Types of Breathing: Ways of Breathing in Yoga and Meditation

Breathing is the mechanical action that we carry out 24 hours a day without stopping and that is vital for our body, but did you know that it can be done in different ways if we put our attention on it? This is how they teach us practices like meditation and yoga.

When we go to our yoga practice, we perform different types of breathing that help us achieve different states of consciousness, but they also make it easier for us to make movements and postures while oxygenate our Body. We tell you the different types of respiration that exist and its use in yoga and meditation.

• Types of yoga: the 18 variants that you can practice and their benefits

Breathing in yoga and meditation

Yoga is a philosophy of life that emerged more than 5,000 years ago in the East. Practiced by Hindus, Buddhists and now, by us Westerners, yoga teaches us to connect our exterior and our interior, that our everything is one and in this sense, that we work body, mind and spirit.

Whatever type of yoga we practice, they all share the three principles of yoga which are: asanas, that is, postures; vinyasa-krama, which are the sequences of these postures; Y

pranayama, the breath that gives rhythm and awareness to our asanas and that leads us to meditation.

Breathing in yoga (or pranayama) is not the same as what we do mechanically to give oxygen to our body and subsist, precisely what you are doing at this moment unconsciously while reading this Article.

As in meditation, there are also different types of breathing in yoga, which fundamentally keeps us aware of the inhale and exhale to be present in the now, in the yoga asanas that you are doing and transferring this well-being to your everyday life.

In this way, pranayama or different types of breathing are one of the keys to yoga, because it is a gateway to the alignment and purification of body and mind. Pranayama is a Sanskrit word (sacred language) that translates Prana as "pra, first unit, na, energy" and Yama as "controlling and extending, manifestation or expansion." Hatha Yoga Pradipika explains breathing thus: "When the breath comes and goes, the mind is restless, but when the breath calms, the mind also calms."

• Related article: "The 7 most common yoga poses and what they are for”

The types of breathing in yoga

In general, we can differentiate 4 different types of breathing that we can do consciously while practicing yoga or meditating:

1. Low or diaphragm breathing

Its about most common type of breathing of all. In it, the air of inspiration enters the lungs, thanks to which the diaphragm falls and the abdomen swells. As this happens, the air massages our stomach, pancreas, spleen and viscera, making them work much better.

After this, in the exhalation that we do with this type of breath, the diaphragm rises again and the stomach descends, so it looks as if it is sinking.

Low or diaphragm breathing is very relaxing, but if we practice it continuously, it can cause our back to take a bad posture and that the abdominal muscles become distended.

Master Iyengar (who expanded yoga to the West) explains that breathing must begin at the base of the diaphragm, very close to the pelvic girdle. In this way, breathing helps us to relax the rib cage, neck and face, where the organs with which the 5 senses work are also relaxed.

2. High or clavicular breathing

It is a more shallow type of breathing. When we do it, we bring the shoulders and clavicle up during the inhalation while contracting the abdomen. This is why it requires a great effort, since we must obtain little air.

3. Middle or thoracic breathing

This type of breathing is incomplete, since we do it using the muscles of the rib area that, during inhalation, the rib cage is opened or expanded to the sides.

4. Deep or complete breathing

This type of breathing is the sum of the previous three and we use it a lot in yoga practices. During inhalation, the air fills the lower, middle and upper part of the lungs first.. In this process, the shoulders and chest remain static, they do not move and it is the ribs that expand. Then, when you exhale, the air comes out in the reverse way it entered the lungs, and the ribs contract.

Types of pranayamas

Pranayamas are more specific types of breathing that we also do during yoga practice, which lead us towards concentration and control of the energy that we hold during breathing. Pranayamas there are many, but we present the most common in these types of breathing.

1. Ujjayi breath

Ujjayi translates "to be victorious" and according to the Hindus, when we practice this type of breathing, the body fills with prana (energy), warms up, becomes oxygenated and relaxes.

To practice it, one of the tricks is to know that this type of breathing has its own sound, you must be able to hear it and your yoga partners as well. For this, we must close the back of the throat, that is, with the glottis of the neck contracted during deep inhalation, and when we exhale we will hear a kind of HA in the throat.

2. Kapalabhati breath

The "forehead purification" breath is, as the name suggests, a type of breath to purify the "Bhatis", improving blood circulation, oxygenation of the body and purifying the Ajna Chakra (chakra of the third eye).

Is about a rapid but very deep inhalation and exhalation into the lungs, which is done for 10 times in a row. This is followed by a deep breath, in which a long breath is held and finished with a rapid exhalation. During the latter, attention should be directed to the heart.

3. Pranayama Bhastrika

This type of breathing, which is translated as "bellows", is used to purify all the chakras and, therefore, improve their functioning. Regarding its methodology, breathing is done the same as in Kapalabhati pranayama, but in this case we must visualize while we breathe how the energy goes up our spine and then down to the heart.

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