Patrick McKeown is an international breathing expert and author based in Galway, Ireland. Since 2002, he has worked with thousands of clients, including elite military special forces (SWAT) Olympic coaches and athletes.

Atomic Focus (2021) and The Breathing Cure (2021) are Patrick’s latest books.

Listen to this episode of The MOVEMENT Movement with Patrick McKeown about the proper way to breathe.

Here are some of the beneficial topics covered on this week’s show:

– How it’s very common for people to have poor breathing habits.

– Why mouth breathing and upper chest breathing affects your focus.

– How breathing correctly provides stabilization for the spine.

– How poor breathing patterns lead to a myriad of different health issues.

– Why breathing correctly can help people move more effectively.

 

Connect with Patrick:

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@oxygenadvantage

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linkedin.com/in/mckeownpatrick

Links Mentioned:
oxygenadvantage.com

Connect with Steven:

Website

Xeroshoes.com

Jointhemovementmovement.com

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@XeroShoes

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Episode Transcript

Steven Sashen:

When you’re stressed you probably know what to do. Just take a big belly breath. What if that is the worst thing you can do? Oh, we’re going to find on today’s episode of the Movement Movement the Podcast from people who want to know the truth about what it takes to have a happy, healthy, strong body. Usually starting feet first because that’s what I do over here at Xero Shoes. But now we’re going to start with something even more essential, and we’ll get into that in just a sec. It has to do with breathing. It shouldn’t be a secret after the intro that I just gave.

 

Anyway, here’s where we break down, like I said, the propaganda, the mythology, sometimes the outright lies you’ve been told about what it takes to walk or run or hike or play or do yoga or crossfit or, in this case, breathe. Anything that you think that you should do or want to do or enjoy doing, how to do it enjoyably, efficiently, effectively. Did I mention enjoyably? Trick question. I know I did. Because look, if you’re not having fun, do something different so you are. You won’t keep it up if you’re not having a good time.

 

So, as I said, I’m Steven Sashen, I’m CEO of Xero Shoes, host of the Movement Movement Podcast. And we call it that because we here at Xero Shoes are creating a movement that involves you, easy, free, I’ll tell you more in a second, about natural movement. Teaching your body or remembering actually how to let your body do what it’s naturally designed to do. We want to make natural movement the obvious, better, healthy choice the way we currently think of natural food. And the movement part that involves you, simple. If you find anything here interesting, spread the word, share, like, review, et cetera.

 

Go to www.jointhemovementmovement.com. Nothing you have to do to join, it’s just the domain that I found. And you’ll find all the previous episodes and all the ways you can interact with us, all the places you can find us. In short, you know the drill, if you want to be part of the tribe, please subscribe.

 

All right, let’s jump in. Patrick, it is a pleasure having you here. Do me a favor, tell human beings who you are and what you do.

Patrick McKeown:

Yeah, my name is Patrick McKeown and I teach people how to breathe.

Steven Sashen:

I adore that you did that and I know it’s not the first time you’ve said that. One of the things for Xero Shoes, people think, oh, I know how to walk, I know how to run. But there is effective ways of walking and running. And the idea of breathing, the idea that any of us might be breathing wrong or there’s other ways to breathe is going to make people think that’s a little nutty.

 

And actually before you even dive in, wait, I’ve pulled something up. I have to see if I can find it. I did something very entertaining before we jumped on this and I thought I kept it on … Oh yeah, I did a search for you on Google just for the fun of it to see what comes up, and I love this line. If you search for your name it says, “World renowned author and breathing practitioner.” I think the idea of breathing practitioner is one of the funniest phrases I’ve ever heard because we all practice breathing. In fact, we all think we do it. But you have a whole different take on this, and I’m so excited to be presenting this to the people listening and watching. So, can you say a little more about what you meant when you say you teach people how to breathe?

Patrick McKeown:

Yeah. It’s very common for people to develop poor breathing habits and I’ll give you my example. I was a child growing up with a stuffy nose. I had asthma. And I never realized that because of my stuffy nose I had sleep disorder breathing and I had obstructive sleep apnea, and it really dramatically affected my concentration. Because of my stuffy nose I was mouth breathing and upper chest breathing, and this will affect your focus and it’ll affect your agitation of the mind. But also there’s even a connection between movement and breathing. And we have to think of the diaphragm muscles not just for respiration but it provides stabilization for the spine. 50% of people with lower back pain have poor breathing patterns. 75% of people with anxiety and panic disorder have poor breathing patterns. 30% of people with asthma and likely 20% of the general population.

 

But just while I’m on the topic, I remember being at a medical conference in Italy about five years ago, and we were watching a video clip of a patient walking down a hospital corridor. And the patient had a poor gait, mobility was not very good. The doctor stopped the patient in the corridor, asked the patient to get the tongue resting in the roof of the mouth, breathing through the nose. The camera kept running and when the patient started walking again their mobility improved instantly.

 

So, we often fail to think that, yes, breathing could be under par and breathing could be holding us back. And for me it was holding me back and it changed my life when I came across it 25 years ago and I’ve written nine books on how to breathe. There must be something in it. And the last book was 190,000 words, it’s 500 pages. But that just shows you the application of it across sports, psychology, focus, movement, respiration, dental health, there are so many. I would say that all of the major disciplines of health are influenced by how you breathe.

Steven Sashen:

Well, one thing that I think about is there if you go into breathing things, and I’ve done a lot of things with breathing and breath work as well actually in the last … Holy smokes, 40 years. I’m an older guy than I like to think sometimes. And you’ll find so many different people teaching so many different things, but the most common thing that people are teaching is you want to take deep belly breaths. That’s the foundation of a lot of what people are discovering. And I have a sneaking suspicion that you have a thought about that.

Patrick McKeown:

Yes. Because if you just focus on the biomechanics you can screw up the biochemistry. And what I mean by that have we ever seen a horse out in the field taking deep belly breaths? Have we ever seen a cow doing it? Have we ever seen any animal do it? No animals’ heads are full of stupid ideas like that, and that’s being honest with you. Where did this big deep breath get out of?

 

The problem with this is that if the individual takes lungs full of air and breathes too much air into their body, which will happen if you’re taking these full big breaths like that, it blows off too much carbon dioxide from the blood through the lungs. Carbon dioxide is not just a wasted gas. Your blood vessels constrict when carbon dioxide in the blood goes lower. So, people with cold hands and cold feet are typically breathing a little bit faster and harder than they should be.

