Breathing Coping Skills
Belly Breathing
Belly Breathing is a coping skill that can help with anxiety, panic, strong depressive thoughts, overwhelming feelings, and much more. It is a very simple skill that involved breathing deeply in and letting the breath expand your stomach before breathing out again as your stomach moves towards your spine. It is a very useful and simple coping skill that is basic and easy to practice!
This sill can be helpful in situations where we are in our stressful environment and experiencing an increase in anxiety or panic, and need to be able to calm down a little. Taking a few minutes to take that breath into our stomach, hold onto it, release, and hold again can really reduce our stress and get us into a space where we can access both emotional and logical reasoning.
How to Practice Belly Breathing
In this video, we walk through a guided practice.
Here is the basic rhythm:
Placement: Place your hand over your belly.
Inhale: Breathe in for 3 seconds, feeling your stomach expand outward.
Hold: Gently hold that breath for 3 seconds.
Exhale: Release the breath slowly over 3 seconds.
Pause: Hold for 3 seconds before the next breath.
A Note on Practice
Like any skill, belly breathing takes practice to feel natural. While it is a highly effective tool for managing immediate stress, please remember that coping skills are most effective when used as part of a comprehensive approach to mental health. This exercise is a helpful tool, but it is not a substitute for professional therapy.
