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you can exercise all you want eat all the right Foods sleep eight hours a night if you are not breathing right you
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will always be sick James Nester International bestseller on
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breathing as a species we've largely lost the ability to breathe correctly James travels the whole world trying to
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figure out what went wrong and how to fix it 99 of people are breathing dysfunctionally they don't realize the
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damage they're doing to their bodies and brains by being this way look at the way we sit all day long the way we sleep the
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way we eat the modern world is conspiring to make us sick diabetes asthma metabolic and autoimmune issues
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anxiety even ADHD experts said it is 100 related to your breathing at night
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especially really bad breathing habits are a recipe for disaster which is what
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has happened for so many kids today so if you're a parent and if you can hear them breathing when they're sleeping
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this is a big red flag but I believe that everybody can become a good breeder
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and these steps are free you can do this while we're seated here so the first thing is to
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carbon dioxide is seen as this poison why levels over 800 into a thousand can
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have serious issues with cognitive and physical functions I've been recording our CO2 during this interview it's going
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up and if we were to continue working in here for the next few hours you will Jesus
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I think this is fascinating I looked at the back end of our YouTube channel and it says that since this channel started
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69.9 percent of you that watch it frequently haven't yet hit the Subscribe button so I have a favor to ask you if
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[Music] James
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[Music] of all the things you could have committed your life to you could have
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committed a decade of work and effort to you decided to commit it to the subject matter of breath and breathing
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why it was a number of things that happened and personally professionally
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over a number of years I never set out to write a book about breathing I mean what a boring subject right until I
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started having breathing problems I came back year after year I was i surf a lot
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in San Francisco so I was getting bronchitis I was getting pneumonia mild
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pneumonia it was nothing to worry about I'd go to my doctor I'd be given a pack of pills and sent on my way this kept
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happening year after year until a doctor friend of mine was looking at me we were out having a
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drink and she's like I think there's something going on with your breathing so breathing you know this is just
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something we do automatically it's nothing I considered she's like oh you might want to go to a breath work class
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and I went to a breath work class and it completely blew me away on on a number of levels I was able to get over the
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respiratory problems I had I don't write about this in the book because I didn't want to make my experience be indicative
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of everyone else's experience but all the issues I had completely went away 100 percent
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and so I started looking into this more just personally what else I could learn about breathing and how it could benefit
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me for athletic performance for sleep and more and noticed that my health was changing in all the right ways over and
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over again when I was adopting different habits so that was more than 10 years ago actually that was probably 12 years
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ago and then I started writing about freedivers started freediving myself and learning the limits of breathing and how
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you can do things that are supposed to be scientifically Impossible by harnessing the power of your breath and
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that's what really got me interested as a science journalist so your symptoms the symptoms you had of what were those
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symptoms at the time I was mouth breathing a lot when I was working out I was always mouth breathing
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when I was jogging I was mild to breathing doing karate mouth about breathing surfing and I noticed at night
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I could not remember a time when I did not go to sleep with a huge glass of
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water by my bedside I would wake up numerous times throughout the night my mouth was very dry
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very pasty in the morning I thought this was completely normal I also noticed
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that when I was working out at really high levels I would start to wheeze a bit like I could hear myself breathing
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and I thought this was normal whenever I talked to people about it they said oh welcome to old age this is what happens
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when you get older and I didn't think that that was a good reason to be breathing so dysfunctionally but it
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really took someone else to point it out for me to understand that maybe there was a problem there maybe I should fix
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it and your friend who was a doctor then suggested this breath work class you go to this breathwork class and is it the
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one session itself that helped you or was it the practices you took away from that session that helped you that one
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session completely blew my mind so it had all of the Hallmarks of flakiness
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and new aginess you know all the people flowing flowing clothes uh there were
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some headbands I said good God what am I doing here there's a lot of this stuff in San Francisco so I'm kind of used to
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it dream catchers all that and it wasn't until I sat down and
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started actually got rid of all of that all those problems in my brain that were
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making me resist really giving myself to this practice got rid of that started breathing and I
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I read about this at the beginning of the book but I completely sweated through my t-shirt was not a warm room
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it's quite cold in there sweat through my t-shirt there's sweat marks on my jeans my hair was sobbing wet and this
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was from sitting in a corner of a cold room just breathing at this certain pattern so it obviously released
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something in me and when I mentioned this to doctors I went back they said oh
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you had a fever or oh you know the room was too hot oh you were covered in blankets all of that was false there was
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something else deeper happening and they didn't understand it from their medical training so I tried to get answers
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elsewhere and that's what I spent years doing you spent years doing I mean your your book on the subject matter comes out
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almost a decade later um so in hindsight now you have those
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answers on why you sweated through your clothes and why you had that physiological reaction what is the answer
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I do not have opinions as a science journalist and I am a filter so uh my
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job is to talk to absolutely everybody and especially when people doctors tell
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me oh don't talk to those people they don't know what they're talking about those are the first people I'm going to talk to so I talk to everybody and try
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to synthesize what I've learned the truth according to all of these different cultures all of these
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different ways of learning and put that in a book that the general public can
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understand so I have my own personal views on it but I try to keep my personal views out of what I write
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and then the sort of next significant I guess Catalyst event that was an Inspiration Point for your work was in
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2011 as you say you went and covered the freediving championship in Greece what
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did that experience add to the inspiration Cloud that would then form the book what did you learn about the
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nature of breath from that yeah it's so funny uh you know as you go through life there are some experiences that you have
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that you have no idea that you are opening a completely different door and you're just gonna be walking through
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that door for the next decade so that's what happened in Greece didn't really know anything about it go out there and
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just have my mind blown I mean you have these people who are at the surface of the water take a single breath of air
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one breath and dive down 120 meters on a single
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breath of air and come back up five minutes later and go
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and then get out of the way for the next competitor so you watch them the water is very clear there right it goes down
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visibility is 150 meters you watch them just disappear into nothing the size of an
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ant and then completely disappear into the ocean and come back and I said my God
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there's so much we don't know about breathing and also about the limits of the human body
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I want to learn more about this I want to experience this as well not diving down that deep but I want to access more
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of what I've been given because I think we've been sold pretty short on what our
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limits are and what we should be doing and shouldn't be doing but I think our bodies are much more potential than that
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when I was when I was reading through your book you describe breath as a pillar of Health
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which is a pretty big statement to make is when we think of pillars of Health we might think of you know exercise or
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um diet but breath hasn't been considered a pillar of Health I think to be honest for the first 27 for the first
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29 years of my 30 year old life I purely viewed breath as this thing that just happens unconsciously that is
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inconsequential and it's only in recent times because your work has influenced some people very close to me that I
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started to second guess that where do we stand as a society at the moment when we're talking about the
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majority of people in terms of our view of what breathing is and the role it plays and then I also want to understand
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um why that's wrong because as I said I thought of breathing as just this thing that happens and it was it was quite um
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unnerving to understand that that view has potentially been impacted me in
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profound ways without me knowing it like you said I've been pointing at the wrong thing I've been thinking I need some pills or I just can't sleep or I've got
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in I'm you know someone might think they're an insomniac or whatever but you make the case quite profoundly
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that breathing is much more than an unconscious act that we just do without thinking about well breathing
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is something that just happens and how wonderful that is that we've evolved to not have to think about every breath we
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take right that would be a real problem but that doesn't mean we can't take
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conscious control of our breathing and then elicit different effects from our body so we have adopted habits according
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to our breathing from our environment from the way we sleep from our mouth
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structure and more that are not the best habits to have for breath so the reason
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why people spend so much time doing breath work and rehearsing slower breathing lower breathing breathing
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through the nose is to reset a natural habit so that you don't have to think
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about it I mean I don't want to have to constantly be checking in on my breath throughout the day I want that to be
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automatic but that takes a lot of time to get back to that healthy state to
