 Hello and welcome to Pukipondas, the podcast where I explore big questions with brilliant people. Today's question is, how can we maximise our breathing to help our anxiety and emotions? And I'm in conversation with Mel Holliday. Hello, I'm Mel Holliday. I have done NLP over the years and over the last couple of years I've specialised mainly in breathing techniques and things that can make us feel really great when we're anxious or emotional. Fantastic. So our episode question today is, how can we maximise our breathing to help our anxiety and emotions? So do you want to make a start on answering that pretty massive question, Mel? Yes, it is a big one. I thought about it today. I was thinking, oh gosh, right, okay, how can I break this down into small compartments? But I think to start off with, if you said to someone I specialise or am interested in breathing techniques, everybody thinks, well, I breathe, so what's the big deal? I don't think a lot of people realise how much of an impact our breathing has over everything we do, our wellbeing, our physical side, the whole lot is governed by our breathing. And I found it interesting over the last couple of years to realise how little we do it well and what impact that has on us over many years. And if I could tap in and teach each child how to breathe in the best possible way they can, what impact that would have on the rest of their lives? So what do we get wrong when it comes to breathing? Because you're right, I thought it was something I had nailed, but maybe not. Well, I think, especially in our Western society, we have become more and more interested in the way we look. And so therefore doing lots of stomach exercises and flattening our stomachs and tensing our stomachs means we've reduced greatly the capacity in our chest to expand our lungs. And in doing that, that means we probably only oxygenate our blood, maybe 60% of what our capacity actually could be. So our body's not actually getting the oxygen, it's geared up to do, our lungs are geared up to do. So we don't breathe in our belly. When you look at children and animals, they breathe right down into their belly. And as we grow up, we sort of teach children, even if it's not consciously, that actually holding our stomach is the thing to do, not actually breathe into our belly. By breathing into our belly, that pushes down the diaphragm, the muscle that sort of sits below our lungs, and it expands the chest. And therefore that allows their lungs to get far more oxygen in. And if we can practice doing that, our body benefits straight away. It's something when I had a couple of singing lessons that the teacher talked to me about was breathing wrong and thinking about kind of your stomach getting big and, you know, yeah, some of those things. And it made a huge difference right away in terms of my singing breathing differently. And it's an interesting one how we've lost the ability and how difficult it becomes when you first start to do it because you become over-conscious on breathing. But actually, you don't have to do that straight away if you can just focus on the breath and breathing into your lungs. That is the first stage, it's just easy to do. Another thing I was curious about is the fact that it's better to breathe through your nose. And over the last few years, realising and researching more into why that's important. Because again, we've become more mouth breathers and high chest breathers. But if we can actually practice breathing through the nose and then expanding our lungs more, we instantly feel benefit in lots of different ways. So you cared so much about this that you've written a book about it? I have, yes, a children's book. It's called Breathe With Bruce. It's a children's book that's based on a cloud. And the reason I like the idea of a cloud is that it's floaty, it can be anywhere. And we instantly recognise a cloud, you don't have to explain what it is. Initially it was developed, I was doing some programmes before we went into lockdown to try and help children and young people with their emotions. I was becoming acutely aware when I was going into schools how children were really struggling to manage their emotions. And so I developed a programme after going to like a breathing yoga festival a few years ago and met an Indian practitioner who was an amazing gentleman who fully explained the biology of breathing alongside the benefits. And I thought, right, okay, this is what I can do. I can go into schools and I can link in my medical knowledge with this new skill that I was learning. And it had a scientific reason as to why it worked because sometimes when you talk to people about yoga practice or meditation, a large percentage of people don't buy into that initially, maybe. I think it's becoming more so now after lockdown and people using yoga as a way of relaxing, but certainly it's something that I found a lot of people didn't really connect with. And having a scientific reason as to why it worked connected a lot more people straight away and children loved it. So the book developed because I had characters to start off each class. So each character represented an emotion I had one for someone being sad or a character that was angry and got himself into trouble all the time. And Bruce was the person that connected all these characters. And so at the beginning of each cast class I'd introduced one of the characters, and we'd talk about that emotion. And then Bruce would teach them very simple breathing techniques at the beginning and the end of the class. When lockdown happened, and I couldn't do that. Someone I knew quite well who was a publisher said, you know, I really like what you're doing and I think you should turn it into a book. So initially I sort of thought, well, goodness, you know, that's that's too difficult, but he'd heard the stories. And the lady Rebecca Dyer who did my illustrations is an actress. And so she couldn't work. And so between us we put the book together and it was published in September. Well congratulations. Thank you. A huge achievement and publishing the, you know, your first book although I gather it's the first of six maybe. It's a big achievement to be eventually if it can happen. Yes, each one will will have a story that relates to Bruce, but have their own backstory connected with the emotion they they represent. And how has the feedback been so far from the book? You know, it's been brilliant. It's been really, really good. I think book sales are down at the moment so that's because people can't get out to book shops and their priorities are very different, but actually I've