In Ayurveda, the first requirement for health, fitness and longevity
is that the body's life force or "prana" must flow
effortlessly into every cell of the body.
This is accomplished primarily via the breath. It is with the proper
use of the breath during exercise that will bring harmony between the
mind and body and create a measurable experience of calm and
rejuvenation into each workout. Most of us do not realize that our
body responds to exercise as an emergency. The fight-or-flight
nervous system gets maxed out even during moderate exercise.
This emergency response during each workout not only
produces stress-fighting degenerative hormones but it is
likely the key factor in America's chronic aversion to
exercise.

Normal people would never intentionally subject themselves
to an emergency day after day after day. Yet when we ask
people to engage in regular conventional exercise that is
exactly what we are asking. It is no wonder that eighty
percent of America doesn't do it. To make exercise fun again
we must replace the degenerative emergency response with a
rejuvenative calming one. It is this experience of calm,
like the eye of a hurricane, that will act as a hub as we
engage in the most dynamic physical, mental or emotional
activity. In nature, the bigger the eye of the hurricane,
the more forceful the winds. It is this experience of calm
that we seek to reproduce in the midst of even the most
extreme stress. In athletics and in life, when people are at
their best they often find it effortless and euphoric. When
tennis great Billie Jean King was at her best she said, "I
would transport myself beyond the turmoil of the court to a
place of total peace and calm."

CREATING THE EYE OF THE HURRICANE - If you were to see a
bear in the woods, you would most likely take a quick upper
chest gasping emergency breath. This breath would trigger a
fight-or-flight response in your nervous system as the upper
lobes of the lungs are primarily innervated by the
sympathetic nervous system. The kind of gasping mouth
breathing much like a hyperventilation breathing pattern is
a normal breathing response to extreme stress. Unfortunately
this how most people breathe during exercise triggering the
same neurological response.

In contrast, the nerves that would calm, rejuvenate,
regenerate the body are in the lower lobes of the lungs
alone with the majority of the blood supply. The problem is
that most people never breathe into these lower
parasympathetic dominant lobes. The most noteworthy reason
is that the rib cage has what's called "elastic recoil"
which means it is constantly contracting and squeezing on
the heart and lungs 24 hours a day. Over time the rib cage
can literally become a cage making it very difficult to
breath into this lower lobes thus forcing us to breath
through the mouth into the upper lungs and triggering a
minor but constant emergency.

Exercise can act as a double-edged sword where it can either
incur stress or remove it depending on the quality of the
breath. The best way to consistently breathe into the lower
lobes of the lungs is by nasal breathing. The nose is really
an intricately designed breathing apparatus that will
prepare the air perfectly for access into the lower lobes.
In short the nose filters, moistens and rarefies the air so
it penetrates the lower lobes. Probably the most unique
feature lies in the turbinates of the nose which act as
turbines to swirl the air into vortices that drives the
incoming air into the small and distal alveoli of the lungs.
It is when these distal lobes are fully perfused that the
body produces a neurological state of composure even while
under extreme stress - thus the eye of the hurricane.

YOUR FIRST AYURVEDIC WORKOUT - Go for a walk and for the
first ten minutes breath deeply in and out through your nose
as you walk fairly slow. Here you are exercising your lungs
first making sure that each breath is deeper, longer and
slower than the one prior with the emphasis on comfort. It
is this experience of comfort that you will be taking into
higher levels of exertion. Then begin to walk faster and
then faster and be sure to maintain the exact same rhythm of
the breath you established from the beginning.

At some point you will notice it becoming more difficult to
get the air in through the nose and an ensuing urge to take
a mouth breath. When your exercise forces you to take your
first mouth breath, you have just then lost the eye of the
hurricane and your body was at that moment forced into an
emergency response to maintain that pace. At that time,
immediately slow down and recapture the original deep, long
and slow rhythm of the breath. Once it is reestablished, try
to walk faster again, telling your body you want more
performance. When the breathing gets labored and you open
your mouth, then slow down on cue again, constantly telling
your body you want more performance and we will not create
an emergency. Soon your body will accommodate a higher level
of a natural and more permanent fitness.

Because of the years of lower rib cage constriction you will
more than likely find this difficult at first. But, what you
couldn't do the first day you will find yourself
effortlessly doing within two or three weeks, comfortably
breathing through your nose. When this happens you rib cage
is not a cage any more - rather twelve rib-like cleavers
that can massage your heart and lungs up to 28,000 times a
day. When this starts happening, a natural calming influence
stays with you all day while you deal with all kinds of
extreme stressors. This is the first step of living in the
eye of the hurricane and the provider of the most important
health benefits of exercise.