Good morning! This is ScottieO with Ecstatic Hearts™. I just want to make this video this morning because I woke up excited about the day and a little stressed because of all the things that I get to do. I was just wondering how many other people out there are excited but also maybe a little overwhelmed or stressed about what they've got in their day. What I wanted to just remind you to do, which I've been reminding myself to do more and more is to breathe. Just breathe.
This is so important and it's something that most of us take for granted. The average American uses only 60% of their lung capacity and when we take the time to train ourselves and we only have to do it a little bit each day, then our automatic nervous system will take over for the rest of it is just to breathe deeply because the more we breathe, the more oxygen, the more we're feeding our blood cells and improves our immune system, it helps us destress, it helps clarity of mind. It improves so many things and all we got to do is remember to do it. So whenever you're nervous, add little oxygen and nervousness turns to excitement.
If you're overwhelmed, just take a moment, take a breath. Do it with me. Just fill your lungs. By the way, I'm going to show you a really quick breath that you can do too, it's called the condensed complete breath. So just because I want to save you time, I'm going to go through the short step. But what it is, there are three parts of your lungs. There's the lower, the middle and the upper part of your lungs.
What we're going to do is we're going to take a breath first in our lower lungs, then we're going to take a breath in our middle lungs, and take a breath in the upper lungs and then we're going to take a breath in the first middle and upper all in one breath. The way you do this, you want the more extended version is you just focus on the front part of your stomach, the side parts of your stomach and the back part of your stomach. For our purposes, we're just going to do that all at one time. So go ahead and take your hands and put it on your belly and don't worry about it if your belly pooches out.
In fact, you would want it to pooch out. You want it to expand out and also sideways and back, all at the same time. So just do this with me right now. Go ahead and put your hands in your stomach and breathe in. Pooch out, expand it, expand it out to the sides, expand it out to the back until there's a big doughnut around the bottom of your stomach and then let it out. Then get all the air out so pull your stomach in and get it all out. One more time. You're using your hands on your stomach to the sides and then let it all out. Make a sound. That's good.
Now, take your hands and put it on your middle part of your chest and see if you can expand your chest out. See if you can expand to the sides and the back. All in one breathe. Yes, it's a little uncomfortable because you're expanding muscles. You don't want it to expand anymore, hold it for a second then let it out. Feel your whole stomach and chest collapsing. Go all the way out. One more time. Expanding your sides, front, back and then let it out. Then get it all out, condense it. Then your front one.
This is when you put underneath your armpits if you like. Then breathe in. Lift your shoulder blades, see if you can expand your upper chest up, out, back. Let it out. Go ahead and do this with me and again. Up and long. Shoulder should be lifted, chest out, back, let it out. If you want the really condensed version, just do this all in one big breath. Here we go. Lower lungs, stomach and sides and back. Middle lungs, add to it. Front middle back, upper lungs. Fill up your entire lung capacity expand to the front, middle, back. All three chambers and then let it out. With a sigh. Get all the air out. Pull your stomach in, hold your stomach in. One time, into the nose, out through the mouth. One more time. Then just breathe normally.
Notice how you felt just from those breathes. If you just do this for a couple of minutes each day, it will train your lung capacity will train your automatic nervous system to start doing this on a regular basis throughout the rest of the day so it's a really good use of your time. Also, exercise is great so if you are at work, take a little walk. Add a little 15-20 minute walk to your lunch break or do it in the morning or get out and if you have the luxury of working out at home, take your shoes off and go stand outside to get a little grounding. Do a little bit of exercise in the morning but don't forget to breathe. If you're overwhelmed with stuff, just take it one chunk at a time. Let's say, an elephant, one bite at a time.
Take all your big tasks, prioritize. Just pick the top three that are most important, do them in order and just knock one out and then go to the next one. If it's a big project, chunk it up in little steps. That's my tip for the day. Don't forget to breathe. If you feel stressed or overwhelmed, just breathe. This is ScottieO. Namaste! Come check us out at Ecstatic Hearts™ for lots more tips and ideas on how to make your life more fulfilling, less stressed, more healthy and more joyful.