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Hello, hello, beautiful souls, and welcome to the Claim Your Power podcast, the ultimate show for all things new age spirituality, entrepreneurship, and embodied leadership. I'm your host, Kim Peretz. I'm an author, entrepreneur, and yoga enthusiast. If you're ready to step up, tap into your gifts, and unleash your potential, you are at the right place. It's time to claim your power.
Hello, everyone, and welcome back to the podcast. Today, I have a special guest on with me, Jamie Clements. Jamie is a Breathwork coach and facilitator, and I'm so happy to have him on today to talk all things Breathwork. So thank you for joining me today. Thanks for having me, Kim. I'm super excited to be here and to have a chat and to dive into the weird and wonderful world of Breathwork.
Yes. So I guess I want to start by just asking you, why is breathwork so, so powerful? Because I know that's something that you talked about in your work. So why is it powerful?
It's the question. And it's the question I certainly get asked the most because we, you know, the average adult breathes over 20 to 25,000 times every single day. And so it's something we can do completely without thinking about it. Like we don't have to breathe.
think consciously to breathe, we do it without thinking. But we can also consciously control it. So we have this opportunity to really use our breath to enhance and optimize our physical health, our mental health, and our emotional health. So it works on these different levels. And, you know, I'm sure we'll dive into exactly what the word breathwork, you know, is made up of. But
it can do so many different things. So the way in which the breath links into our nervous system, links into the body and the mind, gives us such a powerful tool to shift in lots of different directions, whether it's just simple breathing exercises or whether it's slightly more deep transformative style experiences. There's so many
so much potential for what we can do with the breath. So it's multifaceted and it is so simple. You know, it is our breath. It's something we're all very familiar with, but something that we do take a little bit for granted because we can just do it without thinking about it. So it's about really learning how you can use your breath to do all of these amazing things to work with, you know, anxiety, your mental and emotional health, help with sleep, energy, whatever it might be.
And in some cases, and I'm sure we'll dive into this, but you can actually work with the subconscious mind, you can work with trauma, there's so many, yeah, so many different realms and areas that you can tap into through your breath. Wow, that's so interesting. When you were talking about breath work, and how you can use it consciously, that reminded me of yoga in a way, because I practice yoga a lot. And I know that
it's all about your breath. It's about inhaling and exhaling. But I guess that leads me to my next question is what are the different breath work practices? Because I know some people love to do yoga and they love to be active. And so yoga is something that really allows them to do the breath work, but not have to sit still in meditation, which some people find boring, which I would say, if you don't like meditation, you probably need to do it more. But, you know, so what are some of the practices that people can do?
Yeah, so I'd probably split this into three, three categories. So you've got what I would call or what we call in the breathwork space, like functional breathing, which is how are you breathing right now, day to day, moment to moment at rest during exercise during sleep, like, what is your general state of sort of breathing and breath health? And how can we address particular
potential breathing pattern dysfunctions. So breathing in a way that isn't optimal for your physical health and your mental health. How can we actually look at those and make sure first and foremost that you're breathing in a way that is, you know, serving you in a good way. So that's part one, I suppose. And then beyond that, you've then got
what I would call like simple breathwork techniques. So things like box breathing, extended exhale breathing, these simple techniques where you're consciously changing the ratio of inhale to exhale, how slowly you're breathing, how deeply you're breathing. And that could be
really the point of those exercises is to tap into your nervous system and to manipulate your nervous system to either find things like energy and focus and sort of activation and stimulation or to calm yourself down. So actually to help with anxiety and stress and sleep. So you can use the breath in really simple ways to shift your state and change how you feel. And then the third category really is what I would call
So the deeper healing modalities of breathwork. So these are things like holotropic breathing, rebirthing breathwork, conscious connected breathing, which are versions of similar things usually done either one to one or in group settings where, for example, I do a lot of empathic breathing.
