Breath as Prayer: Calm Your Anxiety, Focus Your Mind, and Renew Your Soul

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They’re great as a way of grounding ourselves or re-centering ourselves when we become anxious or overwhelmed. Find hope amid anxiety through the spiritual practice of breath prayer in this beautifully illustrated and practical guide to connecting body, mind, and spirit during times of stress. If there’s a verse you love that is significant to you, turn it into a prayer and breathe that prayer when you’re in those times of stress or when you need to be reminded of that truth. D. in Christian spirituality, ritual studies, and the dialogue between theology and natural science from the Graduate Theological Union.

As I paid attention to my breathing and learned new ways to breathe, I discovered how my breath could support my movements, allowing more flexibility, strength, and endurance. Breathe slowly and deeply – from the diaphragm rather than from the upper chest – as you begin to pray, and you will often find it easier to relax into God’s presence, love, and peace. Even the words for “spirit” in Hebrew ( ruach) and Greek ( pneuma)—the two languages in which the Bible was originally written—can also mean “breath. But many times, because of the fall, our brains aren’t always connected the way God originally intended, and our bodies don’t always process stimuli as we’re supposed to. I may have written a whole book about them, but it wasn’t all that long ago that I had never even heard of breath prayers, and just happened to stumble across them in my hunt for strategies to help with anxiety.Recovery might take a bit longer, though, if the driver blows the horn, someone makes a provocative comment when you bend over, or your coffee spills all over your crucial work documents. You could also use the inward breath to name what you would like to receive and the outward breath to state what you would like to release. We’d love to have you be a part of our insider community so you don’t miss out on any encouraging content or events. Sometimes I use shorter pauses and longer breaths, and sometimes I don’t pause between inhaling and exhaling for a steady flow of air.

Two Hands: Grief and Gratitude in the Christian Life is available in paperback, audiobook, and for kindle. The Breath Prayer that we know today originated with the Desert Mothers and Fathers as a way to “pray without ceasing” (1 Thessalonians 5:17). Whereas other practices like Eastern religions and things, their meditative practices might try to empty the mind, reach some state of nirvana or try to focus inward for peace into yourself for all the answers. It’s almost like I’m experiencing everything around me through a new filter that allows me to see God’s fingerprints all over the place.Stephen Porges in “The Polyvagal Theory: New Insights into Adaptive Reactions of the Autonomic Nervous System,” in Cleveland Clinic Journal of Medicine 76, Suppl 2 (April 2009): S86–S90, and The Polyvagal Theory: Neurophysiological Foundations of Emotion, Attachment, Communication, and Self-Regulation, (New York, NY: W. And she said, “People don’t think that I’m anxious, but there are times when I’m anxious because I look so high functioning, I look like I’ve got my ducks in a row and I have things together. Breath prayers give you the words to pray when you don’t have those words to pray or when you’re feeling anxious in particular.