 

Now, it is correct to say breathe with a lateral expansion and contraction of the lower ribs. We certainly want to have optimum movement of the diaphragm. But the problem is when people focus in on the diaphragm breathing muscle they disrupt the biochemistry. And you can’t just disrupt the biochemistry. You have to have a balance between the biochemistry, the biomechanics and resonance frequency breathing. And it is about that balance and one is intersecting into the other.

 

And, oh, it’s just, yeah, one of those things. Look at nature. Look at how animals breathe. They will tell us a lot more than what humans have.

Steven Sashen:

The interesting thing about the biochemistry, I have a vivid memory when I was in college, I must have been, let’s say, 20, 21 years old, and to make a long story medium short I found myself essentially hyperventilating. Not intentionally but, again long story, it was happening. And what was very interesting, it was the first time I had this experience, my fingers started doing this, my face started to do this and I couldn’t … I was puckered up for people who are listening. My fingers all kind of bunched together.

Patrick McKeown:

Technique.

Steven Sashen:

My face puckered up. I had no idea what was happening then. My girlfriend was with me at the time, and she was freaked out because I couldn’t really talk or move properly. And then only years later when I was doing some work with a very interesting psychologist and was doing something that was a deliberate hyperventilated breathing. It wasn’t holotropic breathing which is from Stan Grof, but a variation on that idea. And you can do some wacky things with your biochemistry and neurology when you do that kind of breathing.

 

And we’re not clearly talking about that, but it’s interesting to your point I don’t remember anyone ever talking about the biochemistry of it, just talking about maybe the psychological or the perceptual effects that can happen when you do certain breathing things. Either hyperventilating or hypoventilating, trying to hold your breath or do various things like that. But that’s not where we’re ultimately going, but it’s an interesting thing how much you can do in both directions by altering your breath.

Patrick McKeown:

Yeah. If you want to stress your body and mind, you can do it by two ways. You can hyperventilate. Take in full big breaths, 20, 30 full big breaths in and out of your mouth or your nose. It’s a stressor. And the second way to stress the body and mind in terms of breathing would be to be breathe in, breathe out, and pinch your nose and hold your breath for as long as you can. Or breathe in and hold your breath. So, if you’re doing a long breath hold it’s a stressor. And if you hyperventilate it’s a stressor. And both by doing it short-term can cause bodily adaptations.

 

Then we have to think about, well, what about people who are in that sympathetic stress response all the time? How can we help alleviate by activating and by dampening the stress response, activating the relaxation response? And we can also do that by the breath. And by carrying breathing techniques into wherever we delight, how many people wake up with a dry mouth in the morning? They’re more likely to be snoring. They’re more likely to have obstructive sleep apnea, insomnia, their dental health is impacted.

 

Say, for instance, you’re in the corporate world. Let’s say your shop assistants or your shoes are sold in a shop. An angry customer comes in. The customer representative in the shop is getting stressed, and the normal reaction to stress is to hyperventilate. But how about if that customer representative knew immediately how to change their state by slowing down the exhalation? And by slowing down the exhalation, within 90 seconds you can tell the brain that everything is okay. So, the one thing about the breath is that if we improve our everyday breathing patterns it can improve all of those traits that we use in society. Our ability to be focused, our ability to be concentrated, our ability to have a decent attention span. But also it helps with your work, creativity, intuition, problem solving.

 

And I as a kid going to school and university, as I said earlier on, I had undiagnosed sleep apnea, my concentration was terrible. And yet society will grade us based on our academic achievement. Nobody is teaching us how to concentrate and mindfulness is not going to do it for the very person who needs it the most. 75% of the individuals with anxiety and panic disorder have dysfunctional breathing patterns. Their respiratory physiology is off. They’re in that increased sympathetic drive and mindfulness does not address that.

 

So, really we have to be looking at the hierarchy of needs here. Sleep, functional breathing and to know when to change states. Steven, you will know what that … Some people will practice a hyperventilation technique and they will believe that this technique is flooding their body with oxygen, increasing oxygen delivery to tissues, whereas the opposite is having effect. So, I think we need to have an understanding that, yes, there are different breathing techniques for different things and to know when do you want to use one and when do you need to use the other one.

Steven Sashen:

So, I want to jump in to some of the techniques and some of the ways that people can improve their breathing. But before we do that I want to start with the simple thing. How is it that people end up adopting dysfunctional breathing patterns to begin with?

Patrick McKeown:

Oh, it could be any amount of reasons. I think genetically there’s definitely something there. I see it has a tendency that it runs in families. Maybe it’s a learned behavior. The children learn from parents. Maybe it is genetic. Perfectionist tendencies, people with perfectionist tendencies are very prone to hyperventilation. And the reason being is because they set high demands of themselves.

 

Hormonal changes in females can contribute to hyperventilation, and that’s known for 106 years, since 1915, and yet it doesn’t get discussed. People with a genetic predisposition towards anxiety or panic disorder, people who have been through trauma in their life.

 

The first description of dysfunctional breathing and hyperventilation syndrome came from the American Civil War, and it was recognized by a doctor called Da Costa, and he noticed that the soldiers coming back from the front line they exhibit symptoms of restlessness, fatigue, and it took them a long time to come back into recovery.

 

Now, we as human beings, we’re not able for long-term stresses. We’ve never had to cope with long-term stresses throughout evolution, and we have been evolving for 10 million years. And all of the sudden in the last very short period of time there’s long-terms stresses in terms of mortgages and business and competition and kids getting into school and university students, and it’s crazy stuff. It’s crazy.

 

And I have to say that without the breath it has been a tremendous tool for me personally. It’s just one of those things that there is a lot of pressure out there on people. And one way that you’re going to have to counter that is by bringing your attention inwards and onto the breath. And the platforms, technology has increased all of this as well. Even though we all use it because we use it to get our own information out there, but I would say to people be very selective about the amount of time that you’re spending because we have to think that if, for example, we have faster breathing and harder breathing, if the breath itself is agitated the mind is agitated.

Steven Sashen:

It occurs to me that we’ve used the word hyperventilation in two different contexts. One is for deliberate increasing of the breath in and out, and then you’re using it it sounds like, what you were just saying, in a slightly different context. Can you say more about that?

Patrick McKeown:

Yes. So, you can have chronic hyperventilation. So, a while ago I was working with an elite athlete and I was looking at his breathing. And I could see his breathing during rest and he’s professional, top of the top. His breathing during rest is faster breathing and upper chest breathing. Now, hyperventilation means that you have a habit of breathing more air than what you need. And that can happen as a result of breathing a little bit too fast and/or a little bit too deeply. That the volume of air that you take into your lungs in one minute is greater than your metabolic needs. It’s a habit.

