I’ve been teaching yoga for 14 years and even now, at least one time every day, I still have to tell myself to breathe.

You we would think by now I’d be good at it.

That would all be good at it.

After all, it’s the first thing we do when we’re born and the last thing we do before we die. So we’ve already had years of practice.

But there is breathing to survive and breathing to be alive.

Because breathing is controlled by our autonomic nervous system (meaning it happens without our conscious effort), many of us spend most of our days not focused on our breath, so we end up breathing to survive.

Some of the ways you might notice this showing up in your life is:

Physical tension or constriction in your body.

Yawning a lot to try to take more air in.

Feeling lightheaded or dizzy because of a lack of breath.

Experiencing a lack of ease and flow in your life.

There are reasons we choose not to focus on our breath.

Our breath is what connects us to our spirit. It expands feelings. And it's what allows us to be in touch with ourselves.

Sometimes all of that is wildly uncomfortable.

There are sensations we don’t want to feel and truths we don’t want to acknowledge.

So we let ourselves be distracted by the world around us- the work we have to do, the people in our lives, the stories playing out on our planet.

We encounter problems that need solutions or questions that need answers, so we spend our time trying to figure them out. We ask others opinions, we Google, we learn, we make it complicated.

We forget that things can be simple.

Our breath is not only the foundation of our survival, but breathing is a skill.

Our breath is a tool that, when focused on, can be utilized to support us in releasing tension in our body, calming our mind, creating flow in our lives.

By allowing it to connect us to our spirit and our heart, we can be guided towards the solutions to our problems and the answers to our questions.

Through practice and honing our breathing skills we can find peace in anxiety, energy in exhaustion and lightness in heaviness.

We can feel, and literally be, more alive with the use of our breath.

Our inhales represent our capacity to feel inspired, excited and fulfilled in life.

Our exhales represent our capacity to release, let go and go with the flow of life.

In other words, our breath is an automatic indicator in each moment of whether we’re surviving or thriving.

It has the ability to change not only how we perceive the world but how we experience it and show up in it.

Do this practice with me to hone your breathing skills so that you can thrive and feel more alive right now.