What's Up, Big Bear?

Includes Taylor Swift Reference!

Next Week: God Loves All!

There is another comic below, should you decide to skip the written stuff.

Completely Unrelated, Chapter 012:

Here’s another line from the poem I wrote for student worker Z, based on questions she asked and our conversations that ensued:

Breathe Deep. Always.

This may seem like last week's Meditate. A lot.

But it's not.

And had I written this last week, I would have said something completely different. But since then, your friends and mine at The Washington Post raught me something new that I find amazing. And so, so simple. Consider the article subhead:

Cyclic sighing appears to be particularly effective among differnt breathing exercies and better than mindfulness meditation, a study says.

The trick is to slowly inhale through the nose to, you know, expand the lungs. Then fully exhale the breath through the mouth.

For five minutes.

The study looked at two other forms of breathwork, but cyclic breathing seemed to be the most effective -- and generated greater positive mood improvements even when compared with the mindful meditation group.

Two more things

Probably good to know, for these purposes, that every fall/winter I slip into a months' long gloom. And each year leans toward being worse than the previous year.

Second, I did the cylic breathing on the drive to campus the very next morning, whilst being especially attentive to traffic. Just five minutes of the exercise. And I had the most positive feeling day I've had in quite some time. This was true the next day and the day after that. I also found I felt motivated again to get things done. So, as a side bonus, my wife if happier too.

Now, there are always other variables in life, and a study of one -- me -- is certainly not conclusive. But I recommend you give cylic breathing a try. Also box breathing. And cylic hyperventilation.

Oh, and the article noted this: "The positive effects of breathwork took time to kick in: The more days the participants spent doing their breathing exercises, the better they felt each successive day."

I wish you well.

Peace,

Brian

From The (really recent) Archive

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