Breathe Your Way to Balance:
How Breathwork SUPPORTS Stress and Recovery
Written by: Emma Masters
Therapy Co-Founder
WHY BREATHWORK
Breathwork has become an essential tool for managing modern-day stress, supporting physical performance, and helping people return to balance. By focusing on the breath, we can influence the nervous system, improve emotional regulation, and even release stored stress and trauma from the body. Here’s why breathwork matters and how it ties into our classes at Therapy.
THE NERVOUS SYSTEMS ROLE IN STRESS & RECOVERY
Our nervous system operates in three main states:
Rest and Digest (Parasympathetic): A state of relaxation and recovery.
Fight or Flight (Sympathetic): The body’s stress response, where adrenaline surges.
Freeze (A combination of both Sympathetic and Parasympathetic): A state where we feel stuck or unable to act, often linked to trauma.
These states are controlled by the autonomic nervous system, which has evolved over time alongside different parts of the human brain.
Understanding the Brain’s Role in Stress
Reptilian Brain (Brainstem): Controls basic survival functions like breathing and heart rate. It reacts to threats, triggering the “fight, flight, freeze” responses.
Mammalian Brain (Limbic System): Governs emotions, memories, and instinctual responses.
Neocortex: The most advanced part, responsible for reasoning, language, and decision-making.
While animals naturally release trauma by physically “shaking it off”—and if you’re not sure what we mean by this, check out animals being hunted in the wild. When a prey animal escapes a predator, it often goes into a state of freeze. If the predator leaves, the animal will start to breathe heavily, experience a bout of shaking, and then simply move on with its day. This is literally where the term “shake it off” comes from.
Unfortunately, humans, with their highly developed neocortex, will often overanalyse or store trauma and even create stories in an attempt to understand the event (e.g., “Why did this happen to me?”). This advanced cognitive processing can prevent us from releasing the trauma fully, leading to chronic stress and emotional baggage.
Today’s Problem: Modern Stress
Modern life keeps us in a heightened state of stress, rarely allowing the nervous system to fully relax. With constant stimuli—from emails and work deadlines to caffeine and social media—our sympathetic nervous system is continually activated. Over time, this chronic stress can manifest as physical or mental health problems.
Breathwork is a powerful tool to close this stress loop and bring our bodies back to balance.
HOW BREATHWORK WORKS
By practicing slow, deep, controlled breathing, we signal our nervous system to shift into a parasympathetic state, promoting relaxation and calm. On the other hand, more dynamic breathing techniques, followed by slower breaths, can help process and release accumulated stress, closing the stress loop in the body.
Faster breathing over set periods can help us access deeper layers of the brain, releasing stored trauma or stress. During these practices, you might experience physical or emotional sensations—this is your body’s way of letting go of old, stored emotions or trauma.
In essence, breathwork is the remote control for our nervous system, helping us transition from stress to calm.
Why It Matters in Fitness
At Therapy, we often guide people to a heightened state through movement. Whether it’s a challenging cycle class or an intense RunLift session, exercise does trigger a stress response in the body, but it’s important to recognise that this is an acute, short-term stress known as “eustress,” which is actually beneficial. Unlike chronic stress, which keeps cortisol levels elevated over time and can wear the body down, the stress from exercise is controlled and productive, helping to build resilience against daily stressors.
Just like dynamic breathing can help release stored tension, the controlled stress of exercise helps the body adapt and become more resilient to future challenges. This is why cool-downs are crucial. If we don’t give ourselves a moment to reset and calm the nervous system, we may leave class still in a heightened, activated state.
And whilst cortisol will naturally lower after a bout of exercise. Incorporating 3-5 minutes of slow, controlled breathing at the end of class, can help bring the body back to a parasympathetic state quicker, ensuring that people leave feeling calm, grounded, and full of those feel-good endorphins!
Performance Benefits of Mouth Taping & Nose Breathing
Recently, mouth taping and nose breathing have gained popularity as techniques to enhance performance during exercise. So for those of you interested.
Here’s why:
Improved Oxygen Efficiency: Nasal breathing filters and humidifies the air, improving oxygen uptake.
Activates the Diaphragm: Encourages deeper, more efficient breathing, which expands lung capacity.
CO2 Tolerance: Nasal breathing increases CO2 levels, training the body to use oxygen more effectively.
Stress Reduction: Mouth breathing can overstimulate the sympathetic nervous system, while nose breathing promotes calm.
Prevents Over-Breathing: Nose breathing naturally slows the breath, preventing hyperventilation. Slower the breath – the calmer we are.
Enhanced Recovery: It reduces heart rate and speeds up recovery after workouts.
BREATHWORK AT THERAPY
Want to explore breathwork at Therapy? Here’s how:
In-App Sessions: Download the ‘Therapy Fitness’ app and try our brand-new 8 min coherence breath for stress reduction (more breath practices coming in the next few weeks).
Connect Heal Classes: Join us twice a week to experience breathwork and sound healing combined.
Breakthrough Breath Sessions: Step into a powerful 2-hour journey with a Breakthrough Breath session. Using a combination of ‘conscious connected’ breathwork and modern science, this guided practice helps unlock emotions and trauma stored in your body. Through intentional breathing, music, and guidance, you’ll enter a deep, transformative state where you can release unprocessed emotions and reconnect with your inner power. This session is about more than just healing—it’s about tapping into self-love, acceptance, and clarity. Whether it’s your first time or you’re familiar with breathwork, this session is designed to meet you where you are and guide you through a cathartic experience in a safe and supportive space. Prepare to let go of what no longer serves you and leave feeling lighter, empowered, and ready for change.
Our next small group Breakthrough Breath is on Sunday November 10th, connect us directly for more details.
Breath is your gateway to balance, recovery, and optimal performance. Join us in exploring its power.