 

And that would be chronic hyperventilation. It’s not that the person is having an acute hyperventilation attack, but any time I look at people with anxiety and panic disorder very often we will see that their breathing is faster and upper chest. It’s not just a trauma situation has changed breathing patterns. Of course it can, but a faster and harder breathing pattern feeds back into the trauma.

 

So, there is chronic hyperventilation which is bad, bad, bad, bad. Not good. And then people will do short-term hyperventilation to get a stress response.

Steven Sashen:

You made me think of two things. One, there’s a famous late psychologist, Fritz Perls, he had a line that anxiety is just excitement without the breathing.

Patrick McKeown:

Anxiety is excitement without over-breathing?

Steven Sashen:

Anxiety is excitement without the breathing.

Patrick McKeown:

Without the breathing.

Steven Sashen:

That there’s some tension to it and there’s not breathing, but you’re also describing something that’s the flip side of that where anxiety is excessive breathing, if you will. Like we just said, hyperventilation.

Patrick McKeown:

Yes, yeah both ways.

Steven Sashen:

I can see how both of those could do it because like we said before too much or too little can create that stress response. So, I’m imagining, now that we’ve redefined, if you will, hyperventilation, people may be thinking, okay, how do I know if I’m doing this? And you identified two things. Breathing in the upper chest, and I imagine the easiest way to tell if you’re doing that is if you’re … It’s always hard as soon as you pay attention to something with breath you’re going to alter it a little bit. But if you can put one hand on your chest, one hand on your belly and keep it there until you realize you weren’t paying attention and then notice to see what’s happening.

 

But the breathing speed, I imagine people might be thinking, well, am I breathing too fast or not? How might they be able to self-diagnose whether they’re hyperventilating based on this idea of doing more breathing than is necessary to sustain metabolic activity?

Patrick McKeown:

There’s a breath hold time you can use, and the breath hold time has been used for about 50 years and it’s undergone as well some research in the last two to three years. And basically the individual is sitting down, an adult sitting down for maybe five, ten minutes with normal breathing that’s settled. And they need to get a timer. They take a normal breath in and out through their nose and pinch their nose and stop breathing. And they time it in seconds how long does it take until they feel the first definite desire to breathe or the first involuntary movement of the breathing muscles. And then to let go and have normal breathing. So, it’s the length of your comfortable breath hold time.

 

People who are in chronic hyperventilation have a lower breath hold time. People who are breathing upper chest and faster and harder have a lower breath hold time. And we do see it, of course, people who are highly stressed, people with panic disorder typically, not all, people with anxiety typically, but not all. So, your breath hold time can give you fairly good feedback of how well do you breathe.

Steven Sashen:

So, again, the obvious question people may be asking.

Patrick McKeown:

How much is it? 25 seconds. It has to be above 25 seconds.

Steven Sashen:

Wow.

Patrick McKeown:

And it’s only your comfortable breath hold time. And a paper by a professor of physical therapy from Evansville University, and I must check what state it’s in, but his name is Professor Kyle Kiesel. He looked at 51, he studied 51 subjects, and he concluded that if your breath hold time is above 25 seconds there is an 89% chance that dysfunctional breathing is not present.

Steven Sashen:

And so just to be really clear, you said the comfortable breath hold time. There’s that you start … Because I’ve been not surprisingly doing this as you were describing it and I got to 15. So, there’s a point where it starts to get progressively more discomforting or progressively less comfortable. Obviously if you start breathing in the moment it becomes mildly uncomfortable that’s going to shorten it dramatically. But you don’t want to be straining to keep your breath out. So, it seems like there’s a bit of a balance in that comfortable breath hold time just letting a breath out, holding your nose. I wasn’t pinching my nose. You could see that I was definitely breathing. Take that breath out comfortably and then wait, wait, wait. Can you give any more subtle guidance about what that point is where you’re going to say, “Stop,” and look at your stopwatch and most likely be disappointed?

Patrick McKeown:

Yeah, your breath at the end should be normal.

Steven Sashen:

Oh, interesting.

Patrick McKeown:

So, in other words, the breath at the end should be no bigger than the breath at the start.

Steven Sashen:

Okay. That’s a really good barometer. That suggests that you’ll probably get it wrong a couple of times until you find … Okay. I just let it out. I’m waiting, waiting, waiting, and then I’m letting that next breath in and it doesn’t feel like you’re gasping for air or panicked about getting air. It’s just a normal breath.

Patrick McKeown:

Yes.

Steven Sashen:

Now, are you suggesting then that if people do some things that we will no doubt talk about in just a few moments and adopt a more functional rather than dysfunctional breathing pattern that just normally the breathing pattern will be in, out and then some significant pause before the next breath?

Patrick McKeown:

No. Well, yes and no. When the breath hold time increases it’s … The breath hold time that we measure there was the length of time of comfortable breath hold time. It doesn’t mean that you’re going to have a 25-second pause after every exhalation. But what it does mean is that when you improve your breath hold time your breathing then becomes smooth. Your breathing becomes regular. The respiratory rate is coming down towards normal, 12 maybe 14, 12, 10 breaths per minute. Breathing driven by the diaphragm and then out through the nose with a natural pause on the exhalation. So, breathing during rest should always be effortless. And breathing should never be an effort.

 

And this also translates into sleep. Because if you think of the individual who is breathing faster and harder during the day, they’re going to have faster and harder breathing during sleep. This increases turbulence in the upper airways. This is contributing to snoring and also to obstructive sleep apnea. But when you breathe faster and harder, what is the brain interpreting? Well, the brain is interpreting that if you breathe fast and hard during rest or sleep, the brain interprets that the body is under stress. So, for example, it can manifest as insomnia, but it’s also more likely to manifest as increased sympathetic drive or increased stress response.

 

So, we should have the mouths closed pretty much all of the time. Yes, there’s going to be exceptions during talking, there may be exceptions during swimming, there may be exceptions every now and again. Well, just as a rule of thumb that the mouth should be closed and breathing should be difficult to pick up on.

 

And if people think that, well, that’s not really true, well, think about having a run but an elite athlete with good functional breathing patterns. And you’re running down the street next to this elite athlete. Who is going to be breathing the hardest and fastest? And it’s likely to be the person who is untrained, is likely to be the person with dysfunctional breathing patterns. But even there are situations that you would see somebody walking down, we call it a foot path but you call it a sidewalk, a sidewalk and they’ve got labored breathing even from the minutest of physical exercise. So, it’s not good to have labored breathing.

