—I was breathless!

How many times do we hear that phrase in the face of a surprising situation or one that generates emotion and stress? A kind of popular saying that is repeated without taking into account the great truth it contains. The expression highlights a vital and organic process discovered thousands of years ago in an intuitive way: the relationship between emotion and breathing.

In the face of a contingency, emotionality shoots up. A wave of energy is released and the organism transforms it and uses it to respond to the stimuli that generate primary emotions: anger or fear. These are not the only ones, there are other varieties of emotions that derive from these two main ones and with which we deal with on a daily basis.

The automatic reading that our organism makes is that survival is at risk and we will need all the strength to perform two immediate physical actions linked to those emotions: basically, fight or flee. This is the synthesis of the well-known process called stress, that physiological reaction of the organism that brings into play various defense mechanisms to face a situation perceived as threatening or of increased demand.

What I am most interested in highlighting about this resource, which has automatically been occupied in keeping us alive for millennia, is the link that exists between breathing and emotion.

Since ancient times, human beings have found in breathing a key to managing their emotions and conquering more objectivity in decision-making. A mechanism to feel more free and self-sufficient.

Philosophical schools, religions, martial arts and other disciplines incorporated techniques and capitalized on that power. Respect for the power of air became present in almost all mythologies, in the form of attributes of deities and grandiose stories.

In Hindu mythology, Parjánya, a figure who represented the hurricane in Vedic times; in ancient Greece, Aeolus, the lord of the winds in the Odyssey and protector of Ulysses; in the Mayan empire, Kukulcán, a divinity friendly to men, who administered the winds; in Norse mythology, Njörd, god of the sea and wind, invoked in storms. And these are just a few examples.

Among the Hindus it is mentioned that we are born with a credit of breaths to consume during life. If we spend them breathing in a hurry, our life time will be shorter. With this belief they strengthen the idea that we should always breathe slowly, deeply, completely and consciously.

With its advances, science supports the claims of ancient philosophies about the need to manage breathing and use it as the baton with which we can conduct our organic harmony.

However -as Professor DeRose explains in the book Respira, the new science of a forgotten art when interviewed by the author, James Nestor-, the most important thing is not only the air: it is the energy, the prána. A force that we can define as any type of energy that manifests itself biologically. An immeasurable source of power that enhances our evolution and allows us to perceive the world and its phenomena with greater objectivity and clarity.

Maybe it's time to observe how you are breathing. Don't forget that every time you breathe in, an opportunity begins.