sold my first print run already we just ordered the next lot. And Amazon are sold out so we're just waiting for them to restock in a few days hopefully. So yeah it's gone, it's gone fantastically but I found really I'm getting a really good relationship with people on Instagram and social media as well as selling the book in that there are lots of parents and teachers and carers who are really struggling at the moment and want to find different ways they can easily do to benefit themselves. And how are you helping them what's the kind of you know the the advice that you're giving to parents or carers or teachers who are supporting children who are struggling. I think a lot of it is is little short bite sized pieces of information that they can attach to their daily practice. It might be so a couple of days ago it was thinking about how you can think about something good that happens in your day because at the moment there's there's little distraction. Perhaps would take us out of those emotions so at the end of the day, the children can draw a picture or write a little post it note and putting it somewhere where you can see it daily because that connection of seeing that picture, or seeing a little statement or something puts you back into that moment and reminds you of that good thing that happened. Might be a kind thing that someone said or so that would be something that would be quite easy to do or little tips on how in how to be in present, because again we're using a lot more zoom or social media. And we're not necessarily able to go out and do exercise so how can you put yourself in the present so that you're not worrying about what's happened yesterday or what you worried about moving forward. It's just being in that moment and enjoying that cup of tea or the dog or the child playing just be in that moment for a few seconds and take yourself out of everything else that's going on around you. And how, how about do you teach sort of specific breathing strategies then as well or is it about being conscious? I think with with with doing full breathing, unless you're doing a video, which I am looking at starting to do unless you're doing something that someone can watch you, you have to be quite mindful that everybody's different. And therefore their ability might not be the same as the next person. So by explaining to people, simple techniques they can read and practice every day is fine. But if you're going into more detailed practice, I think it's more relevant that you know the person you're teaching and knowing their restrictions or things that they find difficult so you can encourage them to improve moving forward. It's self conscious really because everybody has a different way of approaching things. Yeah, absolutely. But the basic straightforward. Say that again, sorry that the base, the basics are straightforward of what you can teach them quite easily. Yeah. Yeah, but I suppose it's like anything isn't it that as you begin to go into a bit more depth it's quite difficult to do that in a really generic way. It is. So how did you decide when you were writing the book how did you decide kind of where to take that and how did you know what could be kind of safely included without someone there to directly guide alongside a child. The simple technique that I have put in the book and I have got on my website is something like box breathing so box breathing is based on counting your breath. And it's also holding your breath. And the reason that counting and holding your breath makes a difference in your body is because it changes the carbon dioxide in your body as opposed to the oxygen. So we breathe in for four counting for four, we hold for four. We slowly breathe out for four and then we count for four again and a child can do that quite easily. And encourage you to breathe through your nose as well because that stimulates a lot of things in your body if you've got your mouth closed and and you're breathing through your nose that stimulates a lot of different things for your body to be able to even process that information. So that's the simplest technique. And it's something that you can teach anybody quite quickly to do. Some people find it really difficult to breathe through the nose for example initially so that might take a little practice. Other people won't be used to taking deep breaths because they shall breathe through their chest. So not rushing this practice is probably the first criteria taking time, putting five minutes aside in your day to practice just breathing through your nose and monitoring what your chest and your stomach's doing and maybe play with that. And when you're more comfortable with that practice extend the breathing out for six or eight because it's the breath out that really helps to calibrate the body. I practice at the beginning and the end of the day. So for me, I will do a practice of breathing out for eight, but I'll do the actual whole process 20 to 30 times depending on how I'm feeling. I'll be getting doing it first thing in the morning. There's not a distraction. I haven't got my phone with me. Everything's peaceful. And whilst I'm, I'm sort of breathing I'm conscious of what my mind's doing as well so maybe playing out the day, trying not to think too much about it, but it really prepares me and it gets me up and I'm ready to go. And then again at the end of the day. Again, I haven't got distractions of phones and being in bed you lying down you can you can concentrate. But it starts to switch me off from the end of the day as well and switch off my chattery mind and I find I can sleep better. So I do it twice a day because for me that works but if you can do it at least once a day for a session of six or 10 times you'll start to see a benefit. So you're thinking about breathing then in a in a kind of very sort of proactive way but I also often talk about breathing and using breathing strategies and I think about it as well in a reactive way sometimes so particularly I use it as a parent if my children are pressing all my buttons and I know the kind of adult they need me to be and I'm not in that place in my head I find literally in my back and taking a couple of, you know, big thoughtful breaths can make quite a big difference to my ability to manage that situation. Perfect. Yeah, I think that is absolutely another strategy that parents can or anybody can have before a meeting or that uncomfortable conversation you have to have with people doing just a few of those deep breaths and holding breath if you can send immediate signals to your brain because what happens if you're looking at the