Steven Sashen:

So, we started the conversation by talking about the biochemical effects of changing one’s breathing. So, what’s going on biochemically that allows for that longer, comfortable breath hold time?

Patrick McKeown:

Yeah. Primary stimulus to breathe is carbon dioxide. Every breath that we take is driven by carbon dioxide. And it’s only when oxygen levels drop by about half that the lack of oxygen is driving breathing. So, if you have an individual who is overly sensitive to the buildup of carbon dioxide, then their breathing is harder and faster.

Steven Sashen:

Interesting.

Patrick McKeown:

So, increased chemo sensitivity to the gas carbon dioxide implies harder and faster breathing.

Steven Sashen:

Interesting. So, clearly then in talking about what to do about this we’re going to be jumping in to what it takes to become less hypersensitive to carbon dioxide buildup.

 

But before we get there, I’ve got to say it’s very entertaining. There was someone who put out an ebook that was all about generating nitric oxide, which can be valuable in different ways, it’s a vasodilator, relax your blood vessels, et cetera. And the technique they were teaching was go sprint and then just maintain breathing through the nose.

 

Now, I responded to the guy. I said, “Look, if you can do what you just described, whatever that person is doing is not sprinting. They may be running as fast as they can, but I can tell you as a masters all American sprinter, as one of the fastest guys in my age group in the country, when I finish 100 meters I’ve got five seconds it’s all I can do to get any air into my body and recover from that anaerobic activity. I am sucking air, mouth open, nose open. The idea of breathing through my nose at that point, it’s just not even remotely possible.” So, there are people who have misinterpreted this. To your point, again, times where you are going to be breathing through your mouth. That’s, in my experience definitely one of them.

 

But again I just love how people twist and turn this and try to make a single box that you’re going to get put in for what you can do. And I loved what you were saying before of understanding breathing enough so that you know what to do when rather than trying to do a thing all the time.

Patrick McKeown:

Yeah. Nitric oxide, the individual is correct in terms of the benefits of it. And nitric oxide inside the nasal cavity, every breath that you take through the nose you harness nitric oxide. If you want to increase nitric oxide, do some breath holds and especially after an exhalation or hum. So, for example, breathe in through your nose and (humming), and that generates more nitric oxide. Nitric oxide is antiviral. So, it’s very, very potent in terms have … Information should have been put out there about COVID. That the body has its own antiviral defense.

 

And I’m not going to say that if you nasal breathe that you are not likely to get COVID. But what I am saying is that the nose is the first line of defense, and NO is an antiviral. It’s the body’s antiviral approach for any viruses that are coming in to help neutralize them. So, I leave it at that.

Steven Sashen:

I’m so glad you made that qualification because so many people love to say, “Hey, if you do the following thing, if you stand on one foot and spin around three times then you won’t get COVID.” It’s like, oh, Jesus. But that’s a whole other story.

 

There’s another thing about the generation of nitric oxide that I love which is basically jumping up and down lightly, if you’re jumping rope or running of course that does it. There are some hospitals where if people are in bed they literally just have a device that taps on the heel to just gently rock the person back and forth and that also generates nitric oxide from the blood vessels themselves, which is also very interesting.

 

I think it’s a very misunderstood chemical and certainly all the things it can do biologically that … Not that it’s even misunderstood. I think it’s well understood. I think it’s mis- … What’s the word I’m looking for? Doesn’t get enough attention. Whatever the appropriate word is for that.

Patrick McKeown:

Yeah. Well, I suppose it’s a relatively … Nitric oxide from the airways to the airways. Nitric oxide in the blood vessels is primarily endothelial. It’s different iso forms of nitric oxide. But it was only discovered on the exhale breath of the human being in 1991.

Steven Sashen:

Oh, wow.

Patrick McKeown:

So, I don’t think it’s fully realized what this gas does in the airways. It plays a role in sleep, for example. So, it’s a messenger from the nose to the upper airway dilator muscles. And yet how many people are waking up with a dry mouth in the morning? And that shouldn’t be happening.

Steven Sashen:

Yeah. Well, let’s jump in then to the fun part of what are the things that people can do to, from what we described biochemically, start becoming less hypersensitive to carbon dioxide so that they have a more functional breathing pattern?

Patrick McKeown:

Sure. So, what you could do is I’m going to have you put your finger underneath your nose as follows.

Steven Sashen:

I’ve got my finger under my nose.

Patrick McKeown:

And use this as a measurement of your concentration. Now we’re going to see just how distracted the mind is. So, take a very-

Steven Sashen:

That’s not fair. I’m the guy hosting the damn podcast. Come on.

Patrick McKeown:

Well, you asked me.

Steven Sashen:

Yeah, it’s true.

Patrick McKeown:

Now, Steven, I need you to take a very soft breath in through your nose and a relaxed and a slow and a gentle exhalation out through your nose. And the whole purpose of this is really focus and taking a very soft breath coming in to your nose and a really relaxed and a slow and a gentle exhalation through your nose. Breathe out so slowly that you feel hardly any air onto your finger. So, your whole objective is that you have such conservation of the breath, you’re taking a very soft breath coming in to your nose and you’re really have a relaxed and a slow and a gentle exhalation. And the objective here is that you feel that you are not getting enough. I need you to deliberately slow down your breathing to the point that you would like to take more air in. And I would like you to do this for three to four minutes.

 

Now what we are doing is deliberately taking a very soft breath in through your nose and a really relaxed and a slow and gentle exhalation to breathe less air, to increase carbon dioxide in the blood. And as carbon dioxide increases in the blood you feel air hunger because carbon dioxide is the primary stimulus to breathe.

 

Now what that gas does is opens up your blood vessels. It also activates the body’s relaxation response and it stimulates a nerve called the vagus nerve. If you noticed it, if you were to do that for three to four minutes, generally your hands get warmer. And also you feel drowsier and also there’s increased watery saliva in the mouth. So, there’s an example of breathing less air to improve blood circulation but also to improve oxygen delivery. Also to harness nasal nitric oxide and also to stimulate the vagus nerve. And that flies in the very face of what people are typically talking about breathing. So, that’s one thing.

 

The second thing is-

Steven Sashen:

Well, I want to pause on that one. And I stopped in the middle because I was about to say something. So, again, it seems like there’s a bit of a balance because if you slow down too much that urged breathe gets super super intense.

Patrick McKeown:

Yes, it’s not to be there. There is a balance.

