Recently, I went solar. Eleven panels installed on the roof absorb the energy of the sun and funnel it directly into the house to satisfy all my family’s electrical needs. It feels good to be directly plugged into the source with no middleman, and, in fact, we’re even making money from selling the surplus production to the grid. Can you replicate this optimal energy efficiency in the body? Of course. Plug into the power of the wind. Draw on the infinite resource of the breath.
Have you heard of the Rule of 3? You can survive 3 minutes without air, 3 days without water, and 3 weeks without food. Out of these 3 – air, water, food – where do you put your energy priority?
If you’re like most people on the planet, you prioritize the least important daily – food. The truth is the human body is naturally designed for short periods of starvation, carrying built in fat reserves. Endurance specialist and trainer of Mark Allen, six-time Ironman Triathlon champion, Dr. Phil Maffetone, says that a 6-foot, 150-pound, low body fat, endurance athlete still has 40,000 calories of fat stores. That’s enough to effectively fuel 100 hours of running!
Food is the least of your immediate worries, yet you probably sat down at the breakfast table shortly after you got up. Score a point for the intermittent fasters who don’t eat for certain periods of the day. Often their fast window includes breakfast, so their initial food intake is later in the day. Combine this practice with the Rule of 3 wisdom and make your first meal a feast of air. It’s fun! Start every day with breakfast in bed. Before you even open your eyes, you can enjoy a heaping serving of breath. The preparation and clean-up can’t be beat!
For a more filling meal, practice 3-part breathing. You can remain on your back or, after a few ‘appetizer’ breaths, sit up in your bed using your pillow as a seat to lift your hips above the height of your knees in an easy cross-legged position. With knees lower than hips, the diaphragm, the main breathing muscle, has space to do its work.
Begin by breathing into the first ‘part’ of the 3-part breath - the space beneath your belly button. Feel your lower belly expand. After 5 breaths here, focus on your rib cage area, feeling the expansion and relaxation of the side ribs as you inhale and exhale. After these 5 breaths, raise your awareness to the upper chest and collarbone area. Breathe here for another 5 cycles of in and out. If you have trouble feeling where the breath is moving, use your hands as a guide. Place them over the area that you’re focusing on – lower belly, side ribs, or upper chest/collarbones. After you’ve completed 5 breaths in each individual part, sew them all together so each breath begins in the low belly, expands up into the side ribs, and tops out at the level of the collarbones. Exhale allowing the breath to drain out as the path reverses, relaxing the collarbone area, ribs, and, finally, the lower belly. Repeat this full breath for 5 cycles. One cycle consists of both an inhale and an exhale. Wave rolling in, wave rolling out. At any time during the practice, if your breathing becomes strained, uncomfortable or you feel dizzy, return to normal breathing.
Go wind power. Breathe better, fueling your own energy needs. Share your surplus to drive actions that bring further benefits to others.