How Breathwork Can Help Alleviate Anxiety & Depression
Breathwork refers to the use of specific types of exercises and techniques that focus on intentionally inhaling and exhaling in a pattern that is different from our usual breathing and then to continue that breathing pattern for a specific amount of time.
In this article, we’ll cover exactly what kinds of breathwork they are, how breathwork works on a physiological level (hint: it has to do with our nervous system!) and we’ll make sure to talk about how we can use this information to help us alleviate some of our anxiety or depression.
Two types of breathwork: slow and fast
While there is a countless variety of breathing exercises that are being used for breathwork all around the world, generally they can all be categorized into one of two types:
Calming or relaxing breathwork (characterized by long, slow breaths as well as shorter inhales paired with longer exhales)
Examples:
2. Stimulating or energizing breathwork (characterized by short, fast breaths as well as longer inhales paired with shorter exhales)
Examples:
Quick health disclaimer: these types of fast, stimulating breathing exercises can be very energizing so they should not be practiced if you are pregnant, have uncontrolled high blood pressure, epilepsy, seizures or any other kind of serious cardiovascular issues.
The way these two types of breathwork affect our body is different. However, before we can go into detail on how they work on a physiological level, we need to take a quick look at how our nervous system functions and understand how that affects our emotional states.
How our nervous system regulates our states of emotional arousal
Based on the theory of the Window of Tolerance (coined by psychologist Daniel Siegel), there are three main arousal states that are regulated by our nervous system: hyperarousal, calm/regulated referred to as the “Window of Tolerance” and hypoarousal.
Regulated state or “Window of Tolerance”
When we’re in our window of tolerance, we're calm, collected and our nervous system is well-regulated. In this zone of arousal, our brain can function optimally and we can respond to the challenges of everyday life without much struggle. This state is the ideal place to be because it makes life feel (fairly) easy and effortless. Depending on each of our own nervous systems, we might have an expanded window of tolerance (meaning we can deal with a lot of challenges before we become dysregulated) or a restricted window of tolerance (meaning we become dysregulated very quickly).
Hyperarousal state (excessive energy/activation)
For certain kinds of threats/triggers, our body will respond with stress, anxiety or the so-called “fight or flight response”. This is called the hyperarousal state and it happens when a part of our nervous system called the sympathetic nervous systems becomes overly activated. When we’re hyperaroused, we’re “stuck” in a state of too much emotional activation, making it nearly impossible to relax, sleep or do any of the other things we can easily manage in a regulated state.
Hypoarousal state (lacking energy/activation)
On the other side of the spectrum, hypoarousal is characterized by feelings of depression, numbness/disassociation and a general “freeze” response. This happens when a part of our nervous system called the parasympathetic nervous system becomes overly active. When we’re hypo-aroused, we’re “stuck” in a state of not enough emotional activation, making us feel like we are shutting down or like we’re “dead inside”.
How calming breathwork can help alleviate anxiety
So now that we understand the basics of how our nervous systems regulate our emotional states, we can more easily understand how breathwork fits into the attempt to alleviate the symptoms of anxiety.
When we are experiencing a moment of anxiety, we are most likely in a state of hyperarousal. Our nervous system has become dysregulated, we’re no longer in our window of tolerance and we might feel stressed, panicky and overwhelmed.
If we’re constantly feeling anxious and stressed without relief, it’s entirely possible that our nervous system has become “stuck” in chronic hyperarousal with prolonged sympathetic nervous system activity. When this happens, it can make us feel like we’re constantly “on” and wired without ever entering back into our normal regulated state.
For anxiety, calming breathwork can be a great tool to help us activate our parasympathetic nervous system and combat the overactive sympathetic nervous that is causing the anxiety in the first place. By engaging in slow and controlled breathing, we can signal to our body that we are safe and secure and therefore help reduce the “fight or flight” mode that our body might be in (perhaps even unknowingly).
The activation of the parasympathetic nervous system can also lower our heart rate as well as blood pressure which are also often associated with anxiety.
How stimulating breathwork can help alleviate depression
When we are experiencing symptoms of depression, we are most likely in a state of hypoarousal. We’ve become unregulated, our parasympathetic nervous systems are overly activated and therefore we feel lethargic, numb and frozen.
Similar to chronic anxiety, for those of us who are battling long-lasting and constant depression symptoms, it’s possible that these are caused by our nervous systems being “stuck” in chronic hypoarousal with prolonged parasympathetic nervous system activity.
