Why are Breathing Exercises so Important

I put a HEAVY emphasis on breathing and rib cage mobility. But why?

We breathe upwards of 22,000 times a day.. every breath nourishes our body.

How good would we feel if this fundamental function of our body was as efficient as it could be?

This requires adequate rib cage mobility and the ability to FIND a stacked thorax over pelvis (you don’t need to be there all the time!). I am not going to get into “the stack” in this blog post, just the rib cage mobility part.

I could talk about breathing for hours, but I will try to keep it simple.

To start, let’s talk about the lungs. They’re located in our rib cage. When we inhale, our diaphragm muscle contracts and moves downwards as the muscles between the ribs contract and move upward, increasing the size of the thoracic cavity. This in turn decreases the pressure in our lungs, so air comes in.

The opposite happens on an exhale; the diaphagm relaxes and ascends as the muscles between the ribs relax and the ribcage comes down and in. Air leaves the lungs.

That’s why breathing requires our thorax (think rib cage) to be mobile and be able to expand in all directions.

The image to the left shows an example breathing exercise to get rib cage mobility in the left lateral ribs.

Pump Handle and Bucket Handle

Wait.. Now we’re talking about pumps and buckets?

It’s because a pump handle and a bucket handle are a good way to visualize the main movements of our rib cage. The pump handle refers to the movement of our sternum / front of our ribs upwards on the inhale. The bucket handle refers to the movement of our ribs laterally (to the sides) on the inhale.

Hopefully the image below helps give you a visual representation of these ribcage movements.

It’s important to understand these movement patterns, because most people (everyone, really) will have compression in their thorax / ribs that won’t allow these movement patterns to happen ideally. This is called thorax compression.

Thorax Compression

Compression in our thorax can result in compensatory (not ideal) movement patterns. Compensatory movement patterns aren’t inherently bad! They are actually good - they are the adaptations our bodies make to help us move through the world. But they might cause movement limitations or make it challenging to do the activities we love.

We want our bodies to be well-oiled and efficient machines, right? Well breathing is a massive part of that. If we have compression in our rib cage somewhere, it will effect EVERY OTHER PART OF OUR BODY. You heard me right!

Let’s look at the shoulder blade (scapula) for example. If you have compression in your upper chest wall, it’s going to impact the position of your scapula on your rib cage. You therefore might not be able to reach your arm behind your back comfortably because you’re scapula isn’t free to move as it should.

Don’t worry if that made no sense to you. It’s my job to recognize it in my clients and help them work on it. I just wanted to highlight ONE example of how rib cage mobility can impact the position of bones and muscles to help highlight the importance of working on it.

And how we work on it..

So how do we improve thoracic mobility and decrease areas of compression in the thorax? Breathing exercises!

Your entire workout doesn’t need to be comprised of breathing exercises. I usually incorporate a few breathing exercises into the warm-up and cool down. Then during the strength portion of the workout, I will cue breathing to help continue to work on the thoracic mobility.

One last thing..

I want to quickly talk about “belly breathing” vs “360 degree / diaphragmatic breathing” because they are profoundly different when it comes to improving rib cage mobility.

The ribs should be able to move in 360 degrees to get full expansion of the thorax and an ideal inhale. That’s why diaphragmatic / 360 degree breathing is NOT the same as belly breathing. Belly breathing doesn’t focus on the movement of the rib cage. As implied by it’s name, it focuses on movement of the belly.

As a matter of fact, when I am coaching rib cage mobility breathing exercises, I actually will often cue to hold tension in your abs (belly) so that you can send pressure into areas of the thorax and NOT the belly.

I’ll leave you with a youtube video that has an example rib cage mobility breathing exercise. Listen to the cueing on this because I explain both options; letting the belly relax on the inhale or holding tension in your core on the inhale. Give both a try and see if this blog post makes a little more sense.

If you want to incorporate this into your training, but don’t know where to start, then come join my Functional Empowered Fitness membership.

Get access to all of my fitness routines, which prioritize strength, mobility, and breathing! You can find out more information at the link below.