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contract and expand. However, unlike our furry friends who pandiculate approximately 40 times per day, most people barely get one or two in per day. Voluntary pandiculation can regulate and alleviate stored tension in the body and strengthen internal structures. The decompression breath is a voluntary practice of pandiculation by weaving together the seemingly opposite forces of muscular expansion and contraction. CHANGE HOW YOU FEEL BY CHANGING HOW YOU BREATHE The benefits of decompression breathing are cumulative and exponential and truly f lourish with a dedicated practice. This practice improves your movement patterns and teaches you how to simultaneously notice the qualities of engagement and spaciousness within your body. By simultaneously lengthening and strengthening the tissues and structures around the diaphragm, as well as the joints between the vertebrae and rib cage, we leverage and coordinate mechanical and physiological movements with great ease. With this conscious breathing exercise, we not only optimize functional movement but also up-regulate our autonomic nervous system so our bodies, minds, and hearts become inoculated to future stressors. Many of us, as well as our clients and family members, try to change how we feel with the strategy of doubling down on more thinking. Here's a new possibility: Instead of thinking your way out of stress, breathe your way into more ease, power, and openness. Science demonstrates that consciously or actively engaging with your breath may change how you think, move, and feel. Short-circuit a stress response, calm your heart, relax into a stretch more deeply, and create more connections with just two minutes of conscious breathing. One easy action you can take to mitigate painful patterns in yourself is to embody the decompression breath a few times a week for a couple minutes. It will not only offer immediate and long-term benefits of actively adapting to stressors but also provide you with an embodiment practice so you can teach your clients and loved ones how to get unstuck from rigid pain patterns. Don't let your next breath pass you by. Heath and Nicole Reed are co-founders of Living Metta (living "loving kindness"), a continuing education company now offering touch therapy tools and self-care practices in their online community. They also lead workshops and retreats across the country and overseas and have been team-teaching touch and movement therapy for over 20 years. In addition to offering live classes, Heath and Nicole are life coaches offering home study, bodywork, self-care videos, and online courses that nourish you. Try their community free for 30 days at livingmetta.com/trial. L i s te n to T h e A B M P Po d c a s t a t a b m p.co m /p o d c a s t s o r w h e reve r yo u a cce s s yo u r favo r i te p o d c a s t s 83 Resources Bradley, Helen and Joseph Esformes. "Breathing Pattern Disorders and Functional Movement." International Journal of Sports Physical Therapy 9, no. 1 (2014): 28–29. ncbi.nlm.nih. gov/pmc/articles/PMC3924606. Goodman, Eric. Foundations of Health: Harnessing the Restorative Power of Movement, Heat, Breath, and the Endocannabinoid System to Heal Pain and Actively Adapt for a Healthy Life. New York: Harper Wave, 2022. Hamilton, Jon. NPR.org. "A Brain Circuit Linking Pain and Breathing May Offer a Path to Prevent Opioid Deaths." December 22, 2021. npr.org/sections/ health-shots/2021/12/22/1066011236/a- brain-circuit-linking-pain-and-breathing- may-offer-a-path-to-prevent-opioid-de. Merriam-Webster.com. "Pandiculation." Accessed September 2022. www. merriam-webster.com/word-of-the- day/pandiculation-2015-01-21. SAV V Y SELF-CARE DECOMPRESSION BREATH 101 Here's a brief explanation of decompression breath. In a sitting, supine, or standing position, place your hands on your abdomen, palms down, with your thumbs contacting your lowest ribs and your pinkies touching your hip bones, otherwise known as the anterior superior iliac spine (ASIS). Inhale as you fill your rib cage and try to expand the space between your hips and ribs. As you exhale, draw your navel point in toward the spine. Feel your core engaged in an attempt to maintain that increased space and length you've created on the next inhalation. Repeat 3–9 times. Especially pay attention to breathing and filling air into the back of the rib cage, behind and around the shoulders, as well as the lateral f lank of your torso. On each inhale, attempt to fill more air into your rib cage in a 360-degree way, and on each exhale, attempt to sustain the length between hips and ribs. Creating a 360-degree expansion and elevation of the rib cage while simultaneously lengthening and strengthening the stabilizing muscles in and around the torso and spinal column provides more mobility and space in the rib cage laterally and vertically. It also provides for a special type of spacious engagement called pandiculation. PANDICULATION If you search for the medical definition of pandiculation, you'll find something akin to "a stretching and stiffening especially of the trunk and extremities as when fatigued and drowsy or after waking from sleep." If you imagine a dog or cat taking a big yawn while stretching, you may begin to get a sense of what pandiculation is. Or perhaps you give yourself the gift of a generous, good morning stretch when you wake up and you feel your body simultaneously