Breathwork Magic
Welcome to Breathwork Magic, a podcast dedicated to exploring the life-changing power of Breathwork. Discover how conscious breathing can unlock inner peace, resilience, and clarity as we dive into inspiring stories and practical insights. Whether you’re new to Breathwork or looking to deepen your practice, each episode offers wisdom to help you connect more fully with yourself and the world around you.
Breathwork Magic
From the Cushion to the Cage: Trea’s Journey through Mindfulness, Krav Maga, & the Breath
In this powerful episode of Breathwork Magic, Amanda is joined by Trea, Krav Maga instructor, behavioral analyst, and breath coach for a deep conversation about reclaiming the breath, rewiring the body, and bridging the gap between meditation and real-life presence. With a background in psychology and education, Trea brings a grounded and insightful perspective on how breathwork can shift performance, mindset, and nervous system regulation.
They explore the hidden ways society disrupts natural breathing patterns from a young age, why most people are unknowingly over-breathing (especially during exercise), and how simple adjustments to breath and awareness can create profound transformation. Trea also shares what happened when he attended a Navy SEAL-led breathwork event, his unexpected experience with emotional release, and why he continues to explore this practice—even when it feels uncomfortable.
🔹 Episode Highlights
[2:33] – Discovering breathwork after decades of meditation and high-performance training
[3:58] – What Krav Maga taught Trea about survival, stress, and the importance of breath
[7:59] – Everyday mindfulness: How opening a door became a moment of presence
[12:48] – Turning 40 and the mindset shift that sparked his deep dive into breathwork
[15:17] – Rib cage flexibility, breath mechanics, and how society teaches us to breathe incorrectly
[21:50] – Warrior breathing with Navy SEALs: Trea’s first conscious connected breath session
[28:27] – Why most people breathe too much during exercise and how to fix it
[35:14] – The “breathing gears” concept: How to breathe smarter, not harder, during movement
Resources Mentioned by Trea
Throughout the episode, Trea shares some of the most impactful teachers, tools, and frameworks that have shaped his breathwork and mindfulness journey. Here are the key resources he referenced:
• Dr. Belisa Vranich – The Breathing Class
• Unified Mindfulness – Shinzen Young
• Patrick McKeown – Oxygen Advantage
• Stig Åvall Severinsen – Breatheology
• Brian MacKenzie – Shift Adapt
• Mark Divine – Unbeatable Mind
This episode is packed with insights for anyone interested in performance, nervous system regulation, or simply learning to breathe in a way that supports the body and mind. Whether you’re a seasoned breathworker or just getting started, Trea’s story offers powerful reminders of what’s possible when we reconnect with the breath.
To Connect with Amanda Russo:
~ linktree.com/thebreathinggoddess
~ Instagram: @thebreathinggoddess
Welcome to Breathwork Magic, the podcast that explores the life-changing power of your breath.
Speaker 1:Breathwork isn't just a practice. It's a gateway to healing, transformation and shifting to a new mindset, by letting go of the past and embracing the possibilities of the present moment. And embracing the possibilities of the present moment. I'm Amanda Russo, your host, a certified breathwork facilitator, level two Reiki practitioner and creator of the Mander's Mindset podcast. On my own journey, breathwork has been a powerful tool for releasing what no longer serves me and shifting my perspective to step into my fullest and greatest potential. Each week, I'm joined by inspiring guests, blood work facilitators, healers and wellness enthusiasts who share how this practice has helped them and their clients heal, grow and embrace lasting change. So take a deep breath in and out, settle in and let's explore the magic of your breath together. The transformation starts now.
Speaker 1:Welcome to Breathwork Magic, where we explore the life-changing power of breathwork. I'm your host, Amanda Russo, and I am here today with Trey, and I am so excited to delve down on his journey. And he has a bachelor's in psychology and a master's degree in education with an emphasis on behavioral analysis. He worked in the field for about 17 and a half years before becoming a full-time Krav Maga instructor, a fitness instructor, a breathing coach and a mindfulness instructor, and I am so excited to delve down how the breath can help with all of this. Thank you so much for joining me.
