Moment 60 - Jay Shetty: You’re Breathing Wrong, Here’s Why

00:01So if I was to be someone who's listening to this now, driving in my van on my way to, to work this morning, and I see a lot of people in their vans driving, listening to the podcast, um, what would you say is a really good, just a first step to, to investigate for themselves subjectively, if, um, meditation can, can add value to their life, where would they start? Yeah. I would say that. The first thing you want to do is put something in your schedule in your calendar, which is time for you. If you look at your schedule, you would never cancel an important meeting with someone else, but we don't even schedule one with ourself. There is nothing in the calendar. That's time with myself, time for me, time for you, time for just this.

00:42This whole thing that's going on right now. Literally put it in for five minutes a day. If you can't do five minutes, do it for two minutes a day. Just put it in there because if you start putting that in there you might then tomorrow go OK, well, what am I going to do with this time? I've got five minutes. Wow. OK. What am' I going to do with it? So start putting it in there. That's the first step. The second step I would say is definitely focus on your breath. I think the breath is just something we can all relate to. It's tangible, by the way. Athletes have to learn how to control their breath. Musicians have to learn how to control their breath. Whether you're a Dell or whether you're a football player, you have to learn how to breathe in order to perform.

01:19Me you and everyone we're all athletes in different ways we all use our bodies, we all use our minds whether you're a business person or whether you're an actual athlete playing on a on a court or a pit. but are you saying that I don't know how to breathe? I am saying. you don't know how to breathe yeah, and not you specifically, I'm saying that most people don't know how to breathe and I didn't know how to breathe until I was taught how to breathe and I know that sounds ridiculous, but how many times a day do you get out of breath.

01:43I know there's timesns of days that I get out of breath. How many times of the day do you feel that when you're experiencing an emotion, your breath changes? Like when you're crying or you're sad or you're upset, your breath changes. When you're happy and elated, your breath changes. So our breath is connected to every single emotion. So if we want to navigate our emotions and our life, we have to train our breath. So I would just say to everyone, take out two to three minutes, and just take a moment to breathe in and out and breathe in for four and out for four just try it as simply as that. Now if you're someone who struggles to get to sleep which can often be something that I think everyone struggles with, that's when you want to breathe out for longer than you breathe in so if you're breathing in for four, breathe out for more than four to relax and rest your body and if you're one of these people that goes Jay, I've got you know I've got like you said I've got to do a delivery today I've got to run to this meeting. I've got to get to this and you need more energy breathe out for less time than you breathe in so you. May breathe in for a second and breathe out for a millisecond, it's a really sharp.

02:43Out and if you do that, you'll feel this pumping energy in your body, and so to me it's these are really practical tools that I think we all need to sleep so everyone knows their meditation for sleep, we all need to get energized, so that's a simple meditation for energize, and we all need to just feel like we're not rushing. yeah. so I think those are hopefully quick things that feel practical to anyone and everyone. Yeah.

03:03I mean I'm I think my natural position on on things is to be a little bit of a skeptic and I when I was in Indonesia the. Last time I my girlfriend brought me to see a breath work coach and before we did the breath work, he explained it to me and so this is this is as a logical guy like I am the explanation matters a lot. Yeah and he was talking to me about um how we pretty much live most of our lives these days because of the over stimulation, because of the stress, because of the screens in this kind of like permanent state of fight or flight and when you look at what happens in fight or flight and I studied biology, I know what happens to the body, um, and anatomically and physically you what happens to your digestive tract and I mean this is what a lot of people say when they say I'm nervous.

03:44And they've lost their appetite. That's your body preparing and keeping the minerals and nutrients it needs to expend energy to help you in a situation on the Serengeti, when a line is running at you. That's a very prehistoric innate part of our conditioning and we do live on edge. Our notifications run our lives and all of these things. So when we think about why people might be getting a little bit more anxious day to day, it's probably because we're living in like a heightened state of fight or flight. And one of the things that happens in fight or flight as well is your breathing changes, so yeah and then I think about the moments where I'm feeling a little bit stressed and one thing I've done, I my find it's funny my head went straight to New York city is I'll go, I'll stop and I'll just go and whenever I do that someone turns to me and goes are you okay? Yeah okay I'm fine I'm just.

04:30look at him now yeah yeah yeah but. no I completely agree and um, I think it's one of those things that I think everybody listening regardless of who you are or how much of a tough guy you are, you should um, definitely. You're a tough guy. Stephen, so you know well not. No, not really. I'm a bit softer, okay, you know, around the edges.