Howto start with breathwork? Begin by adopting a neutral body position, like lying down.
At the beginning, it’s not advisable to start in a seated position, as you may end up focusing more on maintaining posture than on the breathing exercise itself. In fact, an incorrect body position can negatively affect the effectiveness of the exercise.
Deep breathing foundation
The foundation of deep breathing is diaphragmatic breathing. This assumes that the diaphragm has space to move freely. For this reason, the ideal position involves a properly aligned body, with the back straight and the top of the head gently pushing upward. This way, the diaphragm has all the space it needs to function properly. On the other hand, poor posture limits its movement, reducing the depth of the breath.
For this reason, especially in the beginning, it’s advisable to start in a supine position, that is, lying on your back. Since there’s no need to control the body’s balance, it becomes much easier to focus solely on the breathing activity.
At first, you can also place one hand on your abdomen and the other on your chest. In proper diaphragmatic breathing, the abdomen will move (when the diaphragm lowers, it pushes the abdominal organs downward, causing the belly to expand). Therefore, the hand on the abdomen will rise and fall, while the one on the chest should remain as still as possible.
At this initial stage, breathing should be natural and free, without the need to follow specific rhythms or patterns. The goal is simply to become aware of the breathing movement.
Later, to expand diaphragmatic capacity, you can also focus on the movement of the ribcage. A useful exercise is to place the hands on the sides of the ribcage, around the level of the floating ribs, to better perceive the lateral expansion of the breath, which naturally follows the abdominal movement.
Final advice: in this phase, dedicate at most 15 minutes to the exercise, counting your breaths and restarting from 1 every time you get distracted. The higher the number you reach, the greater your awareness of the breath will be.