Speaker 2:All my pleasure.
Speaker 1:I love if we could backtrack, but when did you discover breathwork? When did that come into your world?
Speaker 2:That is an interesting question. It's really hard to peg down. I spent a lot of years, a lot of decades actually in the meditation world and what's interesting is, in that world there's not hardly any discussion at all about breathing. And, interestingly, in the meditation world and what's interesting is, in that world there's not hardly any discussion at all about breathing. And, interestingly, in the breathing world, oftentimes there's not much discussion at all about meditation.
Speaker 2:So I spent many decades in the meditation world and I really would say that training in Krav Maga and engaging in really intense fitness activities breathing is essential. And so I just realized that there has to be something more that I might be able to get out of my performance if I engage in proper breathing. And I will say that I think the pivotal moment for me was I was listening to a podcast with Dr Belisa Vranich of the breathing class and she was having a discussion with Mark Devine of Silphid about aberrant breathing, right. So she was talking about breathing pattern disorders and she starts going through all of these breathing pattern disorders and I'm like I have all of those right. So it was really that moment where I realized that I had some work to do and I could probably eke out some more performance on a physical level if I do what it was that she was teaching.
Speaker 1:Now can you?
Speaker 2:explain what Krav Maga is a defensive tactics program that was developed by the Israelis for their military and in the 80s it was brought to the United States by a man named Darren Levine in Los Angeles, and that became kind of the hub for instructor training in the United States and over the course of time schools started popping up in the US and the instructors from those schools would go to Los Angeles for instructor certification.
Speaker 2:I happened to be living in Houston at the time and the only school in Houston was about 45 minutes away from me and I started training anyway and I just happened to be training under the guy that he was one of the first people to be licensed outside of Los Angeles to teach Krav Maga and that school has been there now for 25 years. So we teach civilians and military and law enforcement defensive tactics, how to defend themselves against anybody that might be using what they call strong arm tactics or using their hands or their arms or their body in some way to attack you all the way up to. What do you do if somebody puts a handgun in your face or tries to hit you with a baseball bat or whatever it might be? You name it, whatever modern day threat there might be out there. We try to have a solution for that that's so cool.
Speaker 1:And now you said you went down the meditation route before the breathing route.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so I was probably 18 years old I'm 48 now when I first started to explore meditation, but, honestly, it was one of those things that it was about, I would say, two decades of on and off practice, really just trying to figure it out on my own.
Speaker 2:I didn't have, you know, we didn't have apps like we have today, and it was a lot harder to find a coach.
Speaker 2:And so, you know, it's just me fumbling my way through and trying to figure out how to be a better human through meditation. And, honestly, it was one of those things that I started getting pretty good on the cushion, in the sense that I went from initially doing a 10 minute meditation, maybe really being focused for 30 seconds of that 10 minutes, to, over the course of time, being able to stay focused for the vast majority of the time. So my concentration power was increasing. But the moment I stepped off the cushion, basically all that meditation went away. Right. What I mean by that is I didn't have a good daily life practice and I wasn't becoming a better human being because of the time that I was spending on the cushion. It took a really long time and really finding the right people to help guide me for that type of thing to start to happen, where I really started to experience great benefit in my daily life from the practice.
Speaker 1:So when you started changing the environment of Foundu, you noticed a difference in the meditation.
Speaker 2:No, it was really having a systematic way of taking the practice from the cushion to everyday life, right? So there just aren't many people that talk about that, and I learned this from the work of Shinsen Young and some really fantastic instructors that I trained under in his organization, unified Mindfulness. In his organization, unified Mindfulness, they have a really good, systematic way of talking about how to take the practice that you just spent 10 minutes doing on the cushion. How do you take that into your daily life? What does that look like? Right? What are all the possibilities throughout your day? And actually have you examine your day and be really intentional about. Well, I'm before I have this particular meeting, for example, I'm going to sit down and I'm going to do a practice that focuses on rest in the body to help prepare my physiology for the next one hour meeting or whatever it is that you're engaged in. What are all the Think about?
