Conscious Breathing: Breathwork for Health, Stress Release, and Personal Mastery [Paperback]

Gay Hendricks (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 1, 1995

Conscious Breathing draws on more than twenty years of research and practice to present a simple yet comprehensive program that can be used every day to improve energy, mental clarity, and physical health. As the essential life-force of the body, the breath influences how we feel on every level.  But many traditional breathing programs are limited by esoteric or cultlike elements.  Pioneering therapist Gay Hendricks has refined the most important practices into a mainstream healing tool that can provide dramatic benefits--ranging from lowered blood pressure and pain reduction to elimination of depression and anxiety--in as little as ten minutes a day. At the core of the book are eight key breathing exercises, fully illustrated, with step-by-step instructions, plus the "short form" ten-minute breathing program.  Additional chapters provide breathing techniques for special concerns, including: Breathing to aid in trauma release and recovery from addictions. Treatment of asthma and other respiratory problems. Enhancement of sex and communication between couples. Improved concentration and stamina in sports.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

"In your lifetime you will breathe in and out more than a hundred million times.... What if you made a tiny improvement in something you did that many times?" So queries Hendricks, a professor of counseling at the University of Colorado and author of Conscious Loving, at the start of this quietly assured guide. His guided breathing exercises, most done lying down and in combination with gentle movements, are designed to free the movement of the diaphragm, increase oxygenation and relax the body. Benefits can include stress reduction, pain management, improved health and spiritual growth. In his discussion of the anatomy of breathing, Hendricks errs in saying there are two lobes in each human lung (the right lung has three lobes), but this handsome handbook, appealingly illustrated and laced with aphorisms about breathing from sports heroes, poets and philosophers, offers much of value to those just fostering awarenes of breathing to such advanced practitioners as singers and athletes.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist

We inhale 20,000 times a day. Deprived of oxygen for more than 10 seconds, the brain fogs and panics; after 4 to 5 minutes, it never again functions with its former efficiency. Hendricks first traces the physiological journey of a breath, then lists the benefits of conscious breathing. Reportedly, it reduces stress and tension; increases energy and endurance; facilitates emotional mastery, particularly over anxiety and depression; prevents and heals certain physical complaints, especially asthma, respiratory problems, and cardiovascular illness; contributes significantly to "graceful aging" ; helps in managing pain; enhances mental focus and physical performance, particularly when applied to sports; and enables psychospiritual transformation. "Ultimately," Hendricks asserts, "breathing can be a path to that most essential of human experiences: learning to love." Thereafter, his amply illustrated book provides basic and advanced breath-work lessons and a 10-minute daily breathing program. Calling himself his "own best client," Hendricks builds a convincing case for his addition to alternative-healing therapies. Whitney Scott

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Product Details

• Paperback: 208 pages
• Publisher: Bantam (March 1, 1995)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0553374435
• ISBN-13: 978-0553374438
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 0.6 x 7.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (13 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #327,061 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Gay Hendricks has served for more than thirty years as one of the major contributors to the fields of relationship transformation and body-mind therapies. Throughout his career, Dr. Hendricks has coached more than eight hundred executives, including the top management at firms such as Dell, Hewlett-Packard, Motorola, and KLM. Along with his wife, Dr. Kathlyn Hendricks, he has coauthored many books including Conscious Loving, The Corporate Mystic, and his latest, the New York Times bestseller Five Wishes, which has been translated into seventeen languages. Dr. Hendricks received his Ph.D. in counseling psychology from Stanford University. After a twenty-one-year career as a professor at the University of Colorado, he founded the Hendricks Institute, which offers seminars in North America, Asia, and Europe. He is also the founder of a new virtual learning center for transformation, www.gaiailluminationuniversity.com,
and The Spiritual Cinema Circle.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

46 of 53 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The 20th Century West's answer to The Science of Breath, May 28, 1996

By A Customer

This review is from: Conscious Breathing: Breathwork for Health, Stress Release, and Personal Mastery (Paperback)

Ask people what they know about popular body-centered therapists Gay and Kathlyn Hendricks and their answers usually contain the words "relationship" and "breathing." Conscious Loving described the Hendricks's thoughts and experience regarding relationship transformation. Conscious Breathing, by Gay Hendricks, Ph.D. details the myriad, transformative uses of breathing he has explored. Reading Conscious Breathing, I was reminded of the Buddha's admonition to accept nothing based on faith or teaching, but only by your experience of its truth. Similarly, Hendricks repeatedly describes how the various techniques in the book have been refined and honed by his personal experience and by the experiences of the thousands of clients and workshop participants over the last 26 years. For example, teaching the age-old alternate nostril breathing, Hendricks shares the particular variation of which his clients reported the most profound effects. The wide variety of applications for breathing that he explores, makes Hendricks's breathing inquiry, and this book, unique. Unlike methods, like Rebirthing or Holotropic Breathwork, which focus on a particular technique and it's effects (e.g. Holotropic's design to reproduce hallucinogenic drug experiences through breathing), Conscious Breathing details breathing practices for everything from releasing trauma, stress reduction, heightened athletic performance and curing asthma to raising the body's "positive energy thermostat" and improved sexual performance. In fact, the cathartic breathing that most people think of as "breathwork" doesn't even appear in Conscious Breathing (but can be found in the Hendricks's earlier book, Radiance). This omission demonstrates the continual evolution of the Hendricks's work. Over the years, Gay and Kathlyn's emphasis has shifted to subtly and gently removing tensions and traumas from the body and "rewiring" it to hold a higher positive charge rather than engaging in less directed, cathartic process sessions. In fact, the constant development means that those who have previously learned some of the techniques described in Conscious Breathing (e.g. the "10 Minute Daily Breathing Program") will find changes in those teachings, and those who attend the Hendricks's workshops will find both refinements and additions to the material in Conscious Breathing. More than merely informative, Conscious Breathing is enjoyable and Hendricks makes his presence clearly felt. Abundant and entertaining self revelation run the gamut from Hendricks's valuable diary of how he uses breathing on a daily basis to the story of how his pre

41 of 53 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars I get the feeling the author wrote these reviews., November 9, 2003

By 

"lavalliere" (Seattle, WA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Conscious Breathing: Breathwork for Health, Stress Release, and Personal Mastery (Paperback)

Suggestions if you want to waste your money on this book.
1. Skip pages 1 -60 useless, boring, information about the author.
2. Read only areas that are in bold. These are the exercises.
3. Skip all the filler. It is about the author lending no interest, content, inspiration, etc. to the book.
4. DON'T WASTE YOUR MONEY. THIS APPEARS TO BE NOTHING BUT A PRODUCTION AUTHOR WHO CRANKS THESE THINGS OUT EVERY FEW MONTHS. Its as if he wrote the whole thing in a day. The exercises are just rehashed from other people's books and videos.

27 of 36 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Don't Waste Your Money!, August 25, 2001

By 

Thomas F. Lee (Seaside, CA United States) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Conscious Breathing: Breathwork for Health, Stress Release, and Personal Mastery (Paperback)

Filled with stories and not much substance. The author namedrops Andrew Weil's name ("Andy") early on and pronounces, not suprisingly, that Andy thinks breathing is real important. The book is filled with lots of half-empty pages, so trees are a big loser, too. Summary: lots of fluff but not much information!