Master the Body-Breath Connection: Unlock Whole-Body Resilience with Innovative Breathwork Techniques in Body by Breath. An interview with Jill Miller
When Jill Miller began writing The Roll Model, her first book, she sent out a call to action through her community: share your stories with me. The response was huge, and Jill spotted a common thread through practitioners’ incredible stories of healing. Many rollers were able to support physical well-being through soft tissue self-therapy, and, more markedly, all practitioners reported strengthened their emotional resilience.
Jill was thrilled. She had first hand experience using these tools during her personal struggles living with anxiety, depression, and compulsivity, and through her face off against an eating disorder. Now she poured through countless testimonials that her therapeutic soft-tissue approach not only amplified physical wellness, but bestowed practitioners with renewed emotional resilience and an improved overall sense of well-being.
Discovering the Science Behind Emotional Resiliency
Fueled to understand the science behind her students’ energetic transformations served as the inspiration for Body by Breath. Jill shares, “I needed to find out WHY people felt so much better on every level by using my approach, and in researching it all, I was able to distill the elements that lead to these well-being transformations.”
Jill discovered that “Mental health does not live in your head; it’s a bodywide phenomenon and breathwork gives you access.” Using breath, practitioners can inspire self-treatment and healing through medicines stemming from the inner compound pharmacy of the body. Body by Breath, Jill explains, offers an opportunity “to optimize your own prescription pad as a self-healer and reframe the healthcare model into something more self-manageable.”
The onslaught of information and pace of the modern world, coupled with the residue of a global pandemic has taken a serious toll on our physical and emotional wellbeing, while often taxing our healthcare system to its limits.
In a study from The Lancet, the global incidence of Major Depressive Disorder increased by 53.2 million additional cases, and the global incidence of Anxiety by 76.2 million in 2020. This isn’t a temporary issue; the greater than 25% (WHO) uptick of global unrest and stress has lasting health implications. Stress is known to cause side effects including headaches, memory and cognition problems, intestinal upset, insomnia, fatigue, changes in sex drive, and negative impact to the immune system–along with high blood pressure, heart disease, diabetes, sexual dysfunction, and chronic GI and health conditions in the long-term.
Stress is not the only body thug. The Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) named Long Covid the #1 disease to watch in 2023. Both Long Covid and Stress share a common quality: the potential to manifest tensional changes in the diaphragm and impact all of the physiological processes that revolve around the breath.
The Diaphragm – Your Second Brain
Body by Breath reveals the diaphragm’s role not only in breath–but as a physical center and as a “second brain” that regulates–and disregulates–neural, digestive, and musculoskeletal systems. Part 1 chronicles the newest science on breath and well-being. Part 2 curates exercises that allow practitioners to “feel” how the diaphragm is an actor-director of the “diaphragm hub,” a term borrowed from the book that denotes how the diaphragm inter-connects and signals many systems of the body.
“Because it takes direction from both the somatic and the autonomic nervous systems, the diaphragm is the link between the conscious and unconscious minds;” and, Jill adds, a healthy diaphragm is important to well-being. Jill quietly and poetically describes the reasons behind why she chose to include visual and experiential content, why she felt both were necessary, “The diaphragm is already in the dark.”
Few of us are granted access to a deep understanding of the diaphragm or its role in “breathing, as a postural muscle, a gut massage, or a lymph pump.” And also, Jill continues, “the diaphragm itself is inaccessible. It’s inaccessible in that you can’t really feel it because biological design left the muscle naked, barren of muscle spindles that would provide the proprioceptive feedback to our brain to tell us about its position.”
The issue is, states Miller, “If your diaphragm is stiff for either known or unknown reasons, in other words, muscular or fascial restrictions in the neighborhood of the diaphragm, you may have a challenge inducing the relaxation response. So much of the book focuses on being able to manipulate, massage, and adjust tensions, either known or unknown in the neighborhood of the diaphragm.” Many of the exercises in Body by Breath directly touch the diaphragm, others affect the breath through the vagal nerve pathway.
Benefits of Improved Vagal Tone
Why should you care about your vagus nerve? In a word, it’s about resilience.
Branches of the vagus nerve wander through and animate the face and neck, and innervate the lungs and the subdiaphragmatic viscera – namely organs of the gut – to provide sensory information to the body. Jill smiles, “If you’ve ever had a ‘gut feeling,’ that’s the vagus.”
