Belly Breathing

Every once in a while, we get support tickets with subject lines or messages in ALLCAPS and with lots of exclamation points.

Something along the lines of:

Subject: “IT’S NOT WORKING!!!!!”

It is clear that the writer is pretty stressed out.

I’ve been there too.  I bet we all have.  And it’s no fun. 

When we are feeling that way, we are usually too upset to communicate effectively about what is not working.  Which means it takes longer for someone else to figure out what the problem is and help us.

And often the problem is pretty simple.  In the case of Simplero tickets, it’s probably a wrong setting, a confusion about how something is supposed to work, maybe a place where something could have been clearer...  Generally, nothing big.  Nothing is on fire.

I go to a yoga class every week. 

Stay with me here, this is relevant.

It’s a really good yoga class that focuses on meditation and breathing and mindfulness, not just on stretching and exercise. Although, there is exercise too.  On Monday mornings it hurts to lift my arms to type…

Anyway, last week the instructor mentioned something new about why we practice a certain kind of breathing called Dirga Breath, or Complete Breath. 

The breath itself is pretty basic. It just involves filling up your belly first and then your lungs, completely.  Expanding all the way from your belly through your shoulders and then breathing out slowly and entirely.  You breathe out more air than you breathe in.

But the why really caught my attention.

Breathing this way will activate your parasympathetic nervous system.  That is the part of your nervous system that tells you to calm the heck down.  That moves your body out of the fight/flight/freeze state and into the ‘rest and digest’ state that allows us to think clearly and calmly. 

I bet you can tell where I’m going with this, right? 

Technology can be stressful, especially if we are in a hurry or if we feel like we have a lot to lose if something doesn’t work well.

Those moments can absolutely be fight/flight/freeze moments.

Simplero staff will walk with you through the stressful stuff.  Let’s each take three Dirga Breaths first!