Chest Breathing or Chest Tension?

If you are a shallow breather chances are you hold a lot of tension in your neck and shoulders. This indicates more often than not that your breath is short and located mostly in the chest and upper back, which means you are not befitting from a full diaphragmatic and functional breath.

Chest and neck tension also relate to both subtle or obvious anxiety and fear, emotions that can activate the vagus nerve to put us on high alert as we search for emotional or physical safety from real or perceived danger.

From the standpoint of the inner web of fascia, our connective tissue, there is no separation between the vagus nerve, the diaphragm, or the heart. What affects one will affect the others.

About the Vagus Nerve

The vagus nerve is the longest and most complex of the 12 pairs of cranial nerves that emanate from the brain. The vagus nerve has two branches—abdominal and dorsal—that regulate abdominal functions and heart rate. The majority of its information is sent from the body to the brain via afferent or ascending nerves.

The vagus nerve is mainly responsible for the regulation and balance of the sympathetic  (SNS) and parasympathetic (PNS) nervous systems, which are the two aspects of your autonomic nervous system that are responsible for your emotional responses and expression. When we experience stress, anxiety, or fear, the vagus nerve will fire, producing a sympathetic fight or flight response. This could be felt in a variety of ways, including increased heart rate, rapid breathing, abdominal tension, digestive distress, and/or back pain.

The Little Brain of The Heart

In 1991 Dr. Andrew Armour of the UCLA Neurocardiology Research Center* discovered the heart is home to over 40,000 cognitive cells, he called the “little brain of the heart”, or the intrinsic cardiac nervous system. What is really interesting is that the heart can make decisions independent from the brain and can communicate those decisions to the brain through the vagus nerve. Amazing, right? *

Because of this connection and the fact that the vagus nerve is 80 to 90% sensory, your autonomic nervous system continually responds to all kinds of subtle information from your inner and outer environment, including your cherished memories and beliefs, as well as any negative self-talk you revisit over and over.

So whether your vagus nerve is responding to past memories of stress, as in PTSD, or current anxieties and fears, it can become hypersensitive and reactive, altering your breath, heart rate, diaphragmatic tone, and emotional responses.

When you habitually chest breathe or habitually focus on negative thoughts, you are stimulating your vagus nerve. Over time this tends to lead to loss of tone and inability of the vagus to successfully regulate your sympathetic and parasympathetic responses.*

Heart Rate Variability Reflects Vagal Tone

According to Patrick McKeown, a leading international expert on breathing and sleep, and author of The Oxygen Advantage, a healthy heart rate varies in intensity, speed, and rhythm to help us maintain the balance and ability to respond quickly (SNS) and recover with ease (PNS) when faced with a challenging event. This is called heart rate variability (HRV) and is linked to both breath and emotion. “HRV is measurable and allows researchers to study stress as a physiological issue rather than a purely psychological or emotional issue,” writes McKeown. *

He emphasizes that when the vagus nerve is stimulated over and over as in chronic stress, the sympathetic nervous system goes into overdrive, which causes the heart rate to increase and remain high. In this heightened state, the heart is less flexible and the variation between beats is smaller, indicating the system has lost some of its heart rate variability and vagal tone, both indicators of reduced health.

The Breath Harmonizes Heart Rate

Fortunately, it is possible to improve and sustain healthy levels of heart rate variability and vagal tone by shifting from chest breathing to diaphragmatic or functional breathing.

Try this for yourself: Using the image of a jellyfish swimming, focus your attention on the circle of the diaphragm to expand it evenly front, back, and sides on the inhale, followed by circular folding of the upper and lower abdomen on the exhale, like a jelly fish squeezing its long tentacles to propel itself through the water.*

During an inhale the SNS causes the heart rate to speed up slightly, during an exhale the vagus nerve secretes acetylcholine, which triggers the PNS to slow the heart rate and lower blood pressure.  Because the out breath is directly controlled by the vagus nerve, by increasing the length of your exhalation it is possible to stimulate the vagus nerve to activate at will the PNS “rest and digest,” response, according to McKeown.

How Long Should You Exhale?

While there is a fair amount of research available indicating the optimal breath for increased heart rate variability and vagal tone is an even 5.5 counts in and 5.5 counts out, it may not be appropriate in all situations.*

In a situation where the vagus nerve may be hyper sensitive as in chronic stress or anxiety, slow even breathing could actually evoke unresolved emotions and thus increase heart rate with an added loss of ease.

In those situations the classic yoga breath technique to reduce emotional distress is to inhale 4 and exhale 7. In my personal experience of rapid heart rate and loss of vagal tone due to sleep apnea and anxiety, the longer exhale is currently more beneficial to me than an even breath. It helps me to settle my heart while increasing vagal tone through PSN response, which in turn helps to settle my spirit in my body.

How long a person should exhale is variable according to the needs of the individual. When you practice jellyfish or functional breathing, you might observe that your exhales naturally begin to lengthen. You may also experience a slight pause at the end of the exhalation.

I recommend you give your exhalation full attention, circularly hugging in from the upper to the lower abdomen until your pelvic floor contracts lightly and lifts, an action known in yoga as Mula Bhanda. Now also observe how any tension in the upper chest and neck begins to melt. Then relax your belly completely to begin your next circular inhalation. Let the breath fall into the lower abdomen and pelvis to allow the pelvic floor to receive the breath fully.

This type of breathing can be done anytime anywhere to help you reduce anxiety and come fully present to the circumstances at hand and the unfolding possibilities. I recommend a regular practice of 3-5 minutes at a time.

Leave a comment and let me know how it goes!

Next Blog will explore the importance of nose breathing and Breath Work practices. Also, watch for a foundational course called Consciously Exhale: The Power of Breath coming in August 2022.

In the Light of Yoga. Namaste, Lillah Schwartz

References:

* Dr Andrew Armour M.D. Ph.D. – Intrinsic cardiac neurons https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1540-8167.1991.tb01330.x

*The Intrinsic Cardiac Nervous System: Dr Armour on YouTube

 *The Oxygen Advantage, Patrick McKeown, 2016

* Oxygen Advantage Vagal Nerve and HRV Research Online

* Heart Brain Communication / Heartmath Institute

*5 Breathing Practices to Support Mind/Body Health, article by Robin Rothenburg

Breathing Techniques for Stress Relief https://www.webmd.com/balance/stress-management/stress-relief-breathing-techniques