The Power of Breathwork in Managing Cravings

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If you find yourself among the millions of people who battle with addiction and want to stop, chances are you have questions as to where to start. We’re here to help.

Sometimes you just need to stop what you’re doing for a moment and breathe. Navigating addiction recovery is a lifelong journey, and there are usually different seasons when you encounter challenges along the way. When you’re faced with substance cravings, stress, or anxiety, healthy coping mechanisms can be a vital lifeline to staying sober. And like taking deep breaths from time to time, breathwork can be a powerful recovery tool for managing cravings and stress.

What is Breathwork?

We’re always breathing, so much that we usually don’t notice it. So how is breathwork any different from what we’re doing all day, every day? Essentially, breathwork is a series of techniques that focus on controlling your breathing to benefit your physical, mental, and emotional wellness. Breathing exercises may include holding your breath, breathing deeply, and other patterns designed to help you achieve greater self-awareness and personal transformation.

Breathwork has actually been around for thousands of years. Ancient cultures in India, China, Greece, and elsewhere used various types of breathwork for their mental and physical benefits, believe it or not. However, modern breathwork techniques utilized today primarily got their start in the 1960s and 1970s. In pursuit of both healing and spiritual awakening, breathwork was initially utilized during this time as a way to experience altered states of consciousness, shares BreathlessExpeditions.com. Eventually, breathwork exercises were adapted as a way to release traumatic memories and emotions associated with childhood trauma.

Today, breathwork draws upon both Eastern influences and Western therapy approaches. It’s used in a variety of ways, including breathwork for sleep, in mindfulness meditation, as a form of experiential therapy, and in personal self-care practices. Current breathwork techniques can be helpful for a variety of needs and challenges, including:

  • Relaxation
  • Mental clarity
  • Tension
  • Challenging emotions
  • Chronic pain
  • Grief and loss
  • Anger issues

Using breathwork for anxiety, trauma, PTSD, and other mental health conditions is common, too. Yet, it’s also incorporated today as part of a holistic treatment approach for addictions in many inpatient and outpatient rehab facilities. Therapists have found that various breathwork techniques can be helpful for addressing both the mental and physical issues associated with struggling from addiction, as well as for maintaining long-term sobriety.

What are the Different Types of Breathwork Techniques?

There are all kinds of breathwork techniques and exercises. Whether you’re interested in breathwork training for your own personal benefit or considering it as a way to cope in recovery, it’s important to understand the different types of breathwork you may encounter. Here are just a few of many common breathwork techniques:

Holotropic Breathwork

Meant to help with emotional healing and personal growth, holotropic breathwork aims to produce an altered state of consciousness that can help activate your ability to self-heal. This breathwork exercise involves breathing rapidly for an extended period of time while lying down. Guided by a practitioner, a holotropic breathwork session is usually accompanied by music to help you transition into a trance-like state. Once the session ends, you’re asked to creatively express and discuss your experience, explains Healthline.com, in hopes of bringing about improved self-awareness and better psychological development.

Somatic Breathwork

Somatic breathwork emphasizes the importance of the mind-body connection, based on the belief that your memories, thoughts, emotions, and physical touch are all interconnected to each other. A somatic breathwork session focuses on intentionally controlling your breathing to connect the body and mind so you can improve your overall physical and emotional wellness. Breathing exercises can vary from deep breaths to rhythmic patterns to produce relaxation and mindfulness.

Rebirthing Breathwork

The practice of rebirthing breakwork is all about ridding blocked energy associated with past trauma from your mind and body. Aided by music and a breathwork class facilitator, you’re invited to lie down and engage in several rounds of “conscious connected circular breathing” for a set period of time. As a result, you’re able to expose underlying inhibitions, emotions, and trauma and ultimately release them, giving you a sense of renewal and rebirth so you can achieve your full potential.

Box Breathing

Also known as 4×4, square, or four-square breathing, box breathing is a breathwork technique that utilizes deep, intentional, and slow breaths. This easy type of breathwork is meant to help alleviate symptoms of stress or anxiety, as these conditions can often interfere with your breathing’s natural cadence. The process of box breathing is simple:

  1. Take in a deep breath in for 4 seconds
  2. Hold your breath for 4 seconds
  3. Exhale slowly for 4 seconds
  4. Hold your breath for 4 seconds

The box breathing process is usually repeated multiple times to help restore a sense of calm and normal breathing patterns. While it can help you relax, box breathing can also quiet your mind and increase your focus in the moment.

