Pausing for Delight and Peace

Here are two of the simplest breathing practices - and among the most powerful:

(1) COHERENT (or “even”) Breathing
The simplest instructions in the world:

Breathe in and breathe out for the same length of time.
So if you inhale for a count of 2, exhale for 2 counts. Inhale 3, exhale 3, and so on.

(2) BOX BREATHING

Nearly the simplest instructions in the world:

Inhale, hold your breath, exhale, hold your breath - all for the same length of time.

So, inhale 3 counts, hold 3 counts, exhale 3 counts, hold 3 counts.

If you know abdominal breathing and ujayyi (or “ocean”) breathing, you now have 4 practices to play with (if you don’t know these, ask in the comments; they’re also VERY simple to learn):

Abdominal breathing
Ocean breathing
Even (Coherent) Breathing
Box Breathing

Are you overwhelmed and feel you’d love to start a meditation or mindfulness practice but don’t have time (or don’t have the mental bandwidth to learn)? Did you know that there are meditative traditions thousands of years old (including Christian and Buddhist traditions), that rarely focus on long meditations but instead - in order to integrate the effects into their lives - focus on “mini-meditations” such as the one I’m about to suggest:


I’m going to set an alarm on my phone for 4 PM, EST When it rings, I’ll do 2 rounds of abdominal breathing (that’s about 20 seconds), 2 rounds of abdominal breathing+ Ocean breathing, 2 rounds of even breathing (using abdominal and ocean breathing) then 2 rounds of box breathing.

That’s about 1 minute and 20 seconds.

I’m going to stop by here and share the what it was like to pause.

I’d love to hear from you if you want to try it - at 4 - or any time you like!

You may find you actually want to continue beyond 80 seconds; maybe after you breathe, you’ll stretch a bit, or dance, or sing, or contact a friend…. And if you still have work to do after that, you may be surprised how much easier it will be.

Try it - and please, share your experience.