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Box breathing

Two for You — take two minutes to live and lead with intention

Episode 5.11

It’s time to take a deep breath. Or several of them. With the research showing the many benefits to the practice of deep breathing, we thought we’d offer a simple practice to help you make that happen. Box breathing — give it a try.

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Transcript

Note: Two for You written transcripts are generated using a combination of speech recognition software and human transcribers, and may contain errors. Please check the corresponding audio before referencing content in print.

[Denise] Hello and welcome to Two for You. As leaders, we often talk about well-being practices, but there's a simple practice that maybe we're not taking advantage of as often as we should have, and that is simply deep breathing. Research shows that taking deep breaths can lower your body temperature. It can slow your heart rate. It helps to regulate emotions. It can put you in a positive mood and it gives you a sense of calm. Now as leaders and community members, I think we could all use a little bit more of that sense of calm.

And so when I'm sharing with you today is a practice called box breathing. And box breathing is a sense of breathing around the box. So if you envision a box, what you can do is that you then take an inhalation for a count of four, take that through your nostrils for a count of four hold that inhalations for four, exhale to a count of four, then hold that exhalation for a count of four. That is one round of box breathing.

It's recommended that you do four rounds. But even if you do one when you're in a kind of a harried state, I think you'll find benefits from it. So this month, as you live and lead with intention, don't forget. Take a deep breath.

Authors: Lori Rothstein and Denise Stromme, former Extension educators

Reviewed in 2021

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