Speaker 2:We go through doors how many times a day? How many times do we open and close the refrigerator in a day? How many times do we open and close a cabinet, whatever it might be? So those are all opportunities to bring a moment of mindfulness right Open a door, even if a door closes on its own. I'll walk through a door and the idea is I grab that handle, turn the knob and I'm aware of all of that happening, right, really feeling that knob, walking through mindfully and then closing that door, even if it closes automatically. I'll close the door myself and it doesn't take very long. When I just described it, it sounds like it takes forever. I go through a door just as fast as everybody else does, but I try to do it in a way that I'm present to what's going on.
Speaker 1:I like that. Do you do that with anything else other than doors?
Speaker 2:I try to do it in all my activities throughout the day, but at least if I have. You know, we all end up in moments where we're just not very mindful and we're transitioning. That transition is a great time to drop into the body and bring a moment of mindfulness. And all of those little transitions of five to 10 seconds, they have a profound cumulative effect over the course of time. Right? I think people really discount that. They think I'm not getting any benefit from my meditation unless I sit down for an hour and meditate. Right, and you would be amazed at how many people I've talked to that said the same thing. I did that you know I've meditated for an hour a day or 30 minutes a day or 15 minutes a day for a decade and don't really feel like it's changed my life in a profound way. And once they start being systematic and intentional behind putting those mindful moments in their day, everything changes for them.
Speaker 1:So is that the first thing you did to incorporate meditation into your life?
Speaker 2:It was one of many things that I did. It was just the first time that I had ever done it when I started working with Unified Mindfulness, but there were so many aspects of my day that I started bringing mindfulness to that historically I had not, and transitions was the first thing where I was very systematic about that. Anytime I was transitioning from point A to point B, I tried to bring mindfulness to that transition and what I found is that as I, if I bring mindfulness to a transition, what happens is the next activity I'm engaged in. I'm more likely to be mindful during that activity because of that mindfulness during the transition to the activity.
Speaker 1:That makes a lot of sense, because you're stoning it like you're stoding it from a fresh headspace. That's right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's just so profound. Sometimes our life we're wrapped up in our heads and we are carrying around tension, and we're doing it even when there's nothing major going on. I'll give you an example I still find with myself that when I'm driving, even if I'm on a long straightaway and there's no one else around and I'm sitting back in a chair and I've got both hands on the steering wheel, my core is tight and I just it's amazing to me, why is my core tight, as if someone's about to punch me in the stomach, when I'm just driving and there's no danger in the moment, right, and I find that we carry around that tension all the time, and so transitions are a great opportunity to check in with the body, notice any unnecessary tension that you're carrying and get rid of it right, relax the body, feel that rest as you're moving.
Speaker 1:You can move and feel rest in the body at the same time and reset the nervous system in a way that is quite profound when it comes to the next interaction that you're going to have after that transition think so many of us we just go to this next thing, like even if it's just a zoom call, but like taking a breath, like even one breath, like to center yourself, is something I started doing before starting whatever. It is even just one breath and people like what's that gonna do? But it centers you a little bit and you're like you're not thinking about the last thing, like you're here in the moment, you know, know.
Speaker 2:I totally agree it can be profound. I love that you mentioned that people can discount it right. But even a subtle adjustment in your nervous system can be profound in terms of the way you interface.
Speaker 1:So you're about 18 when you discovered meditation. Then when did you start realizing the power of breathing? How long from there?
Speaker 2:Yeah, two decades, honestly, when I turned 40, it was around that time that I really started digging deep into the breathing space. I went a little bit crazy with with trainings. I just dove head deep into everything that I possibly could. So, you know, quickly got like five different certifications from different organizations and just kept doing that, just because what I find is that so there's so many different approaches to breathing and each, each approach, each person, each organization has something unique to offer and I just love learning from all those people. So, stix Everinson there's just so many names to mention, patrick McKeown you know there's just. I've learned something from all of them that has been profound in a way and that has benefited me in ways that are truly immeasurable has benefited me in ways that are truly immeasurable.
Speaker 1:Now did something happen like around when you were 40 for you to go down the breathings of it all.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I turned 40 and that's what happened, for whatever reason.
Speaker 2:In my head, 40 was the midway point for my life.
