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Comment by a8da6b0c91d | Hacker News Reader

You repeatedly see deep breathing recommended, which is exactly wrong. Do not take deep breaths to calm down. Instead take shallow breaths as slowly as possible. You want to boost blood CO2 levels. This is how bag breathing works to reduce anxiety.

Overbreathing/hyperventilation induces anxiety. A high breathing rate is correlated to disease and illness; the healthiest people breathe the least.

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Different traditions recommend different breathing techniques, but the most common teaching (that I've come across) is to not make any conscious effort to modify your breathing, instead concentrating on simply observing the breath as it is.

Deliberately lowering the breathing rate is extremely powerful. Who cares what some alleged "tradition" says.

More powerful is vagus nerve stimulation coupled with reduced breathing. Hold your breath for a minute at a time with your face in cold water.

I care. Vipassana meditation is about observing reality as it is and accepting it. Trying to control the breathing would defeat the purpose. Other forms of meditation are based on controlling the breathing and in those cases the purpose and outcome would probably be different but not trying to control the breathing has definitely its uses.

IMO Deep breathing is not the same as Overbreathing/hyperventilation. Deep breathing should be done in calm and controlled manner. There is no tension/stress involved with Deep breathing as in hyperventilation. Deep breathing increases the amount of oxygen in the blood and brain. In my meditation practice I do 10-20 mins of Deep breathing and than the breath gets extremely shallow very easily after that. There is no need to hold or restrict the breath at that point. It naturally slows to 1-2 breaths per minute. Which induces great calmness.

> Deep breathing increases the amount of oxygen in the blood and brain

Read about the Bohr effect. Deep breathing lowers CO2 levels and consequently reduces tissue oxygen uptake.

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