in-person work in groups at the moment where you've got anywhere between 10 and 100 people in a group together doing a certain style of breathwork with music, with a really nice environment. And what that
um, experiences like is more of, I suppose, like almost like a ceremony. So it's about, um, working into a slightly altered state of consciousness that in some cases can mimic a psychedelic or plant medicine experience. And in those experiences, people have very, um,
emotional releases. So a lot of tears, laughter, people can work with kind of their subconscious mind, unprocessed emotional energy that they might be holding in their body, in some cases, trauma, and really, it can be a very powerful and transformative experience was, which is actually that's kind of how I first came into breathwork was through those deeper modalities. So yeah, kind of as we touched on right at the start, like,
Breathwork means a lot of different things and takes a lot of different forms. But those three sort of from the everyday, like how are you breathing right now, through to I'm feeling a bit stressed, how can I shift my breath and change my breath to help myself, all the way through to those slightly deeper, longer, more powerful experiences. So yeah, it's a pretty broad spectrum of things that you might call breathwork. Another thing that this, what you're talking about reminded me of is
I don't remember who told me this, but someone was like, your breath is everything. So if you're ever in pain, your body, if you breathe, like when you're stretching like a lot at the gym and you're stretching and that stretch really hurts.
If you breathe through the stretch and you take long, deep breaths, your body will just get used to the stretch and it won't. I don't know. I think it's like kicking into fight or flight. But since you're breathing very deeply, your body stops doing that. Do you have any comments on that? Am I right? Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's more or less. And this is where I think quite a lot of, you know, breathwork has been around for decades.
and thousands of years, right? Like, especially in Eastern traditions. And we do, you see different people from, you know, yoga backgrounds, dance backgrounds, sports backgrounds, all have this, they know that the breath is up to something, but there's not kind of that full understanding, but that is more or less spot on. So,
Coming back, I suppose, to those simple breathing exercises that work with the nervous system, the breath is part of something called our autonomic nervous system. It's the part of our nervous system that governs all of the body's automatic functions. Breath, heart rate, digestion, all the things we don't have to think about. The breath is the only part of that system that we can consciously choose to change and control. Through the breath, you actually have
a direct line, like a direct key into that nervous system to control where you are within it. And there's broadly speaking, two branches to that nervous system. So the fight flight, which you've mentioned, and then you've got the rest and digest. So the sympathetic branch, which is the fight flight, and then the parasympathetic branch, which is the rest and digest. And a lot of, you know, take that example of stretching.
essentially, yeah, as you alluded to, like you're putting your body into a state of stress through stretching. And so you're moving into that fight flight response. But if you can use your breath to actually calm your nervous system, calm the body, calm the mind, then you are able to tolerate
you know, that higher level of stress because you're telling your body that it's safe in what is a stressful situation for it. So yeah, that's, you know, probably one of the most foundational and fundamental things to understand about the breath is just the role that it plays within that stress response and that stress system is you can actually manage how intensely you feel that level of stress, which is really, you know, it can be really empowering when it comes to things like anxiety and mental stress and mental resilience.
I have struggled with anxiety for a lot of time in my life, and I'm sure someone listening here has struggled too. So do you have any advice for someone who is completely unfamiliar with breathwork? How can they begin to implement breathwork practices to help alleviate their anxiety?
there's a lot of anxiety out there at the moment. And, you know, part of well, most of my journey into doing this work was through my own anxiety. So I spent about 10 years from the age of 15 to 25. severely anxious. And by the time I was 23, I was having
pretty regular panic attacks. And by the time I hit sort of 24, 25, I was having near daily panic attacks and breath work was a huge part, probably the biggest part of my movement out of that severe anxiety. Um, so yeah, this, this stuff really does work. And I suppose the, the first tip that I would want people to start thinking about is some of that functional breathing stuff. So like, how are you breathing right now? Because, um,
Most people, whether you're kind of conscious of this or not, will be familiar with the fact that when you are anxious, you'll start breathing into your chest more shallow, more fast. And what you're doing by breathing that way is actually causing more stress and causing more anxiety. So one of the most common dysfunctional breathing patterns that I see in people is this short, sharp, fast chest breath. And so even when you are
sitting on the sofa watching TV, you could be triggering a stress response in your body and anxiety in your body just by how you're breathing. So step one is basically just gaining a deeper awareness and understanding of your breath so that when you are sitting still and you're feeling anxious, when there's not really anything to feel anxious about, which is normal when it comes to anxiety, right?