Speaker 2:I don't know how long I'm going to live, but when I hit 40, it was the first time. It was just a perspective shift that happened to me. I didn't do it, it just all of a sudden happened and I started thinking about the last half of my life in a way that I had never thought of it before, and it made me reflect on the previous 40 years, and I realized that there were things in the previous 40 years that I just felt like I should, I want to be better at, and so, you know, I just wanted to do anything and everything that would help me be better in the latter half, the later half of my life, and so breath work was one of those things, and what I found was that when I started doing the breath work and started combining it with meditation and mindfulness, they have a synergistic effect on each other, and so you get a lot more bang for your buck from that Right. So it's just been a really fantastic, interesting ride since that perspective shift.
Speaker 1:So you wanted to get better at your breathing, and what was the first thing you did? Was it one of the trainings?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I learned. I did Belisa Vranich's training and did the breathing IQ and figured out that I had zero flexibility in my rib cage, and I was one of those people that spent my whole life, probably since I was five and a half. That tends to be the age at which people go to school and they change the way they breathe. We're the only mammal on the planet that I'm aware of that. We change the way we breathe primarily for social reasons, and we do that at five and a half, which tends to be around the age that people go to school. Right, they start going to preschool and first grade, and it doesn't take very long for somebody to mention, oh you look fat or whatever it is, and we suck our belly in and we tighten our core and we stay in that state for the rest of our lives. Right, and so I was that person, and, as a result of that, I had lost a ton of flexibility in my rib cage, and so that was the first thing is change the location of my breathing, stop breathing vertically and expand the flexibility of the rib cage so that I could take a big breath if I needed to. Right, and so I was able.
Speaker 2:I think I had a two inch difference between the inhale and exhale at that time in terms of the flexibility of my rib cage, and these days it's like a five inch difference between the inhale and the exhale and just making that shift I could feel a profound making that shift, I could feel a profound change just in the way I felt throughout the day, but in particular when I was engaged in exercise. There were so many things that became much easier. They call it the rate of perceived exertion, right. The way you rate it on, say, a scale of one to 10, how terrible does this exercise feel right now, a 10 being the worst, something that historically would be a 10, it's more like an eight or seven. You know, after just making that change of the location of breathing and adjusting the flexibility of my rib cage, it was profound.
Speaker 1:I like how you mentioned about how we're breathing incorrectly. You know, I didn't realize it was that young, five and a half, but I have heard that like people comparing it to like if you look at a baby breathe like they breathe differently than we do, you know, and it's because they haven't been susceptible to all of society's. Even if it's not a comment about weight, you know, it could be something about like the way you look, the color of the and it. It doesn't have to be a big, harsh comment. It could be something so small that you know.
Speaker 2:I think you're right that half the time it's even, it's implicit messaging that we get just in. It's just the way our society works, right. You get all these implicit messages and then people just start tightening up and they stay that way forever. It just it's not a it's not a great way to live, honestly.
Speaker 2:And it's funny too, because you know there's this whole focus on belly breathing or breathing with the diaphragm, but people turn that into belly breathing and then people are afraid that they're going to look fat when they're taking a proper breath, when in fact it's not really. It's not about belly breathing at all, it's about breathing at the bottom of the rib cage, and so there's no concern about looking fatter because you're, you can still have a slight contraction of the core under the belly button, below the belly button. So there's no concern with actually looking fat and still being able to take a proper breath at the bottom of the ribs, around the whole body, circumferentially, around the whole body, which is what people miss. It's not just breathing forward, it's also breathing out and also breathing into the back at the same time.
Speaker 1:What's the difference between the two?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so for me, belly breathing would be that I'm expanding my belly out, right. So that is a completely different set of muscles that I'm using versus breathing right at the bottom of the ribs. I could breathe at the bottom of the ribs and you can't see the belly move at all, right, because the ribs are. They're expanding forward a little bit, but they're also expanding out to the sides and also there's expansion into the back.
Speaker 1:So? So what do you say? Is the first step for people to start breathing correctly or being more aware of how they're breathing.
