Today we’re going to be talking about the important of stretching, but not only the importance of stretching but proper breathing while stretch – it’s very important to breath correctly while you stretch. We all know stretching is great. We all know while stretching you need to breathe, but we have to breathe in through the nose, out through the mouth.

What I want you guys to focus on is, when you’re in your stretch what happens? We all know muscle tissue intertwines itself. When the muscle contracts it closes like a bunch of fingers in a fist- it closes together to make itself smaller and then it opens up. Now when it opens up, that’s when you’re in your stretch depending on how flexible you are and how pliable the muscle tissue is, that’s how far you’re going to stretch. That’s what equals flexibility – pliability of muscle tissue and the ability to open at long lengths. So what I want you guys to really focus on is, when you stretch you open it up as far as you can– the majority people go until they can’t go anymore. What I want you to realize– now this takes the focus, this takes time to understand what you’re looking at. The more detail you get, the better your body’s going to be, right? When you focus on when you open up that muscle fiber, what happens is, it starts to– especially if you use a band – shake and it’s going to be on a micro level so it’s going to shake very, very little. That’s when the body gets confused and it locks up. So I always tell people don’t use elastic bands when they’re stretching, because with that micro fiber that happens, it just confuses things and the body doesn’t do anything. When the body is confused, the only thing it truly does is lock up.

What we want to do is get to a nice area, right? Now try this: Take a nice big deep diaphragmatic breath -so into your belly not into your chest. In to your belly and watch whatever area you’re stretching, it actually stretches just a smidgen more. And if you hold that breath for three seconds and it let out, now you are doing the natural rhythm of how the body works. It won’t lock up. You want to now stretch that out. I want to get you to realize that as you start to open a muscle, you pull this rubber band out and you hold it and you take a breath, you’re going to realize your body’s naturally going to open up just a smidgen more. We’re talking about a hair or two more, but that hair or two make such a humongous difference. So as you are in your stretch, and you take a nice easy breath and you hold it for a second, you’ll feel it. Once you see and feel it, that’s when it becomes real. You see it, you feel it, and it becomes real.

So now you’re seeing your body consistently want to open up – brings more blood flow, more blood flow becomes more healing. Now you’re starting to get somewhere, right? Stretching is good, but if you make that more efficient, more focused, now you’re supercharging your health care. Your self-care is just going to be like, boom! Because now you’re feeling everything. You’re seeing everything and you’re being present. That’s when your body starts saying, “Oh, you’re listening to me. Ah, I see. Let’s give you what you want.” That’s all self-care is, is you, talking with your body and that’s it.