You can check in with your breath and say, okay, I want to breathe more slowly. I want to breathe in and out of my nose. I want to breathe with my diaphragm down into the belly. And all of those things, sort of slower, deeper breathing in and out of the nose, naturally starts to shift our body into that relaxation response. So it pulls us out of that immediate stress response. So that's kind of point one. And then the second part of this really is
I suppose, kind of practical exercises that people can use when they really do feel pretty anxious. And the one that I tend to suggest to people with pretty intense, severe anxiety is something called ratio breathing. So this is really simple.
breathing in and out of the nose down into the belly again with the diaphragm you just start off breathing in for two seconds and out for two seconds and you stay with that until your breath starts to relax and your body starts to relax then you move up to three seconds in three seconds out four seconds in four seconds out and you just gradually take your time to slow the breath down because there's a bit of a you know with social media tiktok instagram everything else
There's a temptation and something I see a lot of for people to be like, well, just breathe in for six seconds and breathe out for six seconds. It's great advice because you do want to slow your breathing down. But for someone who is really anxious and someone who has panic attacks, the idea of breathing in and out for six seconds is just crazy.
Not possible. You can't get there straight away because your breath will be really quick. So gradually moving yourself from two seconds to three seconds to four seconds and so on is a really nice way to gradually take yourself out of that. And then the second exercise that I would suggest to people is something called extended exhale breathing.
So as the name suggests, super simple. You just want to make your exhale longer than your inhale. So for example, breathe in for three and out for six, in for four, out for eight. And essentially the reason we do that is our inhale is responsible for the stress response and our exhale is responsible for the relaxation response. So if you make the exhale longer, then you're going to activate the
relaxation response more. So you're just going to help bring yourself out of that anxiety. So it could be a really nice slow inhale through the nose and then blow the exhale as slowly as you can out of the mouth. And if you do that for a few rounds, you should start to feel that stress and anxiety start to subside. So
those are typically like the two that I suggest to people first and foremost, especially around sleep and anxiety and things like that. I know there's one more breath work practice. I don't know what it's called. So I'm just going to show you. I know listeners can't see this, but it's like you inhale,
And then you hold the breath in and then you let go from the other nostril. I don't know what that's called, but if you know what it is, do you want to explain it? Yeah, so that's actually, that's a pranayama technique, which is just a yogic breathing technique.
And I cannot, I want to say it's called Nadi Shodhana is the Sanskrit name, but we just call it in the West alternate nostril breathing. So as you demoed for people who can't see, you just close one nostril, breathe in through that nostril. You then close the other nostril and breathe out of the other nostril, if that makes sense.
There's not a huge amount of kind of clear-cut science as to why the alternating nostril thing helps, but my belief around it is really it's just, again, about slowing the breath down. Pretty much all of...
especially again, for people with anxiety, people who live quite a fast pace of life, it's just a way to force us to slow down. If we can slow our breath, we slow the body down. If we slow the body down, we slow the mind down. So it's just this link of like, how can we get people to actively slow down? And I think breath is a great entry point, a great way into, you know,
mindfulness into proper rest for people who do struggle with things like meditation. So breath is a really nice way in because you're actively doing something. So you're, you know, thinking about how you're breathing, you're in control of that, you can change that. And
It's an active process in that by doing the breathing, you are calming the body down. So you're not sort of sat there waiting for yourself to become a little bit more calm. You're actively doing something about it. So yeah, I think it all comes back to this idea of trying to get people to slow down a little bit when it comes to these more general kind of day-to-day breathing techniques. You also mentioned that breathwork can be used as a tool for expanding your consciousness.
and things like that. And I've heard of the term fire breath maybe and breath work like that, that mimics like a psychedelic experience. And so I was wondering if you can elaborate on that. It sounds really interesting. Yeah, it's something that I'd recommend, you know, if people are curious about breathing
you know altered states of consciousness it's definitely you know breath work is a really nice entry level into it and it can be incredibly transformative and powerful so um the technique that i work with um myself within this this realm of breath work is something called conscious connected breathing um so it's a circular continuous breath so you're breathing into the belly and then you're just sort of breathing like this for quite a long time you're breathing like this so for
you just breathe like that for you know my sessions are anywhere between 30 and 75 to 90 minutes so it's quite a long time but it as you go deeper into that experience the experience can be very emotional so you can get a lot of emotion starting to come up for people it can be a little bit trippy and sort of mimic a psychedelic type experience and the reason for that
It's a really interesting discussion because the science for this part of, of breath work is not quite at the level of the science for the, for the other, the other realms. And I think obviously because we are working with the subconscious minds and altered states of consciousness and sort of expanded consciousness, I think it's understandable that science isn't quite there yet, but it's starting to emerge and people are doing more and more studies. Um,
There's a couple of different schools of thought. So one of the sort of clearest ones at the moment is when we breathe in this way, we're putting our bodies into a state of something called respiratory alkalosis, which essentially means we're making our blood more alkaline. When we do that,
we actually reduce the amount of oxygen being delivered to the brain, which can give a feeling of being lightheaded. Some people also think that it can mirror a near-death experience. So that's why some people think that you get memories and past experiences coming up.