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make it unconscious where do we get these bad habits from and because I think you know surely my body I'm the
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product of you know several I don't know thousands gazillion years of evolution surely my body is doing it correctly by
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default what is what has changed that is causing me to do it incorrectly your body is not doing this correctly by
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default what has changed is this modern environment is conspiring to make us
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sick and I don't think that that is an exaggeration at all if you look at the
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way we sit all day long if you look at the way we work if you look at the way
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we eat if you look at the way we sleep of all the pollution noise pollution air
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pollution we're surrounded by this is why we are so sick it is the environment the human body is so well equipped to
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live a healthy life which is why indigenous cultures the few left they
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don't need to go to a Cardiologist or a pulmonologist or a dentist they have straight teeth they breathe perfectly
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they don't have all of these problems that we have today so these are diseases
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of civilization the vast majority of problems we contend with we have created
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in the last few 100 years and one of the problems with breathing is that our
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facial structure does not allow us to breathe in a healthy way anymore and it
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did hundreds of years ago and we know that from the skeletal record what are some of the um the most common
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Modern Problems then that the environment we live in um have caused and here I'm talking
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about diseases what are the everyday diseases that you've discovered are byproducts of
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misunderstanding and our bad breathing habits show me a list of the top diseases and
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they're all related to it even diabetes who would have thought that the onset of diabetes could be triggered by poor
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breathing habits at night but that is exactly what researchers have found because if you are choking on yourself
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all night as so many people do oh
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you aren't resting you aren't entering stages of Deep Sleep which means your body never restores and your body is
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going to break down so researchers have have known this for 50 years their scientific studies
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showing this over and over again so that's just with with diabetes and
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metabolic issues autoimmune issues for the same reason you're constantly breathing like this stooped over
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you're causing undue inflammation to your body you're causing nervous system dysfunction you're in that sympathetic
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state which after a while will trigger a bunch of autoimmune issues so so many of
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these things not exclusively are related to breath they are exclusively related
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to diet exercise sleep and breath you can eat all the right foods you can
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sleep eight hours a night you can exercise all you want if you are not breathing right you will always be sick
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and I've heard that six years ago by a researcher and believe it more now than
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I ever have at the very start of your book you you test these things on yourself
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you did an experiment which I found really really interesting I think that experiment has actually stayed with me for a long time and then
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it's impacted me in the gym a lot every time I'm on that tread bloody treadmill I'm thinking about what I read but um
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why did you want to do that experiment on yourself and what was the experiment I didn't want to do this experiment on
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myself I really did not want to do it no one else was going to do it really there had never been a human trial of nasal
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breathing versus versus mouth breathing for this amount of time and I was talking to jayak or Nayak who's the
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chief of rhinology research at Stanford the top top of his field and I said we
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know what happens to animals when they breed this way we know all the deleterious effects of mouth breathing
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on kids on adults on old people on sleep on athletic performance why can't you
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test this let's get a big group of people and test this he said it'll never happen we're not going to find funding
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and he thought ethically there would be problems doing it because he knew what damage could be caused by becoming a
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mouth breather and so after all this I just kind of gave up and then I had an idea I said well what if I did it and
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what if I got one other person we will sign up we'll sign whatever waivers and we did it doesn't you know it's just two
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people but that was the maximum we were allotted and he said okay but he had no
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money for it so we had to pay for this experiment at Stanford which was not the cheapest thing I've ever paid for in my
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life um but I wanted to know I I'm writing about mouth breathing writing about all the problems I'm writing about my
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subjective experience of how it transformed my life becoming a nasal breather I wanted to see that experience
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dictated and documented in data by machines and that's why we did it
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and how did it go terribly it was awful um so just to let let people know uh
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this was an experiment in which for 10 days we had our noses plugged up right
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and then for another 10 days we had all of that stuff released from our noses
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and we were almost exclusively nasal breathing everything else in those 10-day periods was exactly the same we
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ate the same Foods we walked the same number of steps we exercised the same so
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exactly the same and we did scientific studies and took a bunch of data before
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during and after we were collecting data three times a day as well looking at
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what was happening to our bodies Our sleep our inflammation and more and we
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knew this wasn't going to be pleasant but I didn't know it was going to be this bad like it was really not trying
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to be over dramatic but it was awful awful and uh I'm so happy I never have
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to do that again at the same time I feel so sorry for people who do not realize
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that their noses are stuffed up who have been living this way for years and don't understand that this is their main
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source of their issues with migraines sleep problems and more I can I could I could see it in you and you described it
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as being awful that you're almost teleporting yourself back to that to that chapter I could see it in your face
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a little little PTSD from that still uh it was bad um when you say bad what you mean
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specifically is in it was the the first few days so I did this with uh breathing
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researcher and breathing therapist Anders Olson from Sweden he was the only
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person that would do this and he flew from Sweden on his own dime to try to
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understand this he had been talking about nasal breathing for 10 years right and so he said okay I want to put this to the test I want to see if I'm right
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or wrong so the first few days were kind of laughing it was like how bad did you sleep you know we're comparing we went
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from zero snoring to full-on snoring and sleep apnea within a couple of days and
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so we were comparing kind of showing off how sick we were but then after about a week we saw three
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days ago like I wasn't able to sleep at night and I was dreading every single night going to sleep because you're my
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mouth was so dry and my sleep was so bad I was so tired after sleeping nine ten
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hours a night I was so tired and and the data proved that as well so it got
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really bad by the 10th day we were in really bad shape and and again I want to
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mention like so many people especially during allergy season are plugged up for months at a
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time and they don't realize the damage they're doing to their bodies and brains by being this way
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how many people are breathing incorrectly in your view how many people if they if
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they went and did a practice or they had the understanding that's in your book and that you speak
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about do you believe would have better overall health and well-being if they made a change to their breathing
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by taking simple steps I believe that everybody can become a
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better what is considered a good breather and these steps are free and they're available for everybody if you
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look at the percentage of the population who is breathing dysfunctionally I've heard different percentages from
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different people respiratory therapists who do this all day long to Elite
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trainers of Olympians they say 95 to 99
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of the people that they see are breathing dysfunctionally so it's basically everybody some people
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obviously there's a curve to that there's an asthmatic with panic attacks
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that is breathing very dysfunctionally and then there's an athlete who can push
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through the pain and win that competition but is still breathing
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dysfunctionally so there's a there's an arc to that
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we will sit somewhere on that spectrum and we all do yeah and I'm not a perfect breather you're not a perfect breather
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like it's hard to find a perfect perfect breather just like it's hard to find someone that eats perfectly every single
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meal that's probably not the person you ever want to hang out with anyway you referred to tribes there and um
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people that are not living in our environment and also you know you talk a lot about breathing as a lost art I'm so
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fascinated by I think I spent the last couple of years really fascinated by how our ancestors lived their lives and how
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they did things you know I was talking to Dr Daniel Lieberman about running and feet and muscle strength and all those
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things and spoken to so many other people about processed food and you know all of these modern sort of misalignment
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diseases where we're not living in alignment with ourselves have have become a really important part of my understanding of how I should be living
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now breathing has a lost start what did you learn when you looked back through history about how people breathe
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and um what did that tell you about how we're doing it wrong I learned that we
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didn't need breath work classes hundreds of years ago we already had
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bodies that were able to breathe in properly we were living in an environment that supported healthy
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breathing I love lieberman's work by the way I've learned so much from them including a lot of this stuff on skells
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and and breathing so I learned a lot a lot from him so you
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know people say well how do you know that we can't go back in time what you can do is look at indigenous cultures
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which is what Lieberman and so many other people have done and they found they don't have problems with their feet
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they don't have problems with their backs they don't have heart disease they don't have asthma why is it that
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Mennonites this is these are these groups in the U.S that live this very