biological side of being anxious and in our Western society unfortunately we're half switched on in an anxious state. The body has a nervous system that splits into two so we've got a calm side and we've got the side that makes us prepare ourselves for that fearful state of running away and the body does that naturally we don't choose that it's a natural process. And when we are anxious as you've just described or the buttons are being pressed our sympathetic nervous system which is the thing that gets us to run away switches on and calm turns the other bit off because we don't need to worry about our digestion or our bladder or things that we're having for tea when we're running away so your body then prepares you for that moment it wants more oxygen into your body so your breath speeds up your heart rate goes up and you have that maybe sweaty palms that just a not a nice feeling and also then you go into that tense reaction instant reaction. Children interestingly have tantrums because they can't explain it they'll they'll do something very similar, but you're absolutely right if you can then be mindful and take a few breaths deep your body on your brain will go oh okay I'm not frightened there isn't really that reaction or need for the reaction or gives you a few seconds to really think about how you'd have reacted. And by that calmest state, as you say you can then be the person you want to be rather than the person you could be. So are you kind of tricking your body or your brain into calming down. Absolutely it's a great mechanism to do that and you can teach yourself. Interestingly, I started this practice of doing it in the morning and the night, probably two years ago during lockdown and when things were quite stressful I would catch myself actually breathing the technique and thinking oh okay that's interesting what's triggered that there must be something that I'm feeling or worrying about and then by tuning into that I was like okay well it's probably that. So that's preparing me for that moment and so my body's already doing it naturally and if you can have that as a skill. It's really good powerful thing. I read in a book recently and I can't now place where I read this but I remember at the time thinking, oh yes that sounds sensible and now I'm thinking about it talking to you. I don't understand it so maybe you can explain, but it talks about the power of breathing and why learning and sort of breathing techniques and strategies was especially powerful, because it helped to regulate both from the top down and the bottom up. I think that was what it said it was something like that. And now I'm thinking about it. I don't know what that means what does that mean. Well, I would imagine it's the brain connecting with the stomach, because actually the the nervous system connects to the stomach and the brain and those two things are the things that monitor and sense alongside our eyes and our ears and our nose. When we're in danger because that's what's keeping us alive so the brain works on its surroundings all the time it's monitoring everything. So your stomach is completely connected to your brain. So when you are anxious that's why you have butterflies in your stomach, because actually the nervous system talks to the stomach to. If you are in a sympathetic nervous system and everything's, you know, rushing around adrenaline comes out initially so the body will get you prepared with a chemical called adrenaline, and then the longer one will slowly start to come out which is cortisol. And those are the things that keep you really alert on the reverse side. The one major hormone that makes us nice and calm is serotonin, and that sits and is made in your stomach it's a really good chemical. So breathing will actually tell your brain whether you need to have one or the other. So I would imagine that up and down is your brain communicating to stomach, which chemicals are released, how that affects your breathing how that affects your mood. So when we said about tricking the brain, that's more or less what we're doing with giving signals back to the brain that everything's alright and we can calm our breath down so that the chemicals the serotonin and the oxatone in can be released and that calms us down. Adrenaline and cortisol comes out in a second, but it can take about an hour for those to be flushed out. Wow. And our happy hormones come back. If we're in a half switched on all the time I getting up, getting the children ready for school, getting in the car as we would in a normal routine going to work. That whole process tops up our, our negative effectively all day so we're getting more and more cortisol in our body, so that by the time we get to the end of the day. It can take up to 18 hours for our body to recalibrate by using the breathing techniques. If we have some really clever strategies we can actually calibrate that much quicker. Wow, it's really clever. With the body is. The body is. And what about when we are supporting someone else so perhaps as a parent or a teaching assistant if we've got a child who's worried and anxious and we see that their breathing is not as we'd hope then should we be talking them through their breathing or do we breathe in. You know, do we breathe correctly alongside them and they'll fall into kilter or what what's your sort of strategies there. Bit of both because children are great they love role models they just absorb everything we do. I think at the moment, having strategies that work in the way we're working as far as a lockdown scenario are more complicated in that in our normal practice before COVID we had we came home to our safe haven or we had a place we could retreat to and in school they often have rooms or areas children can retreat to and of course we can't do that. And also we probably have several different workplaces within the house now if you're school homeschooling if you've got parents working from home. The rooms that you would normally have as a relaxation room your bedroom or your sitting room or your kitchen and now also associated in your brain with a workspace. And so therefore, if you've got children working in a bedroom because you have to that is the practicality of it. The association of having a calm space is diluted. So creating spaces both for adults and children, even a tiny corner with a load of cushions and a blanket and a favorite teddy photographs or pictures of things that you love could be a holiday or a favorite pet or something in that tiny little space that you can retreat to. And then once they know that's their safe space practice the breathing there when