Others also believe that it could reduce the activity in certain parts of the brain, such as something called the default mode network, which is like the ego mind or the monkey mind. And when that happens, you allow other parts of the brain to become more active. So that's kind of one school of thought. And then there's another kind of school of thought on that as well, which is around the
Essentially, when we experience an adverse event or trauma,
our body goes into a state of stress. And if we cut ourselves off from the full expression, if we don't allow ourselves to feel that if we repress the emotion or we suppress it for whatever reason, um, that emotional charge can get stored in the body. Um, there's an amazing book called the body keeps the score, which is all about the role of the body in trauma. Um, and,
And if we don't allow ourselves to process that properly, then that can show up as physical pain, mental and emotional pain. And so it's also believed that this style of breath work helps us clear out some of that. Aubrey Marcus calls it like gunk that builds up in your nervous system. So it's a bit of almost like a...
an energetic cleanse for your nervous system so you're sort of scrubbing off all of this built up um gunk from your nervous system so um it's a pretty uh as i say like emerging field from that perspective in terms of what exactly is happening but in terms of the experience itself
as I said, it can be amazingly healing. It's, yeah, it's a really powerful tool. And I think, you know, when I start talking about it, people are like,
I can really do that through breathing. And there's a little bit of skepticism, which I completely understand. But once people have tried it, they tend to go, okay, yeah, I get this now. That was pretty out there and pretty wild as an experience. But yeah, it can be really, really powerful. You mentioned how the body stores trauma and different emotions. And so I was wondering how breathwork helps us cultivate this mind-body, even soul connection.
The first thing around this, I suppose, comes back to the breath's role within the nervous system. So the nervous, we essentially, the way we experience the world is defined by our nervous system. So if you have a
an over-activated nervous system, then you might find yourself as a more anxious person. And so the breath, given our ability to consciously work with the breath, it really is this essential connection between the mind and the body. So if you think about our mental state,
impacts our nervous system, our nervous system impacts our breath, our breath impacts our nervous system, our nervous system impacts our mind. So it's like this cycle of how the nervous system, the breath and the mind all interact. In terms of going beyond that and a little bit deeper,
I really think, you know, breath is this essential life force that we have, you know, the first thing we do when we're born, it's the last thing we do before we die. So it's this essential bodily function that also seems to have, you know, the key to a lot of what's going on beneath the surface. And so if we can use the breath to not only
you know, sustain life, but also shift our state, but also drop into altered states of consciousness and go a little bit beyond ordinary waking state consciousness, then you have the ability to really tap into the subconscious and what the body might be holding on to. So there's this great quote, which I really resonate with, which is really simple. It says, you have to go there to know that. And essentially,
what that's all about is through these altered states of consciousness that are possible with the breath, you're able to tap into insights, downloads, um, revelations that you may not be able to glean from ordinary waking state consciousness. So you have to go to those places to then come back to your ordinary waking state consciousness with a newfound understanding of yourself, of the world around you and everything else. So, um,
if you have the right integration processes and ways to make sense of it all, that can have a massive bearing on how your life then plays out. Do you ever work with clients and help them use breathwork to clear their subconscious limiting beliefs and trauma to enter this higher timeline for them where they're able to manifest their biggest goals? Yeah, I think I'm a firm believer in manifestation. I think...