Speaker 2:Well, that's it. That's just. It is being aware of how you're breathing and it's also helpful to look at a list of breathing pattern disorders and be aware of that. There's a huge benefit and you can go online and look up breathing IQ and do that assessment. That's a self-assessment that you could do at home with one of those flexible tape measures. You just put the tape measure over the bottom, that bottom rib, wrap around you, take an exhale, take that reading, take a big inhale, take that reading and it'll score you on there. You put your measurements and it'll give you an A through an F and I failed miserably. I had I was off this chart F. It was terrible, and these days have an A and it's super easy. Once you get the flexibility in the rib cage, it's super easy to maintain. I don't even have to do the physical exercises anymore as far as the flexibility exercises. I just do certain breathing practices and sip in air and get full expansion of the rib cage, and just doing that on a regular basis helps maintain that flexibility.
Speaker 1:Okay, and now regular basis. How often do you do that?
Speaker 2:Several times a week. It varies a just depending on the week and the day and what it is I'm focusing on. But yeah, several times a week is probably what it turns out to be.
Speaker 1:Okay, so you started discovering this, and then where did you go from there with the breathing?
Speaker 2:Well, I went to an event that Unbeatable Mind put on, that's run by Mark Devine, who was a Navy SEAL, and this was my first foray into like conscious connected breathing, or what they called it was warrior breathing, right and it was my first 45 minute heavy breathing session and, yeah, that was that was a really interesting location to do it and it was an interesting group of people to be doing that with Right I think I think most people don't associate that type of breathing practice with Navy SEALs, for example, right, and so you've got Navy SEALs in the room, you've got high performer, high performing business people, you have CrossFit people, you got all these athletes in there and they're all doing this type of breathing and it was fantastic and there were a ton of people who had profound experiences.
Speaker 2:I can tell you that I hated it, absolutely hated it, and but I did it anyway and then I started doing it more. After that situation, I found other trainers, and John Paul Crammy was one of them, and I ended up doing several sessions with them and ended up, over the course of time, also working with Alchemia Breath, learning from them, and everybody has their own spin on what you might do during a 45-minute breathing session, but there are certain consistencies and the reality is, for me, it's always difficult, there's always resistance, but it's always worth it in some way, even if it just turns out to be a long breathing meditation session. Or you have a profound rebirthing experience, like I had and I was not expecting it and it wasn't even in a session that was considered a rebirthing session, but it was. That was a profound experience and resulted in a ton of tears, a ton of gratitude for my mother, who had passed. She had passed. She passed in 2019. And this particular, this rebirthing session, was after she passed and it was a very healing session.
Speaker 1:Okay, now you say you hated it, but you went back for more.
Speaker 2:I'm going. Yeah, I tend to be that type of person. That's kind of the story of my life, I would say, being a Krav Maga instructor which, and, by the way, I hate working out and hate is the proper word for the way my physiology responds to working out and training in any form or fashion. I just have never enjoyed the physical exertion of it all, but I understand the benefits and I really appreciate what it gives me, so I do it anyway. Loving something is not a prerequisite for getting the benefits from it. Right, I like that. Okay Now, you hated it and it was your first time doing it. Did you experience benefits that first time? And I saw and heard some of the testimony of the people in the room. After the fact, after the session, you know, they opened the floor for people to speak and there were some people that had some experiences that I was like, well, that's really interesting and I wonder if I might experience that myself somewhere along the way. So I just kept going.
Speaker 1:Really Okay. Is there something that that helped you keep going, even though the resistance was strong?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I wish I could put my finger on it. I really can't say for sure, other than I'm just stubborn. I don't know. I was just so curious and wanted to know and I feel like you know, you can't really say for sure about anything and it's hard to get all of the lessons from a single exposure to something right. It's like people say I want to run a marathon once in my life. Well, why once? I can tell you I've run a marathon and I've done other things that are like long physical exertion and I can say that it was the fifth or sixth time that I did something where I really ended up getting the benefit, really had the profound experience, right. So I just kind of have that rule that I don't do anything just once to really understand something and get the benefit. I just feel like I need to do it more than that.