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traditional lifestyle right so some people say that asthma is is genetic so Mennonites and Quakers who aren't around
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any technology right they have 0.5 percent of their population has asthma meanwhile in the
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U.S 10 of the population has asthma so obviously the environment has so much to
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do with our health and it absolutely affects our breathing for all the things I mentioned earlier how are you sitting
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how are your stress levels how are you sleeping how are you working out all of these things will weigh upon how healthy
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you are able to breathe and so the in the context of the modern world so if we
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didn't need breath work you know a couple hundred years ago the introduction of things like pollution I understand but all their everyday things
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like the chair I'm sat in right now and the way that I work every day that have impacted breathing and then the
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modalities like asthma and these other things absolutely yeah and we could go through a few of these things so
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when you're sitting as I said eight hours a day I try to stand at the standing desk as well you are inhibiting
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your ability to breathe properly so I'm sitting forward in this chair right now
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even if I wanted to take a deep breath it's really hard I have to struggle to
00:24:01
do that because my diaphragm which is right underneath the lungs is unable to
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descend properly to allow for that proper inhale give me an example of what the diaphragm is sure the diaphragm is
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this umbrella shaped muscle that sits underneath the lungs the lungs are just like two balloons they don't inflate
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themselves they need the diaphragm to come down it creates a vacuum and air comes into the lungs when we exhale that
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diaphragm pushes up and pushes the air out of the lungs so that's how we
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breathe it's not the lungs doing the work the lungs are just these fleshy bags right it's that diaphragm
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descending creating a vacuum air comes in and that diaphragm ascending lifting
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back up and pushing that air out so you need proper diaphragmatic movement in
00:24:56
order to breathe properly when our bodies aren't allowing us to do that when you're sitting on a bus or sitting
00:25:03
on a plane for 12 hours at a time and you're seated like this you aren't able to breathe properly that
00:25:10
means you're only breathing into your chest you weren't accessing all of this
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other area if you're just breathing into your chest you have to breathe way more
00:25:21
breaths the reason is so much of that area you're bringing that air into does
00:25:27
not participate in gas exchange it does not soak up that oxygen that's in the
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air so most of us spend most of our days like this
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slumped over in the chair like yeah and breathing like that we can live this
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way doesn't mean we're healthy we can live on three pieces of pizza every day
00:25:48
right we have enough calories to do that doesn't mean we're healthy so that's that's the number one thing you can sit
00:25:54
in a chair properly to breathe right but it takes some effort if you look at indigenous
00:26:01
cultures again look at how they're sitting look at their spines like it's a beautiful thing they're sitting in a way
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that is conducive to proper breathing any statue any ancient statue look at
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the posture the posture is for people that can't see this right the poster is straight up or it is it is it is it is
00:26:23
straight up but relaxed at the same time it is having a straight spine I now once
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you learn this it just it makes you neurotic after a while but that's the first thing is to really notice how
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you're sitting when we get stressed out when we're answering emails we're over a laptop I spend so much of my life doing
00:26:45
this then we also have a stress response which further reduces our ability to
00:26:50
breathe properly we start to breathe too much we start holding our breath and we breathe too much our posture is like
00:26:57
this so everything is conspiring to make us really poor breathers and this isn't some far-flung hypothesis I have it's
00:27:04
it's basic biomechanics of how the body works the diaphragm part's really interesting
00:27:10
to me because the you refer to and many people refer to the diaphragm as the second heart
00:27:15
because it kind of it's a muscle that is uh autonomous to some degree like the
00:27:22
heart I don't control my heart I can control my diaphragm but when I don't think about it it kind of controls
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itself is that accurate yeah absolutely it's it's an autonomic function but by
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taking conscious control of that diaphragm you can't control your heart you can control your blood flow and that
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the diaphragm also does an incredible amount of work pumping blood into the heart and pumping lymph fluid throughout
00:27:46
the body so when you see people only using five ten percent of their diaphragmatic movement which is
00:27:52
considered normal now just moving the diaphragm this much they their hearts
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have to work so much harder to just pump blood and their bodies have to work so much harder to pump lymph fluid which
00:28:03
you need to get rid of all that waste right the body likes movement the fluids need to be moving so just by taking a
00:28:11
slightly deeper breath and exhaling a little more you were able to help your
00:28:16
heart rate out and which is why your heart rate will start to go down after a while you're able to help your blood
00:28:22
pressure in some cases you're able to pump lymph fluid in more just by taking a slower deeper breath and you know just
00:28:30
look to the Animal Kingdom for your guidance on this we don't need any fancy
00:28:35
animation to show us what proper breathing is look at a healthy dog sleeping look at a healthy infant
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sleeping and breathing look at indigenous cultures how they sleep how they breathe you can't tell they're
00:28:48
breathing and that's what healthy breathing is it should not be perceptible so when a lot
00:28:53
of people hear about healthy breathing they want to overdo it right they want
00:28:59
oh yeah I feel great if you look at a monk or someone who's a master breather you cannot tell their
00:29:06
breathing it's so soft and so subtle that it just comes in and comes out that
00:29:13
is someone who is balanced their nervous system is balanced their breathing is balanced
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are these habits we can learn you talk there about posture and about the diaphragmatic
00:29:24
um movement and at what percentage of the diaphragm we're we're kind of using and how much that's filling our lungs
00:29:30
are these habits we can learn absolutely because even posture feels like it's
00:29:36
like it's quite hard to sit like that if you start paying attention to your breathing your posture is going to get
00:29:42
better it is hard to be leaning over like this and take take a huge breath
00:29:49
look what happens to your posture so form dictates your breathing your breathing dictates your form that was
00:29:55
written in the Dow like 1200 years ago so once you learn how this proper slow
00:30:02
deep breathing Works your posture by virtue of that will get better would you
00:30:07
recommend because a lot of people do work in offices I'm one of them I spend a lot of my days sat down 10 hours
00:30:13
looking down at a screen what would you recommend for for us well I think the science is pretty clear on standing
00:30:18
desks uh convertible standing desks are really helpful to sit for part of that
00:30:24
time to stand for part of that time whenever I'm on the phone which is often I'm standing so I just press a little
00:30:31
button and I go back to standing when you're standing you're opening up your chest these intercostals you're opening
00:30:38
up to allow yourself to naturally breathe deeper breaths so you can do
00:30:43
that sitting but you just look kind of corny like sitting like this all the time so I think that that's a good hack
00:30:51
I think that the science is very clear that every couple hours I'm not very good at this I'm trying to get better go
00:30:56
for a walk for 10 minutes take your call while you're walking around to reset
00:31:01
things but that's just one of many different components looking at the
00:31:07
posture and its relationship to healthy breathing the um when I was reading through your work and I was thinking about having
00:31:13
this conversation with you this is really I guess slightly obvious but I also can understand how it's a stupid question
00:31:19
um which is if nose breathing is so beneficial for our health and well-being then why do we have the capability of
00:31:25
breathing through our mouths do you see what I'm saying great question how wonderful that we have a
00:31:31
backup system in case anything happens to our noses that we don't suddenly die right so you can drink through your nose
00:31:40
right it's really hard to do that but you can and it goes down to your stomach but that doesn't mean it's the right
00:31:46
thing to do just like with breathing again look at the Animal Kingdom look at
00:31:51
a cheetah running at 100 kilometers per hour how is it breathing and then out through its nose the only
00:31:58
time that a horse starts breathing through its mouth is when it's sick so that is a sign that it's sick a horse
00:32:05
running at a Sprint is breathing through its nose this is what we this is the
00:32:10
organ we are designed to breathe through and no one who has studied rhinology
00:32:16
would argue otherwise there are 30 different functions that the nose does
00:32:21
for breathing so not only does it help filter air out and heat air but it helps
00:32:27
capture moisture about 40 percent more moisture so you don't have to constantly
00:32:32
be drinking water when I see people jogging and they're breathing through their mouth and they're carrying like
00:32:38
four different water bottles they wouldn't need those water bottles if they just learned to breathe through their noses because the body is designed
00:32:46
to capture that moisture that's what the nose does and all those hairs do and
00:32:51
then there's nitric oxide which is this miraculous molecule that plays in a central role in vasodilation circulation
00:32:59
and more and it kills viruses and bacteria this all happens in the nose this does not happen in the mouth
00:33:05
nitrous oxide is is only happens in the nose nitric oxide yeah we get six six
00:33:11
times more nitric oxide just breathing through the nose six times more wow and
00:33:17
if you because of all of these different tissues they they release nitric oxide
00:33:23
and there is some science showing that this boost of nitric oxide can
00:33:29
significantly help us defend more from viruses and bacteria including colds so
00:33:36
breathing in and out through the nose there's a lot of work in nitric oxide and covid Rehabilitation who knew we can
00:33:43
produce so much of it in our noses and if you hum you can increase that to 15
00:33:48
fold so humming you're gonna annoy everyone if you do this increases that nitric
00:33:55
oxide 15 fold and there was one study that showed this guy completely got rid of his rhinitis just by humming for
00:34:03
about 10 minutes four times a day so these are simple tricks you can do
00:34:08
they're free available for everyone the humming also helps to calm the body down because we have the vagal nerve right
00:34:16
vagus nerve Bagel tone is right along here so when you hum you're sending signals to the vagus
00:34:24
nerve and you're calming your body down what what is humming doing humming is
00:34:30
stimulating more nitric oxide and allowing it to break free from all of those tissues so you hum in your nose
00:34:37
yeah and you can feel the vibration there so somebody sent me this device like three months ago that they now have
00:34:43
a device for people who don't want to hum that goes on your nose and hums for you if that's going to help you hum you
00:34:51
can do that but I've found it's just kind of easier to pick a song you like and hum that when you talk about the
00:34:57
common colds and you know flu and infection did you see a clear correlation between people that had good
00:35:03
breathing habits and the common cold and bad breathing habits and there have never been like a huge study done done
00:35:10
on that on humming and nasal breathing and the common and there never will be right no one's No One's Gonna fund that
00:35:16
I can say anecdotally absolutely and if you look at the biochemistry if you look
00:35:22
at the physiology if you look at all the functions of the nose you can deduce
00:35:27
it seems very clear to me that you will be susceptible less to certain viruses
00:35:33
certain bacteria by breathing in and out of of your nose you mentioned covid there your book came
00:35:41
out right as covid hit which is unbelievable timing yeah yeah
00:35:47
some people thought I'd plan that somehow it was interesting um the first
00:35:52
week the book came out somebody criticized it for taking advantage of this pandemic without bothering to
00:35:59
notice the book was printed and in warehouses six months before anyone had ever heard the word covid you know and I
00:36:06
worked on this book for years and years and years so yeah lockdown in the U.S was in March this book came out in June
00:36:14
right on the heels of it which was absolutely bizarre to me and all of the research
00:36:22
looking into breathing patterns looking into nasal breathing how that can help rehabilitate people with long covid and
00:36:30
with acute cases of covid is very solid and I still don't see anybody talking
00:36:35
about this one of the most important things that we're not talking about as it relates to things like covid from from your
00:36:41
research and your book I think the most important well it depends on on Whose stock people in breath work communities
00:36:46
have been talking yogis have been talking about Buddhists have been talking about it so I think in Western medicine
00:36:52
you come in and your doctor assesses your health listens to your heart maybe looks at your cholesterol they're not
00:36:59
looking at your breathing and this is especially important for kids I cannot tell you how many hundred thousands by
00:37:06
now of parents have written me their kids are on all these different pills
