The Art Of Breathing

We got the chance to ask yogi extraordinaire, Ninie Ahmad, how the way you breathe plays an important role in day-to-day life.

- Nadhirah Othman

1 IS THERE A RIGHT WAY TO BREATHE?

There is no particular right way to breathe, because as long as we are alive, we are breathing involuntarily. But while practising yoga or during stillness practice, one is encouraged to breathe slightly unnaturally – by extending the length of each inhale and exhale, and breathing slightly audibly so we can compare the sound and length of the inhale and exhale, making them equally long.

By breathing in this structure for an hour a day while we are practising yoga poses or during meditation, we get to encourage more oxygen intake to both hemispheres of the brain and the lungs. With this, more cells in the body get oxygenated to stimulate growth, healing and regeneration of our organs.

2 HOW DO YOU TEACH KIDS ABOUT THEIR BREATH?

I always use an expanding sphere toy or ball to teach kids about how inhalation and exhalation works. Especially with young children who do not have the capacity or attention span to understand fancy verbal explanations, I expand the toy as slowly as I can and make them breathe in together with the expansion of the toy, and vice versa to exhale.