they're calm. If you can do the practice first when you come and really get to understand what that feels like and it feels good. When you really need it you're not having to fight and try and teach the child or yourself that process so for me having a space that you can practice when they're calm. And doing it together probably has more impact and will will speed that process up quicker. And presumably it helps to calm that adult as well as the. Exactly. I have had a couple of instances where children have fed back to me or teachers have fed back to me where when they were in that heightened state of emotion if they were reminded to breathe. Then that would be great but the more the teacher and or the class did it as a practice. They, they did it naturally. So one example was one child had got very, very excited and an over excited because they'd had too many sweets and they they'd realized they were getting to that state of being almost angry. And they said to the dad I need to do that breathing practice and the dad fortunately said well okay what does that mean can you show me and the child just going through the process calms him down but equally in you know it probably helps the parent to because that could have been a thing that the parent probably would have to be sorting out and wouldn't have been as appropriate. It is a learning practice but children absorb it so quickly. And if it's there as a daily reminder so in classroom I have encouraged teachers when they could have done to have lots of different versions of a Bruce. He has a very red heart when he's happy when he's not so happy and he's got angry he gets a very grey heart. And his friend who's a sunflower teaches him how to breathe and calm him down so using those pictures as a daily reminder, not only helped the child and the adult to remember to breathe, but equally the child can associate different colour hearts as to how they're feeling. Talk about emotions so which colour heart do you feel like today and you know if that's not a great place what can we do to practice so having something as a daily reminder is good too. Yeah kind of check in sounds really powerful. Yeah it's helpful. So you made me working with sort of little children and at the moment then with this. Yes the original plan was to go into secondary schools as well and we had started to create a module for secondary schools as well to do as part of their personal development. Because really there's no age limits of being able to learn how to do the practice it's free. It can be easily taught once you know the basics so once the teacher has the grasp of exactly what to do as well. And I think it's going to be more important as we're moving forward for the adolescent ages are really missing friends and that that growing up process of that age group of socialization is really important. And we can't do that in the same way at the moment that social connection isn't there. Of course. Yes I just I was interested because having I've got so many different questions to you about so many different things you've done but it felt from reading your kind of bio that you perhaps started working with young people and then move towards younger children but. Yes actually I've gone backwards I am I'm a construction ambassador because my other job we we we manufacture furniture so many years ago I was asked if I'd be a construction ambassador because there wasn't many females to be able to get females into a construction environment and you were going in and we were we were trying to help you on people to create CVs for their jobs and things like that but equally how they could be walking in for an interview how they could make themselves feel calm what they could do. So the breathing techniques came in then it was a case of okay when you're feeling nervous take some deep breaths first you know. What your hands if they're a bit sweaty and just get yourself into that feeling of I'm alright before you walk through the door so it was something that we'd started using within a practice probably three years ago. It was a technique that young people could use for for interviews or you know auditions or whatever it is that person would be experiencing in the years ahead. Talk to me about being a construction ambassador I'm so intrigued about this idea and I love the idea that you're encouraging young women to make a whole variety of different choices they might not have thought about before. Construction has always been deemed to be a male environment and it's still unfortunately predominantly is however. When you go when you think about construction there are something like 200 jobs involved in construction from, you know, laying the bricks to actually being the architect or the town planner or there are so many different skill bases. And so for me it was, we are fortunate in our area we've got a really healthy construction training group. And so once a year we actually set up in the showgrounds a building site, where we bring in people that bring the diggers in or people that the army come in and they build bridges. We have people that talk about the finance of how you fund the building. And it's an interesting way of getting anybody interested in a career but females in particular have such different skill bases that are so perfect to bring into the building industry because we all think differently. And to have that balance of male and female bouncing ideas off each other or having those different soft skills and you know heavy skills that they work so well, if you've got a team of mixed groups of people. So I started doing it really initially as a hands on going around school, but as the time's gone on we've then started doing sort of careers fairs and things to bring in people onto building sites so we're actually building ourselves. We're building six houses at the moment which has taken a long time. However, I'm hoping when we come out of the next lockdown we can have young people from the architectural group or a couple of building companies to come and have a look at what we're doing and get a feel of what it's like to be on a building site, what it's like to work and the conditions and the whole the whole bag really. You don't have a lot of strings to your bow don't you. So, so okay so that's construction but you didn't start in construction. No I started off in medicine I was a podiatrist. So, yes I did my training in 83 so a long time ago. I'm down in London and started off initially working in London, set up my own practice for a little while in Wiltshire. I moved back to Lincolnshire and I set my practice up here, which was