What is Breathwork?
Breathwork is the intentional use of the breath to influence physical, mental, and emotional states. Whether through deep, rhythmic breathing, controlled patterns, or dynamic breath cycles. It is a bridge between the conscious and subconscious, allowing individuals to release stored emotions, regulate the nervous system, and tap into heightened awareness. Under the breathwork umbrella, there are numerous approaches, from calming slower protocols to intense cathartic breathing journeys, each serving a different purpose and offering unique benefits. While some methods emphasize relaxation and stress relief, others facilitate emotional breakthroughs, releasing stored trauma in the body, spiritual awakening, and profound clarity.
On a physical level, it can be simplified by explaining different parts of the brain. First and deepest is our brain stem, which controls our executive function such as the beating of our heart, our hormones and electrolytes regulating themselves, our breathing to stay alive. Above the brain stem lives our mammalian brain. This is the core of who we are without the story or the narrative. It's the felt sense, and how we experience life through our physical sensations. Memory is also stored here, visions, colors, as well as memory. Lastly us humans over time grew the neo cortex on top of the mammalian brain. This is our computer, it thinks logically, has reasoning, but it also creates a narrative, judgement, self -criticism and a storyline for every sensation our mammalian brain has access to. ( Ex: we feel pain in our hand when we get burned, and our logical mind will tell the story " putting our hand in fire will cause us to burn, be careful.... or never go near fire again, be afraid of fire).
When we breath using certain protocols it can decrease blood flow to our neo-cortex temporarily and safely, giving us access to experience the mammalian parts of our brain without the story of the narrative ( much like the same brains waves experienced in deep meditation, hypnosis, and psychedelic assisted therapy). So much of our lives are spent nurturing the neo-cortex and completely disregarding or not accessing our mammalian brain, what I also like to call my north star and intuition. Our neo-cortex wants to protect us when our mammalian brain becomes flooded with emotion. It can stop us from fully feeling our emotions and immediately stop the natural process pf the stress cycle. We shove it under the carpet and create a reason of why we don't need to feel those sensations. Think about opening that dreaded email, and going into fight or flight, then numbing out with TV, a drink, anything to not feel that dread. These stress cycles left incomplete, became stored in the body, over time creating disconnection to ourselves leading to anxiety, depression physical symptoms and even cancer. We become confused about trusting ourselves and stop listening to our bodies all together. By accessing these trapped cycles and discharging them, we begin to slowly connect back to ourselves and who we were before the stories.
Breathwork is a bottom-up approach to healing, meaning we start with the body. Unlike talk therapy, which is a top-down approach that engages the mind first through conversation and cognitive understanding, breathwork bypasses the analytical mind and works directly with the body’s innate wisdom. This makes it especially powerful for trauma healing, stress relief, and emotional release, as it allows for transformation without needing to put everything into words. Breathwork is not just a practice but an experience and an opportunity to reconnect with the essence of who we are, using the most fundamental tool we have: our breath.