A Most Valuable Gift
Is knowing the power of my breath.
What does that mean?
My understanding of this gift has grown over time, and perhaps that is a truth about the nature of gifts. My first inkling of the importance of my breath came while working a high-stress job in the financial services industry. On the outside, my life looked shiny and wonderful: I worked in a beautiful office overlooking a golf course and the ocean. I was earning good money, drove a nice car, owned two properties, and conducted my life like a checklist. I had expected that checking all the boxes on that list would lead to happiness and a high quality of life. That outer shiny was not reflected inside of me.
Internally, I was a mess. Though sober, I was hiding many, many things I was ashamed of, most notably an eating disorder and heaps of stuff I could not, would not name. I carried a lot of responsibility in my position. I also felt personally responsible for clients’ financial well-being. Carrying around that sense of responsibility exaggerated my stress. At that time, I was unable to see it. My health was suffering as a result of my maladaptive coping mechanisms.
As I was sitting in my office one day, making calls to clients regarding market volatility, I realized I was hearing white noise. My field of vision had narrowed to a pinpoint. My heart was pounding, and more significantly, I noticed that I was holding my breath. I have no idea how long I had been holding my breath nor what prompted me to do so. I only knew, at that moment, that holding my breath like that was harming me. I had a deep, deep sense that I had held my breath like that many times before but hadn’t noticed.
At that moment, I felt the awareness of holding my breath was significant, I just did not understand why. That moment frightened me. It connected me to a deep pool of emotion and experiences that I did not want to look at. I had spent many years desperately avoiding me: my emotions, my thoughts, my behavior, my maladaptive coping mechanisms. I shut that moment out of my mind and in doing so, lost all benefit of that awareness.
Then, my life began to spiral out of control. The things on the outside, the stuff I had worked so hard to earn, that I used to convince myself that I was normal, I lost. I had health problems that got worse. I was making terrible relationship decisions. I harmed the people I loved the most. I was so disconnected emotionally that I could not have told you why I was making any of the decisions I was making. I was so lost, and I couldn’t even say that.
As my life continued to unravel, I had a moment of recognition that I was out of control. I needed help. I confessed to my doctor that I had an eating disorder and “some stuff”. I didn’t know what the stuff was, but I knew it was there. I began working with a therapist.
In the course of losing everything, I experienced debilitating depression. I could barely leave the house. Every day I would awaken with the thought, “f***, I’m awake again”. It was a bleak time in my life. I was struggling. I was isolated.
I had to make some changes in the way I was living my life. I continued in therapy, ended a destructive relationship, ended my career in financial services, and moved back to Maui in a desperate attempt to jump-start my life. I was willing to work any job that paid the bills. I was grateful to clock in and clock out with minimal job responsibilities. I needed to reduce the amount of stress in my life so I could learn new ways of coping.
I resurrected my yoga practice, showing up on my mat, hoping that connecting to my body would be healing. For thousands of hours on my mat, I learned how to feel my breath working in my body, to feel new neural pathways firing, to move parts of my body that I had ignored. I loved my practice. I loved the breath-linked movements. I was reaping benefits from breathwork without realizing it. I was aware that I was slowly connecting to my emotions, the ones I had bottled up and denied for decades.
As my life stabilized, I studied more about yoga and discovered different meditation and breathwork styles. I experienced a chanting meditation that resonated deep inside of me and exposed a powerful connection to myself. From that day, I continued to practice that chanting meditation. It calmed me and helped me develop awareness.
I started exploring more types of breathwork. I noticed that I could use breathwork to calm myself down or to build energy. I used breathwork to interrupt obsessive thought patterns and to enhance the Vipassana meditation practice I had grown. My breath was becoming a foundation of my well-being, healing, and recovery. I started to value my breath.
When I decided to trek in the Himalayas, I prepared myself, training my breath through hiking, hot yoga, and swimming. In particular, using swimming to increase the number of strokes I could take in between breaths without feeling air hunger. Training my breath was vital to ascending high altitudes where the available oxygen is only 50% of that at sea level.
While trekking in the Himalayas, I had two primary goals each day: 1) No injury. 2) Stay ahead of my breath. I discovered that moving my body at a pace where I did not become winded or experience air hunger supported my goal of avoiding injury. Bringing such intense focus to my breathing while trekking helped me see a truth: that breathing was the most important thing I did each day. Those days of trekking in the Himalayas were a meditation of breathing and connectedness. I had a deep awareness of the gift of my breath. The power of my breath.
My breath continues to be an essential focus of my day. I practice several types of breathwork. I check in with myself many times a day to ensure I breathe properly: through the nose, engaging my diaphragm with my exhales slightly longer than my inhales.
Focusing on my breath is like a secret magic trick. I can turn my internal state from stress and anxiety to calm and relaxed in a matter of moments. I can generate energy. I can do it silently and unobtrusively. I can do it anywhere and at any time. I carry this gift with me, all the time.