very different from down in London. It was much easier to work I did I did surgical podiatry as well, which is operating small operations on toes and things like that. That was really easy to do down south because it was more accepted. When I came back up here I had quite a battle with consultants and things to allow me to practice easily. Yes it was again being being female in this area particularly wasn't really something that was fully accepted so I've had to learn and grow into that and that's not a bad thing that's you know. So how did you segue from podiatry to construction. I had once set up a business in what is our company now and didn't like all the book work. So I was doing that at night when I was finishing the practice he didn't like the day to day running he was just purely hands on blow. When I had my first child, I was part time with the podiatry and it was sort of like juggling too many, too many balls up in the air really and I quite enjoyed running the company we had staff by then and so it was, and also it meant I could actually, as the children got older I could actually do the job quite comfortably in schooling hours. And that worked quite well as well because when I was doing the podiatry I was very often working until seven eight o'clock at night. Yes so they were long days and juggling sort of child minding and you know it wasn't great for our relationship in that I would give the children over to my husband as I went back out again so you know it made more sense for me to go into that. And we worked we built our business from here where we work and live and so it worked really well for the children growing up. And I have to say having had a little look. We've just finished building an extension and doing a kitchen and stuff and having had a look at your website so it's chiselwood isn't it and just stunning stunning stunning stuff that you're doing like real beauty and that sort of craftsmanship and I yeah I love all that stuff and yeah it's yeah really incredible. We've got a fantastic team my husband is quite innovative as well so he's not frightened of pushing out the boundaries and yeah he's becoming more noticed for some of the things he does which is lovely nice and rewarding and we don't like, you know, sort of we like unusual. So even the house is curved so. Noriko and yeah we like to push the boundaries of it. And do you think there are any sort of golden threads through all those many different things that you've done in your, you know, kind of portfolio career I don't know what the right word is but you've done a lot of different things do you think there's anything that's kind of in common through them. I think it's people for me, I think it's connections with people because all the way along everything I've done has been connecting people or me connecting with them. I think the common thread is connections with people and what we give to each other how, how we can role model how we can learn how we can move forward all the time the one thing that nlp taught me especially in the early days is that everybody can do what they aspire to. If you have a role model, you might not be as as so if you look at a marathon runner for example I'm not a runner but I really admire them and if I was going to want to do a marathon and I had a role model. I use a lot of the tips and things that they could give me in order for me to at least start running and I am a big believer that nothing's impossible. It might take a while to get there or you might do it in a slightly different routes, but it, you can still have your own version of what you're starting out to do. And that can be quite helpful and I wonder if at the moment that's why a lot of people are struggling because we are so limited to what we can do in a day to day there's only so much television or zoom or YouTube that people can watch and absorb if they can't actually practice it very easily. There's that sticking point. However, I still think we can prepare ourselves ready for when we're able to maneuver around again. Prepare your mind or you know I love podcasts so today I had to do a few errands in the car so I'll have a podcast on and taking little tips away from that person and trying to incorporate them into my life or put them into something that might be helpful for others is maybe the common thread. Yeah, so kind of yeah people and helping people and yeah, not being pigeonholed as well I love the idea that you know you've you've taken those various different areas and said, I'm doing anyway, even if I'm not what you expect to see. Talk to me about NLP then so you obviously trained to be or you started practicing NLP and can you explain what what it is and why you started doing it just for you know people listening in might not be so familiar with it. I was introduced to it by a very very good friend who had done the course the year previous and it was a lady I really respected and was a bit surprised that she'd done it she's a coach. She is very good at what she does and she said oh you'll love it she said because there are elements in there that I think would be helpful for you. And I think she had noticed at that particular point that I was at a pathway I was at crossroads I didn't really know where to go. And, and initially I was going to do it so that I could help my team really at work, because I thought I could have strategies in place. When you have to have those conversations you don't always want to do for an employee. But actually found myself just working on myself. So that was what was great to learn to understand a little bit more about how I reacted why I reacted what my background was my upbringing how I framed things, how I looked at life. And I think for me it was quite inspiring in a way although now I look back at it it might not have been at the time when I was challenging myself but looking back I really realized where my strengths were and where my weaknesses were, but it gave me tools that I could work on those weaknesses so that I could at least do them to to an average ability even if I wouldn't use them again I wanted to practice them and see which techniques worked for me which models which practices and some of those practices I use all the time now. Others I know were there, and I could go back to them if I wanted it allowed me to understand other sides of the conversation as well, and be perhaps a little bit more empathetic. And I thought I was, however, I think it gave me a different tool to be able to show I was listening. So what does it look like in practice it's neuro linguistic programming isn't it which sounds very fancy