We don’t talk much here at Third Age Mojo about spirituality, but being connected to our minds, bodies, and souls is imperative to living a healthy life.
A powerful meditative practice that I’ve discovered, Breath as Prayer, illustrates how to connect breathing and prayer to find hope amid anxiety.
Beautifully written by Jennifer Tucker, Breath as Prayer is written from a Christian perspective combined with proven breathing techniques to calm your anxiety, focus your mind, and renew your soul. Whatever your religious perspective, Breath as Prayer is a powerful tool to calm anxiety.
Practice Calm and Purposeful Breathing
Practicing breathing exercises, like somatic breathing, can help us to reduce stress. That same concept applies when we add meditation to our practice.
Stress affects everything in our bodies, including our immune system and overall health. Deep breathing helps create a relaxation response, reducing harmful cortisol levels and improving blood pressure (among other great things).
We can make deep breathing a spiritual experience by adding prayer to it. Breath as Prayer leads the reader through intentional prayer combined with deep breathing exercises.
This book offers 80 prayers and brief meditations that can be used to focus our minds. It walks the reader through the early days of practice, weaving these prayers and meditations into our lives in a way that will improve both health and mind and help us to connect with our spiritual selves.
A Beautiful Guide to Breathing
Breath as Prayer is filled with lovely illustrations that will bring you back again and again to this beautiful book.
While Breath as Prayer does include the science behind the practice, you’ll find it an easy read and a joy to use every day.
Many of the reviews mention that this book has changed lives, and makes the perfect gift for loved ones.
Focus Your Mind and Renew Your Soul
During times of intense stress, it can be difficult to feel fully connected to our bodies or to be integrated with our true selves.
With breath and prayer, we can bring peace to our bodies, deepen our spirituality, and calm our minds.
