on a seed and it grows); wood creates fire (you take wood and light it on fire and it creates a flame). Fire creates earth, because after the wood is burned, you’re left with ashes, which are like the soil; earth creates metal (if you dig into the earth, you can pull out iron); and metal creates water, because if you heat up metal and it melts, it becomes a liquid.”

Ross also explained that when these five elements are out of order, they destroy one another. “Fire destroys metal (if you heat up the metal with fire, the metal is no longer consistent); but metal destroys wood (the sharp point of the ax destroys the tree),” he said. “Wood destroys earth—again, if you look at the tree as it sends its roots down into the earth, it makes it erupt and move out of the way—but the earth destroys water. If you put it up in enough quantity it makes a dam, blocking the river. And water destroys fire—of course, you pour water on the fire and it puts it out.”

As record summer temperatures rage on, there couldn’t be a worse time for Jinan to outlaw the Beijing Bikini. The practices of feng shui and qigong agree, since they focus on energy flow throughout the body’s center.


David-Dorian Ross contributed to this article. Ross is the founder and CEO of TaijiFit and the creator of the TaijiFit mind-body exercise program. He has a B.A. in Human Movement Studies from San Francisco State University and has completed graduate course work in Physical Education and Chinese.

[GeneChing]

Can the “Beijing Bikini” help Tokyo bear the boiling heat during next year’s Games?
Master Blaster 2 days ago



Some Chinese authorities want to put a stop to it, but might Japanese authorities be wise to encourage letting our guts fly free?

A long-standing hot-weather technique among older guys in China has been to roll up their shirts to just under their chests creating the illusion of wearing something like a bra. Dubbed, the “Beijing Bikini” it has recently come under fire by local governments who are calling for a ban on the practice.



Our writer Meg, who often travels to China, first encountered the Beijing Bikini back in the 2000s while visiting Shanghai. Her companion was startled by a group of men wearing what, from a distance, appeared to be sports bras.

▼ Friend: “Oh my god! Meg! Old guys in a sports bras! There’s a whole bunch of them! Are they some kind of perverts?!”



As they got closer Meg saw one of the men turn to face them. It was clear now that his “sports bra” was nothing more than his tank top rolled up to his nipples. But he held an air of satisfaction and relaxation seldom seen, and he causally flashed a smile as pure and genuine as a newborn babe.

This was a man who had achieved ultimate comfort.



While it had the unfortunate side effect of driving her friend into a panic, the Beijing Bikini was clearly an effective way at countering unforgivably hot weather.

Flash-forward to Tokyo 2019. The government has been racking its collective brain to find ways to combat its uncomfortable and deadly summer heat in time for the 2020 Olympics. Could the Beijing Bikini be the cost-effective key to accomplishing this?

Beijing did have a highly successful summer Olympics in 2008… this was beginning to make all kinds of crazy sense, so Meg assembled a team of writers to hike up their tops and hit the streets to test the Beijing Bikini’s effectiveness in Japan.



Each representing different stomach intensities and styles of tops, P.K. Sanjun, Go Hattori, and Yuichiro Wasai stepped into the steamy Tokyo jungle with their new heat-prevention fashions.



They kept their heads up high and seemed to have an air of confidence, but they lacked that pure feeling of comfort that Meg had once seen in Shanghai so many years before. Something was amiss.



After returning to the office, both Go and P.K. reported a significant cooling feeling in their midriffs. Yuichiro, however, said his belly was only somewhat cooler.

Here’s each man’s feeling on the Beijing Bikini:



Go Hattori: “My midsection was cooler, but I felt really insecure that it would affect my weak stomach. The cool feeling was only in my stomach. Anyway, it doesn’t look cool so it’s not for me personally.”



P.K. Sanjun: “There certainly is a cool feeling in my gut… but even when I’m in good shape and have abs, I still feel bad about showing people my middle-aged belly. But if everyone’s doing it over in Beijing, why not take advantage and do it there too?”



Yuichiro Wasai: “If you’re going to do this, why not just take your shirt off? The Beijing Bikini is hiding only the chest, as if that’s some special line of decency. It definitely got a little cooler, but it’s a half-baked way to preserve manners. On the other hand, just whipping off your shirt sends a clear message that you throw caution to the wind with regard to etiquette. It’s also a better way to be in terms of keeping cool, so I would just take my shirt off. I mean, if it were down to either that or a Beijing Bikini.”

So, the Beijing Bikini does appear to have some hurdles to overcome before it’s embraced by people in Japan. There is still time before the Olympics for it to catch on, though and it’s still considerably better than those umbrella hats.

Images: ©SoraNews24

THREAD
Beijing Bikinis on the belly breathing thread
2020 Tokyo Olympics

[David Jamieson]

Uh...thanks? LOL!

Just to clarify and to get off the dude belly thing....

how-to-breathe-with-your-diaphragm/

[GeneChing]

What Is Belly Breathing and Why Is It Important for Exercise?
Say it with us: deep breaths.
By Mallory Creveling August 23, 2019


FIZKES/GETTY IMAGES

Take a deep breath. Do you feel your chest rise and fall or does more movement come from your stomach?

