Conscious Connected Breathwork (CCB) can benefit every level of your being: the physical, emotional, mental and spiritual. 

 

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On a physical level, CCB releases undischarged

stress and tension held in the body. This stress may

be caused by normal, everyday experiences of acute

stress e.g when someone has a row with a friend and

holds back angry words or tears. It can also come

from chronic tension patterns which build up in the

body over many years, including as a result of

exposure to trauma.

 

How we breathe directly influences our autonomic nervous system. Deep, slow breathing engages the parasympathetic nervous system (the rest/digest response). The kind of breathing connected breathwork involves (deeper, faster, and in and out through an open mouth) charges the body and stimulates the sympathetic nervous system (the fight/ flight response). 

 

By intentionally putting the body into a mild state of sympathetic activation, undischarged tension in the form of sensations or movements such as shaking come to the surface where they can dissipate. By allowing the fight/flight cycle to be completed, there can then be a return to parasympathetic deactivation. This type of somatic release and integration supports you to feel more energised, grounded and connected to your body - like removing road blocks from a traffic system so the traffic can flow again! *

 

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On an emotional level, CCB allows you to get in

touch with your feelings and express them fully and

safely. These may be feelings you are aware of but

haven’t been able to release or feelings which you may

not know were there and may have been buried for a

long time. Unconsciously we will have learned from

babyhood to control and repress overwhelming

feelings by restricting our breathing. It follows then

that the more we breathe, the more we feel. During a

breathwork session, a whole range of feelings can come

up from fear, anger and grief to joy, peace and gratitude.

 

There is often a relationship between letting go of the painful feelings and making space for the pleasurable ones to bubble up. Without realising it, a lot of energy can go into repressing what we perceive as unmanagable feelings. This can result in getting stuck in a kind of chronic low level depression or anxiety and it can reduce our capacity to feel the good stuff or anything much at all - the baby gets thrown out with the bathwater! When you don’t have to use up so much energy to unconsciously keep all the difficult stuff pushed down, that life force becomes available to you again leaving you feeling more present, more alive and more able to be in touch with your full range of feelings. This in turn, can lead to a greater capacity for emotional intimacy with others and improve your relationships. 

 

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On a mental level, CCB can help to reduce all the

mental chatter and allow the mind to settle. Like

meditation, focusing on the breath helps turn our

attention away from the outside world and drop into

awareness of our internal world. Instead of analysing

and using the thinking mind as we might in our ordinary

states of consciousness, we can connect with our

intuition and perceive situations from a fresh

perspective. There can be a release of self-limiting

beliefs and answers to problems you’ve been

struggling with, sometimes for decades. It can

enhance creativity and you can get some great ideas

and inspirations during a breathwork. 

 

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On a spiritual level, CCB can be a gateway to the

transpersonal and support spiritual development.

Through accessing heightened states of consciousness,

it can provide experiences of connection to source

(whatever you conceive that to be), oneness or

connectedness with all beings. It can help you get in

touch with your higher self or an inner wisdom and

experience a deep sense of love and compassion for

yourself and others. 

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* Please note: For people with well regulated nervous systems moving through the sympathetic/parasympathetic cycle from activation to deactivation happens naturally. However, for people with unresolved trauma still held in their nervous systems, skilled trauma facilitation is recommended to avoid traumatic restimulation.

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