Breathe Deep for Your Health

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Birds do it. Bees do it. We do it. We exhale and release into the atmo­sphere carbon dioxide, a chemical that promotes the growth of plants and prevents the sun’s radiant energy from returning to space. With our breath, we keep the planet from becoming a desert.

Apparently, one of our functions on this earth is to be gardeners–unwitting caretakers of a fragile ecosystem. We may be detrimental to the environment in other ways, but when we empty our lungs, we help make the grass grow greener.

For some reason, in our culture, there is a lot more emphasis on inhaling than on exhaling. While we associate taking in oxygen with doing something useful and good for ourselves, we expel carbon dioxide surreptitiously, almost as if we were taking out the garbage–in a rush, nose pinched, mouth open.

Always on the uptake, we derive almost no pleasure from relaxing our chests, clearing our airways, and sending forth some colorless CO2 into the blue yonder.

To breathe deeply and effortlessly, don’t wait to exhale. Think of breathing as giving, not taking. Just tell yourself that you are going to fill up your lungs in order to expel as much air as possible. Don’t scrimp. Dole out an ample supply of carbon dioxide. Do your share to promote photosynthesis. Picture in your mind one of your favorite trees and give its leaves a chance to produce some grade-A, top-quality oxygen.

  • Published on Sep 1, 1999
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