Destructive-Emotion-Killing Exercise a.k.a. Abdominal-Breathing

It may be easier for you to do this exercise with someone else who guides you.

1.       Close your eyes.  Start breathing abdominally.

2.       Inhale through your nose down to below your navel and push up from your navel out through your mouth when you exhale.  (The reverse is also okay.)

3.       Imagine that as you breathe in, you are drawing in energy from the cosmos and, as you breathe out, you are expelling destructive emotions and thoughts.

4.      

Image source: http://www.acupuncture-and-chinese-medicine.com/abdomen-breathing.html

Now, focus on your breath going in.

a.       Feel the movements of the air going in and out

b.      Feel your muscles working to provide you with air.

c.       Feel the temperature and humidity of your breath.  Notice any changes.

d.      Listen to the sound of your breath.

e.      Now pay attention to all of these.

5.       Continue to focus on all aspects of your breathing until you feel completely calm.

6.       Breathe normally.

Try to do abdominal breathing (1-5) as often as you can, even if it’s only for a minute, but especially when you feel stressed.  The more often you do it, the faster that you’ll relax and the easier it will be to regain control of yourself.  Given enough practice, 1 minute may be more than enough to help you sleep and/or calm you down from any sort of hysteria, panic, anxiety, fear, stress, etc.

                The reason it works is quite simply because your complete focus on your breathing causes you to stop thinking about whatever it was that caused you to feel negative emotions.  It’s like a fire – if the fuel is gone, the fire goes out.