Brief Summary
Karo Waga shares his 10 years of experience teaching deliberate breathing techniques, highlighting how it can transform physical health, fitness, and mental resilience. He emphasizes the importance of awareness of your breath, understanding the energetic charge of your state, and strengthening your diaphragm through specific exercises. The key takeaways include building a habit of breath awareness, treating breathwork as a toolbox rather than a quick fix, and practicing diaphragmatic breathing exercises to improve overall breathing health and effectiveness of breathwork techniques.
- Build awareness of your breath throughout the day.
- Understand the energetic charge (arousal level) of your current state.
- Strengthen your diaphragm with specific exercises to improve breathing control.
Introduction
Karo Waga, a former traditional martial arts teacher turned breathwork and mindfulness coach, introduces the video by sharing his extensive experience with deliberate breathing. He's been studying it for over 20 years and teaching it for the last 10, witnessing its transformative effects on people's physical health, fitness, and mental resilience. He aims to share his insights and experience in this video.
Become Aware of Your Breathing
Karo advises building a habit of becoming aware of your breathing multiple times a day. Our breath reflects our inner state, acting as a mirror to our emotions. By focusing on your breath, you become present and can disidentify with emotions or worries, creating space for rational thought. This introspective awareness leads to better long-term decisions and emotional control. He suggests taking two to five minutes throughout the day to focus on the sensation of air entering and leaving your nostrils and the movement of your belly and chest.
Energetic Charge of Your State
Instead of treating breathwork as a prescription for specific feelings, Karo suggests viewing it as a toolbox. He emphasizes understanding the energetic charge or arousal level of your current state, which ranges from high to low energy. High-energy states like anger and excitement can lead to impulsive actions, while low-energy states like exhaustion and sadness can make it hard to act. By recognizing these layers, you can use controlled breathing to influence your arousal level and manage your state. Focusing on inhalation increases arousal, while focusing on exhalation calms you down.
Diaphragm Strength and Control
Karo talks about breathing as an art form, similar to Kung Fu or Yoga. To master your breath and access deeper states of consciousness, you need to strengthen your diaphragm, learn to control it, and cultivate awareness. These elements improve the effectiveness of breathwork techniques and your normal breathing. He then introduces a simple routine to increase the strength and control of your diaphragm.
Diaphragmatic Breathing Exercise
Karo outlines a four-step diaphragmatic breathing exercise:
- Full Diaphragmatic Breath: Inhale through your nose, expanding your belly, then your rib cage, and finally taking a sharp sip of air to fill the upper lungs.
- First Breath Hold: Hold your breath and brace yourself by pushing your breast downward to your belly, creating intra-abdominal tension for 10-15 seconds.
- Exhale and Hold: Exhale lightly at first, then increase intensity until you reach the natural end, followed by an explosive push of air out of your belly and hold.
- Embrace the Hold and Do Urge Surfing: Accept the discomfort and ride the urge to breathe like a wave, relaxing into it without pushing too far.
He recommends doing three to six rounds of this exercise every other day and optionally adding the 3x3 foundational breathing exercise.
Conclusion
Karo concludes by emphasizing that knowledge alone isn't enough; practice is essential. He highlights the importance of consistent breathwork and mindfulness practices for enhancing well-being and transforming your life. He promotes his breathwork and mindfulness academy and community, offering weekly live sessions, in-depth courses, and guided videos.