Steven Sashen:

Yeah, okay. Good to know. Sounds like what you’re doing by doing that in a way is … What’s the word? Well, desensitizing. I think of it like doing-

Patrick McKeown:

Yes, yes, yeah, that’s desensitizing the body’s- … And it’s also a lot of people have a fear around suffocation. So, when people come in to me with panic disorder the fear of suffocation or even the minutest feeling of suffocation can put them into a panic attack. And I bring them in and part of what we do is we deliberately expose them to very controlled doses of suffocation to desensitize their body’s reaction to it.

Steven Sashen:

You gave me a wacky thing that happened in my brain. My completely irrational fear of dying, or let me say that differently. I have a completely irrational fear that involves dying. It’s that I’m in a swimming pool or in the ocean or something and my foot gets caught on something at the bottom. Never happened, never had anything remotely like it, don’t know where that thought came from. But it’s literally the only fear that I can find of almost anything that I can think of. That idea just makes me stop breathing immediately. Again I have no idea why I have that.

Patrick McKeown:

Yeah. No, it is, it’s very primordial. It really, really is.

Steven Sashen:

Not surprising. So, one other thought, you just reminded me of another one, just for the fun of it. So I was doing Tai chi years ago with a guy who, he had been doing Tai chi for 22 years when I met him, he was 27 at the time. His dad was a big deal judo guy, for some reason got him into Tai chi, his son into Tai chi. And he treated Tai chi like the way it was originally developed as a fighting art, not just a thing that old people do to relax.

 

And so we got into a conversation that the most important thing in fighting is to be able to come back from being knocked out as quickly and as alert as possible. And people talked about getting knocked out or being choked out and I made the comment that I’ve never passed out. And so he said, “Oh, let me choke you out.” It’s like, sorry, what? He said, “I’m going to choke you out.” It’s like, okay, I’m game.

 

So, he basically gets his arm wrapped around my neck, around the carotid arteries. He said, “Put your arm up in the air because that’s how I’m going to know when you pass out. Your arm will fall down and I’m just going to do it until you pass out and then I’ll gently put you on the ground and let’s just see what happens.”

 

And so the experience, if I can slow it down somewhat, the first thought was, hey, this is interesting to, hey, this is uncomfortable, to, hey, what the- … And I’m freaking out and I couldn’t move because he’s a big guy and he’s got my feet off the ground. And then at the last moment there was when it just felt inevitable, there was nothing I could do. I can’t remember ever feeling more relaxed in my entire life.

 

And then I pass out for a second maybe, and when I came back to a second later, the first thing I said, “Oh, now I get why people do drugs.” Because I had never done anything. It was such a out of normal experience, but the part that was so fascinating was how much my entire body had just relaxed from that whole phenomenon and stayed relaxed like that for a long time. It was fascinating. I don’t recommend this obviously, but it was really interesting. Anyway.

Patrick McKeown:

We have breath hold exercises and you could do them at various intensities. I remember working with some Notre Dame athletes, they were sprinters, 400 meters track and field sprinters. Going back about six, seven years ago. And they would do their 400 meter sprints with the mouth open normally during training. And what we did was I switched some of their sprints to breathing only in and out through the nose. And it’s pretty tough and I did it to add an extra load onto them.

 

And then we did some of the sprints whereby I would stand at the 360 meter line, 40 meters from the finish-

Steven Sashen:

That’s where, for people who have never run, that’s the spot what they refer to in the track world, that’s where they drop the piano on your shoulders.

Patrick McKeown:

So, that’s where we add the load. And this is just an idea. I had the guys sprint for 360 meters with their mouth closed, and when they see me they had to hold their breath and they had to sprint the last 40 meters in a breath hold. We did it to cause the body to make adaptations. And this is where you can make a difference where lowering the blood oxygen saturation … It wouldn’t cause them to pass out by the way. The blood oxygen saturation we were tracking it as well with pulse oximetry. But the whole purpose was to disturb the body and to disturb blood flow but basically lower the blood oxygen saturation, increase carbon dioxide and use that to cause the body to make adaptations to increase the buffering capacity.

 

But also when you do a long breath hold like that it causes your spleen to release more red blood cells into circulation, your kidneys also become hypoxic, the liver to a lesser extent, and they synthesize the hormone, and this is a hormone that basically, for example, Lance Armstrong and individuals would be familiar with. Not saying allegations or whatever. But a hormone that an individual will often take in the Tour de France to provoke their bone marrow to mature red blood cells. But we produce that hormone naturally. We can do it with breath holding.

 

So, I’m going to give you a couple of easy breath holds and then I’ll give you a couple stronger ones and you can test it.

Steven Sashen:

Well, A, I want to do that, but I also want to make a bookmark because I interrupted you after we did the finger on your nose. You said the second thing and then I interrupted you with a bunch of stories. So, I want to make sure we come back to the second thing if that’s not going to be part of the breath holds. But let’s do breath holds because what the hell?

Patrick McKeown:

Okay. So, with this we’re just going to go easy, a couple of easy ones, and I just say, please, for anybody listening, don’t do these if you’re pregnant. Don’t do them if you have any serious medical conditions. You have to be relatively, I was going to say, young, which normally is the case. But if you’re a master sprinter I’d be fine with that and healthy. And that’s the way it is.

Steven Sashen:

What’s the cut off for young?

Patrick McKeown:

Well, that we don’t know because we have 40-year-olds that are barely able to get up a flight of stairs.

Steven Sashen:

Yeah, that’s true.

Patrick McKeown:

So, that’s the way it’s a combination of both.

Steven Sashen:

Now in advance I’m going to say, of course, that I am also … What’s the word? Disadvantaged by being outside of Denver, Colorado, so I’m over a mile in the air. So, there’s no oxygen up here to begin with. Just letting you know. In fact, when I moved here from sea level, for the first month I thought my bicycle was broken because I just couldn’t get it to move. That was all me. So, anyway, let’s have some more fun.

Patrick McKeown:

Well, we’re going to go easy anyway, so just at your intensity. But this also is an exercise just to give the body a little bit of a stress and also to increase blood flow to the brain. Take a normal breath in and out through your nose, and pinch your nose and hold your nose. And just gently start jogging on the spot, jogging on the spot. And hopefully you have Xero Shoes on. So, you’re doing it for about 15 paces or so. And now let go and breathe in through your nose. That’s fine. And just breathe just normal now for a moment. Just breathing as normal for about a minute or so. Now you might also notice that this exercise will help open up your nose.

Steven Sashen:

I noticed that. I also noticed a very entertaining head rush.