In either case, one of the ways we can treat depression symptoms in the moment is by trying to activate or increase our arousal levels back to normal. And stimulating breathwork can be a great tool for that.
By engaging in fast and energetic breathing techniques, we are increasing our sympathetic nervous system activity to help us move out of the hypoaroused state and back into our window of tolerance.
How breathwork can help prevent the depression + anxiety cycle
For many of us, depression and anxiety can often go hand-in-hand, making it nearly impossible to determine if we’re dealing with chronic hypoarousal or chronic hyperarousal.
Spoiler alert: we’re kind of dealing with both - and neither. Sound confusing? We’ll explain:
When our bodies become extremely unregulated, it is common for our nervous systems to try to compensate for one extreme state by jumping into the other extreme state. So instead of going from hyperarousal to regulated (or from hypoarousal to regulated), we often jump back and forth between hyperarousal and hypoarousal.
We get caught in a vicious cycle of dysregulation that makes us feel super anxious and stressed one moment and completely depressed and numbed out the next.
So if we notice that our depressive episodes almost always happen after a period of heightened anxiety or stress (or the other way around), then we might want to focus on improving our overall nervous system regulation as a long-term strategy for preventing both depression and anxiety.
In this case, we might really benefit from a regular practice of both relaxing and stimulating breathwork for two reasons:
Breathwork can help disrupt our pattern of dysregulation
After recognizing that both hypoarousal and hyperarousal can be a response to the other and that both part of the same vicious cycle, we can use our breath as a deliberate tool to try to disrupt this cycle so that we don’t have to continue it any longer.
Instead of jumping back and forth continuously without end, we might be able to use the appropriate form of breathwork the moment we realize we’ve become dysregulated. That way we can intentionally increase or lower our arousal levels and self-regulate our way back into our window of tolerance - therefore preventing any further dysregulation.
2. Breathwork can help “grow” our nervous system so we don’t become dysregulated/aroused as quickly
We touched on this briefly before but our window of tolerance isn’t static. It can grow and shrink, affecting how easily we become dysregulated by certain triggers in our internal or external environment.
There are many different ways that we can try to expand our window of tolerance and heal our nervous system from dysregulation (we talk a bunch more about this in our The Self-Care Space program so if you’re interested in that, you can learn more about it here).
However, in regards to breathwork specifically, there’s a lot of current research showing that breathwork (specifically stimulating breathwork) can be used as a tool to help us train our nervous systems to become better and stronger.
* How? *
Increased fast breathing actually sends our body into a short but intentional “hyperventilation state” (or in other words, hyperarousal) which temporarily increases the activity of the sympathetic nervous system. Makes sense based on what we’ve talked about so far, right?
By voluntarily sending ourselves into hyperarousal and then calming back down, we are causing our nervous system to become better and our window of tolerance to grow.
Think of it as similar to weight training at the gym. When we want to get stronger, we start by lifting the lowest amount of weight that we find challenging. That process shortly breaks down our muscles, but then they grow back stronger and the next time we go to the gym, and we’re capable of lifting that same amount of weight without as much struggle. And if we continue, we can slowly increase the amount of weight we can handle.
Our nervous system basically functions in a similar way. By continuously training our nervous system response through breathwork, our nervous system becomes stronger. Then, when we encounter a real-life trigger, we’ll be better prepared and know to do regulate ourselves without becoming either hyper- or hypoaroused. (Thus preventing any unnecessary episodes of anxiety or depression).
How to start practicing breathwork
If this has piqued your interest and you’d like to start your own practice of breathwork, there are a great number of resources available for you to try.
What your personal breathwork practice will look like in the end, will depend on what type you choose and what your own preferences and needs are. We absolutely recommend trying out different styles and techniques until you find what feels right for you.
If you’re new to breathwork, you might enjoy participating in live breathwork classes (local or online) where trained breathwork instructors guide you through the learning process. Or if you’d like to go down the self-guided route, you can start by following some online videos (search Youtube or Google for great free resources) or even breathwork apps.
Here at The Self Care Space, we also use a variety of breathwork techniques to help you shift your mental and emotional state and break through your patterns. So if you’d like to learn more about breathwork while being part of an awesome community of like-minded women, then you can find out more about us and sign up here.
xoxo,
The Self Care Space
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