Breathwork with James Dowler
Tell us a little bit about you and your journey to becoming a Breathwork Coach and starting Breathe With James.
Battling years of chronic illness led me on a journey of exploring all types of healing modalities. It wasn’t until I discovered the connection between the mind and the body and understood chronic stress to be the cause of my physical dis-ease that symptoms began to ease. I now teach thousands of people around the world to alleviate stress and anxiety through their breath. My aim is to provide people with knowledge and practices that help to re-wire their nervous system and brain, and in doing so restore people’s ability to regulate their emotions and build resilience.
What is breathwork?
Breathwork is the quickest, most powerful and effective way to enhance and transform one’s state of mind and body. Breathing is the only system in our body that is both automatic and under our control. This is not a coincidence. It’s an invitation to tap into and influence the evolution of our mind and body. Once understood, breathing practices can be used as a tool to radically improve our physical and mental health, performance and emotional wellbeing.
What are the benefits of breathwork?
The main two benefits that I see are reducing stress and anxiety, and improving sleep. The main reason for this is that conscious breath regulation dials down “the worry centres” of your brain and activates the parasympathetic (slowing down) nervous system - moving people into a more relaxed and settled state.
What's one thing that always surprises people about breathwork?
The ease at which they are able to shift their state and move into being more relaxed and settled. Especially because the breath is a resource that is available any place, any time and for completely free too!
What's one misconception about breathwork?
That breathwork alone will "heal" you. There are quite a few breathwork coaches out there who suggest that "you just need to breathe". The reality is that breathwork will always be part of a wider healing puzzle and as much as it is an amazing resource, it shouldn't be practised in isolation.
Is there one particular area that most of your clients utilise breathwork to overcome?
My breathwork for sleep sessions are the most popular. This probably isn't surprising if you consider that in the UK alone 2/3 of adults now suffer from disrupted sleep patterns.
