This is great if you are being chased by a tiger. But it is not so great when it becomes part of chronic high stress . Breath control is a key to instant stress reduction, and is an excellent stress management tool.

The Problem: You can survive for several weeks without food, and for days without water. But life ends in minutes without oxygen. You have an estimated 75 trillion cells in your body, and each of these tiny cells needs a supply of oxygen to do its work.

You normally breathe between twelve and sixteen breaths a minute. But when you are experiencing high stress, your breathing may become so rapid you might even start to hyperventilate. In some cases, your breathing may even stop momentarily to give your body a chance to recover.

Here is what you need to know: When you become caught up with such rapid breathing, you are only using the uppermost portions of your lungs. This can only result in very rapid shallow breathing, and often becomes hyperventilation.

Shallow breathing triggers a vicious cycle in which your stress level will become even higher. Shallow breathing can even cause distressing chest pains simulating those connected with heart attacks.

Continued shallow breathing causes your anxiety levels to rise, your physical and intellectual performance to diminished, and your sleep to become disturbed. Even your vision can become disrupted vision, creating hallucinations and sensations of unreality.

Shallow breathing is a primitive mechanism for survival, and gives us the ability to prepare to fight or run. But since we rarely actually have to run or fight, we do not use up the adrenaline and noradrenalin being released into our bloodstream. This causes our physical tension to become chronic.

The Solution:

The bottom of your lungs have the most blood flow, so it's important to get as much air down to the bottom of the lungs as possible. Slow deep breathing gets air to the plentiful blood vessels in your lower lungs, and gets balanced gases into your bloodstream.

This helps your brain stimulate the production of the mood-boosting endorphins that help control your emotions, moods and motivation.

So do make it a point to control and reduce your stress using the tool of deep breathing. Deep slow breathing will not only help reduce your tension, it will also give you a much greater sense of personal control, and a solid feeling of physical and mental well-being. http://www.quantum-self.com