Breath and Quality of Life🔗

Breath is intimately connected to life. There is no life without breath. Yogis learned how to develop long and deep breathing, which directly increases their energy level and lifespan. The yogic tradition states that each person comes to life with a certain number of breaths. The lifespan is determined by how fast these breaths are used up. Certain lifestyles accelerate the aging process by causing constant stress and emotional charge which speed up the breath and decrease our longevity.

A person who is relaxed, and calm, has a slow breathing rate. A person who is irritated or stressed has a fast rate and shallow breaths. Breath is closely related to mental and emotional states. There is a breath for each emotion. Manipulating the breath through yoga asana and the science of pranayama changes the state of mind and emotions. By bringing awareness to the body and the breath, it is possible to bring the mind into the moment, where the thoughts of past and future are not affecting the present.

When one is constantly in a state of tension, deep breathing is forgotten and awareness of our breath is lost. A sedentary lifestyle also makes the breath shallow unless there is a conscious effort made to breathe deeply. Shallow breathing leads to insufficient prana and oxygen in the body which leads to disturbances in organ and body functioning.