Speaker 1:No, I get that. It's difficult to understand, like how, if you like it, if you're doing it the right way, even if it's not way, even if it's not, even if it's not breathwork, even if it's a new fitness routine, you know, like you don't know how to squat with the barbell. The first time you're squatting with the barbell, you know, like it's the same concept, like it might feel good but it's gonna feel different your fifth time. You know that's.
Speaker 2:That's right, I agree.
Speaker 1:Okay, wow, so now do you facilitate breathwork.
Speaker 2:Okay, I have many sessions and I still do occasionally, but I don't.
Speaker 2:I don't do long super ventilation breathwork sessions for myself or for other people on a frequent basis for lots of reasons that we can go into if you want, but I do them like once a year now, as like as special events, right? So, yeah, I have a group of people that I know are healthy and that I can trust to be fully present, and once a year, twice a year at the most, I'll announce to them that, hey, we're going to do a breathwork session and we'll all get together and do it, but it's just not something that I do for a living in any way. Right now. I do other types of breathing and I teach other types of breathing, just like daily breathing, right, how do you breathe throughout the day? How do you breathe during physical exercise or whatever it is that the person is wanting to train for? So, if a person is trying to train for a triathlon, for example, we may have a discussion about how they're breathing during their run and how that breathing might be affecting their heart rate. You know those types of things.
Speaker 1:Okay, so is it like one-on-ones you're doing? Is it small groups?
Speaker 2:Both, yeah. So I have a six-week breathing and meditation fundamentals course that I teach online, but I also have private students that I train.
Speaker 1:Now you mentioned like breathing for triathlons. I'm curious about that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so well, this particular person. What they were experiencing was, while they're running their, their heart rate is much higher than what they would expect for the pace that they were running. So during their training sessions sometimes they would just do a slower run so say, 10 minute mile but his heart rate was as if he was running double that speed, right, and so we were exploring the possibility that he was breathing too much for the metabolic demands of the activity itself. So your heart rate is already going to be elevated because you're physically working, you're exerting yourself, but if you're breathing in addition to that you're breathing too quickly your heart rate will be much higher than it should be so how did you have him adjust it?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so it's just him practicing.
Speaker 2:We.
Speaker 2:One of the things that we did was an assessment of, say, 50 squats right, and this is one of the things in fitness that you see a lot that results in people unknowingly breathing more than is necessary.
Speaker 2:So think about air squats, so there's no weight on your back, you're just doing your body weight and most people are taught you go down, you breathe in, you go up, you breathe out right, and so you do 50 squats, you breathe 50 times, and so what ends up happening is people carry that into all physical exertion activities that they engage in and they end up ultimately over-breathing and all of those activities. So I had him do 50 squats and pointed out to him that, hey, even during squats, you're breathing too much because you're breathing for every squat at, which is not necessary. So teach him to be able to do that physical activity of 50 squats and breathe less often. So I can do 50 squats and breathe like eight times in 50 squats, right? So the idea is that you just breathe as much as necessary, but no more than necessary, regardless of the activity.
Speaker 1:So it's not different for the triathlon.
Speaker 2:No, it's no different. So if you're going out and you're running, how much do you actually need to breathe? So slow everything down. Your body will tell you how much you need to breathe. But don't take control of your breath just because you're physically exerting yourself and breathe more than is necessary. I see this all the time, for example, with people who they finish a workout right and they're no longer working hard, and they, it's like they, right, and they're no longer working hard. And they, it's like they. They're not doing it on purpose.
Speaker 2:I have no reason to believe this. It's subconscious, but they're huffing and puffing as if they're still working out. They're breathing more than the current metabolic demands of the activity that they're engaged in. There's no reason for them to breathe like that. It's not necessary. Just slow everything down and your body will then tell you when to breathe like that it's not necessary. Just slow everything down and your body will then tell you when to breathe. There's an urge, right, there's a reflex, and if you just wait for that reflex to happen, then your body will take care of itself. It's when we start to control the breath sometimes unknowingly, but we're still controlling it it's when we start to control the breath that we put ourselves into states that aren't healthy over the course of time.
