I received an e-mail from a student today asking about breathing.Why do we breathe in through the nose and out the mouth? I’ve been puzzling and haven’t yet discovered a benefit other than the sound.
First we have to understand that both inhaling and exhaling are very important to the breathing process. It’s the job of our lungs to ‘extract’ oxygen from the air that we breath in. What a lot of people don’t realize is that the lungs do this primarily during the exhale. Exhaling through the mouth is done so that we can use the tongue and mouth muscles to control and restrict the air flow when it’s appropriate. This slows the exhalation, allowing more time for the lungs to work their magic, effectively making each breath more effective. When you exhale too quickly. you actually decrease your levels of oxygen absorption.
There are also times where I need to exhale quickly such as when I am on the receiving end of a strike or need to tighten my body. Exhaling through the nose can take too long. So by exhaling through the mouth, we have a versatile tool that we can use in our martial arts training.
Breathing in through the nose has many benefits though. Primarily, the nose and sinus actually filters incoming air and also warms it to be better processed by the lungs.
During normal day-to-day activities, I recommend both inhaling and exhaling through the nose.
During our kata training, we really start to learn the ins and outs of breathing. This is especially true when we get into Sanchin kata.