“The vagus is an important nerve for regulating your heartbeat, rate of respiration, and digestion. The vagus turns the dial down on our sympathetic, fight-or-flight response and ramps up our relaxation response,” Jill explains.
The vagus nerve is the major nerve of the Parasympathetic Nervous System (PSNS) that stimulates the relaxation response. Activating our PSNS stimulates our internal compound pharmacy, a cascade of internal responses that support healthy immune function, recovery, and overall well being – without any unwanted side-effects.
Body by Breath also describes the vagus’ role in communication and social engagement, as a predictor and protector against cancer, glucose regulation, inflammation, and emotional stress including anxiety, fear, and PTSD – and against Long Covid.
Built on four pillars–Breathe, Roll, Move, and Non-sleep Deep Rest – exercises support the attainment of conscious relaxation
The Body by Breath methodology is different. Built on four pillars – Breathe, Roll, Move, and Non-sleep Deep Rest – exercises support the attainment of conscious relaxation through these tools – and with other principles including the “5 Ps” of Parasympathetic Bliss: Perspective, Place, Palpation, Pace of Breath, and Position.
Jill describes how she thoughtfully utilizes “Position,” one of the “5 Ps,” in her most requested pose: “In the upper trap release, your pelvis is a little bit higher than your heart, and your heart is a little bit higher than your head and neck. This position sets off a cascade of responses in what’s known as the baroreceptor reflex. When your heart and pelvis are slightly higher than your brain, these sensors in the side of your neck sense that more blood is rushing towards your brain. The brain can’t tolerate more blood than it needs. This feedback loop travels through the vagus to the brainstem and ends up slowing down your heart rate, constricting the blood vessels and slowing down your breathing. Just by shifting your position so that gravity is aligned with your relaxation response, we add this additional element of free relaxation [to the myriad benefits of self-massage].”
“The thing that’s really exciting is that we can directly influence the vagus with the pace of our breathing, with pressure in the different zones the vagus innervates, through position and through humming or singing,”states Miller.
These exercises help you feel better; they lessen pain–but also “feel better” as in sense your internal processes by strengthening your inward “seventh sense” known as interoception, which Jill helps readers clearly process.
Learning to listen body through Interoception, your “Seventh Sense”
Interoception is your body’s subtle sensing system. Miller explains, “It’s your ability to pick up on the messages from your physiology. It’s as intuitive as actually feeling that you need to pee or feeling the movement of air come out of your stomach and out your mouth in a burp. And some researchers expand that our interoception is also our ability to feel our own and others emotions – that there’s also an overlap with empathy and mental health research. Body by Breath helps you connect interoception into your fascial system as well, but all these practices are subtle. Over time, interoception amplifies your ability to sense the subtle things about your body. And that’s very, very important for emotional intelligence. It’s also very important for being able to recognize how other people are feeling, so that your communication with them can improve.”
How Breath Helps A Good Night’s Rest
Jill delves into how interoception is key in terms of managing sleep disorders. “It allows you to sense the melatonin wave. If you can pick up on when your brain starts to release this cascade of neurochemicals, you’ll be able to fall asleep quickly and sleep deeply. But if you bypass it, pushing through it because you want to finish a couple more documents or you want to watch another episode on Netflix or you want to subdue it by caffeinating yourself or eating, you’re going to miss the big sleep freight train and have to hop on to a push car later – and that push car is stressful, interrupted sleep.”
Body by Breath also supports practitioners in finding better sleep through the first three pillars as well as conscious relaxation, similar to meditation, with Non-sleep Deep Rest, also known as NSDR.
For many, deep states of conscious relaxation may seem out of reach, but NSDR is, Miller shares, “done really as the cherry on top for when you work your way through the other tools that have attenuated and adjusted your tolerance for relaxation, so that non-sleep deep rest actually is very fulfilling. And by the way, our non-sleep deep rest is not a traditional, upright, stillness type of meditation.”
Body by Breath may offer a more tolerable way to move towards mindfulness and empower the relaxation response than traditional, still-based meditation.
Some studies suggest that between 17% and 53% of the total population is stillness-based meditation intolerant. For these restless meditators who find stillness near impossible, Body by Breath provides tolerable options of managing the relaxation response through movement, breath, roll outs, or exercises.
An Introduction to Body By Breath Practices
Breathe, roll, and move with Jill and experience the relaxation response in your own body.
Bridge Lifts
Bridge Lifts are a highly effective way to enhance breath, stretch the diaphragm and activate the relaxation response. This exercise from Jill will become your instant breath classic.
