Breathe Your Way to Balance: How Calming and Activating Breathwork Can Transform Your Life - by Gerry Bronn, Clinical Psychologist at In Health - Byron Bay Psychology
Most of us breathe without thinking about it. In fact, we take around 20,000 breaths a day, and yet, we rarely stop to consider how powerful each breath can be. Breathwork—the practice of intentionally controlling your breath—can be one of the most effective, free, and immediate tools to improve your physical health, mental clarity, and emotional balance.
In this post, we’ll explore two powerful types of breathwork:
Calming Breathwork – to soothe your mind, release stress, and restore peace.
Activating Breathwork – to boost your energy, sharpen your focus, and lift your mood.
By the end, you’ll know how to use your breath to feel more in control of your life—anytime, anywhere.
Why Breathwork Works
Breath is the only part of your autonomic nervous system that you can control directly. This system runs the automatic processes in your body like heartbeat, digestion, and stress response. Through breathwork, you can send powerful signals to your brain and body to either relax or energize.
In simple terms:
Slow, deep breathing tells your body, “It’s safe to relax.”
Fast, rhythmic breathing says, “It’s time to wake up and take action.”
This means you can shift your emotional and physical state in minutes—without coffee, without alcohol, without medication—just with air and intention.
Part 1: Calming Breathwork – Finding Your Inner Stillness
What It Does
Calming breathwork activates your parasympathetic nervous system—often called the “rest and digest” mode. It lowers heart rate, reduces stress hormones like cortisol, and brings you into a state of calm alertness.
It’s perfect for:
Anxiety or overthinking
Trouble sleeping
Moments of anger or frustration
Pre-performance nerves before a meeting, speech, or game
Example Technique: 4-7-8 Breathing
Inhale through your nose for 4 seconds.
Hold your breath for 7 seconds.
Exhale slowly through your mouth for 8 seconds.
Repeat 4 cycles.
This extended exhale is the magic—it signals safety to your brain and melts away tension.
Motivational Mindset
Think of calming breathwork as your “reset button.” No matter what chaos is around you, you have the power to hit pause. You can slow the storm inside your head even when you can’t control the world outside. It’s a skill that puts you in the driver’s seat of your emotional life.
Part 2: Activating Breathwork – Igniting Your Energy
What It Does
Activating breathwork stimulates your sympathetic nervous system—the “get up and go” mode. It increases oxygen in your blood, speeds up your heart rate slightly, and wakes up your mind.
It’s ideal for:
Morning energy boost without caffeine
Pre-workout activation
Beating the mid-afternoon slump
Boosting motivation before tackling a challenge
Example Technique: Breath of Fire
Sit upright with a straight spine.
Take a short, sharp inhale through your nose, immediately followed by a short, sharp exhale through your nose.
Keep the pace quick and steady—about 2–3 breaths per second.
Focus on the exhale, letting the inhale happen naturally.
Continue for 30–60 seconds, rest, and repeat up to 3 rounds.
Note: If you feel dizzy, slow down or stop—this is normal when your body isn’t used to rapid breathing.
Motivational Mindset
Think of activating breathwork as lighting your internal fire. When you feel flat, unmotivated, or foggy, you can create your own spark instead of waiting for inspiration to appear. Energy is not just something you have—it’s something you can create.
How to Choose Which Breathwork You Need
Your breath can be your steering wheel. If you’re stressed and need calm, slow it down. If you’re flat and need energy, speed it up.
A simple daily check-in:
Am I wired, tense, or restless? → Calming breathwork.
Am I tired, distracted, or unmotivated? → Activating breathwork.
With practice, you’ll get better at noticing what state you’re in—and switching gears faster.
The Bigger Benefits of Breathwork
While calming and activating breathwork have different effects, both share long-term benefits that ripple into every part of your life.
1. Better Emotional Control
Breathwork trains you to respond instead of react. Instead of snapping in anger or spiralling in anxiety, you have a tool to change your state before you act.
2. More Physical Energy
Activating breathwork can improve oxygen delivery to your muscles and brain, boosting stamina and alertness.
3. Sharper Mental Focus
Both calming and activating practices clear mental clutter—calming removes anxious noise, activating cuts through mental fog.
4. Improved Sleep
Calming breathwork before bed helps you fall asleep faster and sleep more deeply.
5. Greater Resilience
The more you practise, the more you strengthen your nervous system’s flexibility—your ability to shift between calm and alert states easily.
How to Make Breathwork a Daily Habit
Like any skill, the power of breathwork grows with consistent practice. Here’s how to make it stick:
Anchor it to something you already do.
For example, try calming breathwork after brushing your teeth at night, or activating breathwork right before you open your laptop in the morning.Start small.
Even 2 minutes can make a difference. You don’t need to commit to 20 minutes from day one.Use it in real life moments.
Waiting in traffic? Breathe. Feeling stressed before a meeting? Breathe. Need a wake-up at 3 PM? Breathe.Track your state.
Keep a simple note in your phone: before/after mood and energy rating. This helps you see the difference over time.
Final Motivation: Your Breath Is Always With You
You can’t always control what happens in your life. But you can control your breath. That means you can influence how you feel, how you think, and how you respond—every single day.
When you practise calming breathwork, you teach yourself that peace is always within reach. When you practise activating breathwork, you remind yourself that you can create your own motivation.
This is not just about breathing—it’s about owning your state of mind, building resilience, and creating the energy and calm you need to live the life you want.
So next time you feel stressed, tired, anxious, or flat, remember this:
The power to change your state is already inside you. All you have to do is breathe.
By Gerry Bronn
Clinical and Coaching Psychologist