Patrick McKeown:

It can be, and sometimes the legs go jelly as well, so there’s different kind of–

Steven Sashen:

After the head rush I could feel not quite tingling, it’s cool on the outside in my legs. And by the way I’m not wearing Xero Shoes right now. I’m wearing zero, Z-E-R-O, shoes. I’m barefoot in the office.

Patrick McKeown:

All right, zero shoes. Cool. That’s great. And again, whenever you’re ready, take a normal breath in through your nose and out through your nose and pinch your nose and hold your nose. And now jog again holding your breath until you feel kind of a moderate air hunger. So, it’s just gently doing a few easy ones and then we’ll do a couple strong ones.

 

And you’re just relaxing into the body. And this is about relaxing into a feeling of discomfort as well. And even though you were just doing a moderate exercise there that would have a stronger effect in terms of the anaerobic capacity than sprinting. If you were to use pulse oximeter and measure your blood oxygen saturation during that exercise and then go for a sprint and measure your blood oxygen saturation, you will lower your blood oxygen saturation more during the breath hold than you would during the sprint. So, that’s why we use them to have training effects.

 

But now I’m going to push you a little bit more. So, whenever you’re ready take a normal breath in through your nose and out through your nose and pinch your nose and hold your nose. And start jogging holding the breath. And now faster, keep jogging, keep pushing, keep going, keep going, keep pushing, keep holding the breath. Relax into the body. When it gets pretty tough let go in through your nose, that’s it. And then get your breathing under control. In through your nose and you could have your hands either side of your lower ribs. So, now your hands either side of your lower ribs. As you breathe in your ribs should move outwards, and as you breathe out your ribs should move in. And as you breathe in your ribs are moving out. And as you breathe out your ribs are moving in. And then just to do that for recovery about a minute or so, I’m going to do one more. And that will kind of give you an idea.

 

Now there’s another aspect of it as well is just even for people to do their physical exercise with the mouth closed. And you feel an increased air hunger, but if you keep on doing it for physical exercise with the mouth closed the body adapts to that and your breathing becomes lighter. So, I just do one more if that’s all right or–

Steven Sashen:

Yeah, yeah.

Patrick McKeown:

So, whenever you’re ready take a normal breath in through your nose and out through your nose and pinch your nose and hold your nose. And start jogging. And out faster, keep going and keep pushing, keep going and keep pushing and keep going and keep pushing. And keep going until the air hunger gets fairly strong. Now let go and in through your nose and recover your breathing. And hands on your sides.

 

So, the best way to recover breathing even after a sprint is always to breathe low and slow, okay? I get it that you could be too taxed that you have to breathe through the mouth, but if we breathe fast and shallow we waste so much air to dead space that that air actually doesn’t get down into the greatest blood flow in the lungs is. Yeah, so that’s kind of just a couple of ideas there.

Steven Sashen:

So, two questions there. There’s two kind of conflicting things that happen when you’re doing something like this over time. One is that if you’re putting yourself under some deliberate mild stress there’s a temptation to try to avoid doing it in the future because it was experienced as mildly stressful. The flip side of that is when you see progress, that’s the thing that motivates you to keep going. So, what do you recommend for sort of the balance of making it so that you’re not adding more stress than is necessary when you’re stressing yourself? In other words, how often should someone practice something like this? And what are the signs to look for for progress which will give you that incentive to keep going?

Patrick McKeown:

So, I suppose listen to your body if it’s something that’s helping it’s going to make a difference. You’re going to feel a difference. In terms of energy levels, in terms of your nose opening up, in terms of your breathing becoming lighter during physical exercise. And the real thing is that the best way to do this is to bring it into your normal physical routine.

 

Everybody warms up pre physical exercise. All warm ups should be done in and out through the nose. And during the warm up bring in some breath holds. When you’re nice and warmed up, breathe in, breathe out and hold your nose and just do a simple maneuver. You could be even doing it on a bike, you could be doing it … I’m talking about a stationary bike as opposed to one on the road. And just bring it into your way of life.

 

But recover within a couple of breaths. That’s the key. There isn’t a risk of passing out because your blood oxygen saturation is not going to drop down into the 60s or 50s. So, we’ve used those exercises with movement for 20 years, and to give you an example, some of the guys I work with could be … Okay, we have professional footballers today, I had a mountain biker in the morning. But I had a team of snipers about six weeks ago. And the whole aspect was using breathing techniques of when to pull the trigger of a gun.

 

And using different states because of course … And it’s from a safety point of view because if you have an individual and they’re stressed out and it’s their job, that’s their job, but if they’re stressed they’re more liable to make a mistake. It’s very important that we as human beings can control states. And using the autonomic nervous system, having a really relaxed and slow gentle breath out and having total focus of the mind on the target.

 

I brought these guys through all of the exercises. I had them do repeated sprintability, which is the exercise, one of them, breathe in, breathe out through your nose, breathe in and out through your nose, pinch your nose and hold, and sprint for 40 meters with your breath held. And once you get to the 40 meter line, then you have a recovery for 30 seconds. And after 30 seconds recovery you breathe in and out through your nose and your sprint again 40 meters, 30 second recovery. And we do that five times.

 

And we start off with exercises to gently up regulate and influence the autonomic nervous system. And then stress the autonomic nervous system, but then to relax the autonomic nervous system. There is often sometimes that I feel that we need to look at breathing that it’s much more broader than just holding in on, well, now what I want you to do is take these full big breaths or now what I want you to do is I want you to take full big breaths, 30 breaths and then exhale and hold your breath. And all that’s fine, but what about the recovery? What about the person’s breathing post-dash and how are they breathing during sleep? And how are they breathing if they get stressed? That’s what the breath should be and that’s what we should be doing.

Steven Sashen:

Again it’s so interesting the idea whether I’m breathing through my mouth or my nose if I’m going all out for 40 meters I’ve got three of those in me before a 30 second recovery just isn’t going to happen. That’s a whole other story. Again, this is just for the fun of saying it. People who use the word sprinting, those of us who are actual sprinters do a very different thing metabolically than people who are just trying to run as fast as they can. I finally figured out how to codify this in a way. Someone who was saying, “Sprint for 30 seconds, rest for 30 seconds and repeat.”

 

I said, “Any real sprinter, if they’re going all out for 30 seconds, that’s it. They’re not going to rest for 30 seconds and repeat.”

 

They said, “Well, it’s not about going all out the same speed that next one. It’s just doing the best you can.”

 

I went, “No, I don’t think you get it, man. After 30 seconds all out we’re done.” And maybe halfway through the next one. And finally I said, “Wait,” this is a young guy, he was in his 20s. I said, “When you go all out for 30 seconds how far are you going?”

