Did you know that if you stopped to breathe for more than five minutes your brain would begin to die and soon enough all your organs would shut down and cause death? Breathing is important to our organs because of the oxygen it brings in.
However, apart from respiratory infections and diseases, there are some conditions that can distract normal breathing like anxiety and stress. Anxiety is a common condition but that does not make it less severe.
When you are anxious, you may feel tightness in the chest, like you are suffocating, or can't catch your breath. It can be scary and you may feel like you are having a heart attack. Symptoms of anxiety are almost similar to those of a heart attack.
When you are stressed, instead of breathing normally, you may have small shallow breaths. Stress hormones affect your respiratory system making you have shorter faster breaths to ensure that oxygen is still distributed to your organs.
In situations like this, breathing exercises can remedy the situation. It doesn't have to be something complicated. Simply taking deep breaths can do the trick. Deep breathing calms the mind and reduces the concentration of stress hormones in your blood.
You could also try to count each breath from one to ten and feel the breath move down to fill up your stomach. These techniques can distract your mind and take it off the situation that is stressing you.
Breathing exercises are beneficial because they help reduce stress and anxiety, improve the quality of sleep, blood flow, and heart health, boost immunity, enhance cognitive functions, etc.
Our ‘breathe quotes' remind you that sometimes it's okay to take a minute to just breathe. The world moves fast and there's a lot happening. When everything seems to weigh down on you and you are feeling overwhelmed, just breathe.
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