(upbeat music)
- We're going to start our breathing segment.
But before we start,
we wanna make sure that we're relaxed and centered.
And when we say centered,
that means relaxing your mind
and relaxing your body.
So, to begin our breathing segment,
we're going to simply play something called the sound bowl.
So what I want you to do,
find your sweet spot.
We'll be talking about the sweet spot later.
Some place where you can sit,
relax your shoulders.
Just be comfortable
and join us.
Before we start with the sound bowl,
I want you to inhale through your nose,
and exhale through your mouth.
One more time.
Inhale through the nose,
and exhale through your mouth.
Now, we'll play the sound bowl,
and when I play it,
I want you just to close your eyes,
relax, let your mind take you wherever you want to be,
but just be calm.
(sound bowl ringing)
Inhale
and exhale.
One more time.
Inhale,
exhale.
Let's begin breathing.
Wow.
(laughs)
I really needed that.
Oh, that felt so good.
So anytime that you might be feeling stressed
or you need to just relax,
remember to center yourself,
and center yourself means finding
a way to relax your body and your mind
just as we did with the sound bowl.
My name is Toyia Tynae Taylor.
I'm the executive director for WeAPP,
We Act, Present and Perform,
the speak with purpose program
in many of Seattle Public Schools.
We're really proud that we're
the only public speaking school,
or excuse me, only public speaking
class offered in many of our schools.
This is my awesome team.
Ms. Sophie.
- Hi.
- And Ms. Krystal.
- Hello.
- Today, our segment is about breathing.
And so, I'ma tell a really fun act really quick.
First of all, get ready,
relax yourself, stand with us
and learn to breathe.
Now, why did Ms. Taylor say learn to breathe?
Because you'll never believe this,
but we are the only animals on the planet
that don't breathe correctly.
Now, don't be afraid,
you're okay,
but we're gonna learn how to breathe again.
♪ Breathe again ♪
They don't know that song.
It's from the '90s,
but anyways.
Ask your parents, they know.
All right, so all other creatures
on the Earth breathe from where?
Where do you think they breathe?
- From their bellies.
Any time, if you have pets as many of you do,
look at your cat or your dog
when they're relaxed and on the floor.
You see their bellies going
like this when they breathe, right?
That's called diaphragm breathing,
or belly breathing,
because it's right above the belly button
and right beneath the chest cavity,
the rib cage area where your lungs are, right here.
That's the proper way to breathe.
And somehow someway,
we breathe naturally and properly until we're about five,
and I think it's 'cause we start going to school,
we start getting a little stressed and anxious,
and we start to breathe from where?
- Chest.
- Our chest, right?
It's like.
(panting)
When do you breathe from your chest?
- When you're stressed out.
- Scared.
- [Ms. Sophe] Anxious.
- Nervous.
- Angry.
You breathe from your chest.
But the natural, healthy way to breathe that relaxes you
and helps you think is from the belly called the diaphragm.
So we're gonna learn to breathe again today, all right?
You ready?
- Yes!
- Let's do this!
- Let's do it.
All right, so what I want you to do,
you're standing.
And we out, we stand,
this is called our heroic stance.
We'll talk about it a little later in some other videos.
Heroic stance is your feet are shoulder width apart.
Your shoulders are not like this,
but really kinda relaxed
and in alignment with your feet.
Your sternum is high like so,
and your chin is up.
This allows you to breathe,
let it flow.
What I want you to do,
take your hands,
and you're going to put them on the side,
not on your hips,
but where your ribcage is right here
'cause that's where the diaphragm area is.
All right, and we're going to learn belly breathing.
Now, belly breathing,
I want you to imagine,
imagine that you have a balloon that's in your belly,
and that balloon is tight.
We haven't blown it up yet,
but we need to in order to breathe.
When you inhale through your nose,
you wanna watch the balloon,
or make the balloon expand.
So inhale through your nose.
From here, not here,
and then exhale through your mouth.
When you inhale,
that balloon expands.
When you exhale,
that balloon contracts and gets small again.
All right?
So let's try it.
Be relaxed,
don't stress.
You got this.
Hands on your rib area,
or for some people,
they like to see the belly.
You can put it right here on your belly.
Either way.
Nice.
Here we go.
Ms. Sophie, can you count us off with a four count?
Okay. - That sounds great.
All right, so we're gonna inhale through our nose.
One,
two,
three,
four,
exhale through your mouth,
one,
two,
three,
four.
Let's do that again.
Inhale through your nose.
One,
two,
three,
four.
Exhale through your mouth.
One,
two,
three,
four.
We're gonna inhale one more time.
- Ms. Sophie?
- [Ms. Sophie] Yes?
- Make sure, watch the expansion,
and then the contraction.
Okay?
You've got this.
Take your time.
Relax.
- For our next exhale,
I want you to exhale on a sigh.
So it's gonna look like this.
You're gonna inhale through your nose,
exhale on a sigh.
(sighs)
Let's do that all together.
Inhale through your nose.
One,
two,
three,
four,
exhale on a sigh.
Nice.
- Thanks, Ms. Sophie.
Now, I still kinda feel like
I'm breathing from my chest area.
I can feel it.
We've been doing this a long time incorrectly,
breathing from the chest instead of the belly.
So this is a way that really helps
you breathe from that diaphragm.
So try it with us.
We are going to put your hands out in front of you,
relax those shoulders, though, all right?
Now, I want you to gently bend your legs.
It's something about this stance
that allows your chest to open,
and then you breathe properly from your belly.
Relax those shoulders,
and we're going to inhale through our nose.
A four count, Ms. Sophie.
- Inhale,
one,
two,
three,
four,
exhale through your mouth,
one,
two,
three,
four.
Let's try that again.
Inhale through your nose.
One.
- Expand that belly.
- [Ms. Sophie] Three, four.
Exhale through your mouth.
One, two, three, four.
- One more time.
Make sure that you are expanding that belly when you inhale,
and when you exhale, contract.
Here we go.
- We're gonna try it for five counts this time.
Inhale through your nose.
One,
two,
three,
four,
five,
exhale through your mouth,
one,
two,
three,
four,
five.
- Now, gently come up.
And the last thing,
release those hands
and relax those shoulders.
I can feel the difference with that one.
- Me too.
- All right.
So now, we have two ways of breathing
properly from our belly, the diaphragm.
One other modification is.
- If you really are struggling with figuring out
how to breathe from your diaphragm,
I like to lie on the floor in my back
and actually put a book on top of my stomach,
and I can really feel when I'm using my diaphragm,
the pressure against the book when my stomach inhales,
and then it releases the pressure when I exhale.
- Nice.
So we've learned to properly breathe again.
It doesn't happen overnight,
so do it at least once a day when you wake up
and before you go to sleep.
So we've learned to inhale through our nose,
exhale through our mouths,
belly breathing,
using our diaphragms,
not our chest breath.
And just as we started,
we will end, with the sound bowl.
Ready?
Find your sweet spot.
Relax your shoulders.
Relax your mind, your body.
(sound bowl ringing)
(mellow music)
Inhale through your nose.
Deep breath,
exhale through your mouth.
Inhale through your nose.
Deep breath and exhale.
(exhales)
So we're signing off.
I'm Ms. Toyia Tynae Taylor.
- I'm Ms. Sophie.
- And Ms. Krystal.
- And we're WeAPP.
So happy you could join us today.
Remember to enjoy life,
be true to yourself,
speak with purpose.
Until the next time we see each other.
Bye.
(upbeat music)