00:37:11
none of them are doing anything they have ADHD they're flunking out of school and I am astounded that more
00:37:18
pediatricians and more doctors aren't looking into this because so many millions of kids are suffering because
00:37:24
of their breathing is is so terrible it's been so terrible for so long that their their bodies are now rebelling
00:37:31
against them and why are kids breathing in such a way because you think you think of a kid you think they I think we
00:37:38
form these bad habits when we're adults or later on in life but to thought the thought that a kid has developed such a bad habit somewhere
00:37:47
it's quite hard to take see all roads go back to those skulls right and that anthropology and those ancient cultures
00:37:55
right so these kids are not able to breathe well because their facial development is is so retro nathic which
00:38:04
means it has grown so far backwards that their airways aren't able to open up enough so whenever they put their heads
00:38:11
on a pillow that's what it sounds like so it is a
00:38:18
problem with facial development that we did not have hundreds of years ago and
00:38:24
you can see this I spent years looking at ancient skeletons and they did not
00:38:29
have these problems so right out of the gate were messed up right arts or facial
00:38:35
function is messed up and it's making it harder for us to breathe add on top of that pollution
00:38:42
bad sitting habits bad breathing habits and you have a recipe for disaster which
00:38:48
is what has happened for so many kids today so I have to ask why that facial
00:38:53
um issue started and how that is being passed on because in my mind Evolution or de-evolution or whatever the word
00:38:59
would be in this case stopped I thought we stopped changing and evolving because
00:39:05
we are no longer being selected out of the gene pool
00:39:10
there is no stopping Evolution Evolution means change throughout time
00:39:18
it does not mean progress so when people use the word Evolution to mean we're evolving uh better and we
00:39:25
have these better capabilities that's not what the word actually means is change throughout time and we can change
00:39:33
For Better or For Worse and for the past few hundred years we have been changing for the worst this is
00:39:39
not my opinion this is a scientific fact so it comes back to that question why
00:39:45
why would an animal change for the worse and it goes back to my answer the
00:39:51
environment we can trace the exact point that our facial structure started
00:39:57
growing in this deform way to make us less susceptible to healthy breathing to
00:40:03
that changed in such a way to make us such poor breathers and that point is
00:40:09
right when industrialized food came into different cultures so that happened at different times came in first to England
00:40:16
and France then it spread to Germany then is spread to you know Scandinavia
00:40:21
then it spread through the rest of the world you can see in a single generation of eating industrialized Foods things
00:40:29
that were canned things that were bottled things that were baked things with sugar in it single generation 50 of
00:40:36
the population will have crooked teeth that didn't have it before crooked teeth are indicative of having a mouth that's
00:40:44
too small for your face your mouth grows too small teeth have no or to grow in so
00:40:50
they grow in crooked what else is a problem with having a mouth that's too small for your face you have an airway
00:40:56
that's too small you aren't able to breathe properly so we can see that exact point and researchers have done
00:41:03
this for decades and decades and I've seen these skulls before after
00:41:08
industrialization and the same story plays out no matter where you are on the planet so that is what is what has
00:41:16
ruined our faces and that's why we look so different than we did 300 years ago
00:41:21
two thousand years ago 20 000 years ago why did our mouths get smaller at that point because of industrialized food
00:41:28
elicits very little chewing you don't need to chew very much when you're eating soft foods so every if you think
00:41:36
about it our ancestors chewed for like three four hours a day
00:41:41
chewy raw meat bones or Roots uh yeah think about the foods you ate today well
00:41:47
maybe not you because you're probably eating healthy food but the food that most
00:41:53
people are eating everything's soft takes a few bites is gone there's no
00:41:58
rigorous chewing and if you don't get that early on in life your skellicature does not develop properly and your
00:42:05
musculature does not develop properly and you grow a different kind of face that makes you much more susceptible to
00:42:12
poor breathing habits does that then mean that one way we can avoid these
00:42:18
breathing Related Disorders later in life would be to have our children eating more difficult Foods when they're
00:42:24
younger absolutely and if you look at the reasons why our ancestors all had these
00:42:31
pronathic really strong faces these huge Airways it's because they were breastfed
00:42:36
for a minimum of two years and after that they weren't weaned onto applesauce or baby food they ate Adult food right
00:42:44
there was no such thing as Gerbers back then a few hundred years ago they went from being breastfed to eating Adult
00:42:51
food which requires a lot of chewing that's the main driver behind how our
00:42:58
faces have developed and devolved in the past 300 years
00:43:04
the point there about being breastfed for two years why is that consequential this is where I get into a lot of
00:43:09
trouble here so I want to be very don't worry I'm gonna do I get in trouble as well you might trust me
00:43:18
so I want to be extremely clear here I am a journalist and I go out and talk to
00:43:25
experts in the field these are not my opinions what I'm telling you what I
00:43:30
have been told by dozens and dozens of experts and I'm not shaming anyone for
00:43:35
feeding their children any way they want that's none of my business okay what I
00:43:41
have learned from several experts is the stress and chewing required for
00:43:49
breastfeeding will help pull the face out and develop a larger Airway
00:43:56
again I want to be very clear I'm not shaming modern mothers you're under an incredible amount of stress
00:44:03
bottle feeding perfectly fine you want to do that I think it's great but
00:44:09
that stress and and you think about it like for two years if you're constantly
00:44:15
pulling that face out the face is going to develop differently right so that
00:44:20
makes sense to me but even if a kid is is bottle fed which is great if you want
00:44:25
to bottle feed a kid as long as they're eating healthy food
00:44:30
that they actually chew after that I believe my personal opinion is you can
00:44:36
develop all of that proper facial structure and you can also use some different orthodontic devices to help
00:44:43
push that along and you will be perfectly fine what is the difference between the bottle and the nipple like
00:44:50
in terms of what it does to my yeah see when I when I mentioned we're both going to get in trouble here uh this is what I
00:44:56
was talking about I will not visually demonstrate look it up on YouTube anybody but there
00:45:04
is it's much easier to feed from a bottle it requires less less stress to
00:45:11
feed from a bottle when you are breastfeeding it is much more activating for the infant to have to glom onto the
00:45:19
breast and the nipple goes actually deep into their mouth almost down their throat and it requires more chewing
00:45:26
stress we know this okay which is why a lot of kids when they're given the choice between the two they want the
00:45:32
bottle because the bottle is easier they want more food more quickly and and
00:45:37
again I want to be clear just because you were bottle fed or whatever early on does not mean you're doomed it's some of
00:45:44
this sounds depressing but I considered it inspiring and empowering to know the
00:45:50
science behind this so you can fix what the core issue is and I'm convinced that
00:45:56
kids who are bottle fat can be wonderful perfect breathers by adopting other
00:46:01
habits beyond that you mentioned hyperactivity as being correlatory to breathing
00:46:09
so if you're a parent and you have kids who are having health issues even if they don't have health issues look at
00:46:15
how they're breathing at night this is so important look at how they're breathing in the day if they're breathing the vast majority of their
00:46:21
breasts through their mouth you have to fix that number one they will be much more susceptible to asthma allergies and
00:46:28
other issues later on in life especially at night if they are breathing through an open mouth and if you can hear them
00:46:35
breathing when they're sleeping this is a big red flag that you better
00:46:43
look into immediately because there will be so many Downstream issues caused by that breathing pattern like this is
00:46:51
increased risk of diabetes increased risk of autoimmune issues increased risk of asthma ADHD and more so some
00:46:59
researchers this is not my words this is what they told me they said there is no
00:47:06
such thing as ADHD what that is is sleep disordered breathing
00:47:11
period really they said it is 100 related to your breathing at night
00:47:18
especially so again that is not my view this is what they have said
00:47:23
I think that's a bit of an exaggeration but I don't think it's too far to say the vast majority of those issues if
00:47:30
your kid has sleep apnea or is snoring are caused by that they are not sleeping well if you are not sleeping well what
00:47:37
do you do all day long your body is trying to stay awake so they're giving Ritalin to stay awake they're given
00:47:42
sleeping pills to go to sleep those sleeping pills will make their breathing worse because they loosen all of the
00:47:49
muscles in here and they cause more resistance when
00:47:54
they're breathing so even if kids even if you hear a
00:47:59
slight resistance to it that is cause for alarm as well I know this seems overblown like some some crazy warning
00:48:07
but you can there are 500 scientific references available for free on my website look at the work by Christian
00:48:14
gimino who is at Stanford for 40 years he was sounding the alarm in the 70s and
00:48:20
nobody listened to him and people still aren't listening to this and it is a serious problem so what's true for kids
00:48:27
is also true for adults but I'll just cap that off right there I mean please do not cap it off ever I
00:48:34
prefer when you talk so um the ADHD point is fascinating to me because it's been a huge topic of conversation in society because of the
00:48:41
apparent Rise um in the disorder but the certain rise in the diagnosis of the disorder
00:48:47
these researchers and scientists that believe that ADHD is purely a consequence of early breathing habits
00:48:55
what evidence have they got for that or what studies have they done to show the
00:49:00
correlation between how we breathe when we're at little and our chance of ADHD when they fix the breathing the ADHD
00:49:06
goes away really for the majority of the cases offer everybody for the majority
00:49:12
of the cases it disappears
00:49:17
you can look at the studies you know if you I'm I'm happy to provide those for
00:49:22
you to me it makes sense it's if you're struggling to sleep
00:49:28
you are never going to be fully aware during during the daytime right
00:49:34
and this is one of the reasons why so many kids get their adenoids taken out
00:49:39
their tonsils taken out and more but unless you fix the breathing habit you
00:49:45
can do those surgeries and they can be very helpful unless you fix the breathing habits all of those problems
00:49:51
tend to come back sometimes even more so so you're not fixing the core issue in the core issue is breathing and
00:49:58
breathing retraining breathing habits ahead of this um conversation you know
00:50:04
we were doing some research and we found that study that analyzed more than 11 000 children over six years beginning at
00:50:10
six months of age and that revealed that children sufferings from sleep disordered breathing had a higher
00:50:16
incidence of Behavioral and emotional issues such as hyperactivity aggressiveness depression and anxiety
00:50:21
they have 50 to 90 percent more likely to develop ADHD like symptoms than were
00:50:27
normal breathers that blew my mind there it is right there I'm glad that you you
00:50:32
mentioned that and I didn't yeah and there's there's dozens of studies showing the same thing over and over and
00:50:38
over the question then becomes I guess is if I have ADHD and I'm 30 years old uh yeah
00:50:45
I I think it depends on who you are I don't think that there's a blanket prescription or a blanket guarantee on
00:50:50
any of this stuff I think it depends on what's the root cause of that ADHD we
00:50:55
know in kids it's treated as a neurological problem right if that were true then the drugs should work and they
00:51:01
don't right and I believe it's a physiological problem it's a breathing
00:51:07
problem and that that study is just one of many that that has espoused that if you're talking about an adult with ADHD
00:51:14
what I know about adopting healthy breathing habits you will only benefit
00:51:20
that benefit might be this big or might completely transform your life right you
00:51:25
will only know once you do it so I don't feel comfortable guaranteeing anyone of anything there might be some respiratory
00:51:32
therapists or breathing coaches who will say absolutely I can cure your ADHD with these breathing practices that's fine
00:51:39
but I don't think it's the same prescription for for everybody I know
00:51:45
it'll help though um going further back at this train of thought then we're talking about um exercise and nose breathing at the
00:51:51
very start of this thread of thought and I have sat here with a few people now I
00:51:56
think it was Peter attia who was talking to him about VO2 max a subject matter I
00:52:02
don't still fully don't understand but from what I understood it was the amount of oxygen we're able to take from each
00:52:07
breath yeah yeah so that's that's a general measurement of the amount of ox how efficient you are at taking up
00:52:14
oxygen which is related to breathing but it's also related to the respiratory system and how you're able to extract
00:52:20
that oxygen from your lungs into your bloodstream and it's a good gauge of General athletic performance it's not
00:52:27
everything and there's been some pushback against using that as a as a measurement but but it's a general
00:52:34
General gauge a good tool for that is there a correlation between our health
00:52:40
outcomes how long we'll live and our lung capacity or VO2 max and all of that
00:52:46
stuff is there a correlation there so I had the same question years ago and I started looking into it and it turns out
00:52:52
that numerous Studies have found found that the healthier and larger your lungs
00:52:57
are the longer you will live that is the greatest indicator of lifespan was lung
00:53:04
size and lung Health the greatest indicator the greatest indicator according to these studies the
00:53:10
Framingham study looked at 5200 people over the course of 70 years and they
00:53:15
found that the people who lived the longest have the largest and healthiest lung function they even did studies in
00:53:22
which they were looking at people who had lung transplants so surgically
00:53:28
implanted lungs those who were given larger lungs lived way longer than those
00:53:33
given normal size or smaller lungs so no matter how you get these larger lungs
00:53:39
it's better and luckily we don't need to get a transplant to do this we can
