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breathing Much emphasis is placed on correct breathing and breathing exercises to enhance the process due to its influence on performance. However, breathing must not be viewed as a separate function but as a process involving the whole person. Tension and performance anxiety affect breathing as tight muscles restrict intake and changes at a hormonal level compromise the delivery and absorption of oxygen. Breathing exercises interfere with a process that should be determined by the physical demands placed on the body. To concentrate on breathing during exercise or activity is to put the cart before the horse. We just do not have the ability to estimate the exact oxygen requirement of the body to the point where we can consciously regulate our breathing to meet it! The
term 'taking a deep breath' is misleading. What do we do when we think
we need to take a deep breath? I, in common with many, would puff out my
chest and suck in the air through my nostrils. Firstly, both of these
actions do nothing to help the air flow in! Closing down the nostrils
restricts the intake whilst puffing out the chest pushes the ribcage
into a position that does not allow for natural expansion. Secondly, why
did I think I needed to take a 'deep breath'? If I was not breathing
properly it was probably due to my position, ie, slumped forward
dropping weight onto the ribcage or too rigid preventing the ribs from
moving. I do not need to take a 'deep breath', I just need to remove the
impeding factors of inappropriate muscular effort to allow my body to
resume its natural balanced (poised) state. Once achieved the external
air will flow in through the nostrils to fill the pockets of lower
pressure in the lungs. Early
in his career Alexander was known as the ‘Breathing Man’ due to his work with
performing artists (he stressed doing nothing directly to promote
efficient breathing). The structure and how we use it is the most
influential aspect of breathing. Where poor breathing habits already
exist, exercises or machines that force air into the lungs tend only to
consolidate the habit. Spirometric tests may register changes in lung
capacity but does this improve efficiency of the respiratory system? The
main factor in performance is not lung capacity but the ability of the
ribcage and diaphragm to expand and contract to create the space, a
function easily impeded by unnecessary muscular action.
We breathe perfectly well as infants and whilst asleep so why try to improve a natural function? Coaches of breathing exercises instruct the pupil ‘to control the diaphragm’, yet as this muscle has no proprioceptive nerves (nerves that feed back sensation) we cannot know what it is doing. In business the popular mantra states ‘you cannot manage what you cannot measure’. If we have no direct sensation of the diaphragm we do not know what effect our attempts at controlling it are actually doing to the muscle. So perhaps the best way to improve our capacity to breath is to remain poised and leave all the mechanics of the act to the systems that know best.
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