What Type of Breather Are You?  Discover your Unique Breathing Pattern.

We all share the same air and the way the air enters and leaves the body, creates a distinctive movement that is like no other; the way your breathe is as unique as your thumbprint.

There are 7 billion human breathers on the planet today and no one breathes in exactly the same way as you.

Each inhale has its own pace, character and rhythm, and each exhale creates its own way to exit. There’s often a short pause in between each breath too. We breathe on average 20,000 times a day and if we are lucky enough to live to 70 years old, that’s around 500,000,000 breaths in a lifetime. Some, if not all of these, can go completely unnoticed, yet breathing is the only system of the body which we can have some control over, we can change the way we breathe to change the way we feel. We can switch from breathing in a subconscious way to a conscious state, in just one breath. Why and how we trigger this switch is still a scientific mystery. Alongside side knowing what triggers labour. A mystical moment which leads to our very first breath.

As long as it’s taken you to read this sentence thus far, someone has just taken their first inhale, another their final exhale. Someone somewhere will be experiencing their first conscious breath, another enjoying the sensations of breathing fully, where the breath moves fully and freely through the entire respiratory system, having a healthy ripple effect on all other systems of the body. Others will be holding their breath, some having their breath taken away. Some chests will be rising on the inhale and others will be breathing into the belly space with little movement in the upper chest. Each and every living being inhales and exhales at a different pace, as if listening and dancing along to its own song.

Imagine your breath as the dancer of your body. The way your breath moves your body, creating a wave in the torso, a little rock in the sitting bones, an expansion of the ribs, a lift in shoulders creating a length in the neck  and even subtle movements in the throat and face. Is your breath gliding smoothly through the body, like a well trained dancer, where there is an effortless feeling of grace and flow to the body’s movement on every breath? Or does it feel a little more like a Morris dancer in training, a tad stop start, more staccato, less room to move, slightly short on the inhale and exhale? And what rhythm does it have?

Does your breath have a slow, deep, bass like rhythm, long and full on the inhale and easy on the exhale, or does your breath like to rush in and out of the body as quick as possible with a fast shallow pace?  You have to almost tap into your inner detective as the breath is so subtle you may find it tricky to track your breath on this level. It’s all in the practice.

Just by reading about breathing should bring your awareness a little closer to it’s learned rhythm.  Now let’s look a little closer.

Although we can all celebrate having a UBP (Unique Breathing Pattern), we do slip into certain categories. These are:

• Breath Holder
• Belly Breather
• Reverse Breather
• Upper Chest Breather….
• In-betweener Breather

What does your UBP look like (Unique Breath Pattern)?

First things first, let’s get as comfortable as possible.

Make sure you are either sitting or lying down on your back, allow the body to feel supported, either in a chair or even better, on a bed.

Place one hand on the lower belly (a couple of inches below the belly button) and the other on the upper chest (just below the collar bone). Breathe as you normally would. Simply feel where the body moves on the inhale. Where does the breath like to land in the body? Which part of the body is rising most? Take another inhalation and exhalation to deepen your research. Where does the breath like to work most? Is it working well in the lower belly or is the upper chest doing all the work?

a) Belly rising on the inhalation, more than the upper chest?

If this is so, it can be indicative that you are a belly breather.  This is a good foundation to have, but movement in the upper chest is paramount for bringing more energy into the system.

b) Chest rising, belly sucking in on an inhalation?

You could be a reverse breather. This means everything is a bit topsy turvy. You could improve your respiratory system if you concentrate on exercising and strengthening the diaphragm. Practicing exercises to retrain the respiratory muscles which use the abdominal muscles and pelvic floor muscles to work in a more healthy way.

c) Chest rising more than the belly rising on the inhalation?

This could indicate that you are an upper chest breather. Do you spend a lot of time up in your head? Full of ideas but often don’t get these off the ground? Do you give a lot of energy to other people but often neglect your own needs? You may find it helpful to practice some belly breathing exercises to help ground you and reconnect with your body.

d) Breath is even in both parts of the upper and lower chest.

This is great news, if the breath is free flowing and the inhale feels expansive and effortless and the exhale feels relaxing with no effort of letting go. There’s always room for improvement though! Start with some pelvic breath exercises and move on to the diaphragmatic and upper chest expansion poses –  a couple of which can be found on the Yoga and Conscious breath page.

More and more of us these days tend to fall into the upper chest breather category and those of us who are belly breathers are rarely breathing deeply enough into the abdominal area so there are exercises you can do to connect with a healthy, deep belly breath.

There are many exercises you can practice to improve your entire respiratory system. In my experience Transformational Breath is the most powerful breath work to correct any unhealthy breath patterns.