7 Ways to Practice Breath Work for Beginners

There’s a reason “take a deep breath” is a phrase people often say to each other during moments of stress.

“Breath work is the foundation for stress management,” says Alistair Hawkes, a licensed professional counselor and certified Clarity Breathwork practitioner in Lakewood, Colorado.

Anxiety may give you an impulse to act fast, but the practice of intentionally breathing is often the best first step to facing a stressful situation.

And while breath work is a bit more complicated than simply inhaling and exhaling, there are plenty of beginner-friendly techniques you can get started with on your own.

Breath work describes a range of breathing exercises designed to enhance physical, spiritual, and mental health.

Within published research, breath work is commonly referred to in terms of “interventions” such as diaphragmatic breathing, breathing techniques, or even breathing rehabilitation, which we will discuss later in the article.

It’s important to note that breath work, like many health and wellness practices we now study, has been around much longer than modern research.

“Western science is patting itself on the back for saying breath work works, whereas [some] people have been doing this for [millennia],” says Hawkes.

Research shows a variety of intentional breathing methods may benefit people experiencing certain health conditions. Breath work may:

• Reduce stress and anxiety

  [1]

• Improve immune response

  [2]

• Decrease hypertension and heart rate

  [3]

• Support COPD rehabilitation

  [4]

• Temporarily reduce neck pain

  [5]

• Aid glycemic control in people with type 2 diabetes

  [6]

• Improve the quality of life in people with cancer by reducing anxiety and depression symptoms

  [7]

• Reduce symptoms of bronchial asthma

  [8]

Breath work and meditation are interconnected processes, often used together, though they have distinct aims.

The goal of breath work is to alter your breathing in order to control your physiological responses, whereas the primary aim of meditation is to foster awareness of both your state of body and mind.

Breath work is a helpful compliment to meditation, because it can help you focus on the present moment. Similarly, meditation can help you assess your body’s needs before starting breath work, and enjoy the benefits of intentional breathing as they come.

Therefore, it can be difficult to separate the two completely, and there is really no need to understand the difference before getting started.

“We all breathe, all the time. The way that we breathe is what makes the difference,” says Jessie Taylor, a cofounder and the director of education at the Mindfulness Center, an online health institute focused on mind-body practices.

When we are under stress — whether running from a predator or dealing with a particularly frustrating email — the brain turns on the sympathetic nervous system (SNS), which governs the flight, fight, or freeze response. You'll notice the activation of your SNS if you have shallow breathing, tense shoulders, increased blood pressure, or an upset stomach.

Countering the SNS is the parasympathetic nervous system (PNS), or the rest-and-digest response, where you are in a state of calm. When you release tension with a big sigh or exhalation, you’re moving away from the fight-or-flight response and into the rest-and-digest response.

“A sigh of relief releases carbon dioxide and literally changes the biochemistry in your brain,” explains Taylor.

As you prepare to try deep-breathing practices, here are a few things to keep in mind.

1. Take It Easy at the Start

“The most important thing is to start slow, start small, and work your way up. You want to condition your nervous system,” explains Hawkes. “You can’t go run a marathon when you haven’t run a mile.”

Hawkes says beginners should set a timer for one minute and avoid long meditations. Increase the time as you get used to breath work.

2. Move the Breath to the Belly

Deep breathing won’t make your shoulders or upper chest move dramatically. A sign that you’re engaging your diaphragm is that your lower abdomen is filling and emptying. Try placing a hand on your belly and practice pushing it in and out.

3. You Can’t Really Do It Wrong

At its most basic level, breath work floods the brain with oxygen and removes larger amounts of carbon dioxide — you can’t mess that up.

“Whatever technique it is, just the fact that we are paying attention to our breath bridges the gap from the sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous systems,” says Taylor.

4. Find a Breath Work Practice That Resonates With You

The ultimate goal of your breath work practice is to activate the PNS, and there are many techniques that can help you achieve that. Hawkes says it’s all about finding the one you like and can use consistently.

Here are a handful of breathing techniques and how they may help you promote health and relaxation in your body.

1. Dirga Pranayama, aka Diaphragm Breathing

Hindu in origin, pranayama is the type of breathing you might learn in a yoga class. It refers to slow, deep breathing.

How to do it:

1. Start by sitting up or lying on your back with your hands resting on your belly, just below the navel. As you breathe in, let your belly soften and expand like a balloon. When you breathe out, let your belly sink toward your spine.
2. Place one hand on your ribs and the other on your belly. Breathe in slowly, let your belly soften, and feel your ribs expand.
3. Move the hand that was on your ribs to your upper chest, just below the collarbone. As you inhale, allow your belly to soften, your ribs to expand, and upper chest to broaden. As you exhale, let everything go.
4. Repeat.

Hawkes recommends taking three to five (or up to 10) of these deep breaths every morning before you get out of bed, again anytime during the day when you’re stressed out, and again before you go to sleep at night. Do this every day for three weeks.

“You might get bored, you might wonder why,” she says, “but stick with it because, over time, your limbic brain will begin to respond to your mindfulness and breath.”

2. Sama Vritti Pranayama With Antara Kumbhaka and Bahya Kumbhaka, aka Box Breathing

Kumbhaka pranayamas are a type of breathing exercise in which you hold your breath after inhaling and exhaling. Holding air in the lungs after inhaling is called antara (inner) kumbhaka, and momentarily holding the breath after exhaling is called bahya (outer) kumbhaka.