Speaker 1:Wow, now, I've been into fitness for a while, but one of my new best friends is a triathlon athlete and I don't know a lot about it, but so, so why do you think that so many people breathe more than they need to?
Speaker 2:That is a really good question, I think. When it comes to physical activity, like we were just discussing, your body naturally is going to want you to breathe more, right, because you're physically exerting yourself. It's trying to get rid of the CO2 that your body is producing as you move your muscles, and so it could be partly that there's this momentum that is gained in that process. There's also the psychology behind physical exertion. For some people experiencing high intensity, physical exertion is kind of panic inducing, and so they will end up breathing in a way. That kind of facilitates this vicious cycle where they start to feel panicky, right, and they end up telling their doctor that this happens during exercise and the doctor just says, ah, it's exercise induced asthma. When it's not at all, it's quite often psychological effect that results in them breathing more than is necessary and what ends up happening is because they're off gassing so much CO2, they experience vasoconstriction, which then causes tingliness. It causes physical sensations in the body that reinforces the panicking Right, and then they start to get less blood flow to the brain at the same time. So it's just that they end up in this vicious cycle. I see this a lot with my, with some of my Krav Maga students in particular.
Speaker 2:When we do things like what they call hard and fast drills right, where you're punching a heavy bag or punching a pad as hard and as fast as you can and you're doing self-defense techniques in the middle of that, there are some people who have a real panic while that's going on, and so that reinforces this heavy breathing. They think they need to breathe heavier to get more oxygen, but they don't realize is that the opposite is happening. You don't breathe more to get more oxygen. This is one of the things that I hear people in the breathwork space say all the time. Is that you're oxygenating the body during a 45-minute breathwork class? No, you're doing the opposite, and that's why people get tetany and that's why people get tingly.
Speaker 2:It's because there's vasoconstriction, because you're dropping CO2 so much. And the same thing is happening to this person who's physically exerting themselves, but they're breathing too much, given the metabolic demands of that activity. They're getting all of these secondary symptoms that they think makes the. They believe if they breathe more, those symptoms will go away. But the answer is to breathe less and those symptoms will disappear. They're experiencing those symptoms partly because when you breathe out so much, you off gas, so much CO2, hemoglobin is actually hanging on to the oxygen molecule and not even allowing it to pass into the tissues that you're trying to exercise, and so you're actually behaving in a way that is counterproductive to what you're actually what your goal is. You're trying to get more oxygen, but you're actually causing less oxygen to get into your the cells of your body.
Speaker 1:So so what would you suggest as a first step for people to stop doing this?
Speaker 2:Well, it's just like the. It's just like the squats I had that person do, right, it's just reteaching the person to engage in low level physical activity. You do it in the squats first, to where you do 50 squats and you don't breathe 50 times. You breathe much less than that, right, you just get comfortable doing those exercises, simple exercises, and breathing less, and then, over the course of time, you just expand that into whatever other activities that you're engaged in, breathing less and also, as much as possible, breathing through the nose instead of the mouth. Too many of us are walking around first mouth breathing throughout the day, and then, in particular, during exercise, people are moving to mouth breathing way too early in exercise.
Speaker 2:There's a concept of breathing gears that I really like. I'm not sure who came up with it, but I learned it from Brian McKenzie and his organization, and the idea is you think about a. Let's say we take two cars, right, a Ferrari, for example, and a Volkswagen Beetle. Okay, in first gear, a Ferrari goes 61 miles an hour. Volkswagen Beetle goes 16 miles an hour. Right, either one of those vehicles you can modify if you needed to make them go faster, but that you're not going to be able to do a whole lot to that Volkswagen Beetle to make it go faster in gear one. The idea behind this is if I go from gear one in either one of those vehicles and I go straight to gear five, what happens to that car? It's not going to go very far. You can't go from gear one to gear five and expect to go anywhere. You have to go from one gear to the next and if you think about your body the same way, you use that car as a metaphor for your body and use breathing as the gear shift right.
