Stuart Sandeman has turned his hand to everything from judo to a high-powered corporate career in Hong Kong, but it wasn't until he was faced with grief that he turned to breathwork and eventually found his true calling.
The founder of Breathpod – a wellness initiative – and the host of Radio 1's Decompression Session, joined Jennifer Zamparelli on RTÉ 2fm to discuss his book, Breathe In, Breathe Out: Restore Your Health, Reset Your Mind, and Find Happiness Through Breathwork and to share his tips.
Sandeman tells Jen the remarkable journey began when his girlfriend tragically passed away on Valentine's Day 2016, after an 18-month battle with terminal cancer. The couple had spent the 18 months looking into treatments but sadly nothing worked.
Soon after, he moved back to Scotland and brought his mother to a breathing class for Mother's Day. "It was the most powerful thing I've ever done", he says.
"It was like my secret Fight Club. I'd go along to these sessions and it would be a wonderful way for me to find solace and let go of some of the physical tension I was holding onto, and all the emotional tension that built up."
This, he says, inspired him to set out on a mission to find out as much about breathwork as possible. "It's more complex than we think", he says. "Our breath is really a measure of how we're living. It's a link to how we're feeling."
He says we lose our way when it comes to breathing as adults, as he calls babies the "breathing gurus". "Then life happens", he says.
"It might be bad habits that we pick up from our parents, from our school, from our peers in terms of breathing mechanics. Or we hold our breath to stop ourselves from feeling", such as anger, upset or any other emotion.
"When we're feeling good our breath is expansive and open, when we're feeling stressed things start to contract and get a bit tight. When we're holding back anger, we hold on even more."
He says that we may have a habitual breathing pattern that kicks in when we're stressed, and if that continues for a long period of time, "we become held hostage to our breathing pattern" which sends stress signals to our brains.
He says that for him, his breathing contracted and got shorter. Even though his mind processed that time had passed from his loss, his body was holding onto it and still struggling. Once he started breathing into the space that he wasn't using, "it's like releasing the trapped emotion since that experience".
Sandeman says that the key to optimum breathing is using your nose, which filters the air and gets moisture to our lungs.
"If we're breathing through our mouths throughout the day then we're just sending an alarm bell of stress. It messes up the chemistry of our body and we can end up over-breathing, which is a little bit like overeating. We're throwing the system off balance."
Next, the belly needs to be allowed to expand with deep breaths, he adds. Chest breathing, he says, makes up more stressed and stops us digesting food properly.
To listen back to the full interview, click above.