00:53:44
practice healthy breathing we can practice stretches we can exercise and
00:53:49
this naturally can keep our lung size up it's very sad when you start looking at these charts of what happened after
00:53:56
you're 30 you're almost there so get ready it's a real bummer but your lung function starts dropping off
00:54:03
very quickly and especially for women around 50 and 60 your lung function and
00:54:09
your lung size starts shrinking shrinking shrinking up which means at the time you need more oxygen more
00:54:16
easily it's much harder to get that and that's where People's Health really starts disintegrating and they start
00:54:23
having problems the good news is you can Stave off this deterioration this
00:54:29
shrinking of your lungs by doing all the stuff we're talking about by doing breath work exercise by exercise what is
00:54:37
yoga but stretching and breathing into this lung and breathing into that lung so the Yogi's
00:54:43
newest thousands and thousands of years ago and he said it almost feels like that downward spiral is kind of
00:54:49
self-reinforcing and self-fulfilling because if my lung capacity deteriorates
00:54:54
my movement and my Exercise capacity will deteriorate which means my lung
00:55:00
capacity will deteriorate which means I'll move less which it's kind of this downward spiral right absolutely and
00:55:06
it's my belief after studying this stuff for so long that that is the thing you want
00:55:12
to pay attention to more more than anything else especially as you grow older your lung function how much air
00:55:19
you can pack into your lungs how long you can hold your breath all of this is indicative of your general respiratory
00:55:26
function in your General Health so that that little hint of using a breath hold
00:55:32
every morning to see where you are physically and mentally I think it's good they've used it for thousands and
00:55:38
thousands of years and now it's coming back this is something that a lot of these longevity experts aren't looking into they're looking into nutrition and
00:55:45
exercise they're not looking into lung capacity we get more energy from breath
00:55:50
than we do from food and drink right we take 30 pounds of air in and out of our
00:55:57
lungs every single day and so I I find it interesting they're focused on all
00:56:03
these micronutrients all that stuff's important right I believe most of it but from what I know a lot of them
00:56:08
aren't focused very much on their breathing I want to make sure that I have something to that I can take into my own life there for the expansion of
00:56:15
my lung capacity because I'm sold on the importance of it so um exercise expands my lung capacity
00:56:22
yeah 15 20 just just by exercising by virtue of actually if you're a good exerciser your lung capacity will will
00:56:29
stay up cardiovascular exercise cardiovascular exercise and there's ways to access that a little
00:56:35
more if you're dysfunctionally breathing when you're working out you're not doing yourself too many favors so you have to
00:56:41
remember those simple basic things you have to learn how to take a proper breath then apply that to your workouts
00:56:47
you will see such an incredible difference once you do this this is what yoga is good for it's hard to do yoga
00:56:53
without breathing well right you can do it but by virtue of all those different
00:56:58
poses they're meant to open up your chest right to expand this area so yoga
00:57:05
cardiovascular exercise with proper breathing through my nose breath work practices the start of the day I think
00:57:12
biomechanics the first thing is awareness to any of this stuff you can take your hands we can do this while
00:57:17
we're seated here you can put it above your sit bones here yeah and when you breathe in breathe very very low and you
00:57:24
want your hands to move out laterally I don't care what your stomach's doing moving out laterally so as you breathe
00:57:29
in when you say low you mean in my belly you want your hands to me moving outwards okay I don't care what's
00:57:37
happening with your lung I with your uh stomach I can hold my breath
00:57:42
and move my stomach in and out so when people talk about a belly breath that's not what we're doing when your hands are
00:57:47
moving out laterally that means your diaphragm is descending that's how we can see if you're taking a proper deep
00:57:53
breath so as you breathe in you want your hands to be moving outward
00:57:59
and if you take a cloth measuring tape you can actually measure your progress this way the next thing you want to do
00:58:05
is take your hands okay take your four fingers place them on your collarbone and put this one's very weird place your
00:58:12
middle finger right there so it's only your middle finger that's touching okay and we're going to breathe deep then
00:58:18
we're going to move that breath up into our chest okay
00:58:24
don't move your shoulders you want to see those fingers naturally
00:58:29
separated okay so this is not a flexing thing your shoulders stay down like this
00:58:37
just like this fingers on the collarbone we're going to take a big breath into our lower abdomen area
00:58:44
move it up and you want your chest to be expanding
00:58:51
outward the last thing we want to do take your hands and put them especially
00:58:56
you you need to do this take your hands put them around your neck yeah I want
00:59:02
you to do that same breath you should feel zero tension in your neck there's none of this going on okay it should
00:59:09
feel soft and supple so let's take that belly to the chest breath
00:59:15
if there's any tension do it again until there's no tension
00:59:26
okay now try that again keeping your shoulders down okay do not move your
00:59:32
shoulders up there's none of this going on you're very soft very relaxed take
00:59:37
your hands above the hip bones when you're breathing in very deep those hands should be out like this
00:59:43
like wings yeah okay and you're going to breathe in deep and those hands should be moving out laterally
00:59:52
you will start to feel those organs getting compressed that's good you want
00:59:57
that then you can move it up one more time so we're going to start low we're going to move that breath up to the
01:00:03
chest keep your shoulders down
01:00:09
try it again keep the shoulders down there you go and those fingers should be
01:00:15
separating so this is something that you can check in if those hands are moving
01:00:21
out laterally if those hands are separating on your chest you're taking a proper
01:00:27
biomechanical breath and that's what you need to focus on and
01:00:34
you'll notice once you start learning how to access these different areas you start applying this to working out and
01:00:41
your performance will tend to go up you'll be less exhausted at the end you'll just feel better all around
01:00:48
so we should expect our chest to come kind of move outwards as we breathe in you you want to see your chest moving
01:00:55
outwards because most of your lungs the expansion is in your back but some of
01:01:00
that is going to be happening this is not a pose that you want to do like this right you should be very loose very
01:01:08
limber and when you breathe in you want that air to fill all the way up there but you
01:01:15
want to start low first that means the diaphragm is descending most of the air that is soaked up from the lungs in that
01:01:22
gas exchange happens at the bottom of the lungs so you want to be able to access the bottom of those lungs is
01:01:29
there a certain way that I because when you say you want to start by breathing at the bottom is how do I know so this
01:01:36
the symptom of me breathing at the bottom is it coming out my my sort of what do they
01:01:42
call this my abdomen coming outwards on the sides that's right because everyone calls this a belly
01:01:48
breath so people do this with their belly but you can move your belly independently of your breathing yeah
01:01:54
this is a way that you can't cheat so a tape measure is good and if you get an
01:02:01
inch inch and a half that's pretty good but you can work that up and if you see really good breathers people have
01:02:08
practiced a lot of yoga and done it the right way they can have this massive expansion and this is what ties into
01:02:15
free divers free divers are the experts at accessing every square inch of their
01:02:22
lung capacity to fill it with air that's what they do which is why if you ever
01:02:27
see free divers go to one of these competitions they're short people tall people fat people whatever they all have
01:02:34
these enormous chests because they've been able to develop this incredible
01:02:39
lung capacity one of the things that um I think causes shallow breath is this
01:02:44
kind of constant state of fight or flight stress anxiety screens social
01:02:50
media and it's funny because whenever people would have been listening to this podcast and started how do you talk
01:02:56
about breath and they would realize that they were probably at that exact moment doing really shallow
01:03:02
breaths you talk about these free divers who are able to extract you know 18
01:03:08
use 80 90 of their diaphragm or more we you said we used 10 roughly 10 this is
01:03:14
about 10 and oftentimes less than that the average person what is the correlation between like stress and
01:03:20
breathing and also I'm talking now about like the everyday angst of life
01:03:27
so we've talked about the skeleton we've talked about anthropology we've talked about biomechanics and posture but
01:03:34
something else that ties into this you're 100 right is is psychology is your brain so how you breathe affects
01:03:41
how your brain works affects your anxiety but your anxiety also affects how you're breathing so again it's
01:03:47
another one of those circles what happens so often is when we're at work we're so sensitized to threats and to
01:03:56
fear that we overreact when something happens even though it's not threatening
01:04:02
our life we get a nasty email from a friend or a email from the boss that's
01:04:07
disappointed at the last project you did and we get stressed out right and so
01:04:13
what what is the physiological response to stress is we clench up
01:04:20
we hold our breath and then we breathe like this
01:04:25
and we hold our breath again and we breathe like this you think about
01:04:31
thousands of years ago when we were out in the Wilds what would we do if there
01:04:36
was a threat approaching you'd hold your breath to be silent and then you breathe too much you get respiratory system
01:04:42
ready to either fight it off or to run away so we're having the same response in our
01:04:48
day-to-day lives now because we're so over sensitized to it so researchers have different names for
01:04:55
this they call it email apnea or continuous awareness I mean there's an
01:05:01
academic name for it partial attention syndrome I prefer email apnea easier to
01:05:07
remember no matter what you call it it's the idea that when you're in the office
01:05:12
place you're breathing dysfunctionally because of this constant stress Loop and
01:05:17
they've found there were some NIH studies on this they found that breathing this way can have long-term
01:05:24
damage to your health high blood pressure issues all the things we had talked about metabolic dysfunctions and
01:05:30
more which makes sense because you're just constantly in this Loop of fear and
01:05:35
threat and stress so the quickest most effective way way more than drugs to
01:05:42
take control of this stress is to take control of your breathing and this has
01:05:47
been documented time and time again so when you notice you're breathing this way you stop
01:05:54
what I like to do is breathe two breaths in and then an exhale looks like this
01:06:00
laughs that resets your respiratory system that
01:06:06
resets your breathing pattern then you can do a few rounds of that and go back to very simple five second and five
01:06:13
second out so let's just pretend yeah you're in line at the airport someone's
01:06:19
cut you off you ordered something at Starbucks it gave you the wrong you know all the things that are just drive us
01:06:26
crazy nowadays at that moment want you to breathe in
01:06:32
pause breathe in again let it out
01:06:38
relax yourself a little bit when you're doing these breaths okay breathe in
01:06:43
breathe in again and let it out do that one more time breathe in
01:06:51
a little more subtle let in it again and let it out
01:06:56
so you did this in very exaggerated way which is fine but you can do this so no one can tell you're doing it you can do
01:07:03
it very subtle you probably feel a little different now than you did before yeah so much different you can return to
01:07:09
then a slow low rhythmic breathing pattern from there or whatever makes you
01:07:14
comfortable I like five seconds in five seconds out also what's beneficial for
01:07:20
people if it's comfortable for them is four seconds in six out will really mellow you out and we could try that
01:07:26
right now breathe in okay first of all slow I should not be
01:07:32
seeing you okay so we're going to breathe in just very very lightly we're going to relax here
01:07:37
what does it matter if you see it because you're trying too hard okay this is not there is a time and place for the
01:07:45
this is not it okay okay right so breathe in
01:07:50
two three four out two three four five six
01:07:59
breathe in two three four out two three
01:08:06
four five six doesn't have to be that exact pattern but this will trigger all
01:08:13
of that parasympathetic response in your body you can see this if you're looking at
01:08:19
your heart rate variability it's amazing to see the the difference that this happens just after a few breaths look at
01:08:25
looking at your HRV looking at your heart rate looking at your stress levels what is it doing you mentioned
01:08:30
parasympathetic and resetting the respiratory system but if I you know what is the parasympathetic and the
01:08:38
respiratory system for dummies what is that so how you breathe is going to activate your nervous system function
01:08:44
your nervous system function is going to activate everything in your body so we can take conscious control of our
01:08:50
breathing we can't take conscious control of our heart rate or liver function or any of that we can take
01:08:55
control of our breathing when we take control of our breathing we can hack into our nervous system so you can be in
01:09:01
a sympathetic State just like we were you take a couple of those double inhales and exhales what's sympathetic
01:09:06
that is sympathetic state is the act the fight or flight this is the action part
01:09:12
of your nervous system when you're in this state you are ready for action and
01:09:19
what happened which is great we want to be ready for action we want to be ready to fight or run away from stuff we do
01:09:25
not want to be in this state all day long anxiety anxiety stress because this
01:09:31
is where autoimmune issues and so many other problems come from by constantly staying stressed we want stress we want
01:09:38
to be able to access stress for short amounts of time then we want to flip back into this parasympathetic
01:09:46
this relaxing state if you look at once again animals in the wild you even look at like a gazelle that's been attacked
01:09:52
you know five minutes later it's just sleeping so it has a nervous system that's able to Pivot from one to the
01:09:59
other unfortunately we live in an environment where we're always activating always
01:10:04
pushing towards that sympathetic and is making us sick really really sick so your breathing is the quickest way of
01:10:13
taking control of acute stress so pills work okay other modalities work but in
01:10:19
