These helps you to establish and practice healthful rhythms. You may also gain additional insights into the nature of the breathing processes, and how to attain additional relaxation through them. The Complete Breath Most of us use three or four kinds of breathing. These may be called high, low and middle breathing and complete breathing. The complete breath is a combination of high breathing, mid breathing and low breathing.
High breathing refers to what takes place primarily in the upper part of the chest and lungs.
Persons with asthma, a tight belt, a full stomach or who otherwise become short of breath tend to resort to high breathing. One may deliberately draw in his abdomen and force its contents upward against the diaphragm and into the chest cavity in order to cause high breathing. High breathing is naturally shallow and a larger percentage of it fails to reach the alveoli and enter into useable gaseous exchange. This is the least desirable form of breathing since the upper lobes of the lungs are used and these have only a small air capacity. Also the upper rib cage is fairly rigid, so not much expansion of the ribs can take place.