Breath: The New Science of a Lost Art

This was another thing that kept happening to me. Mouthbreathing causes the body to lose 40 percent more water.20 I felt this all night, every night, waking up constantly parched and dry. You’d think this moisture loss would decrease the need to urinate, but, oddly, the opposite was true.

The ancient Chinese were onto it as well. “The breath inhaled through the mouth is called ‘Ni Ch’i, adverse breath,’ which is extremely harmful,” states a passage from the Tao.27 “Be careful not to

teeth. You fools, I imagined that ancient skull saying. And for a moment, I swear, it looked like it was laughing.

“very strange happening”: “Asthma Patients Reduce Symptoms, Improve Lung Function with Shallow Breaths, More Carbon Dioxide,” ScienceDaily, Nov. 4, 2014, https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/11/141104111631.htm. 39 A half-dozen other clinical trials: “Effectiveness

The magic of the nose, and its healing powers, wasn’t lost on the ancients.

I realized then that breathing was like rowing a boat: taking a zillion short and stilted strokes will get you where you’re going, but they pale in comparison to the efficiency and speed of fewer, longer strokes.

of negative emotions.

The key for exercise, and for the rest of life, is to stay in that energy-efficient, clean-burning, oxygen-eating aerobic zone for the vast majority of time during exercise and at all times during rest.

When the nasal cavity gets congested, airflow decreases and bacteria flourish. These bacteria replicate and can lead to infections and colds and more congestion. Congestion begets congestion,