No, this isn’t about a sale. Its about an interesting article I read several years ago by health journalist Cindy Kuzma on the psychological benefits of breathing exercises.
My interest in this subject has been rekindled by recently discovering the 4-7-8 breathing technique which I have found to be very quick and significant in reducing mental tension.
The article is about an Italian study where researchers taught test subjects some yogic breathing exercises. After 6 months the test subjects had a 44% drop in symptoms of anxiety and depression:
Italian researchers put 69 people with generalized anxiety disorder, depression, or similar conditions through a two-week workshop in Surdashan Kriya Yoga, or SKY. Though SKY includes some poses and meditation, the core component is a sequence of 5 breathing exercises: slow breathing, alternate nostril breaths, fast breathing from the diaphragm, rapid exhalations, and cyclical breathing.
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After graduating from breathing bootcamp, participants practiced at home and went in for weekly follow-up sessions. Six months later, their anxiety scores had decreased by about 44%, and many no longer qualified for a clinical diagnosis.
The article didn’t describe what those 5 exercises were, but I had an intuition that they are yogic breathing exercises that existed long before the SKY ( Sudarshan Kriya Yoga ) program was taught by The Art Of Living organization.
It wasn’t easy to find, but with persistent Googling I found this academic paper which describes the SKY breathing routine:
The sequence of SKY, adapted to clinical purposes, consists of five sequential breathing exercises separated by 30-second periods of normal breathing.The sequence is performed as follows:
- Ujjayi, slow breathing 3-4 cycles per minute
- Nadi Shodana, alternate nostril breathing,
- Kapalabati, fast diaphragmatic breathing
- Bhastrika, rapid exhalation at 20-30 cycles per minute
- Sudarshan Kriya, rhythmic, cyclical breathing in slow, medium and fast cycles.
A brief interlude of chanting is introduced between the Bhastrika and the Sudarshan Kriya cycles.
I was told that the sequence above, minus #1, has been around in yoga for a long time and it is known as The Four Purifications.
So, it looks like it is possible to learn the breathing exercise routine that had the fantastic results in the research study without going to The Art Of Living organization. I have seen 1-4 described in many pranayama books, and endless YouTube videos. I am a big fan of getting proper guidance from live, in person teaching so I would likely find a yoga or kriya class in my area that taught these things or hire a yoga teacher for private lessons.The SKY ( Sudarshan Kriya Yoga ) breathing routine is taught through a “non-profit” organization called “The Art Of Living” in their “Happiness Program” course. You go for two evenings and two days on a weekend (18 hours total ) and pay $400. That may or may not be a reasonable cost when compared to the cost of 18 hours of yoga instruction from other sources. People who pay for the course are entitled to near unlimited follow ups and practice classes.
Over the course of my Googling I found that some of the scientists who studied those techniques took what they learned and made their own breathing exercise program which they claim gets similar results.
The Healing Power Of The Breath — about $10 on Amazon.
My intuition ( uninformed, non-expert opinion ) is that the SKY routine is not necessary for these results. I read a Psychology Today article just the other week stating that ordinary slow deep breaths can relax people.
The Art of Living foundation is a “non profit” founded by Sri Sri Ravi Shankar, the famous Indian musician. Though being a nonprofit they “keep” a lot of the money collected ( big buildings all over the world, cars, paid staff, etc ). Some accounts (take with a grain of salt) on the web have stated the organization felt kind of cultish. I found this article that indicates some part of this organization may be sketchy and trying to profit off yogic practices that have existed for thousands of years.
Its a large organization so it is quite possible for some parts of it to be crappy and for other parts to be crappy. Its the Internet, take it all with a grain of salt.