the way in which I work with people, usually more on a one-to-one level, but also on a group setting as well, is really using these deeper modalities of breathwork and getting people into this state where their mind is less active. So that kind of narrative, that everyday narrative, that little internal inner voice that's always there, you know, those limiting beliefs, all of that narrative that is there that holds us back starts to step a
aside for a period of time. And so we can use visualizations, we can use certain prompts and questions when people are in that kind of state to really get answers on key questions about, you know, future plans, goals, whatever it might be. Um,
So that I suppose is where the two interlink is, you know, putting people or getting people to put themselves through the breath in this state where they are more open, where they're more in tune with themselves with essence, and
as a result of that, they are able to get deeper insights into what is actually important and what does matter to them and what they do want to get out of their lives. And as a result of that,
therefore being able to bring those things I guess more clearly into their consciousness and more clearly into alignment with what they're doing um and set them on that right path so yeah I think that's that's probably where um my work with breathwork starts to I suppose move into the realms of manifestation and help people with that and help people with those limiting beliefs that might be blocking them from from getting what they want to totally yeah
For you personally, how has Breathwork transformed your own life? Yeah, so I think in a few different ways. So obviously, I'm fortunate and grateful to have had some amazing experiences. I think it's become just a staple tool that allows me to
manage my emotional response in any given situation. So I was saying this to someone last night in a session that I ran, I view the word responsibility as the ability to respond. And through breath, I have the ability to respond to a trigger to an event in whatever way I choose, because there's, you know,
you know an external trigger that pushes me into a certain reaction but if i can tap into my breath and tune into my breath i can say okay that's making me feel x allow yourself to feel it but then also know that you have this tool at your disposal to shift how you're feeling so the intensity of that reaction isn't so strong so it's really kind of fundamental tool to to have
by your side to come back to any given point and then i suppose beyond that it's just allowed me to um i suppose make it my work and and that wasn't something when i initially found breathwork that i was expecting to do so being able to just share it with other people being able to um you know travel around the world and really share it with people and create spaces and containers and and
experiences for people that allow them to go to these places that we've talked about and really understand more about themselves. And on a personal level, kind of a practice level for me personally, it's just always something I can come back to whenever I need to sort of have that level of emotional cleansing, clearing if I feel blocked, if I feel particularly stressed, if my body feels a little bit overwhelmed, or if I feel burnt out, whatever it might be,
Doing a regular breathwork practice just allows me to
really manage that and move through that as quickly as possible. So yeah, it's just it's something that I always come back to. It's something that I am very grateful and kind of fortunate to have by my side. This conversation is making you want to do breathwork. I think after this episode, I'm going to go breathe for like 20 minutes. But another thing you were talking about how you work with a lot of people all around the world. And this is just a random fact that
that reminded me how there was this study. I think it was in New York that a bunch of people meditated that day
And the crime rate in the city went down by like 33%. The weather was good. So many, like so many changes. And I don't know, that just reminded me how people like you and your work raise the collective frequency. So I guess my last question for you would be for someone who wants to start implementing breathwork into their life, what is one sentence or advice that you would give them?
One sentence. It's a line that I use quite a lot, which is your breath is speaking the language of your body. Learn to listen. So that really comes back to that awareness of your breath and actually learning
we need to stop taking it for granted and stop ignoring it because it's telling us so much about our mental state, our emotional state, our physical state. So the first port of call is to learn to listen to it, learn to understand your breath. And once you have that understanding, you then start to come into the realm of being able to change it and use it to shift your state, to change how you feel. So yeah, learning to listen to kind of that,
that essence, that breath that we all have, uh, understand what it means. And then beyond that, you know, there are so many different ways, you know, listening to people such as myself and, and kind of asking questions around how you can support yourself. But also I always encourage people to go away and, um,
just breathe in different ways, see how it affects them, you know, speed the breath up. What does that do to you? Slow it down. What does that do? Go and do a deeper, more intense session. What does that do for you? And so just getting really curious with it, exploring the possibilities and just having a bit of fun along the way as well. Cause you know, the group events that I love running,
are where people really can have these experiences, but also connect with each other. And I think that to what you were saying about sort of raising the collective, that's been really special to see since we've been able to do in-person events again is actually, yes, people are having an amazing individual experience, but they're also connecting with people on a different level than just, you know, a normal event.
Yes, I love it. Well, thank you so much for joining me. I had such a great conversation with you and I really hope that anyone listening learned a thing or two about breathwork and its powerful nature. And yeah, so thank you so much for joining me. Amazing. Thanks for having me. Beautiful souls. Thank you so much for joining me in today's episode. As always, feel free to DM me on Instagram if you have any topic suggestions for future episodes or if you would like to apply to be a guest on the show.
I hope you feel inspired to claim your power today. Bye. Yep, that's who you think it is. The Grimmest Mud. The Hello Kitty keychain. Barbie herself.
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