How do you breathe properly? (Life and Breath work)

[cle103]

Hey guys, I've been meditating alot on my breath for the last months (using Culasada's stage model) and I've been noticing some interesting changes which also pose the above question. 

A couple of nights ago I was lying down getting ready to sleep after meditation and my mind just stopped completely. Like zero thoughts. I then was sucked into something that seemed like swirl of consciousness which was also profound as it wiped away the feeling of the body. However it stopped after a minute or so.

Ever since then I've been focussing on the breath even more throughout the day (I also do breath work and Kriya Yoga). Which poses my question: 

 

How do you breath properly? 

I am serious. There's alot of conflicting advice. 

Some ppl. say to breathe into your stomach. Some say to expand your full torso... 

Same in breath work: Do you breathe only through your nose? Only through your mouth? Or does it not matter? I've heard all 3 answers from seemingly legit experts (Wim Hof, Laird Hammilton, ...). 

As for my direct experience: In daily life I feel that if I breathe with my whole torso I also move my shoulders upward a bit which is not good. However if I only breathe into my belly it doesn't seem optimal either (most likely either takes more practice). 

Note: Focussing on the breath throughout the day is immensely calming, even meditative. My day feels like low level meditation when I don't forget to check in with my breath regularly. In my view this has immense potential as I feel it's essential to make life your practice as well. 

Regarding breath work: Breathing only in through the nose seems really forceful when you want to go balls deep (bc. the breath would otherwise take alot longer compared to mouth breathing).

 

So what is your experience? 

If I remember correctly @Leo Gura wanted to shoot a video on the proper way of breathing (maybe he could spill the beans ). 

 

- Cheers

 

 

[Commodent]

I think the most important thing is that the breath follows a smooth continuous motion with no holding of the breath.

Breathe into both the stomach and the torso. You will notice that when your body is relaxed you naturally tend to do this.

Closing the mouth and breathing through the nose mantains correct tongue posture, so in my view that's better.

[cle103]

@Commodent Ok thanks. What do you think about breath work? And what are your sources? 

[White Monk]

@cle103 Breathing properly seems to happen best when you let go of the process of breathing and allow yourself to breath as you will. Also, in regards to breathing practices (shamanic/holotropic) these really help to assist you in finding and removing blockages to your natural breath wave. I think for some people mouth closed is great but for many people I would maybe suggest making sure your jaw and throat regions stay very relaxed and surrendered in the process. 

I would recommend trying some shamanic breathing, for 40 minutes a couple times in the month or week. Just be in a place where you can really surrender to the process which I am sure you already know. 

Last thing I just started doing Sadghuru's inner engineering and it includes pranayama which I have found extremely helpful, not only for aligning my chakras, but also charging them and aligning the two halves of my body(masculine and feminine). It's a great tool for me.