In the online Embodied Breathwork day in May of this year, I was delighted to take part in a breath teaching session by breathing expert Dr. Ela Manga. Dr Ela Manga‘s approach is also based on Natural Breathing. „Working with breathing is working with the body“, she said, „…the body loves the breath, it receives the breath. We have to do very little for the body to remember.“ I loved the philosophical, yet grounded and earthy way she spoke about breathing.
The session she was offering that day was about the way we relate to our bodies through „story“. „So much of illness is wrapped up in story“, she said, „in habitual story, in conditioned story, unconscious story“, and that we need „to find a new way to relate to story.“ To demonstrate what she meant by that, the participants of the Embodied Breathwork day were invited to an exploration she called 3 degrees of separation:
„1st degree: Tune into your inner world. How have you been feeling lately? Say „I feel like“ or „I‘ve been feeling like…“
Notice how that feels in your body.
Then change the sentence to „the story I‘m telling myself is…“
2nd degree: How do I experience myself when I tell myself this story? What am I experiencing in my body, how is that story showing up in my body right now?
3rd degree: Draw an edge around the strongest sensation that is present and feel into the centre. Is there an epicentre that feels most intense?
Breathe into it and on the exhale soften the edges around it, let it spread. Let the energy of the breath infuse the energy of the sensation. Notice what‘s happening to that sensation. Continue until it‘s shifted. How do you feel now?
Now you can say: „the truth that I know is…“
I found this to be a powerful exploration with a palpable shift in my emotional state to balance and connectedness with the corresponding fullness of the breath and a calm breathing rhythm.