that moment is when you need the most help and your breathing is the thing that can get you there
01:10:25
so people that have chronic stress must have awful breathing absolutely and they've they've documented that they've
01:10:31
looked at their breathing they've looked at their carbon dioxide levels and carbon dioxide is indicative of how slow
01:10:38
you're breathing if your levels are very low that means you breathe like this so you're just off-gassing all of this
01:10:45
CO2 and they're always low especially for anxiety and panic as well they're
01:10:51
always low extremely low you ask someone with acute Panic or anxiety to hold
01:10:56
their breath this is usually what happens [Music]
01:11:01
I'm never doing that again I've seen this hundreds and hundreds of times so by breathing slowly you're making them
01:11:09
more comfortable with more CO2 you're making them more comfortable with their nervous system function with themselves
01:11:15
which is why this assessment of a breath hold is very useful and so important
01:11:20
it's not only a diagnostic it's a therapeutic because while you're holding
01:11:25
your breath you're also in the action of training yourself to tolerate more CO2 which will calm your body down
01:11:32
and going back to this point about the parasympathetic and the nervous system and anxiety why
01:11:38
does having an extended exhale help with anxiety so you said breathe in
01:11:44
for four breathe out for six why why does extending that Exhale by two seconds help with stress anxiety
01:11:50
so if you really pay attention and a lot of people have problems doing this is which is why it's helpful for them to
01:11:57
look at their whoop or or whatever you can place your hand over your heart and when you inhale
01:12:05
you can feel your heart rate increase when you exhale slows down this is how HRV works this is
01:12:13
how it's calculated is the difference in time on that and the shortest distance to the longest difference and this is
01:12:21
looking at your nervous system function respiratory sinus arrhythmia so how you
01:12:26
breathe affects how how many times your heart beats right so if you're exhaling
01:12:33
which slows the heart rate down more what's going to happen to your heart rate it's going to start slowing down more
01:12:40
and that exhale that slowing down and telling your body you're in a safe place that it can relax is what triggers this
01:12:47
response by the nervous system interesting so it's like tricking them tricking the body into believing that's such a simple hack
01:12:54
um and a lot of people they say oh this can't be true but so many of us have these wearables you can check it for
01:12:59
yourself and in real time to look at your heart rate variability changing
01:13:04
your breathing pattern look at your blood pressure too for many people they can just switch to their breathing after
01:13:10
a couple of minutes you can see drops of 15 points not for everybody but for some people 10 to 15 points just by switching
01:13:16
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01:14:14
talked about the pandemic earlier on in covid one of the big conversations you must have seen playing out was that masks are
01:14:22
um bad for us because it's like trapping carbon dioxide in inside the mask which is making us sick I even see people
01:14:28
having this conversation right now on online in the wake of the pandemic they're saying you know these masks that we put on kids they've caused sickness
01:14:35
and illness in kids um carbon dioxide is kind of seen as this poison
01:14:40
what is your POV on all of this oh man there's even more controversial than the whole breastfeeding thing but let's go
01:14:46
there Okay so surgeons and Dennis have been wearing
01:14:52
masks for 100 years they're able to function just fine they wear good quality masks and
01:14:58
they wear them when they need to be wearing them there are several studies that support if everyone wears a mask
01:15:05
and if everyone is wearing that mask properly it does seem to stem some
01:15:12
transmission of covid and other viruses that's that's the truth
01:15:17
now let's look at the other side has been telling we've been telling people that social distancing at least in the
01:15:25
US they after six months of social distance distancing which absolutely worked they said no now you can go out
01:15:31
as long as you're wearing a mask did that do anything to stamp the spread of covid from what I see no so there's
01:15:40
there's a number of problems most the mass that people are wearing are terrible quality they're filled with
01:15:45
chemicals that you are inhaling and they're causing a lot of health issues okay that's that's number one second one
01:15:52
is most of us are wearing them improperly we're not wearing them in the right way the third one is people feel
01:15:58
this sense of comfort that they're actually protected wearing this mask
01:16:04
which is not the case in many situations and this is because I've done my own
01:16:09
research looking at carbon dioxide levels in indoor environments and have
01:16:15
found these places that we were told that we could go to and we would be safe as long as we're wearing masks
01:16:21
completely not the case some of these places had such high CO2 that it meant
01:16:27
every seventh breath you were inhaling was someone else's breath backwash was
01:16:33
someone else's exhale so I don't care how many masks you're wearing they are not going to stop the
01:16:40
spread of these diseases if you are in an environment where so much of that air
01:16:47
has been recycled so that's really interesting to me I've never heard this before the the idea that the amount of
01:16:53
carbon dioxide in the room you're in which I guess is determined by how well ventilated it is has a
01:17:01
relationship with how much recycled air I take in how absolutely and this I learned all
01:17:07
this after the book came out I was talking to a pulmonologist who said you really need to look into indoor CO2 I
01:17:14
said well why he said that is a good way of determining how much of that air has
01:17:20
been recycled so I bought one of these which is a carbon dioxide meter and I've
01:17:25
been recording our CO2 during this interview Jesus and uh so
01:17:32
um if you are outside it's about 418 depends where you are 418 19 parts
01:17:39
per million CO2 that's healthy right even though CO2 is going up it's causing climate change we all know that
01:17:47
but for breathing that is perfectly healthy once you get into 800 parts per million
01:17:54
some Studies have found that sorry it's going when they are testing people when they're testing students you
01:18:01
see a 20 decline in test results just from 800 by the time you get to 1 000
01:18:10
you start suffering from things like eye irritation sore throats other issues so
01:18:16
we're probably breathing in every one in every 30 breaths that I'm breathing in
01:18:22
is your breath or the cameraman's breath by the time you get to 2500 you're in
01:18:28
really bad shape one in every 17 breaths is is a breath you're breathing from somebody else so we have been told by
01:18:36
authorities that we should only worry about levels that are up to 5 000 parts
01:18:41
per million that is completely false there are over 18 studies that show
01:18:47
levels over 800 into a thousand can potentially cause problems with bone
01:18:54
demineralization kidney calcification and chronic inflammation and so just
01:19:00
since we've been sitting in this interview we started off at 700 and now we're at 1100 and if we were to continue
01:19:07
working in here for the next few hours this could be up to 1500 1700 which has
01:19:13
been shown to have serious uh issues with with cognitive function and with
01:19:18
physical function that's very scary and it it's cause for
01:19:24
a redesign of this studio because I mean putting on the air conditioning would that help because that would that would
01:19:30
ignore us recycling the same air unless that air is is coming in from outside
01:19:36
does that air come from outside I don't think so I think it's recycled and uh a really scary study I read was a
01:19:45
lot of schools are at 1500 to 2000 um several studies have found this they have shown a 50 dick decrease
01:19:55
in test results when students were exposed to air with that much CO2 in it 50 decrease in test
01:20:03
results from fifteen hundred to two thousand I've recorded levels up to four thousand and five thousand in bars in
01:20:11
subways and more Jesus yeah this isn't my uh hypothesis either this is
01:20:18
something I was told about about a year after the book came out and I've seen a
01:20:23
lot of scientific studies since and I sent some of those to your team just to show that this isn't something I'm
01:20:29
making up the the ones you sent to my team I I have um some notes Here I can
01:20:36
pull up um in one study of 24 employees cognitive scores were 50 lower and the
01:20:43
participants were exposed to 1 400 PPM of CO2 compared with 550 PPM during a
01:20:49
working day we're nearly there so I'm 50 Dumber because you've been breathing so
01:20:56
much I start to I and I highly recommend nobody get one of these because you go
01:21:03
crazy wherever you are on an airplane I've uh seen 2700 per million and you
01:21:09
wonder why you feel like crap after a long flight and sometimes it goes up and then it comes down because they put in
01:21:15
more oxygen but usually when the plane is warming up it's 25 2600 which is why
01:21:21
a lot of people just immediately go to sleep you know I think maybe they're doing it on purpose to Mellow everyone out
01:21:27
but if you think about cognitive function I mean this is a 50 decrease in
01:21:32
test results is insane and to think you have kids in these schools taking tests
01:21:38
to go into college and all of the air is recycled I mean it's just when I
01:21:44
mentioned at the beginning of our chat here that the modern world is conspiring to
01:21:49
make us unhealthy I think this is an example and from what I've seen very few
01:21:54
people are paying any attention to this and it's real you're reading the scientific studies over there this isn't
01:22:01
stuff that I'm feeding to you it almost sounds like I'm smoking it sounds like I'm inhaling
01:22:08
you know because we talk about people have got a smoke outside to keep us healthy so we change the laws in this country so you can't smoke indoors
01:22:15
well at least smoking is fun and it gives you a buzz right CO2 is you can't
01:22:20
smell it it's really hard to sense it it's invisible and yet it's always there
01:22:28
any outside environment you don't have to worry about it but indoor environments especially in the buildings
01:22:34
we've created now that don't have Windows I can't tell you how many hotels sometimes really nice hotels I go to
01:22:40
open the windows like my God they've glued the Windows shut right and overnight I watched this just ticking up
01:22:48
100 points every couple hours and you wonder why you wake up so feeling so
01:22:55
much worse than you did when you first came in there so this is this is real stuff in in a
01:23:01
room like this there's nothing you can do because the HVAC system has been designed to just recycle the air over
01:23:09
and over and over again my hunch and I'm probably wrong about this in the next few years people are going to start
01:23:16
requiring bosses of companies are going to require that there be fresh air for
01:23:23
their employees because I think you're going to see big problems with performance I mean even just sitting
01:23:29
here now that you know this so some of that's a placebo effect sure
01:23:35
but I feel great but don't you feel a little like warm and tired so so take my
01:23:42
word for it do not travel with one of these it will make you a complete neurotic I'm doing it because I want to
01:23:49
document it I'm going to be updating future editions of the book with some of this information because I didn't know
01:23:55
about this when the book came out but I think people really need to know about this and start asking hotels can I open
01:24:02
the window start out before you run an office can I open the window like it's that easy you just need to open it a
01:24:08
little bit it makes a huge difference just opening it a little bit people can't see this but we sit in a room here
01:24:14
and we like air seal it for sound reasons yeah so we don't have any windows in here
01:24:20
um and we actually move this this is a replica of my old kitchen which is on the top floor of this building so the
01:24:26
reason which had this wonderful huge balcony over there that you could open the whole side of the the
01:24:32
um that side of the building and walk outside into the fresh air but we moved it down here and made this little
01:24:38
chamber because of sound reasons I do sit in here for sometimes nine hours a day there's been an occasion a few times
01:24:45
where I've done three podcasts in a day and I feel that now you've said it I do
01:24:51
feel incredibly fatigued I'm sure it's because I'm talking and you know having really you know sort of challenging my
01:24:57
brain a little bit but I I only I can only wonder if the studies are correct and there's a 50
01:25:03
variance in my cognitive scores what would happen if I found a way to get oxygen into this room
01:25:09
more oxygen in the carbon dioxide out I promise you'd feel better I'm going to figure out how much better who knows it
01:25:16
depends on the day depends on the person I promise you'd feel better I promise your brain would be operating and
01:25:23
functioning better than it is now we're not meant to be in four White Walls trapped inside are we and this is the
01:25:29
misalignment problem never this is that misalignment problem even a hundred years ago right every building had
01:25:36
windows that you could open even 50 years ago every build almost every building had had Windows you could open
01:25:43
but but now the standard protocol is because it's easier to heat and easier
01:25:49
to cool right you're creating this this bubble which is why if you go into like a Walmart one of those stores there's no
01:25:55
windows there's no anything you just got blue light in this bubble you can control the the environment much more
01:26:02
easily but what is it doing to People's Health you know uh so this is I'm the
01:26:07
guy that asked for a hotel room does it have a window and you get really funny looks
01:26:14
and until you start traveling with one of these and start reading these studies and you realize how important it is so
01:26:21
interesting one of the things that I that I've really taken from this is when I wrote my book um I always go to the
01:26:26
Jungle to write I literally write the book in nature I've just realized that I'm
01:26:32
actually increasing my cognitive um performance by going and sitting down by Lake every year and writing versus
01:26:38
doing it inside an office so when I reflect on tasks that require real cognitive performance honestly like
01:26:44
having an interview conversation or writing a book or any sort of deep sort of intellectual cognitive tasks it's so
01:26:50
important that those rooms and those spaces are well ventilated right and the right light
01:26:55
those those two things I think are very important and I think we're going to see
01:27:00
so much of this changing in our culture soon because people are going to ask for it and they're going to feel the difference so there's a whole bunch of
01:27:07
different reasons why you're thinking more clearly it's not just the lack of CO2 right in the environment it's the
01:27:14
natural light your nature itself is just so inspiring and relaxing but this is
01:27:20
one component of it without a doubt I'm shocked that nobody has ever told me
01:27:26
this before I've never heard about that ignorance is bliss like if I haven't done this but we both feel energized and