 

He goes, “150 meters.” He was very impressed with himself.

 

I said, “Yeah, I’m twice your age and when I go all out for 30 seconds I’m doing 250 meters. It’s a slightly different amount of energy production that’s happening and therefore the oxygen band is very different.” But that said, I’m already adapting what you’re describing into what would work for me to make a certain amount of stress that’s not going to be overwhelming. It may be I’m doing 20 meters or it may be that I’m doing whatever.

 

But you also gave me a flashback, yet another. When I went to the World Masters Track and Field Championships in Finland about 13 years ago, it’s at sea level. And what shocked me, again as a sprinter where it’s anaerobic, I was still amazed to discover that while it didn’t change my running it changed my recovery like I couldn’t even imagine. I finished 100 meters and 10 seconds later I felt fine. Whole different game.

 

I have the theory I’ve been living at altitude for 28 years. I have the idea that I still may not have adapted or maybe it’s just the way it is with what the air is like up here. But suffice it to say that idea of those little stressors and playing with that is super interesting.

Patrick McKeown:

It would be very interesting to get your hematic –

Steven Sashen:

I’ve had it measured. I’d have to look it up and see what the numbers look like, so I don’t know off the top of my head. But, yeah, that would be the obvious thing to do to see if I’ve adapted at all.

Patrick McKeown:

And the other thing is I would say is that because you’re already living at altitude is just go a little bit easier with the breath holds. The few we did today fine by the way, but you know yourself because you don’t want to have too much stress either. Normally when we’re working with somebody we have them do kind of moderate to strong breath holds, maybe five reps twice daily at most. But if they’re doing, instead of using the word sprint, but running as hard as they can with a breath hold we have them do five reps every second day.

Steven Sashen:

Got it.

Patrick McKeown:

So, we switch the reps based on the dose of the air hunger.

Steven Sashen:

Do you think in the same way that learning happens during the rest periods after a bout of attempting something and muscle growth and other physical changes happen again during those rest periods after the stress, do you think the same thing is happening with working on the breath? That the real adaptations are happening after you’re doing the exercises, for example, or during the rest periods between sessions?

Patrick McKeown:

I suppose we haven’t really focused on it. We focus on breathing for recovery absolutely, but that’s more just for recovery. And what we’re doing there is we’re looking to optimize heart rate variability. So, when an athlete really pushes themselves hard during physical training it’s very important that they’re able to down regulate very quickly. And we show them ways to do that via the breath. But I’m not sure if the advantage from the sprinting is happening post exercise or during the exercise.

Steven Sashen:

Again, another flashback. I had a friend who developed one of the first real-time biometric sensors that allowed them to measure heart rate, breathing, everything in real time for up to 24 hours. And so they were looking at heart rate variability, which for people who don’t know, when you breathe out your heart rate should slow down a little bit compared to when you’re breathing in, and if you get really stressed your heart rate will basically stay the same no matter what you’re doing, which is not a good sign.

 

And they put this device that they had developed on one of the guys that they were working with. And they were just curious about heart rate variability. And he had none. And they said, “We think you probably need to get to the hospital now.” And he gets to the hospital and they check him in and he immediately goes in for a quadruple bypass.

Patrick McKeown:

Wow. That is crazy stuff.

Steven Sashen:

Yeah, they caught it accidentally just in the nick of time. And again this is one of those things that is relatively well known in the literature but not very well utilized in the field.

 

So, anyway, backing up to after we did the finger under your nose and you said, “There’s number two,” do you remember what number two was? Is that still in your brain?

Patrick McKeown:

Number two might be just there’s lots of different exercises. Normally we would start off with small breath holds and that’s breathe in and breathe out and hold the nose for five seconds.

 

For example, box breathing might be an exercise that’s interesting to people. It’s called tactical breathing also. Going into an operation the individual that’s going in needs to be absolutely focused. They want to be that flow state whereby you’re alert and you’re relaxed at the same time. And they would do this exercise. It’s breathing in for four seconds, holding for four, breathing out for four seconds, holding for four. And continuing to do it. And even if you’re doing it for two, four or five minutes. So, this exercise here, Steven, is you’re breathing in, two, three, four; hold, two, three, four; out, two, three, four; hold, two, three, four; in, two, three, four; hold, two, three, four; out, two, three, four; hold, two, three, four; in, two, three, four; hold, two, three, four; out, two, three, four; hold, two, three, four.

 

Because there’s two ways to help stimulate … Well, there’s more, but in terms of the breath we kind of focus on a couple of ways to help stimulate the vagus nerve. First of all, the vagus nerve for people who might not be aware it, it’s a nerve that is wandering pretty much throughout the human body. And it’s innervating most of, if not all of, the major organs. And 80% to 90% of the nerve fibers are from the body up to the brain. So, you have a communication going from the body to the brain via the vagus nerve.

 

And if we can stimulate the vagus nerve it’s a neurotransmitter which causes the heart rate to slow down. And when the heart rate slows down the brain is interpreting that the body is safe. And it’s a great way to help bring a better balance to dampen a stress response. If you’re feeling stressed and your breathing is hard and fast, and to activate the body’s relaxation.

 

You can do it two ways. We can breathe in through the nose and out through the nose and pinch the nose and hold the breath for one, two, three, four, five, and let go. And just breathe normal for 10 seconds. And then do it again. Normal breath in through your nose and out through your nose and pinch and hold, one, two, three, four, five. That could be one way of doing it.

 

The box breathing earlier on is similar enough, not too dissimilar from it. The finger underneath the nose, taking a very soft breath in and a really relaxed and slow, gentle breath out can stimulate the vagus nerve. And also breathing in for five seconds and out for five seconds or breathing in for four seconds and out for six seconds.

 

And all of these are … Any of us I suppose it’s all about building resilience and what’s resilience for the human being other than that we are able to switch. And if there’s a situation presenting itself we can deal with the situation better.

 

As opposed to think of two people going to do a job interview. And you interview the first candidate, and the first candidate is sighing and upper chest breathing and breathing is a little bit faster. It’s going to put the interviewer on edge. And the second person comes in and has got calm, nice, collected breathing. And even though both might be ideally suitable, they both may have the same qualifications, what’s going to happen is that the interviewer is going to choose the person with the calmer demeanor because if you have … You have to be very careful not to let your breathing let you down. And that’s one aspect of just an example of where breathing can play a role.

Steven Sashen:

Love it. It occurs to me I need to ask you a potentially politically insensitive question.

