Breathing Exercises For Anxiety Attacks

Breathing exercises for anxiety attacks and anxious moments in general are an absolute must have technique to master when it comes ot overcoming anxiety attacks!  First of all it is important to understand what we mean by anxiety, anxiety attacks, anxiety disorders and anxious moments.  They are all the same really.  They are just different names given out by different people for those times when you may notice a rapid heartbeat, shallow and rapid breathing and tense muscles.  This is when your body becomes anxious.  This is when you need breathing exercises for anxious moments.

Anxiety Attacks – What Exactly Are They?

When a person senses something threatening, or it may only be perceived as threatening, a number of subtle and mood effecting physiological changes take place in the body. The brain sends a system of warning messages through its central nervous system. The body through the adrenal glands starts to produce extra quantities of specific hormones which cause the heart to beat faster and breathing to become shallow and much more rapid. Muscles tend to tense up and the pupils in the eyes dilate.

How Do Anxiety Attacks Impact Upon You?

Experiencing these anxiety attacks is both exhausting and uncomfortable.   In addition, there are possible detrimental physical and emotional consequences to feeling stressed out like this all of the time.  At the very least it can be a contributing factor to high blood pressure, tension and even migraine headaches.  None of which are healthy conditions.  It may be that you are thinking all of this is an involuntary physical response to a situation or set of circumstances.  You may think there is nothing you can do to deal with these physical sensations.  Well there is plenty you can do and breathing exercises  are an excellent starting point.

How Can Breathing Exercises Help You?

It might not be possible to issue a mental directive to our adrenal glands to instruct them to stop producing the hormones that are causing these anxious moments.  However, breathing exercises provide a relatively easy method for coming down from this heightened state of anxiousness.  In simplistic terms, by just taking a moment to engage in breathing exercises for anxiety, some relief comes about naturally.  By just taking a moment to pause and notice what’s going on in your body a whole calming state “kicks-in” and you will begin to regain control over your body.

Breathing Exercises to Stop Anxiety Attacks

I know it might sound too easy or even a bit daft, but simple breathing exercises can help to calm you down during your anxiety attack.  When you are going through an anxiety attack or anxious moments in general it may seem that there is nothing you can do to resolve the situation.  Panic has set in and you just do not know what to do or how to deal with things.  It is frightening – I know, but do not despair.

Breathing exercises will immediately reduce the level of stress and tension in your body.  It moves you mentally away from the repetitive pattern of the negative thought processes that occur during anxiety attacks.  In doing these simple breathing exercises it diverts your immediate attention to something other than the damaging thoughts going on in your head during anxiety attacks. In basic terms it gives you something else to do so that you are no longer a passive victim of the anxiety attack.

A Simple Breathing Exercise To Follow!

For this to work the breathing exercises must be easy to remember and a simple process to follow.  This ease of use is very important.  When the next time an anxiety attack happens to you the breathing exercise must be virtually automatic.  I would recommend that you practice these breathing exercises when you have few quiet moments.  In doing this you will be preparing yourself for when you need the technique during your next anxious moment.

• Slowly breathe in through your nose in a measured and controlled manner.  Try not to breath in too deeply though.
• Consciously pause and hold the air inside for just a couple of seconds.
• Let the air out very very slowly through your mouth.
• Try to ensure that this exhalation process lasts as long as possible.
• Pay particular attention to every moment of this exhalation process.  Concentrate and picture in your minds eye every molecule of air being exhaled.
• Consciously make yourself aware of the moment the exhalation ends.  This should be a silent moment that fully registers and resonates with you.

You should then repeat this breathing exercise for as many times as necessary, until you feel you are back in control of your body.  As you repeat these breathing exercises for anxiety take a look around you and become aware of your surroundings and let what is going on around you register with you.  Anxiety is often associated with panic and these same breating exercises can be used when it comes to finding ways of How To Stop Panic Attacks.

These breathing exercises  can be very effective in helping to deal with anxiety attacks and anxious moments when they arise. However they will not eliminate the root causes of your anxiety attacks. The breathing exercises for anxiety will only relieve the symptoms as and when they occur.