01:27:32
ready to roll but I'm the type of person that would rather be empowered by information I like when people turn the lights on because we go through our
01:27:38
lives um misdiagnosing the problems we're dealing with and so for me knowledge is
01:27:44
power because of course I've sat in this chair for you know a long time and to know that there's a potential to
01:27:51
potentially increase my cognitive performance when I'm doing a conversation just by finding a way to get oxygen into this room is is profound
01:27:58
without a doubt I found Advantage I ensure that that will happen
01:28:04
in the morning when you do this diagnostic of holding your breath so you get to the hotel room you do this diagnostic you hold your breath do you
01:28:10
time on a stopwatch yeah no time in on my watch so what this is is you can call
01:28:15
it a bolt score body oxygen level test you can call it a control part call it
01:28:21
whatever you want all it is is you take a breath in breathing
01:28:34
you take a calm breath in okay and I'll tell you what it is and then we'll maybe
01:28:41
do it which will make for terrible podcast time you guys can just snip it out but we're just going to take a calm
01:28:47
breath not a big breath calm breath in to that point where it just stops when you're exhaling you don't push the air
01:28:54
out it just naturally stops that neutral point okay just take it we'll just practice this right now take a breath in
01:29:01
just let the air out there will be a point where it just naturally stops yeah that's when you
01:29:06
start the timer okay on that neutral hold so you just take a breath in
01:29:13
and breathe out I'm not going to tell you when I'm going to do this so you don't take an extra big breath and breathe in again
01:29:21
breathe out to neutral hold your breath hold it
01:29:31
as you're holding your breath the first point at which you feel resistance that
01:29:37
means a swallow that means your diaphragm starts convulsing gently that means you
01:29:44
feel a buildup of pressure at the back you have to be honest with yourself this is not a maximum breath hold test
01:29:52
this is the very first point that you feel some palpable discomfort
01:30:01
then you go back to normal breathing so you won't be doing yourself any favors if you're cheating past that threshold
01:30:10
okay yeah so good so what you want to get to is 40 seconds and when you return
01:30:17
to breathing the way that you know you've gone too far is when you go
01:30:23
yeah your return should be come you're not seeing me return okay there
01:30:29
is no effort so these are good gauges to know that you pushed it too far okay so
01:30:34
what you want to be going for is 40 seconds or more to be holding your
01:30:41
breath and you've got 40 seconds I think you pushed a little too far but um I was waiting for that point of just feeling a
01:30:47
little bit uncomfortable and then most athletes even Elite athletes get to
01:30:52
20 seconds when they first start doing this and they've trained themselves to push through the pain they compete and
01:30:59
they win but their bodies are not happy which is why so many athletes Peak and
01:31:05
then they're a complete mess after they stop competing that this happens with football players this happens with
01:31:11
baseball players and more what most people do is about 15 seconds
01:31:17
15 seconds 15 seconds you would be surprised especially older people especially people of respiratory
01:31:24
problems as I mentioned before people with asthma and panic about three to
01:31:29
five seconds if they have severe asthma and panic so you just start to understand how dysfunctionally their
01:31:36
breathing is their CO2 tolerance their ability for their lungs to extract oxygen their nervous system and more
01:31:44
just because you got a low score that is just a diagnostic and it's a
01:31:51
starting point to improve your breathing this is not a competition do not compete
01:31:56
with yourself we can get to stuff that is very competitive if you'd like but
01:32:03
this test is just to tune in to how your body is responding and another warning I
01:32:09
want to be very very clear about do not take one number and think you're good to go this changes in the morning changes if
01:32:16
your sleep is bad changes if your sleep is good changes after you eat and more so you take these throughout the day
01:32:22
maybe three times a day and after a week of recording that number you average it
01:32:28
that's your number that you're working with does that make sense perfect sense so so take it at night take in the
01:32:35
morning take it at noon and just put it in your phone and then at the end of that week you'll have your
01:32:41
your bolt score is what they call it Patrick McEwen calls it that can't stop looking at your carbon
01:32:47
dioxide Monitor and the more I said it did we just tick up here yeah I wish this was like a stock meter we'd be in
01:32:53
good good shape you know you mentioned asthma there um the I mean my my perception of asthma I
01:33:00
don't suffer from asthma so I don't know a ton about it I've never no point in my life if I've been forced to learn about
01:33:06
it or has my curiosity led me there so far but when I my understanding of asthma is that people are born with it
01:33:12
and then they're given medicine that is the General accepted understanding of asthma and it's wrong
01:33:20
so if some people are naturally predisposed to have asthma but that is not a life sentence of asthma and the
01:33:27
idea that a three-year-old a friend of mine his kid has asthma is given
01:33:32
albuterol it's given all these different drugs they're taken as adenoids they're taken out as tonsils no one's looking at
01:33:38
his breathing I asked my friend I said how does your kid breathe at night he's like oh he snores all night long with an
01:33:44
open mouth how does he breathe in the day his mouth is constantly open nobody mentioned that nobody mentioned that so
01:33:51
I don't go for unless you've got a genetic neurological disease right I
01:33:56
don't go for this argument that diseases that come on that are diseases of
01:34:01
civilization that we are stuck with these diseases our whole life we certainly know that's true with diabetes
01:34:08
who thought that diabetes is actually reversible type 2 diabetes is reversible
01:34:13
by adopting a different diet it is there's a company called virta and this
01:34:19
is what they do they reverse diabetes the same thing is true for asthma and
01:34:24
anxiety that's my belief at minimum you can reduce the symptoms
01:34:30
if it really works out well you won't have any symptoms at all and I can say this now because I've talked to dozens
01:34:37
and dozens and dozens of people who suffered through asthma for decades they
01:34:42
weren't able to go outside and play as a kid they had to stay indoors they had to stay locked up their breathing was
01:34:48
terrible who now have no symptoms of asthma by taking control of their breathing seems impossible there's a
01:34:56
number of different clinical trials showing that the effects of healthy breathing showing exactly what these
01:35:03
effects of healthy breathing can do for asthmatics not three-year-olds your friends three-year-olds yeah can you
01:35:10
play out that story what did what did that what was the end of that story he called me up he's like
01:35:16
you know a bit about breathing a little bit you know what what can I do for you he told me what was going on he's like
01:35:22
they're taking out their adenoids they're taking out this kid's tonsils he's three years old taking out the kid's tonsils at three and adenoids uh
01:35:29
because they think that he you know that is the root cause of of his asthma this will allow
01:35:36
him to breathe better but what they don't realize what they didn't mention as I mentioned earlier if you just take
01:35:42
out adenoids and tonsils but don't fix the underlying breathing dysfunction all
01:35:48
those problems come back this is true with asthma this is true with sleep apnea this is true with snoring and more so you have to fix that core issue so I
01:35:56
hooked him up with a very well-known breathing therapist who and he's now
01:36:01
this just happened last week I said I'm not going to argue with your doctor and your surgeon maybe your kid needs all
01:36:08
these things taken out immediately I will argue with the comment that he's going to be on oral steroids and
01:36:15
bronchodilators for the rest of his life I I said I don't think he's starting off on the Good Foot at three years old so
01:36:23
he's now and I'll let you know how it goes but if what happens to him happens to the hundreds and hundreds of other
01:36:30
people I've heard from you can reduce the symptoms and in some cases reverse them entirely you mentioned tonsils
01:36:39
it just perked my curiosity because thinking back through my childhood every you know so many people have their
01:36:44
tonsils taken out yeah and now I reflect on that through the frame of like
01:36:49
misalignment and ancestors and stuff I go why would we be cutting something out of our body
01:36:55
um that must be a misalignment problem of sorts I the that must be a symptom of
01:37:02
the environment we live in not being right for the human body that's my guess why would a part of the human body
01:37:09
that's taken millions of years to evolve to this certain function just all of a sudden be of no use in the past 40 years
01:37:17
you have to start to ask that question so what is the root cause of those
01:37:23
inflamed adenoids and tonsils is it the fact that they are there and that's the
01:37:28
problem maybe for some people genetically right that that could be the issue but what's causing that
01:37:34
inflammation you have to answer that question first before you're going to fix it and just
01:37:39
going into a three-year-old to their mouth and starting to rip things out I my personal opinion is that that's a
01:37:46
really bad idea I would go through a bunch of different methods to see if you could improve the core condition first
01:37:54
before you revert to that surgery is great I know people who have had their breathing absolutely transformed by
01:38:00
doing nasal surgery it works wonderfully for so many people but I would try to see what you can do with your natural
01:38:07
body first interesting I told you my partner she um she's got I think she's got like her
01:38:13
deviated symptom or something which means that breathing you can always hear a breathing through her nose
01:38:18
pretty much all the time especially when she sleeps kind of something when she goes 50 even
01:38:24
you know she'll wear to be fair she started wearing mouth tape I wanted to talk to you about this she started wearing this thing called Maya tape
01:38:30
which goes around her lips and has a hole in the middle yep um but that having that myot tape around
01:38:37
her mouth when we looked at her whoop scores in the morning really interestingly her heart rate was flatter
01:38:42
than ever so usually what you'd see in our heart rate is kind of these like spikes upwards throughout the night so
01:38:48
sometimes it might Spike up to 60 or 70. but with the with the mouth tape around her lips key which kept it kind of keeps
01:38:56
your mouth closed throughout the night her heart rate super flat her wake events down her sleep efficiency up
01:39:06
I hear this every day really I mean yeah this is the the beauty of nasal breathing what the brain wants is a
01:39:13
consistent fluid signal it gets that signal from your breathing so there's a
01:39:19
study I'll send you guys on this that the clock the Master Clock of sleep and of the brain at night is that cyclical
01:39:27
deep easy breathing pattern this is what the body doesn't want to have to fight
01:39:33
and defend itself when it's sleeping this is it's time to rest and restore and grow right if you're constantly
01:39:40
waking up what's that doing the body has to stop what it's doing the repair mechanisms and address the threat over
01:39:46
and over and over and that's what's happening when people are struggling to breathe breathing like that so this doesn't
01:39:53
shock me at all this is exactly what happened to me this was my same experience and it's the experience that
01:39:59
hundreds of people have had and they've sent me their sleep scores for some some reason showing their heart rate
01:40:04
variability showing their uh how much more deep sleep they're getting and
01:40:10
showing how rested they are in in the morning so no matter how you get to
01:40:15
nasal breathing if it's by force of will some people can just will themselves I think that's awesome that's the greatest
01:40:21
way of doing it if it's a piece of tape that's what I like using Mayo tape's fantastic it's been around for a long
01:40:28
time and it takes away some of the paranoia that people have with first taping their mouth it's especially good
01:40:35
for kids you don't want to tape a kid's mouth the smile tape just sort of it provides a gentle reminder to keep your
01:40:41
mouth shut at any time you can talk you can breathe through your mouth but it's it's just gently reminding you to keep
01:40:48
your mouth shut I think it's great some people use chin grass whatever you want to use but breathing in and out through
01:40:53
your nose at night has so many benefits your girlfriend has seen it millions of
01:40:59
people have experienced it now and it's free and easy available for everybody it's just it's profound and you know
01:41:06
this this whole discovery of breath and sleep in the two-way relationship has just been so Illuminating for me and
01:41:12
that's hugely part of the reason why I wanted to have a conversation with you to get that message out out there
01:41:18
um the perfect rhythm of breathing there was this fascinating thing you talked about that there is a perfect Rhythm to
01:41:24
breathing which is it was quite spooky reading about it what is the perfect Rhythm to
01:41:30
breathing in depends on who you are I've learned a lot more about this as well but a good
01:41:36
first place to start is this five to six seconds in five to
01:41:42
six seconds out you can get more geeky after you hit that I used to call this
01:41:47
5.5 I write about this in the book with 5.5 seconds in 5.5 seconds out that's
01:41:53
5.5 breaths per minute that's what researchers found to be really the most
01:41:58
beneficial but then I got so many inquiries and emails and letters from
01:42:03
people saying you know I'm into the slow breathing but I can't hit that half
01:42:09
second and it's driving me crazy and I've been trying for two weeks I'm like good god what have I done here so I'm
01:42:16
now telling people five to six seconds is fine you don't have to worry about that half seconds being off anything in
01:42:25
that range but what I've learned since this book has come out that tall people
01:42:31
six foot six one and above should be breathing even slower larger lungs
01:42:37
diaphragm has more time to descend so around four and a half
01:42:43
breaths per minute so that's about eight seconds and eight seconds out even
01:42:48
slower and for kids they naturally need to breathe more so you want to start a
01:42:54
kid off at start at three and three out just starting there and working up to that so
01:43:01
this is a general guide that will work for most people a good launching spot
01:43:07
but once you get there and you're comfortable for that you can actually view in real time your HRV to find your
01:43:14
perfect perfect Rhythm because it varies a little bit for most people so slow is better
01:43:20
so if you're taller yes but but not necessarily for some people who have Panic anxiety who don't have a very good
01:43:29
CO2 threshold you have to start with two and two out
01:43:34
