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Just
Breathe Out:
Developing
a User-Friendly Body, featuring BreathPlay
© 2010 Betsy
Thomason, RRT
CHAPTER 1
How to be a BreathPlayer
If You Are Above Ground
Every human being lives from one breath to the next. If you don’t
breathe, you are not living. If you hold your breath, you are not living
well. If you never pay attention to your breathing, you are missing the
many benefits of effective breathing.
The basic purpose of breathing is to manage the energy required by each
cell in the human body. In our modern, fast-paced culture, we humans live
on autopilot. Breathing, which can be an automatic process or a
conscious, focused process, is now sorely neglected. Thus, its
significance is lost. Brains are running the automatic show. Bodies are
simply dragged along for the ride, often bumpy at best. However, bodies
always have the last word, like it or not.
This book shows you how to honor your body and make it user-friendly. The
result is harmony between conscious mind and body. This is accomplished
by redefining breathing. The new word is BreathPlay.
BreathPlay is focused breathing
with the emphasis on an active, spine-stretching outbreath and a passive,
relaxing inbreath. This cycle of outbreath and inbreath is just the
opposite of what is considered ‘normal’ breathing. BreathPlay challenges
the age-old assumption that breathing is an in-out process. The
BreathPlay out-in focus is based on the ancient esoteric wisdom
from yoga and martial-arts masters. By using this out-in orientation,
BreathPlayers efficiently expand their physical and mental abilities.
BreathPlay is inherently fun—that’s why it’s called BreathPlay not
breath work. Ian Jackson, who began developing this breathing system in
the 1960s, understood that learning anything is easier if it peaks the
imagination. Thus, BreathPlay incorporates many images, like the bellows,
that explain the out-in breathing process. BreathPlay invites you to
develop your own images that propel you along the learning path.
Ultimately, BreathPlay helps you access your core muscles and your core
identity. From this, your own wonderful self-expression emerges. [Insert
sidebar #1 here]
BreathPlay teaches you a new way of looking at life—at your life—the
only one that you can change. You are learning a new way to focus on
releasing carbon dioxide into your surrounding environment and letting
life-giving oxygen enter your internal environment. This is the
simplicity of BreathPlay. As you practice and get in touch with your body
rhythms and messages by letting nature’s vacuum work, you will
experience the rich complexity of BreathPlay.
Use your belly muscles to push air out of your body through slightly
pursed lips, as if you are a gentle breeze. Then, release the belly
muscles to let the universe refill your lungs. You’ve already
started learning BreathPlay!
Be The Bellows
Over the years, I have used the fireplace bellows as the primary metaphor
for BreathPlay. I encourage my BreathPlay students to “be the bellows”!
When you squeeze something, then suddenly expand it, you create a vacuum.
This is a physical law of our universe. The bellows image suggests that
if you push the air out using your belly, assisted by gently pursed lips,
all the air you need comes bounding back automatically as your belly
expands. Voila! An effective breath, with half the effort. Active
outbreath; passive inbreath.
During BreathPlay workshops, we examine the bellows metaphor. What is the
job of the bellows? How does the air leave the bellows? How does the air
reenter the bellows? How do you know that the air has come in?
The bellows is an imperfect metaphor because energy is required to expand
the bellows. With BreathPlay, little or no effort is required to expand
the belly. Allowing the muscles to recoil naturally, without effort,
causes the expansion that creates the vacuum that sucks the air back into
the lungs. Recently one of my students said that from her perspective,
the bellows metaphor explains BreathPlay perfectly, even in its
imperfection.
The bellows expels air through a narrow opening. In the human body this
is analogous to pursing your lips (the whistling position) and gently
blowing out. The benefit of gently restricting air flow with your lips is
the creation of back pressure which keeps the airway open so you can expel
more used air. There are other ways to create a restriction without
effort. You can blow out against smiling lips and teeth; grunting,
singing or humming work as well.
A ten-year-old student asked if you could purse your nose. Now this is
BreathPlaying at its best—fostering creative thinking. After all, the
nose is designed for breathing. It cleans and humidifies the air. Why
not try it, I suggested. See if it works. I tried it too. I focused on
directing the flow of air out through my nose. For me, nose pursing
worked for quiet, still BreathPlaying, but it did not provide enough air
exchange for fast-paced activities.
The imperfect bellows metaphor defines BreathPlay perfectly. The job of
the bellows is to make a fire burn more brightly because air aids
combustion. This is accomplished by pushing air out of the bellows. The
entrance of air back into the bellows, while essential, does not support
the fire. This is also true in the human body where the metabolism is the
fire and the bellows is the belly. So it is with the breathing cycle of
outbreath and inbreath. The outbreath generates power and is longer than
the inbreath which supplies the accelerant—air.
Without adequate air exchange, metabolism is sluggish. The body screams
for help with messages such as shortness of breath, cramps, heavy legs,
chest pressure, brain fog and anxiety.
My students never question that the bellows always fills with air. But
they do question the idea that, when BreathPlaying, air always comes back
into their own lungs by itself instantly, and without hesitation. See for
yourself! Practice, then you will believe it!
