It happens rarely (less than 1% of my clients have reported this) but after a few deep bodywork sessions it is possible that we stop breathing automatically, and need to consciously focus on breathing. I’ve never heard of anyone forgetting to breath for more than a minute or so, and have heard similar reports from people who have taken ayahuasca, where they are so ‘not’ in their mind that the body literary gasps for air so they can start breathing again.
From my understanding this is not related to sleep apena, or any other disfunction of the nervous system, but for some people is an important step to creating physical, mental and emotional alignment.
In my sessions I teach people, different and simple breathing techniques that are best suited to them and their system. These techniques help energy move and allow us to get out of our minds and into our bodies. Which in turn means we feel our emotions instead of thinking them, and start to feel other people too, developing empathy and intuition (the science and the emotional understanding of our breath is covered in some of my videos if you’re interested!). One of the reasons that automatic breathing can stop after this work is that our desire to escape the suffering of our mind and our sense of separation is so strong that we succumb to our desire to feel more than think. We manage to put conscious awareness into our body, around our stomach and sexual organs and keep it there, but we do this before we are really ready and have trained the mind to breath in a relaxed and aligned way.
In one sense it’s an achievement because we are fast tracking to spreading conscious awareness and creating integration between our head, heart and sex, which means we can listen to our soul.
The mind is still there and we don’t forget how to speak but our relationship with it changes.
As our mind lets go we need to retrain our body to breath consciously. Life turns into a constant state of meditation, and we need to breath, deliberately or simply not breath during this intense phase of retraining our body.
For me, this experience was a big gift and happened at the start of when I was becoming more conscious of energy and Kundalini in my body and how it worked. But I also know the terror of laying in bed at night scared to go to sleep, believing that I will stop breathing and never wake up, but then falling to sleep anyway and waking up a few minutes later gasping for air.
To my knowledge this does not happen to many people, and so far only two clients from several hundred have reported a similar experience, but I wanted to write this post for those who have or will experience this but don’t report it.
In medical terms this is a psychological condition, it’s not sleep apena and there is nothing wrong with the nervous system. During this period the same will exist to a lesser degree even when awake, and eventually conscious and unconscious breathing becomes more integrated so that we can both think and feel at the same time.
I believe that life is a meditation, meditation is breath and breath is life. Life is about aiming for conscious breath 220% of the time. Sometimes I forget this but I am thankful each time I remember.
If you’re having a similar experience I would suggest
- Relax, enjoy it
- Feel the fear that you might die and say yes to it, say I’d rather die now pursuing consciousness than live another day unconscious (don’t focus on the fear! just let it be there)
- Stick with a simple three part yogic breathing rhythm, don’t try anything fancy but do experiments with and without pauses
- Also work on pushing the stomach out and in, similar to reverse breathing
- Forgot all the other practices and just relax as much as possible
- Get excited about the massive transformation that takes place when we learn to move into a life of woke conscious meditation
eventually your breathing will find some normality again, and the mind will be more in control over the glands and other bodily organs, but notice how much better and more connected you are with all of your bodily parts, from the sexual organs (Yoni, Lingham, ovaries, testicules) to the liver, kidneys and heart, developing a relationship with these bodily parts in also hugely rewarding.
@elliottsaxby
#kundaliniawakening
#breathwork
#symbolofbreath
#taoism
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1 Response to "If you stop breathing unconsciously"
Hi Eliott
Thanks for this article. It is actually something I experience very often. Mostly when falling asleep, but also when I’m meditating and reliably while receiving a tantra-massage. Interestingly never while giving a such.
I never heard of this phenomenon before I read your words. And it calmed my mind about it.
Thanks for what you do.