You will find a variety of counting patterns if you research box breathing — for example, 4-7-8 or 4-4-4-4 — but beginners should find their own pace, says Taylor.

“Count slowly as you inhale and see whatever number you come to and match that at your exhale.”

How to do it:

1. Sit in a relaxed position, and exhale all the air in your lungs out through your mouth.
2. Close your lips and use your nose to inhale slowly from your belly, and count to 4 as you breathe in, filling the lungs.
3. Hold the air in your lungs while you silently count from 1 to 4, and then slowly release the air through your mouth as you count from 1 to 4.
4. Repeat three to seven times. Do not practice while driving or using machinery, as it may cause a slight light-headedness with prolonged practice.

3. Nadi Shodhana Pranayama, aka Alternate-Nostril Yoga Breathing (ANYB)

The name of this Hindu practice can be translated as “channel purifying,” and it's a gentle exercise that might be helpful for people who don’t want to sit still.

This technique involves breathing through one nostril at a time, while manually closing the other nostril, to facilitate alternate breathing and airflow.

How to do it:

1. Sit comfortably and rest your right hand on your knee. Use your left thumb to gently close your left nostril. Inhale slowly through the right nostril, then take your thumb off your left nostril and close the right nostril with your ring finger.
2. Hold your breath for a moment, then exhale through the now open left nostril.
3. Breathe in through the open left nostril, then hold the breath and take your ring finger off the right nostril and put the thumb back on the left nostril. Breath out the right nostril.
4. Repeat this on each nostril 5 to 10 times.

4. Ujjayi Pranayama, aka Ocean Sounding Breath

Sanskrit for “victorious breath,” ujjayi is another pranayama (yoga breathing) technique. Ujjayi generates a “haaa” sound on the exhale.

How to do it:

1. While sitting up, inhale through your nose.
2. As you slowly exhale, contract your throat and make a gentle “haaaa” ocean sound. If you’re a beginner, it’s easier to make the sound while exhaling with your mouth open. A helpful body cue for this is to imagine using your breath to fog up a window.
3. As you become advanced, try exhaling without opening the mouth. A tip here is to try to sound like Darth Vader from Star Wars.
4. Repeat until you feel relaxed.

5. Buteyko Breathing Technique (BBT)

Created in the 1950s by a Ukrainian doctor named Konstantin Buteyko, this technique has been explored for those who experience respiratory distress or panic attacks. It focuses on creating “air hunger” to normalize breathing — in other words, relaxing the diaphragm until you feel the lack of air.

“Air hunger” is a sign that CO2 levels are rising and the body is adapting to a more efficient breathing pattern. It's a controlled and gradual process, not meant to cause significant discomfort or anxiety.

How to do it:

1. During this exercise, you should breathe exclusively through your nose. In a relaxed sitting position, elongate your spine and sit upright. Start with some easy, deep breaths.
2. After a calm and relaxed exhale, hold your breath and gently plug your nose. This is called the control pause.
3. When you feel the need to take a breath (you begin to experience “air hunger”), gently release your nose and take a slow, easy breath in. Your diaphragm might involuntarily move, but do not panic or gasp.
4. Breathe normally and evenly again for at least 10 seconds. Repeat three to five times.

6. Hasyayoga, aka Laughter Yoga

Laughing releases feel-good brain chemicals like dopamine, oxytocin, endorphins, and serotonin. And in the same way that the brain can’t sort perceived danger from real danger, it can’t entirely tell the difference between manufactured laughter and real laughter.

To begin this exercise, you could simply start spontaneously laughing, smiling, and clapping. But if you’d like to follow a more regimented approach, try these steps.

How to do it:

1. From a confident standing position, and with a smile on your face, cross your right hand over to meet your left hand near your left hip and clap your hands while exhaling “ho ho.”
2. Pull the arms up on a diagonal to the right side of the head and clap while exhaling “ha ha ha.”
3. Repeat that three times. After the last “ha ha ha,” reach both arms above your head and exclaim “Yay!” then start laughing.

7. Heart Rate Variability Biofeedback (HRVB With Breathing Awareness)

If seeing is believing for you, HRVB is a biofeedback tool that can show you that your breathing is getting deeper.

If you’re working with a biofeedback specialist, you’ll be hooked up to a few monitoring devices, but you can do an at-home version as well. You’ll need a tool that will measure your heart rate — many smart watches and apps have this feature.

The goal of HRVB is to have your breathing match your heart rate patterns.

How to do it:

1. From a relaxed sitting position, note your current heart rate on your device of choice.
2. Begin breathing deeply into the belly. Visualize a roller coaster track. On your inhales, imagine a car climbing up the track, and on the exhale imagine the car going down the track. Your goal is to have a smooth ride for the car as it goes up and down over and over, pausing slightly between each inhale and exhale.
3. After five breaths check your heart rate number. Your goal is to get your current heart rate number below the starting heart rate number. Once you have it there you can finish your practice.

• Breath work is a simple way to help calm your mind and body, especially during times of stress.
• Practices like diaphragmatic breathing, alternate-nostril breathing, and box breathing are accessible to beginners and offer both physical and mental health benefits.
• Research shows that breathwork, in general, may improve your mood, sleep, and heart health.
• Experts recommend starting slow, focusing on belly breathing, and choosing a practice that feels enjoyable and sustainable to you.
• If you are struggling, seek out a certified breath work facilitator or a yoga or meditation teacher for help.