but what you're describing sounds very practical so what I mean, yeah how does it work. So well there are lots of different models so you can come at it from lots of different angles so one of the things I really liked was about a behavioral triangle where you get stuck with another person. And you just go round and round and round so if you're trying to help someone, and you're giving them advice and they'll take the advice and then all of a sudden they throw it back at you and you get upset. And then you become that person that moves around in that triangle it. It taught me to, to not always say yes to take a step back to evaluate things that particular model helped me because I could see it and I could see certain people I was stuck with. Okay, how I could maybe change my behavior so instead of running to help all the time maybe tackling it in a different way so that I was allowing that person to make the choices instead of thinking I was being helpful so that could be one tactic. Standing in people's shoes so another tactic is to imagine yourself in that other person's body. And in a particular situation look at it from their side as well as yours or how to be able to remove yourself physically from a situation that is an emotional heightened and become the helper without physically helping them. There's lots of different versions of an NLP things like clean questioning is another example of a really good technique where if you're trying to support someone you're the way that you talk to that person doesn't put any influence on their decision. So you're being careful to manage the way you lead the conversation so the person comes to the decision on their own. There are lots of different versions and NLP different practitioners do it in in in very different ways some people use a lot of breathing and a sort of hypnotic way as well. So it really depends on what you want to get out of it. Why is it so controversial because I know you know you say NLP and it seems to really split opinion and yeah there's a lot of questions there around the science behind it so on and so forth but yeah. I think a lot of people think it's brainwashing. Okay. I think a lot of people think that a lot of the techniques make you think in a different way in a brainwashing way. However, my the person that taught me my practitioner is very open minded and it's it's this is the model. Let's explore it and if it works for you and you can see a benefit from it and you can use that in daily practice. That's great. If it doesn't work for you. That's fine. Let's look for something else that might achieve the same balance. Yeah. So I can see a lot of people think it's brainwashing and it's a bit strange, but actually we're doing it all the time because the way we when we're children. Our brain models are teaching us we absorb everything and that is our belief in that moment. It's as we get older we might change that belief because of the way we've experienced something or the way something has made us felt. It might be that it might be that members all out. So then when you come across that scenario again your brain or instantly say no you can't do that because last time it happened that's that's the result well if that was the case would never move forward so how can we recalibrate that and know that can be changed. It would challenge your beliefs when you were a child because your parents felt it was that way. But if you can understand you've moved forward and you've grown and that experience could be different keeping in mind your previous beliefs as long as your your moral standards are still there then you can achieve more. Does that sort of make sense? Yeah that does make sense. So I guess it's about being yeah being kind of flexible and open minded in our approach and not thinking this is some kind of yeah go bullet I guess is that it's about it's a tool it's a tool. It's a tool and it's allowing you to remember that your brain will always default back to what it thinks is a protective mechanism. Yeah. So if you challenge it then you've got a chance of changing that because if you use that negative as actually experienced and okay I've learned about that next time I could do it differently then your brain won't default back to that behaviour. It will dilute that behaviour the more you do it and it won't become something that challenges you and stops you doing something. I guess it's like anything where we're looking to change habits and feelings that just because something's always been a certain way doesn't mean it always has to be. No I saw something the other day about it was about using breathing and someone had a phobia and they could not get over this phobia. It was a thing about heights and it really challenged them every time they wanted to do something that involved heights. It just could get in an escalator and all sorts of things and by doing the breathing they were able to overcome that and stop the body going back to that default reaction. It took a little bit of time but the more they were able to do baby steps and breathe it through. Eventually they had got to a point where they could stand somewhere and look down and feel alright about it and your brain is only there to protect you but you can challenge it. Yeah and I think that's the thing isn't it? Our brains are amazing things and we don't necessarily understand them brilliantly but yeah there are hacks there aren't there? It feels like yeah breathing is a brain hack. There's a question that came in on Twitter so this is from Priestnell School, their wellbeing room and they said the young people I listen to tell me they worry about hyperventilating. How best to approach discussion around that? I can explain the science behind it at worst you'll pass out but that's not very reassuring. Any ideas or alternative approach please? Well I think hyperventilating, I'm going to go against perhaps what your body would want to say but it's almost holding breaths. So when you're hyperventilating and people say that you actually should breathe in a paper bag what you're doing is you're actually changing the chemical state in your brain because you're breathing in carbon dioxide. Carbon dioxide is acidic and what your brain does it doesn't actually monitor the oxygen in our body it actually monitors the carbon dioxide in our body. So that's why when you're breathing in a bag you're actually changing that state very quickly. A more comfortable way of doing it is to try and practice the box breathing. So if you can get them to try and literally really concentrate on the breathing in and the breathing out and as they