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Raising Your Baseline
In practicing the slow, shallow breathing approach from The Oxygen Advantage that I shared about during the past two days, I’m grasping that the key to this approach is to define a new baseline for my breathing and then keep synching back to that new baseline whenever I catch myself drifting from it. The initial temptation is to sync back to my old way of breathing, which can happen automatically when I lose awareness of my breath. Then I might catch myself and practice consciously reducing my breath so I’m not over-breathing. An aspect of this change that’s easier to catch is when I moderately exer...
Source: Steve Pavlina's Personal Development Blog - October 9, 2020 Category: Psychiatry & Psychology Authors: Steve Pavlina Tags: Emotions Health Productivity Source Type: blogs

Relearning to Breathe
As I noted in yesterday’s post about learning to breathe differently, I’m leaning into a different way of thinking about breathing and working on changing old habits to see how The Oxygen Advantage approach affects me. This morning I went for my second nose-breathing run with a similar format like I tried yesterday. I started with a 15-minute walk (all nose breathing), and then I was able to run for 3 minutes with nose breathing before dropping back to walking for a few minutes. That’s longer than the 1:44 I did yesterday for the first round. For the second round, I ran for 5 minutes before dropping...
Source: Steve Pavlina's Personal Development Blog - October 8, 2020 Category: Psychiatry & Psychology Authors: Steve Pavlina Tags: Health Source Type: blogs

Apparently I ’ ve Been Breathing All Wrong
This week I’ve been enthusiastically digesting the book The Oxygen Advantage: The Simple, Scientifically Proven Breathing Techniques for a Healthier, Slimmer, Faster, and Fitter You. It’s eye-opening and counter-intuitive in many ways. I thought I knew how to breathe, but it turns out I didn’t. Someone recommended this book to me earlier this year, so I added it to my audiobook queue. I wondered what I’d learn about breathing from nine hours of audio that I didn’t already know. I figured it would just be reinforcement of some relaxation techniques and meditative practices that I was already...
Source: Steve Pavlina's Personal Development Blog - October 7, 2020 Category: Psychiatry & Psychology Authors: Steve Pavlina Tags: Health Source Type: blogs

Defining Your Own Spiritual Path
Have you ever connected with someone who had strong preconceived notions about what your spiritual path should look like? Apparently there’s a rulebook for being spiritual, and you have to satisfy certain criteria for how you’re supposed to think, feel, and behave in order to consider yourself a spiritual person. You got the memo summarizing those rules, right? Being spiritual is a label and lens. But it’s not the same lens for everyone. We all assign different meanings to what it means to be spiritual or to walk a spiritual path. My meaning is undoubtedly different from yours. These days I’...
Source: Steve Pavlina's Personal Development Blog - October 6, 2020 Category: Psychiatry & Psychology Authors: Steve Pavlina Tags: Creating Reality Lifestyle Relationships Values Source Type: blogs

End the Vegan Tax
Vegans are typically well aware of the vegan tax – the extra money we pay to order a latte, a pizza, or some other item made vegan instead of with animal products. Substitute plant-based milk for dairy or vegan cheese for dairy cheese at a restaurant, and you can often expect to pay more. Starbucks is one of the main outlets that’s been charging a vegan tax for years, whereby it costs extra to order a drink with soy milk, almond milk, or coconut milk instead of the same drink make with dairy. Lots of other places that offer drinks with plant-based milks also charge extra for it. Depending on what you order, t...
Source: Steve Pavlina's Personal Development Blog - October 5, 2020 Category: Psychiatry & Psychology Authors: Steve Pavlina Tags: Health Lifestyle Values Source Type: blogs