PREVIEW

Here's Why Deep Breathing Works to Keep You Calm. Stanford University researchers were responsible for uncovering why deep breathing can be so effective at mitigating anxiety. Their research sought to make clear the connections between mind and body by focusing on a small group of brain neurons in mice. The neurons were discovered through research conducted 25 years ago and were nicknamed the breathing pacemaker. The Stanford researchers discovered that the pacemaker consists of at least 65 kinds of neurons that each control certain parts of breathing. When certain neurons were disabled, the mice would maintain serenity despite being put into normally anxious situations. ”They were, for mice, remarkably chill.” Scientists realized that because the area of the brain that would often cause some form of arousal remained dormant, no alert signals were sent out to incite the other alert mechanisms of the body. ”What we think was going on was that the disabled neurons normally would detect activity in other neurons within the pacemaker that regulate rapid breathing and sniffing.” This means that the feedback loop that can lead to increased anxiety would never be initiated. Because humans are known to have a similar breathing pacemaker mechanism in our brains, the research implies that deep breathing helps to prevent anxiety because it helps to keep brain neurons in check. ”Mothers were probably right all along when they told us to stop and take a deep breath when we got upset.” THIS VIDEO MUST NOT BE EDITED FOR LENGTH TO COMBINE WITH OTHER CONTENT