The Power of Breath Work and The Wim Hof Method For Resilience and Growth
This past weekend we had our first Wim Hof Workshop take place at Flow Spa.
Most of us have lost touch with what it means to breathe well but there are certain people like Wim Hof who are influencing that reconnection to one of the roots of our health.
Hof has dedicated his life to serving as an inspiration and case study for scientists on the ways that our mind can overcome the perceived limitations of our body.
This is a man who has shown that mind over matter is a real thing, as he’s climbed past the kill zone of Mount Everest in just a pair of shorts. He’s also run a marathon in the desert while carrying no water with him, and if that doesn’t sound hard enough, he didn’t even training for the run.
While this charismatic man from Denmark may be eccentric and put off some cult leader vibes, his methods which have modernized millennia-old breathing traditions are helping people all over the world handle some of their biggest health issues and reach new levels of well-being.
Just Breathe
It’s hard to believe that something we do 20,000 times per day is almost universally done incorrectly and it’s leading to weakened immune systems and chronic stress. Wim Hof has been one of the pioneers in the past several years to bring researchers and journalists alike into the scope of understanding the power of breath and how to breathe properly.
Most of us breathe too much - we actually get better oxygen flow in our body when we breathe slow and deep instead of short and shallow - with many people also mouth breathing which are two contributors as well as indicators that the body is in a stressed state.
The Wim Hof Method introduces us to a number of unique components of breathing that we don’t normally practice. In its most basic form it consists of hyperoxygenating the body through about 30 deep breaths while releasing on exhale without fully breathing out. This leads to a shift in oxygen to carbon dioxide ratio in the blood which is then followed by a full exhale and a breath hold with lungs empty of air.
The body activates the parasympathetic nervous system on this exhale which allows for a decrease in cortisol levels and deeply relaxed state during what is known at the retention time or breath hold. As the breath hold time, the body starts to crave oxygen again and while you gently resist that sensation, there is an activation of the sympathetic nervous system and release of epinephrine.
This combination of low cortisol and high epinephrine has been shown by researchers studying Hof and his students to be a way to control parts of the autonomic nervous system and immune system that were believed to be impossible by Western Medicine before Hof started showing the world what he could do.
They’ve even researched how this breathing method can suppress the immune response to an endotoxin being injected into the subjects all of whom showed little to no symptoms after training in this breathing style compared to the control group which exhibited cold and flu-like symptoms.
Train The Mind and the Body Will Follow
Other parts of the Wim Hof Method are used to train the mind to remain calm in the face of intense sympathetic activity, through power breathing and cold exposure.
By remaining calm and controlling the breath in the face of cold exposure that creates an intense spike in epinephrine and sympathetic activity, we learn how to better handle other stressors as well and create a mindset that we are able to accomplish anything.
This mindset of grit and resilience are at the forefront of the characteristics that most world-class performers foster for achieving greatness.
Not that anyone necessarily has to be driven to achieve greatness but we’ve all seen in 2020 the importance of maintaining an optimistic mindset and handling adversity with resilience. Having a reserve of self-confidence and grit means that we are ready for the obstacles in our way and also able to be there and lead our loved ones when they need us most.
Learn more about the Wim Hof Method online and if you’re ready to experience the full power of this method, check out the page on our website for upcoming Wim Hof Workshops at Flow Spa.
Unlocking Creativity and Flow Through Breathing
Can we unlock deeper states of creativity and flow states through breathing?
We often hear the question arise about what do you do in the float tank?
Other than the pithy answer of “well, you just float,” it often helps to provide some open-ended guidance to those new floaters who maybe don’t have a lot of practice with single-point meditation or focused yoga.
Breathing is often the first place I turn to when recommending something to focus on when floating. Your breath and your heartbeat are the only things you can hear if you’ve turned off the music and so you can either embrace it or it may become a foe like the telltale heart of Edgar Allen Poe.
It still sounds a little hokey, but learning to attend to your breath and breathe more consciously is doing miraculous things for people’s health. You can do anything from reducing stress to performing and recover better in sports all just by shifting the way you breathe.
Most of us breathe an average of 12 times per minute and this isn’t far away from what researchers suggest is a sign of a stressed body at 15 breaths per minute. Shifting your body into a relaxed state takes a little conscious awareness and practice to reduce your breathing rate to less than 8 per minute.
I believe that getting into this relaxed state alone is enough to induce deep states of flow in the tank and enhance creativity by allowing your brain to function more optimally.
However, to take it a step further, there are techniques more deliberately designed to tap into the creative centres of your body, as you practice and develop more conscious awareness of oxygenating your body through deep breathing.
This is an example of a Wim Hof Method (WHM) technique used to specifically induce creativity through thyroid activation. This is a more advanced technique with the Wim Hof Method and while you may try and practice it, I will be releasing more information in the coming months about how you can join me in learning more of the fundamental techniques to help you get more out of the practice.
WHM Technique for Creativity:
* Never push anything past your comfort zone. This isn’t about doing anything to extremes. It’s about developing more control and capacity in your body over time.
* Get into a comfortable position, either seated in a chair or preferably lying flat on the floor.
* Begin WHM breathing - fully breathing into your belly, chest, head in a wavelike motion. On the exhale, only let your chest and belly fall without effort to retain most air and oxygen.
* Repeat this wave-like breathing for about 30 breaths until you are fully oxygenated. The signs of an effective round are that you will begin to feel lightheaded, tingling in the fingers and toes, and loose in the body.
* On your final breath, fully inhale, fully exhale, fully inhale again and hold at the top of the breath with your lungs full of air.
* Squeeze your chest and neck and push that oxygenated blood into your upper chest where the thyroid is located. Only partially squeeze the neck to avoid the sensation from going to your head, which is another technique for different intended purposes. It helps to visualize the blood going to your chest and thyroid as well.
* Hold for about 30 seconds before exhaling fully.
* Repeat two more full rounds before ending or doing some regular WHM breathing for relaxation.
This practice will take between 15-20 minutes depending on your pace of breathing.
After completed it helps the first few times to sit for a moment and take inventory of how you feel. If you are doing the practice for the intended tapping into your creativity, you would then ideally sit down to do the creative work you’re wanting to do.
This might not make complete sense at first, but we talk about it in this podcast episode here as well and watching the video version may help to better see how it works. Read or listen through a couple of times while trying it out for yourself.
P.S. I will be running some seminars inspired by the Wim Hof Method and other meditations that I’ve learned from in the coming months and so follow us on social media or subscribe to the email list to get advanced notice on the limited space that will be available in each of those groups.