III The Practice of Respiratory Re-Education
Habit in Relation to Peculiarities and Defects
“If we contemplate the method of Nature, we see that everywhere vast results are brought about by accumulating minute actions.”
—Herbert Spencer.
The mental and physical peculiarities or defects of men and women are the result of heredity or acquired habit, and the most casual observer has noticed that certain peculiarities or defects are characteristic of the members of particular families, as, for instance, in connexion with the standing and sitting postures, the style of walking, the position of the shoulders and shoulder-blades, the use of the arm, and the use of the vocal organs in speech, etc.
Such family peculiarities or defects are unconsciously acquired by the children, often becoming more pronounced in the second generation, such acquirements making for good or ill, as the case may be. I will, however, confine myself to an enumeration of those with a harmful tendency, as an understanding of bad habits is essential to the consideration of the teaching principles adopted in my method of respiratory-physical re-education.
The chief peculiarities or defects may be broadly indicated as:—
1. An incorrect mental attitude towards the respiratory act.
2. Lack of control over, and improper and inadequate use of, the component parts of the different mechanisms of the body, limbs, and nervous system.
3. Incorrect pose of the body and chest poise, and therefrom consequent defects in the standing and sitting postures, the interference with the normal position and shape of the spine, as well as the ribs, the costal arch, the vital organs, and the abdominal viscera.
Re-education, when one or other or all of these peculiarities or defects are present, means eradication of existing bad habits, and the following will indicate some of the chief principles upon which the teaching method of this re-education is based:—
That where the human machinery is concerned Nature does not work in parts, but treats everything as a whole.
That a proper mental attitude towards respiration is at once inculcated, so that each and every respiratory act in the practice of the exercises is the direct result of volition, the primary, secondary, and other movements necessary to the proper performance of such act having first been definitely indicated to the pupil.
It may prove of interest to mention that W. Marcet, M.D., F.R.S., and Harry Campbell, M.D., B.S., London, are of opinion that volition as such makes a direct demand upon the breathing powers quite apart from all physical effort, and with these great advantages, that, unlike the latter, it neither increases the production of waste products nor tends to cause thoracic rigidity, thus more or less retarding the movements of the chest. The experiments made by Dr. Marcet show that the duration of a man’s power to sustain the muscle contraction necessary to raise a weight a given number of times depends upon the endurance of the brain-centres causing the act of volition rather than upon the muscular power. An instance is quoted of a man who lifted a weight of 4 pounds 203 times, and who, after resting and performing forced breathing movements, raised the same weight the same height 700 times.
Regarding muscle development and chest expansion, Dr. Harry Campbell has in his book on breathing taken the case of Sandow. His conclusion will prove of interest. He pointed out that Sandow claimed to be able to increase the size of the chest 14 inches—that is, from 48 to 62 inches in circumference. Dr. Campbell then expressed the opinion that this increase is almost entirely the result of the swelling up of the large muscles surrounding the chest, and that most probably the increase in his bony chest (thorax) is not more than 2 to 3 inches, seeing that his “vital capacity” is only 275 cubic inches.
(For ten years past I have drawn the attention of medical men to the deception of ordinary chest measurements and to the evils wrought by the physical training and the “stand at attention” attitude in vogue in the army, and also to the harmful effects of the drill in our schools, where the unfortunate children are made to assume a posture which is exactly that of the soldier, whose striking characteristic is the undue and harmful hollow in the lumbar spine and the numerous defects that are inseparable from this unnatural posture.)
There is such immediate improvement in the pose of the body and poise of the chest whatever the conditions (excepting, of course, organised structural defects), that a valuable mechanical advantage is secured in the respiratory movements, and this is gradually improved by the practice until the habit becomes established, and the law of gravity appertaining to the human body is duly obeyed.
The mechanical advantage referred to is of particular value, for it means prevention of undue and harmful falling of the upper chest at the end of the expiration, which is always present in those who practise the customary breathing exercises, the pupil being then deprived of the mechanical advantage so essential to the proper performance of the next inspiratory act.
Then follows due increase in the movements of expansion and contraction of the thorax until such movements are adequate and perfectly controlled.
Further, these expansions are primary movements in securing that increase in the capacity of the chest necessary to afford the normal oscillations of atmospheric pressure, without unduly lowering that pressure—or, in other words, they give opportunity to fill the lungs with air, while the contractions overcome the air pressure and force the air out of the lungs, and at the same time constitute the controlling power of the speed and length of the expiration.
The excessive and harmful lowering of the air pressure in the respiratory tract, and the consequent collapse of the alæ nasi, is prevented by so regulating the respiratory speed that the lungs are filled by atmospheric pressure.
The value of this will be readily understood when it is remembered that such lowering, which is always present in the “sniffing” mode of breathing, causes collapse of the alæ nasi. It also tends to cause congestion of the mucous membrane of the respiratory tract on the sucker system, setting up catarrh and its attendant evils, such as throat disorders, loss of voice, bronchitis, asthma, and other pulmonary troubles.
From the first lesson the effect upon the splanchnic area is such that the blood is more or less drawn away from it to the lungs, and is then evenly distributed to other parts of the body. The intra-abdominal pressure is more or less raised, and there is a gradual tendency to the permanent establishment of normal conditions.
The use of bandages or corsets is to be condemned as treatment in protruding abdomen instead of the adoption of practical means to remove the cause. Such support to the abdominal wall is artificial and harmful, since it tends to make the muscles more flaccid. The respiratory mechanism should be re-educated, for this would mean a re-education or strengthening of the supports Nature has supplied. In other words, the sinking above and below the clavicles and the undue hollowing of the lumbar spine—the great factors in the direct causation of the protrusion of the abdomen—are removed, and a normal condition of the abdominal muscles established. This means a very decided improvement in the figure and general health.
The improvement in the abdominal conditions (the improved position of the abdominal viscera and the development of the abdominal muscles) is proportionate to that of the respiratory movements—a fact that can be readily understood when I point out that the movements of the parts are interdependent. When the faulty distention of the splanchnic area is present it will be found that the diaphragm is unduly low in breathing; and when there is excessive depression of the diaphragm in respiration there is interference with the centre of gravity by displacement forward, and the compensatory arching backward in the lumbar region.
After a time there is such improvement in the use of the component parts of the mechanism that an inspiration may, if desired, be secured by a depression of the diaphragm, while at the same moment the condition in the splanchnic area is actually improved.
Improvement in respiratory exchange is secured by gradual increase in the expansions and contractions of the thorax, which increases the aeration of lungs, the supply of oxygen, and the elimination of CO2.
The quantity of residual air in the lungs is greatly increased, and if the expired air is always converted into a controlled whispered vowel during the practice of the breathing exercises very great benefits accrue, notably those derived from the prolonged duration of air in the lungs, and the proper inter-thoracic pressure necessary to force the adequate supply of oxygen into the blood and eliminate the due quantity of CO2.
The employment of these whispered tones means the proper use of the vocal organs in a form of vocalisation little associated with ordinary bad habits, and that perfect co-ordination of the parts concerned which is inseparable from adequately controlled whisper vocalisation.
There is a rapid clearing of the skin, the white face becoming a natural colour, and a reduction of fat in the obese by its being burnt off with the extra oxygen supply.
This reduction in the weight and size is often quite remarkable, as also the development of the flaccid muscles of the abdominal wall and the consequent improvement in the activity of the parts concerned.