start to calm as they breathe in and hold the breath and then breathe out. So don't get them to hold the breath straight away concentrating purely on the breathing in and the breathing out. That first state will just slow the heart down a little bit enough for the brain to recalibrate enough for the person to then who's helping you be heard because when we get into that fight and flight very often we don't even hear anything around us. But if you can literally do it with them so it's a bit like pregnant women when they're breathing in and out it's the same practice is keeping that calm state and hyperventilation at the moment. Is actually becoming it's increasing with we're seeing more and more people doing that because the body becomes overloaded with the emotion. It's then in a in a panic state and it's all it's trying to do is get more and more oxygen in but because we're breathing through the mouse. We're actually just breathing back in the calm dioxide. We've just moved out. So again trying to concentrate on breathing through the nose and just taking slow deep breaths and once they're in a calm state then doing the box breathing should help. So that's how helping in those kind of moments of like yeah big anxiety or panic and trying to stop it spiraling but maybe there's something there as well about sort of the proactive stuff around you know having that practice you know you said about developing those techniques. More generally so because presumably it's easier to use them in those moments if someone prompts you if you've practiced them at a time. So for me when I was doing when I was going into the schools we were doing it. We did it at the beginning of class because very often they would just come in from play time so to get them calm. And so you can do it sitting up. I liked to actually get the children to lie down and it doesn't take long so lie down close their eyes. Keep a distance between other children which naturally we're doing at the moment but try and keep a distance so if they do be a bit fidgety they're not interrupting the other person. If you can put calm music on birdsong especially and if they've got a way of introducing oils lavender oil or I use lavender incense sticks. And get them to just start to breathe to start off with so if the teacher or the person that's actually showing them the technique just calmly says now breathe in. And breathe out and then slowly start introducing the counting so breathe in 234 hold your breath 234 out 234 hold your breath 234. So if you do that and it's pending on the class how fidgety they are I could usually get maybe six times before I could see they were starting to fidget. Generally though, you could actually see the calm come through into the class anyway. And if you can do that so some of the schools were starting to do that in a daily practice but the children sitting up in assembly. And they just did it two or three times but because the children were starting to practice on a regular basis, it didn't feel unusual. That's interesting. I often will teach the box breathing or five finger breathing or one of those simple strategies if I'm giving a keynote or running a big workshop and I always find it incredible how you know if you've got 300 people in the room and you've got them with their hand out in front of them and you're talking them through the breathing, how the energy in the room can completely changes almost instantly. And I think particularly because I'm often teaching about quite challenging stuff we might be talking about self harm or anxiety or suicide or you know really difficult stuff and so you do get that feeling in the room sometimes that it feels quite tense. And yeah it just, I don't know there's something almost you can almost just see it change everything when everyone really relaxes and. Yeah, we did a lot of the practice outside as well so to get the children in present I got initially standing up and just looking around them as to what they could see what they noticed. And then we lay them down and again just ask them to sort of just breathe gently and then close their eyes. And then just for a couple of minutes do the same practice so it was, what could they see what could they hear what could they smell when they were standing and then when they were lying down what could they hear what they smell. And that it that was quite interesting as well that all of a sudden children suddenly realize when their eyes are closed how more connected they are with the environment how much more they can hear or smell or that that association with just removing one of the senses as in not being able to see. So then immediately taking that into a breathing practice because they were calm and they were present. You could connect them very quickly again it was that's quite a nice practice to do as well. If you can do it outside that's fantastic if you can't, you can still create that in the classroom environment by putting music on or something that they can tune into. Yeah, it's a nice idea actually coupling the breathing with the yeah closing your eyes I think I often will talk about sort of taking, you know having mini resets for children who are struggling with kind of anxiety or autistic children who might feel quite overwhelmed and just closing your eyes and kind of looking inwards and shutting yourself off from all that overwhelm is such a powerful thing but I think coupling that with a breathing strategy as well would be super super powerful wouldn't it really powerful technique. Well it's also because it's free and so easy to do. If a child is becoming feel feeling overwhelmed, they can soon nip to a toilet and practice that they don't and the more they practice it the easier it becomes to do it without anybody noticing. So I can find myself in certain situations and and by registering on breathing and doing the breathing it gives me a few moments to think okay what do I want to do with that. Instead of going into that panic mode I can concentrate on the breathing and it just gives my brain a little bit of time to refocus and that's that sometimes all you need is just that moment because that change of state is so second so if you can explain to someone. So if you see a child having a tantrum that state is immediate but it quickly calms down because the body realises it's not in a dangerous state so your breathing settles. And if you're able to remind yourself of that moment when you can feel the anxiety coming that it's only a momentary thing that you can slow it down and you can stop it. It might stop you getting to that next stage of you know panicking, sainting