28: The Way to Breathe – The Oxygen Advantage with Patrick McKeown

The breath is the bridge between the mind and the body.

This episode with international best-selling author of The Oxygen Advantage® and master breath instructor, Patrick McKeown, will change the way you think about breathing.  How do you increase health, performance, resilience, mindfulness, fitness, and train the brain to be focused while lowering stress?  You follow the breath through your nose. But it’s more than that. Mastering your breath is the path to finding peace and potential, and this episode is the roadmap.

In our culture, we prioritize health and fitness with an emphasis and education on hydration and nutrition.  But, we can last days and weeks respectively with out either of those. It is air/oxygen, that we wouldn’t last minutes without. Without functional breathing, we do not have functional movement. But what is functional breathing? How can we most efficiently breath oxygen from the atmosphere and get it into the cells of our bodies? Why does that process matter to the health of our minds and bodies?

We answer all these questions and more.  Patrick and his breath work has not only forever changed the way I breath, but also the way I teach my kids about breathing.  I never thought I would be the one taping my mouth closed at night, but with an open mind I realized that it was my own mental boulder that was blocking my path. I am completely grateful and honored to have had the opportunity to sit down, face to face, with Patrick for this episode.  His knowledge, passion, and humility on this topic is fascinating.  Remember I warned you, you will forever be changed after this one!

Strength is a Choice,

Scott

SHOW NOTES AND TOPICS:

Intro: The Obstacle in our Path

5:30  Why is light breathing and nasal breathing not common knowledge?  Breathing less is more.

7:55  Advice to teenager: Find the job you absolutely love to do.

Your profession is not what brings home your pay. Your profession is what you were put on this earth to do with such passion and such intensity that it becomes spiritual in calling. -Vincent Van Gogh.

Looking at sleep to change resilience.

13:00 THE BREATH – How you breathe and how much you breathe matters.

Why do people end up chronic over breathing through the mouth?

16:35  If you mouth breath during the day or during sleep, you’re likely to gas out too soon during physical exercise, your mind is likely to be agitated, and your sleep is affected. 

20:18  How do you train the brain to be focused? You follow the breath. 

21:08  The Oxygen (Carbon Dioxide) Paradox and the Bohr Effect

How do you increase CO2?  You slow down your breathing. Don’t over exhale your CO2.

25:37  Light Breathing Exercise – and why it lowers stress and raises performance

35:00 Wim Hof breathing, box breathing, and “deep breathing”.

Wim Hof Method vs. The Oxygen Advantage

43:38  What I do is breath holding to change the brains sensitivity to CO2. I purposefully and deliberately increase CO2 in the blood. We hold the breath to increase CO2 in the blood to change the ...