just doing that once you get comfortable with that let's go three and three out
01:43:41
four and four out right and you find what's most comfortable for you it's wonderful being in the world of
01:43:47
wearables where you can actually see where your body is responding most to my girlfriend does a lot of um that kind
01:43:54
of it's almost I can almost describe it as like a psychedelic experience um is that what they call Inner the the
01:44:00
inner fire stuff or is that the holotropic I don't really know the difference between the two but that when
01:44:06
you do the breathing breathing ceremonies that almost it was almost like my ego dropped away the first time
01:44:11
I did it I felt so emotional the first time I did it not in a not in
01:44:16
like a sad like a sad way I just could see things a little bit more clearly in my life the first time I did one of
01:44:22
these breath work sessions with her and I felt the need to apologize to a bunch of people
01:44:27
because I just I'd had an argument with someone that day about something small and I just felt it was almost like my ego had just like dissolved or something
01:44:34
what's going on there what is that you know because it's all people are prescribing this as a cure for like
01:44:40
mental health and Trauma and well I could tell you what's going on biologically I could tell you what's
01:44:46
going on psychologically psychically and more we'll start with the biology
01:44:51
a lot of these very vigorous breathing techniques which I would strongly suggest people figure out your breath
01:44:58
Foundation before you go on to these don't just jump into this stuff everything we've talked about nasal
01:45:05
breathing slow breathing proper biomechanics if you figure out all that you will get so much more out of these
01:45:11
more vigorous breathing exercises so a lot of these have you breathe very fast
01:45:17
sometimes through the mouth and you may be saying well I thought you just said we shouldn't be breathing through the
01:45:22
mouth for these short exercises it's perfectly fine and you breathe that way to specifically elicit a stress response
01:45:31
in your body that you are creating it's the same thing with ice baths right those aren't relaxing they cause a
01:45:37
stress response so when you're breathing pranayama Kundalini holotropic you are
01:45:44
stressing your body out and then you're learning how to use your breath to calm your body down
01:45:51
right because all of these breathing techniques you and then you hold your breath and then
01:45:56
you breathe slow and then you go back to and then you hold your breath so you are
01:46:02
learning how to take control of your nervous system function and stress and so that stress you're compacting into
01:46:09
this exercise so you don't carry it around with you the rest of the day like I do and so many other people do so you
01:46:17
go there you blow a fuse and then you're able to be chilled the rest of the day so biologically what's happening to your
01:46:24
blood flow when you're over breathing you are inhibiting blood flow to your brain people I've heard this in breath
01:46:31
work classes people say the more you breathe the more oxygen is getting to your brain that's why you're getting so high the opposite is happening you're
01:46:39
inhibiting blood flow right now if we were to over breathe and yeah you're gonna feel light-headed
01:46:46
you're going to feel some tingling in your fingers that's not from an increase of blood circulation but a decrease
01:46:51
so you can breathe into a state in which you have 40 percent less blood flow to
01:46:57
your brain by over breathing holotropic is classic you start feeling all kinds
01:47:03
start going like this that's from all the ionized calcium being glommed on
01:47:08
with albuminum so all of these and lack of CO2 so this is a classic response
01:47:14
something some breath work people say it's because you're going back in time
01:47:19
and you're becoming a bird and all that's beautiful if you want to believe that but what is actually happening to
01:47:26
your body is that we're losing that calcium is being sucked up and that CO2
01:47:32
is being inhibited so that vasodilation is happening and it's causing you felt
01:47:37
that I felt it too it's it's freaking when it first happens but it's completely natural and it comes back when you hold your breath or you breathe
01:47:44
more slowly I only knew I was doing that because of a photo so they took a photo of me while I was doing the breath work
01:47:50
exercise and my my and we're in the air I didn't put them there and my fingers
01:47:55
were curled like a crap it was like that was like that whoever's running that breathwork is doing the right thing yeah
01:48:01
because you want to get to that state if you're ready for that state so that's what's happening to to the brain and the
01:48:07
body you were denying yourself oxygen you were stressing yourself out so that you can live without that stress after
01:48:14
that class sorry so how is it getting the stress out of me though the same way that a cold bath is
01:48:21
the same way that going to a gym for a half an hour or an hour you're working getting the stress out the same way of
01:48:28
going to a yoga class for an hour like I feel so relaxed right this is
01:48:33
compounding that stress it's stressing out your physical body and your brain it's really pushing it so that you can
01:48:41
be reacquainted with what a threat actually is right you're not over sensed so when an email comes in from a friend
01:48:48
and they're being kind of pissy at you you don't completely lose your top right so I never want to talk to you again and
01:48:54
I think that's one of the reasons why after that class you just went whoa I have a better perspective on what stress
01:49:01
is how I should be treating other people around me and how my brain should be feeling that relaxed feeling that you
01:49:08
have so it's harder to quantify psychologically especially psychically or spiritually what's happening as a
01:49:14
very personal experience however I will say having done a lot of this intense
01:49:20
breath work you know this vigorous breath work I've seen people absolutely transformed by it
01:49:26
um they do it one time then they come back the second time they're a little better at it and they get rid of a lot of
01:49:32
luggage psychological luggage people have go through some real stuff when
01:49:37
they're doing it I think it's beautiful because this is something that we're doing completely naturally with our own bodies that we have access to there's
01:49:44
nothing exogenous about it right you know this is something that that we're commanding inside our nervous systems so
01:49:51
that's something I think needs to be explored a lot more I tried numerous times to get into an MRI machine I want
01:49:57
to do blood work I did one study which was not in this book in the hypoxia Lab at San Francisco one of the oldest
01:50:04
hypoxia labs and have freaked out the researchers so much that they really didn't want to be a part of it so um
01:50:11
because my hands did that thing and they were pulling blood and my CO2 was so low
01:50:16
that you know they wanted to put me into the ER I said no no I feel great I said this is what it's supposed to be doing
01:50:21
but they want to see everything consistent all the time right they see these big dips and CO2 they see this
01:50:29
stress they associate that with serious illness they don't realize when you bring it on yourself it's something that
01:50:36
you can help to master and and so I hope that more research will will look into
01:50:43
what happens to the brain during these vigorous breathing exercises because not a lot has been done but I know it's very
01:50:50
beneficial for people and there's been several studies showing just how beneficial it is for depression for
01:50:56
anxiety even autoimmune issues and more of all the things we've discussed what is the most important thing that we've
01:51:03
missed that is pertinent to breathing Health well-being and you know daily
01:51:09
practices what is the most important subject matter that that we've missed in this conversation I don't think it's necessarily that
01:51:16
we've missed anything I think it's the importance of sort of doubling down on a
01:51:21
point of trying to make a few times is you don't need to pay for this stuff you
01:51:28
don't need to read a bunch of different scientific articles to know that breath
01:51:35
is a healing and very nourishing modality this is something that's
01:51:41
available to us all day long all night long so you can just focus on these
01:51:47
simple things get good at those simple things and work up from there ultimately I would love if people finally were able
01:51:54
to work up to go to these big breath work powerful sessions because I don't
01:51:59
know anyone that's gone to one of these and hasn't really gotten something out of it I think you're oh yeah I went to
01:52:06
your your living proof of that right now I'm an ultimate skeptic as well as as am
01:52:12
I that's the nature of of my job so just adopt these these simple things and I
01:52:18
will say a final word breathing dysfunction is a serious problem especially with kids especially for
01:52:25
adults as well so take this seriously fix it and I think you'll really see the
01:52:31
benefits from that you'll hear in part because you're doing a BBC Meister series aren't you my team told me yes
01:52:37
which is very exciting so that Maestro series have you written it yet do you know what it's I am in the midst right
01:52:43
after this okay okay write it up yep and I'm presuming it's going to be on some some of the subject matter we've
01:52:48
discussed it it will be it it's a basic guide and toolbox of exactly what to do
01:52:54
and when and how to improve these conditions but it also contains 90 of
01:52:59
this book was thrown out right because I didn't want to have a 600 page book so I'm able to slip in all this other stuff
01:53:06
that was thrown out and some of this more mystical some history but a lot of science as well James I I'm I could talk
01:53:13
to you forever about this I really really could such a that your way of articulating the points and the research
01:53:18
you've done is so captivating but I can see our carbon dioxide is ticking up
01:53:24
[Music] it's so funny I feel like I'm like you
01:53:30
know a little bit like all of a sudden I am going to buy one of those things though we have a closing tradition okay
01:53:35
which is the last guest leaves a question for the next guest not knowing who they're going to leave be leaving it
01:53:40
for the question left for you very simple what is it that drives you to be the
01:53:47
best version of you curiosity that's all that's the only thing that
01:53:54
not the only thing but the main thing that I wake up in the morning I'm excited to take on the day because I
01:54:00
have the luxury of having a job that allows me to be curious I've had a lot of jobs that did not allow me to be
01:54:06
curious but I'm able to ask questions and have conversations and it's every
01:54:11
day is uh is a privilege because of that well I think from reading this book as I
01:54:16
said this is the book that has sat on my bedside on my girlfriend's side for the last I think a year roughly since we
01:54:22
moved into that new place you've done a phenomenally great job of condensing the information to make it accessible
01:54:28
um and relatable to every type of reader out there but it's so
01:54:33
it's like a light every other page there's almost like a light bulb that's being switched on in my head about the
01:54:38
way that I'm living my life and how small simple things that as you say aren't complex I don't need to buy some
01:54:44
huge course or I don't need to become a master in anything can have a fundamental change in my life and that's
01:54:49
why this book is so unbelievably important but I mean the book speaks for itself because this book is sold like absolutely crazy and it's one of those
01:54:55
books that is being driven by Word of Mouth one person is passing it to another you know I can talk through the
01:55:03
people in my team in the web of how the book traveled and Jemima and then Merlin and Sophie and so on and I think that
01:55:10
speaks to this book I think it's fun it's a shame it's a real shame that I actually believe that this book is now
01:55:16
required reading but it speaks to the misalignment problem and how far we've
01:55:24
gotten from good habits as it relates to breathing and the consequences that that it's had on our health I'm very excited
01:55:29
to see the BBC Maestro series as well I'll be checking out looking out for that because I love the series and they
01:55:34
provide as you say an actionable toolkit for a lot of the things we're talking about today I love the way you approach
01:55:40
subject matters I love the impartiality of it I love the fact that you lead with the evidence first
01:55:46
um and as you've done throughout this conversation you try and keep your opinion secondary to what the evidence is saying um which I think is really
01:55:53
important and a lot of people actually they get quite scared of what the evidence is saying so they either avoid it or um they don't mention it at all
01:56:01
but you you hold that line really really well your work is going to help so many people I cannot I can't imagine millions
01:56:07
and millions of people that you'll never get to meet so on behalf of all of those people including my girlfriend as I said
01:56:12
she started Studio upstairs called Bali breath work because in part because of what you wrote so afterwards I'd just
01:56:18
love to show you it but um just so you can see it because you it's it's an example for you of all the lives that
01:56:23
you'll never meet that your work is touching you'll never you'll never get to meet you know you'd probably if we
01:56:28
hadn't met today you wouldn't even know there was a studio that had launched in London because of your work or there was
01:56:34
someone that's dedicated their life now to helping people with breath because of your work so um on behalf of all those people you'll
01:56:40
never meet thank you James your work is very necessary and I can't wait to see what you write about next I'm very
01:56:45
intrigued I heard there's a book on the way very excited by that thank you very much for having me
01:56:52
as you guys may know we are a sponsor of this podcast and I'm a shareholder in the company as someone that is on the go
01:56:58
pretty much 90 of the time I always prioritize getting my workout in and for me it's a non-negotiable working out
01:57:03
staying healthy and trying to optimize my body so I can achieve the results that I want but a new addition to my lifestyle which complements my busy work
01:57:10
schedule and my tough workout schedule is my prioritization of my rest and my recovery I never quite knew how
01:57:17
important it was until I started my woop journey to understand exactly what's going on in my body and how to look after my body moop is a wearable health
01:57:23
and wellness coach that provides you with the feedback and actionable insights you need on your sleep your recovery your training your stress and
01:57:30
your overall health and seeing this data that we provides has made it 10 times easier to understand what my body needs
01:57:36
for it to reach its optimal State helping me to conquer those long days and tough workouts without breaking down
01:57:41
see for yourself by searching join.woop.com CEO to get a free month free week
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membership on me and I have a suspicion you'll stick with it because I certainly have and I don't stick with much as it relates to wearable tech enjoy it and
01:57:55
let me know how you get on [Music]
01:58:12
foreign [Music]