Aikido is not an individual practice but you can practice at home. Breathing is a great place to start. It is helpful to see what we talk about when explaining meditational breathing but most instruction just shows a very relaxed person telling you to breathe deeply, expecting you to automatically find it easy and relaxing empty out all of your air and hold your breath without passing out.
I found it surprising that I couldn’t find any videos explaining how to extend your breathing without creating anxiety from the fear of asphyxiation. Most videos tell you to breath, pause, slow down, pause longer…. I found that breathing can be broken down into stages to “practice” breathing. Rhythmic breathing moves you from passive to active breathing; you focus on pace and balance in and out. Then to extend the length of breath and to “pause” adding a transition made the practice far more relaxing and much less hard work
4 thoughts on “Breathing Basics”
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Whenever I think of breathing and martial arts, I can’t help but think remember a scene in the karate kid (1 or 2) where Danny was hammering a nail in, Mr. Miyagi came over, taught him to focus on breathing, and suddenly the nails went in with a single hit. I was so excited about this new technique I had to try it, and I failed miserably. Then I found drywall and figured out his trick. Nonetheless, I realized the importance of breathing. As mundane as it sounds it is truly fundamental for any kind of physical action, and its an easy way to calm one’s mind in a hectic world. When I’m stressed, kokyu is a useful technique to bring me back to what’s important. Maybe its the simplicity or the increase in oxygen to the brain, but is definitively one of the most important practices I have learned in this course.
I think whether its aikido, another martial arts or really any activity breathing is often over looked. I know in class at the end we normally practice breathing and it seems helpful and I will admit there is one part of my back I always have trouble relaxing during that exercise. But I digress, I like that in that end of class exercise it breaks this rhythmic breathing down in a different way than is what normally is heard. I know with a lot of exercise classes the teachers tell you to make sure to breath and we always life and people don’t realize how important it is to the movement you are doing. I had a friend in MMA and he was telling me this was one of those things he had to work at and how you could always pick out the new guys or ones who hadn’t been trained as well because they would get winded. So this trick and idea to visualize breathing is definitely not something a lot of people even mention and is definitely a great way to go about it. This calm breathing is definitely something that makes at least me feel like I have more energy and even more calm. This passive to active breathing is definitely something that could be taken from aikido and used in future sports, exercise or martial arts to help improve performance.
I found the second video in this section extremely interesting, particularly because it’s extremely similar to another breathing exercise I found out about recently. The base idea is pretty much the same, but the other breathing exercise is called 4-7-8 breathing. Rather than controlling the pace of your inhales, pauses, and exhales (like in the video above) at a rate that you determine yourself; you instead follow fixed amounts of time for each portion of the breathing exercise. First you breathe in through your nose for four seconds, then hold your breath for seven seconds, and finally you breathe out through your mouth for eight seconds and repeat. The cool thing about this is that it literally forces your heart to beat slower and thus helps you relax. What I think is really interesting is how well this exercise works in conjunction with the ones in the videos. I tried combining the timing of the 4-7-8 exercise with the body movements and it felt almost like a sedative. After only a few rounds I could physically feel my body loosen and relax. I think it’s amazing how simply breathing and doing some movements could nearly instantly put one’s body in a state much more aligned with the philosophies of aikido.
I always found it interesting how breathing techniques can put you at ease. It helps you to focus on one’s self and your inner being putting all distractions away to meditate on what’s important. The way you breathe and the techniques play a major part in whatever it is you’re trying to accomplish. Breathing in your nose than breathing in your mouth first it all makes a difference and you can very much so tell especially when breathing with Aikido. Extending your breathing and breathing slowing all play a major role in Aikido and concentrating on the importance of every little thing.