or whatever it is the thing for you when you get overloaded. And I think there's something there as well about talking about what is the worst thing that can happen because I think that the worry about the worry is often that almost you get into that tricky cycle don't you and and yeah trying to kind of yeah circumvent that. It's interesting though hearing you talking about breathing because you suddenly become very aware of your own breathing when you start talking about it don't you. I'm sure people listening are feeling the same but I was just thinking about how it's quite a natural thing isn't it if we know that we're about to do something scary we automatically kind of you know you okay and it's yeah. I think a lot of actors and actresses or performers tend to do it because they're taught to breathe so if you're a singer you're taught to read you mentioned that. So it's a default they can go back to that it's something that's instilled in them in an early age to breathe before they go on to stage. Because those nerves are important to you know I always say to children these these emotions are normal they are there and we can utilize them and we can harness them to become better performers better people. We look at runners and and they they use that adrenaline to get that energy in that sprint. So it's there for a good reason and we can harness those things if we know about them and we understand them. I think a lot of young people at the moment don't understand their emotions because it's something that we we forget to talk about we forget to talk about all of these things that happen in our lives are actually quite normal it's all right to get angry it's all right to get as excited. Those are normal behaviors it's how you manage those so that they don't take over your life. Absolutely and yeah and I think it's a really important point there about actually that some degree of those kind of anxious feelings are yeah protective and positive aren't they I mean you would not be able to. Sit and do an exam for three hours if you didn't have some degree of adrenaline coursing through you, but I guess it's about being able to take that calming breath so that you can get calm enough to actually access your kind of thinking and language. That's the balance isn't it. How can you utilize it for its best things, but also how you've got the quick techniques to recalibrate yourself when you when you need it and for me the breathing just seems to be the simplest and easiest first format. There are lots of other things you can put alongside that that are great and helpful routines and sleep routines and all of those things are great. If you can have the breathing alongside that it has a better bigger impact. Yeah, and it's yeah it's amazing breathing is, yeah, it's making me think this is a slightly random segue but I am always think of myself as someone who can't swim like I have a history of being a very good swimmer and a lot of panic and worry around swimming which is much more really to do with you know kind of anxiety around body and eating disorders and all that sort of thing when I was younger than anything else but as an adult I decided I wanted to see if I could swim and and I tried and found it very hard and and then I got myself some goggles that were prescription goggles and I could see and I was calmer and then I found I actually was quite capable of swimming. And I think it was just because I calmed down and I breathed and I know it sounds really silly but suddenly I mean I wasn't in a brilliant swim but I could do a few lengths and yeah just being able to see and calm down. You've over right the thing is what you've done is you've conquered your fear by by your coping mechanism is to put you in the anxious state so your brain well I can't do it because every time I try, I get into this anxious state so rather than put myself in that place, I just won't do it. So you wanted to challenge yourself so one of the things maybe was that you wanted to be able to see why you could swim because that was helpful to you so by breaking down the little things that would make it more comfortable. It allows you to breathe better and your brain goes okay well maybe we can do a little bit more and maybe you can do a bit more and that is the balance of that's where the NLP comes in because it's it's reminding yourself that you can do it and you can't and very often it's the fear that's behind that can't do whatever that fear or how that manifested itself the brain is a clever thing to remember those moments and it might have been something absolutely small when you were very little that you don't even remember each time you've tried to do it you become more anxious and then it becomes a very big thing but you've broken the cycle and maybe it was just the goggles initially. Yeah I mean that's it I'm sure it was that I convinced myself of that but I tried to be forgiving of myself on that basis because when you can't see everything scary and so it felt like a perfectly logical thing at the time but yes but the key thing I realised was that when I calmed down I could breathe and when I could breathe I could swim and that yes. Yeah and you're more relaxed and when you're more relaxed then you actually achieve things faster and enjoy it and again that's a lot of the thing the brain needs the reward too so when you're enjoying it and you're happy with it then that recalibrates too because what perhaps was a negative now if you are breathing and you enjoy it or at least can do it and achieve it then it's no longer the thing the brain says you can't. Yeah so if in doubt breathe. So we have talked about a lot of different things what what thought would you like to end with what thought do you want to leave people with. I think that if you can bring breathing technique into your life, even in a small way you'll see the benefits very quickly so if you can try and learn to breathe through your nose and that perhaps is the biggest thing that people find hardest. So just take a couple of minutes every day and breathe through your nose focus on it just breathe through your nose then breathe through your chest and take it in baby steps and incorporate the idea of breathing to start off with into your life. And then if you can put aside a few minutes a day. As I said for me it's beginning and end of the day because I've got no distractions to practice that breathing so that when you realize the benefits of what it feels like when you're calm. Hopefully you can put that into practice when you're not feeling so calm when you're feeling challenged, you can actually do it with ease.