This is fascinating to me lately. I didn’t buy into breathing exercises for years, or my entire life really, until recently when a coworker recommended trying Wim Hoff exercises.

The idea that breathing should affect my mood or mental function was nonsense. It didn’t seem like it should make much of a difference.

He enjoyed it so much and was so excited though, I figured what the hell, I’ll give it a shot. That was a couple months ago and now I do it almost twice a day, daily. My breath holds are well into the 3 minute range and the restful reset it provides me is becoming something I actually look forward to. It’s sort of my ‘okay, time to wake up/sleep’ activity. Get the blood going, get relaxed, get the brain ready.

I never would have imagined that simply breathing would make me feel so nice.

I don’t have the experience others describe, but it’s a great experience nonetheless.

One of the fun features is that you can tell how well it’s working by how much better your breath holds get with each hold. As my body and mind calm and relax, my ability to hold my breath dramatically increases. The times I haven’t been able to calm or relax well due to external factors (kids arguing or loud music for example), my breath hold has tended to be consistent but much shorter. When it works, it really works.