Why is breathing important?

Hello!
Today I am going to write about breathing.

Now, you may hear from a variety of sources that breathing is important, but why is it important?
There are three main reasons.

1. Breathing is an action that we perform 20,000 times a day.

Each breath is one movement. What if the respiratory muscles are used incorrectly, and the error is repeated 20,000 times each day? For example, if you breathe by lifting your shoulders, you will shrug 20,000 times a day and your shoulders will become stiff. If you have stiff shoulders or back pain that won't go away for a long time, perhaps breathing is the cause.

2. We can't live for 10 minutes without breathing.

Humans can live without eating or drinking for 2-3 days, but we cannot live without breathing. Breathing is essential for human beings to live. Even if we can only breathe in a way that causes the aforementioned stiff shoulders and back pain, we cannot stop breathing if we want to continue to live.

3. Breathing can work on the autonomic nervous system.

Breathing is controlled unconsciously by the autonomic nerves (sympathetic and parasympathetic).
However, breathing can also be performed consciously, so breathing can affect the autonomic nervous system. When we breathe in, the sympathetic nervous system becomes dominant, and when we breathe out, the parasympathetic nervous system becomes dominant.

If you are stressed, and your sympathetic nervous system is dominant, you can relax by exhaling to make your parasympathetic nervous system dominant, but you cannot relax if you cannot exhale.

To summarize briefly. If you cannot breathe well, it may cause stiff shoulders and back pain, you will not be able to relax, which will lead to stress, insomnia, and other problems!

Breathing is important because it is closely related to both physical and mental health, but many people living in modern society do not breathe well. Many people who are not breathing well are unable to exhale. 

Can you exhale?

As the phrase "taking a breather" suggests, exhaling is associated with relaxation, isn't it?
I would like all of you reading this blog to be able to relax, so try exhaling now.

When you exhale, be sure to go until you can't breathe out anymore!

Give it a try right now. Wooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo.

Are you done exhaling? Now, try to remember what you were doing before you exhaled. Did you take a big breath in before you exhaled? If you spontaneously took a big breath in, chances are you didn't exhale as you normally do!

Good news for you there who were not exhaling!
We are going to hold the second breathing workshop soon.
Details will be posted in an upcoming blog, Instagram post and on the official CrossFit Kyoto LINE account, so please keep an eye out for the announcement.
Bookings can be made on Coubic here

I will write about the relationship between breathing and performance in my next entry.