lifefullyinhabited

I have asthma, and for the most part, a well managed asthma condition. I learned the hard way a few nights ago not to take my breath for granted.
I had a scary asthma attack during the night and found myself waking up gasping and struggling to breathe.
Now of all the anxieties that plague me daily, I rarely feel anxious about breathing. It is just one of those things I take for granted. You probably do too.
The lungs do all the work, and I really don’t give them credit.
When I’m in my yoga class I think about breathing and moving with breath. And it’s in this yoga practice that I learned some techniques that probably saved me the other night during this terrifying asthma attack.
When you can’t get air, panic sets in and makes everything worse.
So the practice of breathing calmly through difficult poses helped me to turn the scary into manageable.
Almost instinctively, I started to try to breathe through my nose calmly. Exhaling completely, deeply as I could. It took awhile, but I began to breathe easier.
My lungs felt bruised for a whole day after this episode, so I was aware all day long of my lungs and my breath.
It was a good reminder that the most basic things in life are also the most essential. And sometimes its really all you need to do.
If you can’t breathe and you can’t breathe well, not much of anything else is really very important that day.
Don’t take your breath for granted. Thank your lungs today for the hard work they do every second of everyday of your life.
Learn to breathe properly. Most of us don’t.
Thank your yoga teacher. I did.
Blessings