Breathing techniques are so simple to do that I think sometimes their overlooked as a way of healing the body. Breathing techniques are based on the concept that breath is the source of life in the body. In fact breathing techniques are now being used by Western doctors for a variety of treatments, from everything from sports performance to reducing high blood pressure, and from headaches to emphysema.

So, how can breathing techniques help with healing?

If you breathe deeply and slowly, you take in oxygen which then helps to remove waste products from the body and ultimately help to increase energy. (For example up to 70% of the toxins that the body gets rid of everyday are released with the air that we breathe out.) If makes sense then that if we learned to breathe properly with the proper technique we could help the body to detoxify faster and allow it transfer more energy over to work on healing the body instead.

Many people who use breathing exercises stated that they had fewer colds, more energy and greater endurance. By breathing incorrectly you also lose a great deal of muscular energy because we tend to keep the ribs and shoulders raised abnormally high when we use the chest muscles to breathe with, rather than using the diaphragm.

The key principles of breathing techniques are based on the fact that oxygen is vital for energy production and therefore the way you breathe affects your energy levels. If your breathing is too shallow, you will not obtain all the oxygen you need for the optimum production of energy.

According to the yoga system, we inhale not only oxygen but also energy or prana. According to yoga, pranayama consists of various ways of inhaling, exhaling and retention of prana. These Breathing Techniques or Pranayamas are designed to allow the free flow of energy in the body and to purify the body's energy channels called nadis. To master pranayama, your mind pictures the exhalation of toxicity and gas while on inhale, your mind envisions clean, pure oxygen feeding your body. For several thousand years, yogis have drawn on the powerful practice of pranayama to maximize prana, or life-energy, rejuvenate the body and transform themselves. It supposed to have a great healing effects in that I heard recently claims that pranayama breathing techniques are not only effective in the control of diabetes, but can also cure the disease as well.

If you like to learn the basics Indian Pranayama techniques, the easiest way to learn the technique,is to inhale for 8 seconds and exhale through the nose 8 seconds.Remember we only need the use basic breath control here. If you think Pranayama can help you then look for one of the many good books available or better still join a class to learn the techniques.

As I said at the start of this article breathing techniques are such a simple thing that they are often overlooked as a way to heal the body, the bottom line is that they are certainly worth a try as the simple act of breathing properly can allow energy to flow into the "chakras," (energy centers located in the body) and allow the body to return to its normal healthy state.