Breathing is the new black

Breathing is the new black. I am a huge fan of Nassim Taleb. He introduced me to the Lindy effect. Something that was true 3000 years ago is probably still valid 3000 years from now. That is why you should trust Chinese medicine over modern medicine. Including their perspective on breathing.

Breath: The New Science of a Lost Art

In ancient medicine, breathing is a topic of enormous interest. That is why we introduce all our Doorbraak clients to the Wim or Marcel Hof method. Proper breathing makes a huge difference. Via Tibor, I met Ruud van de Wiel, who is a breathing coach. He recommended “Breath: The New Science of a Lost Art”.

Twenty-five sextillion molecules

You inhale twenty-five sextillion molecules (that’s 250 with 20 zeros after it), 18 times a minute, 25,000 times a day. In a single breath, more molecules of air will pass through your nose than all the grains of sand on all the world’s beaches — trillions and trillions of them. Your body, like all human bodies, is essentially a collection of tubes. If you lined up all the tubes in the airways of your body, they’d reach for more than 1,500 miles.

Oxygen and carbon dioxide

Those tubes bring oxygen to our cells. Cells need oxygen. We have got some 37 trillion cells in our bodies that need oxygen. You are what you do, you are what you eat, you are what you think, and you are what and how you breathe. It not only about oxygen. Carbon dioxide is the chief hormone of the entire body; it is the only one that is produced by every tissue, and that probably acts on every organ. Carbon dioxide is, in fact, a more fundamental component of living matter than is oxygen.

Dysevolution

And we are doing it all wrong. Today, the human body is changing in ways that have nothing to do with the “survival of the fittest.” Instead, we’re adopting and passing down traits that are detrimental to our health. It is called dysevolution, and you should take note. In simple terms, industrialised food is shrinking our mouths. We are not chewing anymore, and it is destroying our breathing. Societies that replaced their traditional diet with modern, processed foods suffered up to ten times more cavities, severely crooked teeth, obstructed airways, and overall poorer health.