Speaker 2:Gear one should be nasal only in and out through the nose and just as relaxed as possible. Gear two would be power nasal inhale, relaxed exhale, and what that means is you're breathing in fast through the nose and then exhaling softer through the nose, so something along those lines. Gear three would be power nasal inhale, power nasal exhale, right, and you could do gear three and be running pretty fast. But most people what they're doing is they're going from gear one to gear five, so they're skipping all the most important gears right, and they're losing all the benefit of being able to breathe through the nose versus the mouth. You get all kinds of benefit when you breathe in through your nose, even during exercise right, especially during exercise that you don't get those same benefits when you breathe through your mouth. One of those is that just making the system more efficient. Ultimately right, this is possible.
Speaker 2:Most people don't think about this, even in the fitness world, but these days, you have people running sub three hour marathons with their mouth closed the whole time. You have you watch the Olympics. Sprinters are sprinting pretty long distances using nasal breathing exclusively. So this is doable.
Speaker 2:It's not comfortable, though, to transition from mouth breathing to nasal breathing only during exercise, but there's plenty of evidence at this point that you can make your system as much as 20% more efficient, and, just like six weeks of practice, so it's a worthwhile endeavor, ultimately right, yeah, and so, by the way, you wouldn't shift to any mouth breathing at all until gear four. So gear four is in through the nose, out the mouth, right? So you're not going to, you're not going to be breathing out of the in and out of the mouth exclusively until the fifth gear, and you shouldn't be in gear five unless you're running for your life or to save someone else, right, essentially right. So there's limited context for breathing exclusively with the mouth, but it's what most people are doing when they're engaged in exercise, and there's so many reasons not to do it, not the least of which is you lose so much more water. You're more likely to become dehydrated during your exercise if you're breathing through your mouth.
Speaker 1:I didn't realize that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and dehydration obviously has a profound impact on physical performance, right, so you're always better off breathing through your nose as much as you possibly can, as we're both wiping our nose today.
Speaker 1:No, that's so true, that makes a lot of sense. So, everybody listening to us, hearing all this great information you shared, what would you say is the first thing they can start doing today?
Speaker 2:Honestly, when I look back on my journey, I realized that I made a lot of mistakes along the way that I would have never made or at least I don't think I would have made them if I had a good coach, and so I can't say it enough that finding a good coach whether it be for meditation or breathing, find a good coach that can help guide you.
Speaker 1:I love that Well. Thank you so much for speaking with me. I really appreciate it.
Speaker 2:All my pleasure. This was a lot of fun. Thanks a lot, Amanda.
Speaker 1:Yeah, of course, and where can listeners connect with you?
Speaker 2:Really, the best way is go to nervousapescom and I'm on social media as well. Trey Drake and also Nervous Apes on Instagram and Facebook.
Speaker 1:Okay, and I will link that in the show notes. And no pressure, but any final words of wisdom for the listeners.
Speaker 2:Oh, that is a great question. Yeah, Say. You know, I really consider breathing and meditation to be pivotal skills, in the sense that a pivotal skills is something that you learn, that opens up possibilities and opens up gifts that you don't even know are available. And once you learn them and you combine them especially combining meditation and breathing it's just such a profound synergistic effect that those gifts start coming in quite quickly.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I love that Well. Thank you so much.
Speaker 2:Yeah, all my pleasure.
Speaker 1:And thank you, guys, for tuning in to another episode of Breathwork Magic. Thank you for tuning in to Breathwork Magic. I hope today's episode inspired you to connect more deeply with your breath and embrace the transformation that it can bring. Remember, as long as you have your breath, you have options. You're not stuck. You can make a change. You can make a change, you can make a shift. Each inhale is a new beginning and every exhale is a chance to let go of what no longer serves you.
Speaker 1:If you enjoyed the episode, it would mean the world to me. If you shared this with a friend, left a rating or review. Your support helps more people discover the magic of breathwork and the incredible transformations it offers. If you're ready to take the next step, I encourage you and I invite you to join me every Monday evening to and I invite you to join me every Monday evening virtually for a mindful mindset Monday, a virtual pay, what you can Black Work session where you can reset, recharge and refocus. All of the information is in the show notes. Until next time, keep breathing, keep shifting and keep embracing the magic with inside of you. I'm proud of you, I'm rooting for you and you got this.