Cool breathing

Hacking stress management with science

If you can't roll your tongue at all this one might not be for you!

A lot of the breathing exercises that get taught for stress management are relying on the fact that any form of paced or controlled breathing helps activate our parasympathetic nervous system (PNS) and slow our brains down. The PNS counteracts the effects of the sympathetic nervous system - aka the response that often gets summarized as "fight, flight, or freeze." When stress is high, sympathetic nervous system activation is high, and we need tricks to turn on the PNS to help us out.

Breathing is great! For me, "cool breathing" with my tongue rolled is even better.

Why rolling your tongue? This, as well as breathing through a straw, can have the effect of somewhat chilling the air you breathe in. The coldness of the air is another boost to your PNS.

Yay for hacking stress management through science.