The Benefits of Breathwork in Addiction Recovery

When you’re navigating addiction recovery, learning how to cope with your addiction triggers and cravings is critical to staying the course in sobriety. So how can breathwork help keep you on track with your sobriety goals? Here are some key breathwork benefits you can experience along your recovery journey:

Anxiety and Stress Reduction

Stress and anxiety are often catalysts that lead people to self-medicate, which can eventually spiral into substance abuse and addiction. It’s no wonder that stress and anxiety are common triggers you’ll encounter in recovery, which so often lead to substance cravings. However, breathwork meditation and therapy actually helps reduce stress and anxiety by calming your nervous system, which then keeps addiction cravings at bay.

Improved Emotional Regulation

The ability to manage your emotions—both the good and the bad—is a critical aspect of staying sober. Because many types of breathwork are designed to help you process your emotions in a healthy way, they can also help you get better at your ability to emotionally self-regulate. That means, when negative feelings arise, you’re able to cope with your emotions in productive ways that don’t lead to relapse.

Increased Mindfulness

Breathwork’s mind-body connection helps you cultivate mindfulness. This important recovery skill is defined as the awareness of your internal states and surroundings. Mindfulness allows you to observe your present experiences, thoughts, and emotions without judgement, according to the American Psychological Association. As a result, mindfulness can help you get better at recognizing triggering thoughts and cravings in the present.

Better Physical Health

While breathwork can help you emotionally and mentally, it can aid in improving your physical health, too. Practicing breathwork exercises over time can boost respiratory efficiency, increase lung capacity, aid in detoxification, and increase your body’s oxygen intake. The relaxation breathwork produces also helps lower blood pressure and relieve muscle tension. All of this leads to enhanced overall wellness, which puts you in a better position to stay sober for the long haul.

Greater Mental Focus

Because breathwork techniques involve conscious, intentional breathing, they can help strengthen your mental clarity and focus (and the increased oxygen levels in your brain certainly help, too). These improved mental capabilities can help you develop better discipline in your recovery efforts and make smart, more thoughtful decisions.

What About Breathwork Dangers?

While there are many benefits of breathwork in the recovery journey, some of the more challenging techniques do pose some risks. There is the risk for hyperventilation (especially for those new to breathwork), which can lead to dizziness, irregular heartbeat, and a lack of oxygen.

Certain types of breathwork can also generate intense emotional responses that can be difficult to manage, so it’s best to work with professionals who can provide guidance in these cases. Holotropic breathwork specifically, shares VerywellMind.com, can lead to distress in people at risk for psychosis.

How to Do Breathwork: Tips to Make It Work for You

Though certain breathwork techniques are best utilized in a group breathwork class led by a professional, other exercises—like box breathing—can easily be done on your own. With that said, before jumping in, here are a few practical tips that can help make your breathwork experience successful:

  • Start slowly: Breathwork takes time to get used to. If you’re a beginner at breathwork, it’s a good idea to take it slow. This also means you don’t have to set aside a lot of time in your schedule, either. Start with a few minutes a day and go from there.
  • Practice consistently: The rewards of breathwork don’t happen overnight. That’s why it’s important to utilize breathwork exercises on a consistent basis. Over time, you’ll get better at it–and reap the benefits.
  • Find a quiet place: Because breathwork meditation requires intentionality and self-reflection, it’s best to find somewhere where you won’t be distracted, if possible.

Breathwork as Part of Holistic Addiction Recovery

Whether you’re seeking inpatient or outpatient therapy for addiction, breathwork works best as part of an integrative, holistic treatment process focused on your individual needs. After all, comprehensive, personalized care puts you in the best position to overcome your addiction and achieve lasting recovery.

At Defining Wellness Centers in Mississippi, breathwork is just one of many experiential and evidence-based therapy modalities we use to treat addiction. We also understand that your physical and emotional wellness are important to your sobriety, so our fitness and nutrition programs are a critical aspect of our treatment approach. To learn how our inpatient, outpatient, aftercare, and alumni programs empower you to stay healthy long-term, contact our team today.

 

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If you are ready to take the step towards a new life, call Defining Wellness today and learn more about how we can help you.