HA HA HA: a breathing exercise for the anxious artist

Exhaling is the physiological switch we can flick to move from fear to excitement, I explored the research the backs this up in an earlier blog. But it turns out that exhaling can do so much more for your body and mind, are you ready?

My recent fascination with ‘breathing out’ began at the end of a recent bikrim yoga class. The strenuous ninety minute class finished, as always, with Kapalabhati breathing. A powerful breathing exercise that involves forcefully expelling all the air from your lungs by drawing your navel in toward your spine, repetitively. The instructor, as always, said ‘focus on the exhale, the inhale happens automatically’. And it does. 

When you empty your lungs they automatically refill, like a sponge. But when they’re full, they don’t automatically release, at least not fully. The more air we expel the more we can take in, resulting in deeper breathing or Diaphragmatic Breathing, breathe that uses the full capacity of the lungs. Due to the amount of time we spend sitting, most of us do not breathe in or out of our diaphragm. It’s as if we hoard stale air, in fear we might run out of oxygen. Resulting in less air rather than more. Fear not my oxygen loving friends, here is a really fun way to detox your air bags. 

Have you ever noticed that laughter is but a series of hearty exhales? Like a sigh of relief, laughter is just exhaling with sound. With its stress reducing hormones and boost of immune cells and infection-fighting antibodies, it’s well documented that laughter is the best medicine. Even the fake laughter practiced in laughing classes has benefits that match physical exercise. Try this free wonder drug for yourself by exhaling repetitively with sound, try it now: HA HA HA. 

Whether it’s when you’re about to do something new, when you’re thinking about how hard it’s going to be or how high the stakes are. Next time fear makes you take the sharp inhale that you hold tightly in your chest, as soon as you feel that constriction remember to let out an exhale of relief, or some HA HA HA’s. You can even do this under your breath. 

I tried the quiet HA HA HA’s today in a busy city street.  I was on my way to a tattoo parlour, no matter how excited you are to get a tattoo there are always last minute jitters.So I did three quiet HA HA HA’s, exhaling from stomach, and it did the trick. Ironically the tattoo I got today is about breath, which brings me to the other miraculous benefit of exhaling fully.  

You see, I experienced a traumatic and painful event recently. During the pain my body took over and began breathing very deeply. The deep breaths took away the pain completely. I had moments of fear where I’d hold my breath, or restrict the exhale, and the pain would shoot back, forcing me to focus on letting go and breathing into my whole body again. Exhaling fully and breathing deeply is a natural pain relief and healing agent. 

I lost someone that night, so the tattoo I got to today is to remember them and the power of breath. I made a promise that I would breathe enough for the both of us, deeply like I did that night and feel connected to them when I did. I can already feel that not only did exhaling fully to breath deeply ease my physical pain, but it’s healing and transforming my emotional pain as well. 

So my friends, remember to:

Breathe.

Your Friend,

Buzzy