BITESIZE | How to Reduce Stress and Anxiety by Changing the Way You Breathe | Patrick McKeown #221
This episode features Patrick McKeown, an expert who believes correct breathing is key to health. He explains how emotions, sleep, and breathing are interlinked, offering practical tips to reduce stress by optimizing breathing patterns, primarily through nasal and slow diaphragmatic breathing.
Deep Dive Analysis
10 Topic Outline
Introduction to Breathing's Fundamental Importance
Patrick McKeown's Personal Breathing Transformation
Prevalence and Impact of Dysfunctional Breathing
The Critical Role and Functions of Nasal Breathing
How Breathing Influences Oxygen Uptake and Delivery
Interlinkage of Breathing, Emotions, and Sleep
Breathing Patterns During Stress and Relaxation
The Myth of 'Taking a Deep Breath' for Stress
Scientific Discovery of Slow Breathing's Calming Effect
Breathing as Information and a Biohack for the Brain
4 Key Concepts
Dysfunctional Breathing
This refers to breathing patterns that are fast, shallow, irregular, or primarily through the mouth and upper chest, rather than the nose and diaphragm. It can worsen conditions like asthma, impair sleep, reduce stress handling, and keep the body in a fight-or-flight state.
Nasal Breathing Functions
Beyond filtering, warming, and moistening air, the nose actively engages the diaphragm, leading to slower, more efficient breathing. It significantly improves oxygen uptake in the blood and enhances oxygen delivery to cells, promoting a relaxed state.
Breathing as Information
Breathing patterns act as a feedback loop to the brain. Fast, shallow, chest breathing signals danger, causing the brain to send stress signals, while slow, diaphragmatic breathing sends calm signals, allowing individuals to consciously hack their physiological state.
Brain Structure Spying on Breathing
Research from Stanford Medical School identified a brain structure that monitors breathing. This structure relays signals of agitation to the brain when breathing is fast, potentially waking an individual from sleep, but relays signals of calm when breathing is slow.
6 Questions Answered
Breathing correctly and efficiently is fundamental to life, significantly determining the quality of our life, performance, and even relationships, by influencing oxygen uptake, delivery, sleep, and emotional state.
Nasal breathing actively targets the diaphragm, leading to slower, more efficient breathing and a relaxed state, while mouth breathing is shallow, puts the body into a fight-or-flight response, and is not a natural function of the mouth for respiration.
A Cochrane review suggests about 9.5% of the general population experiences dysfunctional breathing, but this figure can rise significantly to as high as 80% in individuals with conditions like anxiety, panic disorder, or depression.
These three aspects are deeply interlinked; if one is disrupted, it negatively affects the others. For instance, stress leads to faster, shallower breathing, which then hampers sleep, and poor sleep, in turn, agitates the mind.
No, the advice to 'take a deep breath' when stressed is considered ineffective and 'absolute nonsense' because it often encourages fast, large breaths that do not lead to positive physiological changes or true relaxation.
Slow breathing relays signals of calm to the rest of the brain, as identified by Stanford Medical School research on a specific brain structure that monitors breathing, contrasting with fast breathing which relays signals of agitation.
6 Actionable Insights
1. Always Breathe Through Nose
Consistently breathe in and out through your nose because the mouth has no breathing function, and nose breathing targets the diaphragm, increases oxygen uptake and delivery, and promotes relaxation and a calm mind.
2. Slow, Light, Diaphragmatic Breathing
Gently slow down your breath, breathe lightly, and utilize your diaphragm instead of your chest. This sends calming signals to your brain, improves oxygen delivery to cells, and helps mitigate stress.
3. Open Nasal Passages
If experiencing nasal congestion, try a simple breath-holding exercise to open your nose. This technique can lead to significant improvements in sleep quality and calmness.
4. Avoid Fast, Shallow Breathing
Do not breathe fast, shallow, or irregularly, as this keeps your body in a fight-or-flight state, agitates the mind, and negatively impacts sleep and oxygen delivery.
5. Self-Assess Breathing Patterns
Regularly evaluate your breathing for signs like mouth breathing, audible breath, feeling short of breath, nasal congestion, or fast/shallow patterns. Identifying these indicates areas for significant improvement in well-being.
6. Deep Breath Advice is Flawed
Do not follow the common advice to ’take a deep breath’ when stressed, as this is considered ineffective and does not produce positive physiological changes according to the speaker.
5 Key Quotes
The mouth performs absolutely zero functions in terms of breathing.
Patrick McKeown
The information, take a deep breath when you're stressed, is absolute nonsense. It is based on nothing. And it helps nobody.
Patrick McKeown
Stress and anxiety is causing our breathing to be faster. But faster breathing is feeding back into stress and anxiety.
Patrick McKeown
If your emotions are off, and if you've had a very stressful day, you will find when you go to bed that night, you cannot sleep because you're twisting and turning.
Patrick McKeown
The way you breathe is the way you live.
Dr. Rangan Chatterjee
1 Protocols
Stress Reduction Breathing Practice
Patrick McKeown- Breathe through your nose.
- Gently slow down your breathing, even to the point of a slight air hunger.
- Use your diaphragm for breathing.
- Adopt a cadence of the breath, aiming for regular breathing instead of sighing.
- Concentrate on these changes and observe effects like body temperature, saliva increase, and overall feeling.