The answer should be the latter—and not only when you're focusing on deep breathing during yoga or meditation. You should also practice belly breathing during exercise. News to you? Here's what you need to know about making your inhales and exhales come from your gut.

What Is Belly Breathing?

Yes, it literally means breathing deeply into your stomach. It's also known as diaphragmatic breathing because it allows the diaphragm—the muscle that runs horizontally across the belly, kind of looks like a parachute, and is the primary muscle used in respiration—to expand and contract.

While belly breathing is our body's natural way to inhale and exhale, it's more common for adults to breath ineffectively, AKA through the chest, says Judi Bar, a 500-hour certified yoga instructor and yoga program manager at the Cleveland Clinic. Many people tend to resort to chest breathing when they're stressed because the tension makes you tighten your belly, explains Bar. This ultimately makes it harder to breathe efficiently. "It becomes a habit and because it's a more shallow breath, it actually feeds the sympathetic response—the fight or flight response—making you more stressed," she says. Thus, you get a circle of anxious reactions just from chest breathing. (Related: 3 Breathing Exercises for Dealing with Stress)

How to Belly Breathe Properly

In order to try belly breathing, "you first need to understand how to relax enough so there's space in the belly for the diaphragm and your breath to move," says Bar. "When you're tense and hold the belly in, you're not allowing the breath to move."

For proof, try this little test from Bar: Pull your belly in toward your spine and try to take deep breathes. Notice how hard it is? Now relax your midsection and see how much easier it is to fill your stomach with air. That's the looseness you want to feel when you're belly breathing—and a good indication of whether it's all coming from the chest.

The practice of belly breathing itself is pretty simple: Lie down on your back and place your hands on your belly, says Pete McCall, C.S.C.S., a personal trainer in San Diego and host of the All About Fitness podcast. Take a nice big inhale, and when you do, you should feel your belly lift and expand. As you exhale, your hands should lower. Think of your stomach like a balloon filling with air, and then slowly releasing.

If taking deep inhales and exhales feels tough or unnatural to you, Bar suggests practicing it once or twice a day for just two or three minutes. You can place your hands on your belly to make sure you're doing it right, or just watch to make sure your stomach moves up and down. Try doing it while you're tackling an everyday task, too, says Bar, like while you're taking a shower, washing dishes, or right before you go to sleep. (Because there's nothing like a little breathing exercise to calm the mind for bedtime!)

After you've been practicing for a while, start paying a little more attention to your breath during exercise, says Bar. Do you notice if your belly is moving? Does it change when you're squatting or running? Are you feeling energized by your breath? Take all these questions into consideration when you're doing your workout to check in with how you're breathing. (These running-specific breathing techniques can also help make miles feel easier.)

You can belly breathe during most forms of exercise, spin class to heavy lifting. In fact, you might have seen a technique used among the heavy lifting crowd called core bracing. "Core bracing can help stabilize the spine for heavy lifts; that is a form of belly breathing because of the controlled exhalation," says McCall. To do it correctly, practice the technique before actually lifting heavy loads: Take a big inhale, hold it, then deeply exhale. During a lift (like a squat, bench press, or deadlift), you'd inhale, hold it during the eccentric (or lowering) part of the movement, then exhale while pressing to the top. (Keep reading: Specific Breathing Techniques to Use During Every Kind of Exercise)

The Benefits of Belly Breathing During Exercise

Well, you're working an actual muscle—and one that helps to improve core stability, says McCall. "People don't realize the diaphragm is an important stabilizing muscle for the spine," he says. "When you breathe from the belly, you breathe from the diaphragm, which means you're strengthening a muscle that stabilizes the spine." When you do diaphragmatic breathing through exercises like squats, lat pulldowns, or any of the like, you should actually feel your spine steady through the movement. And that's the big payoff of belly breathing: It can help you learn to engage your core through each exercise.

Also, breathing from the belly allows more oxygen to move through the body, which means your muscles have more oxygen to continue crushing strength sets or conquering run times. "When you chest breathe, you're trying to fill the lunges from the top down," explains McCall. "Breathing from the diaphragm pulls air in, filling you from the bottom up and allowing more air in." This isn't only crucial to having more energy through your workouts, but throughout the day as well. Big belly breaths make you feel more awake, says McCall.

With more oxygen throughout your body comes the ability to work harder through your workout, too. "Belly breathing improves the body's ability to tolerate intense exercise because you're getting more oxygen to the muscles, which lowers your breathing rate and helps you expend less energy," says Bar. (Also try these other science-backed ways to push through workout fatigue.)

To top it off, practicing a few moments of mindful belly breathing—especially if you focus on counting through the inhales and exhales to make them even, as Bar suggests—can help with a little stress relief and some moments of peace (or, say, when you're recovering from a bout of burpees). "It really down-regulates your system in an effective way," says Bar, meaning it takes you away from a fight-or-flight state and into a calmer, more relaxed composure. Talk about a good way to recover—and a smart strategy for gaining mind and body benefits.

By Mallory Creveling

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belly breathing
Yoga
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