The Lateral Rib Hammock
Effortlessly decompress the upper back and gently traction the ribs while activating “Zone 2” of the vagus nerve. This double Coregeous Ball exercise stimulates the relaxation response and helps you feel better fast.
Learn More About Body By Breath
To learn more about Jill’s new book Body by Breath come visit the BBB launch site. For those interested in delving deeper into relaxation practices and the science of wellness, Body by Breath can order on Amazon.
The Body by Breath approach brings a much needed awareness on self-care for the diaphragm. It’s not intuitive that we can and should turn our awareness to the massage and myofascial release of the diaphragm, a muscle whose movement we cannot even sense or feel. This is a huge blind spot for my athlete clients, and once we started working on it, they all want more!
When cueing breath patterns in my classes, I have gone back and forth debating whether or not to cue movement of the diaphragm in my Pilates classes. It is not a muscle most people have taken an interest in connecting to in a deep way (unless they are a vocalist) up to the point of starting classes. Because the diaphragm is barren of muscle spindles that would provide proprioceptive feedback, it’s almost as if we’re left to observe the traces of the diaphragm (the expansion of the belly on the inhale, perhaps sensing fascial restriction in the surrounding area, inability to fully relax, etc.). By explaining the diaphragm as the link between subconscious and conscious, somatic and autonomic, and healthy function as a precursor to full relaxation, I believe clients would be more eager to connect with their diaphragms.
The four pillars of Body by Breath; breath, roll, move and deep non-sleep rest are very important for the whole health of each person I come in to contact with. I have had wonderful experiences using breath control practices, pressure with Roll model self myofascial release and body position changes as part of a vagal nerve rebalancing session with my patients, which gives them power over their own nervous system function. I have enjoyed reading Body by Breath, as it has reinforced my understanding of breathing mechanisms, nervous system and immune function.
Great post! The Body by Breath book is such a valuable resource, I have the hard copy at home and bought the ebook to bring with me to work as I travel for work
Incredibly important findings.
The relationship to my breath really changed after having my daughter. She was born earlier and I felt like I constantly couldn’t catch my breath even if I tried to incorporate diaphragmatic breathing my vagus nerve was responding to the trauma that I experienced. I lost my seventh sense and lived in a freeze state. I’ve been working with a somatic therapist and working towards finding my breath. When you did your workshop in Chicago it was very eye opening for me to realize how the balls allowed me to be back in my body and breathe in a different way. I look forward to learning more about this method.
I grew up with severe asthma (daily medication, 2 week-long hospital stays) and was even told by a doctor that I was just a “bad breather.” Eek! The experience has had a lasting impact on my life, and on my breath. However, when I started practicing yoga in my early 20s, my relationship to my breath changed dramatically and I was able to stop daily medication. The implications were profound … breath is life! For myself, breath was best experienced by movement otherwise I would feel tired, stagnant, sad and depressed. In addition, I still struggle with anxiety and the constant feedback loop of asthma “I can’t breathe” and the feeling of anxiety and fear feels hardwired in my body. I bought Jill’s Roll Model book and am excited to work my way through it and to continue to free up the structures in my own body that will alleviate the mental overwhelm and anxiousness of not being able to access a deep belly breath.
Thank you for the work you do and for helping people to unlock their deep healing capacity through these practices: rolling, breathing, and resting deeply.
The Body by Breath method is the much needed medicine for so many of our modern day ailments that arise from stress and burn out. Instead of thinking one can solve every health issue with a pill, we need to educate the general public to start by taking deep breaths. We have scientific evidence that indicates that many chronic illnesses either arise or worsen with stressful mental states. Feeling our body with deep palpation, down regulating the nervous system and even just slowing down to be gentle with oneself can achieve so much with improving our health. I can’t wait to take the Body by Breath immersion training!
Loved the importance given to the diaphragm…such an influential part of our body that is often neglected! I often find that so many imbalances in the body are connected with improper breathing and bringing some awareness to the function of the diaphragm can help so much. The healing journey cannot be separated from breathing!
I liked learning that the hip bridge lifts are a way to relax because I realize now that’s part of why we do them at the end of a barre class. I hadn’t known about the connection with the diaphragm and the light inversion signaling the heart rate to slow as the blood moves toward the brain. It’s good to know those are functions of that move so I can incorporate them intentionally now, not just habitually. And I’m happy to learn more tools for meditation as I’ve also always struggled with the stillness aspect.
I have had trouble sleeping for as long as I can remember and these videos have been extremely helpful!