Patrick McKeown:

Go for it.

Steven Sashen:

Yes, and you can answer it however you want of course. I don’t know why I said that. Of course you can answer it however you want. I don’t have any rules here. The politically insensitive question is the person on the planet right now who is most well known for breathing related things is, fill in the blank, Wim Hof. Do you have any thoughts or comments about what he’s doing?

Patrick McKeown:

Yeah, it’s primarily a stressor. It’s a stressor breathing exercise forcing the body to make adaptations. I think it’s a useful exercise. I’ve worked with thousands of people over the years, many of them I would not teach them such an exercise. I think it’s very important people to realize that this isn’t an exercise to increase oxygen delivery to the brain. This isn’t an exercise that we should be practicing all of the time. This is like going for a sprint. There’s times that you might want to go for a sprint, but you shouldn’t be sprinting all the time because it’s soon going to wear you out. And not everybody should be going for a sprint. So, sprinting is not going to suit people with different health conditions. So, the Wim Hof method is a sprint.

Steven Sashen:

Interesting.

Patrick McKeown:

And I mean that in terms of not just fast running, we go for the sprint that you said. That’s what it is.

Steven Sashen:

Yeah. My favorite thing about Wim Hof is that there are some interesting conflation between what he’s doing with the breathing method and other things. So, his cold adaptation, my favorite thing about that is he has a twin brother who apparently can handle the cold just as well without ever doing any of the other stuff. So, there’s apparently a big genetic component in what he’s doing that many people don’t know about because they don’t even know he has a twin brother. Which, again, I always like to get underneath and find out what’s really going on. When I heard that I went, “Oh, fascinating.”

 

It’s part of this idea that anyone can become anything and we’re all basically the same, which is so patently false. I always like to see, all right, what’s going on where maybe this person is just a freak? Is this reliably teachable? And if so, to whom? And for whom is it not reliable? That’s a whole other thing.

 

So, Patrick, this has been a total, total pleasure. And I can only imagine … And more than being a pleasure, I think out of all of the chats that I’ve had with human beings we’ve given people more stuff to play with and experiment with and do than anybody else that I’ve talked to. Which is not too surprising since your breath is always available and we rarely pay attention and we’ve just given a lot of ways to pay attention.

 

But of course I would be remiss if I didn’t say, in addition to thanks, if people want to find out more, whether it’s just getting your book, which we didn’t talk about at all, or anything else that they might want to do to dive into this more deeply, how can they get in touch with you and what else would you recommend?

Patrick McKeown:

Yeah, I have a few different books depending on what you kind of want to read about. I’ve got a really recent book called Atomic Focus, and that’s self-explanatory. I have a book called The Breathing Cure, which was released in the United States and worldwide in August of this year. And then I’ve got a book called The Oxygen Advantage, which is 2015, which is still very popular thankfully. It’s great to see it.

Steven Sashen:

What’s the difference between those three things if someone is going to–

Patrick McKeown:

Yeah, The Oxygen Advantage was kind of geared a little bit towards sports performance and bringing breathing techniques into sports. And The Breathing Cure is geared very much towards health and children and sleep apnea, epilepsy, diabetes, asthma, cranial facial development. Women’s breathing, which doesn’t get touched upon but should be talked about. And then Atomic Focus is about improving your concentration and attention span. And the tools to achieving flow state. Because I don’t think people are going to achieve flow state if they have sleep apnea. And I don’t think they’re going to achieve flow states if they have dysfunctional breathing. Because if your physiology is in that increased sympathetic drive, how can you achieve flow states?

Steven Sashen:

Yeah.

Patrick McKeown:

Yeah, so it’s just kind of using the breath and going a little bit deeper into it. We have social media channels as well of course, and you can find different videos and different things on Oxygen Advantage and also Buteyko Clinic.

Steven Sashen:

Spell Buteyko Clinic for people who want to be able to spell things.

Patrick McKeown:

It’s a tricky one. B-U-T-E-Y-K-O Clinic.

Steven Sashen:

And I know the answer to this, but you’re going to have to tell people why Buteyko Clinic? Where does that-

Patrick McKeown:

Well, Buteyko Clinic, yeah, it was the name is after a Soviet doctor called Dr. Constantine Buteyko. And he kind of made a very profound discovery even though it’s a very simple one. He’d seen that people who were sick breathed harder and faster, and he asked a question. He said, “Is it their sickness which causes them to breathe harder and faster or could their harder and faster breathing feed into their sickness?” And he started teaching them to breathe light and slow and nose. And even though the science back then, he’s put out a lot on carbon dioxide. Yeah, carbon dioxide plays some role, but now the science is really looking at the Bower reflex and basically the autonomic nervous system, that we can influence the autonomic nervous system.

 

And people who have depression, people with anxiety and panic disorder and a host of different conditions, they have reduced heart rate variability and the Buteyko method is very geared towards improving HRV. And even with long COVID we’re seeing some terrible situations with individuals, mainly women aged between 20 and 50 years of age, and a lot of them are really healthy and fit individuals. And we have some of them that their breath hold time, they can’t hold their breath for more than four seconds. They can’t even talk. They can’t stand up because their heart rate goes through the roof. So, they have postural tachycardia syndrome. And the whole autonomic nervous system is in total state of dysregulation. So, we are using breathing and gentle breathing exercises to help influence the autonomic nervous system.

 

And that’s the one thing about the breath. If you can kind of tap into your breathing you have something that you could always use for yourself. And it’s a nice thing to know.

Steven Sashen:

Beautiful. Patrick, once again, total, total pleasure. Thank you so much. Continued good luck with everything you’re doing. Congrats on the new books coming out. Having something coming out during COVID I’m sure poses a number of interesting challenges. But, anyway, I hope everyone does take advantage of finding your books and going to the websites that you mentioned and checking out those resources. Obviously from what we’ve already just played with in the last hour there’s a lot to dive into and more to experience, and I hope people take advantage of it.

 

So, A, thanks and, B, let me do a quick sign off. Actually any last words before I forget or anything that I-

Patrick McKeown:

No, it’s pretty much it. Pleasure. Thanks very much, Steven.

Steven Sashen:

Yeah. So, everyone else, thank you so much. Once again just a quick reminder that you can go to www.jointhemovementmovement.com to find previous episodes, all the places you can get the podcast, all the places you can interact with us on YouTube and Facebook and Instagram, et cetera. If you have any questions or comments or people you want to recommend for being on the podcast drop me an email, move, M-O-V-E, @jointhemovementmovement.com. And most importantly go out and have fun and live life feet first.

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