Learning and applying a new idea, one that turns your world upside-down,
is a challenge. It is easier to learn something new than to change an old
habit, like in-out breathing. This is why I recommend that you forget
about undoing “normal” breathing and become a BreathPlayer. Learn a new
trick. Just add it to your daily routine and trust BreathPlay to connect
you with all the energy you need.
Physical Education, Imagination
and Practice
One image, the bellows, describes basic BreathPlay. Becoming a
BreathPlayer is not difficult. It simply takes practice, because this is
physical education, not intellectual brain training. You are teaching
your muscles some new tricks. Different kinds of muscles have different
jobs. When given a chance, and each knows how to perform its own job.
When muscles have been neglected (as in a beer belly) or overused (as in
military posture—guts sucked in), they forget how to behave. So muscles
need your conscious help to do their best. They are smart, but require
practice and a nonjudgmental brain in order to perfect their craft.
[Insert sidebar #2 here.]
Muscles respond to pictures of what you want them to do. Thus, the image
of the bellows—actually be the bellows. But not everyone responds
to the same image or metaphor. Ian Jackson uses many images and invites
you to create your own. Develop a metaphor consistent with your knowledge
of BreathPlay, human body design and your life experiences. One caution:
blowing out a candle is not a valid image because the outbreath has
knocked the flame off the wick. Your outbreath increases your internal
flame! [Insert bellows diagram here.]
Ian’s idea of the belly button string is another BreathPlay
metaphor. Think of your belly button as a real button with two holes in
it. Now lace a string into the holes and bring the string straight back
through your spine. Grab the string and pull it to accomplish the
outbreath. Release the string to accomplish the inbreath. Expand upon
this metaphor. Make it your own.
One of my students suggested that if you physically pull the imaginary
string, it becomes an exercise for the triceps muscle on the back of the
upper arm. She recommended alternating arms so both arms benefit.
Be-a-Balloon is another game Ian created. It works well when you
are BreathPlaying quietly because of the effort added to the inbreath.
Sitting in a chair, or lying down, push air out through gently restricted
lips, to a point of comfort, then, gently glide into the inbreath with
extra effort. Experience the in-rush of air expanding your belly, as if
you were a balloon, then your chest, until the inbreath wave reaches your
throat. Do this over and over for a few minutes. You might consider this
game a BreathPlay yawn. It stretches both the chest wall and the lung
tissue. It’s okay to put the extra effort into the Be-a-Balloon inbreath
because you are not using your limbs for movement. The whole Be-a-Balloon
breathing cycle (outbreath and inbreath) might take 6-10 seconds. You
decide what length feels best.
If you play Be-a-Balloon lying flat, notice that your shoulders are
stationary. This is desirable because the lungs are not attached to the
shoulders, rather to the diaphragm. When we sit or stand up and take a
traditional deep inbreath, we habitually raise our shoulders—without
benefit. BreathPlaying eliminates this wasteful movement.
I credit Be-a-Balloon with solving my ticklish rib problem. Every time a
friend or family member put an arm around my waist, I would jump. This
did not seem normal to me. Apparently the efficiency of BreathPlay was
not stretching the muscles of my rib cage enough. Muscles that are not
moved often become twitchy. So, I started daily Be-a-Balloon practice.
After regular practice for a month or so, my tickle problem disappeared.
I no longer jump at the flick of an arm around my waist!
I love the image of the pin wheel. It only works when you blow on
it! Its job is to spin. The work is accomplished with the outbreath.
Over the years, I have had fun teaching children how to BreathPlay by
turning the pinwheel metaphor into reality. First, the children make pin
wheels, and then play with them. Bingo! They understand the power of the
outbreath and the value of pursed lips. Then a discussion can start about
how to apply BreathPlay in their lives. Children have the answers.
They’ve just never heard the questions!
Sidebars
Sidebar #1
Ian Jackson on the simplicity of BreathPlay
“Although the BreathPlay techniques are simple, they are powerful, or to
put it more precisely, they help you discover how powerful you
are. They give you focusing tools you can use to do better whatever
you’re doing. Since it (BreathPlay) makes such profound changes in the
basic rhythm of life--the rhythm of emptying and filling the lungs--it can
change everything.”
From: The BreathPlay Approach to Whole Life Fitness
by Ian Jackson
Garden City, New York: Doubleday, 1986, p. 38.
Sidebar #2
Learning Basic BreathPlay
To initially learn BreathPlay in your muscles, (as opposed to knowing it
in your brain), practice three times a day, for three to five minutes or
more. Find a quiet place with no television, no radio—no distractions.
It might be when you wake up in the morning or when lying in bed falling
asleep, and then one other time, sitting in a straight-backed
chair—perhaps before a meal. With this quiet BreathPlay practice, you
will become deeply acquainted with your body. Experience the ebb and
flow—the out and in—of your breath. Feel the movement of your spine
against the mattress or the back of the chair during the outbreath. Be
with your body. Be in praise of your body—that is, be nonjudgmental.
Enjoy what you are accomplishing. You are preparing your body to
BreathPlay with movement.
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