Breathing is something your body does automatically. But how you breathe changes everything about how your nervous system responds, how your body feels, and how your mind experiences the world.
Diaphragmatic breathing, sometimes called abdominal or belly breathing, invites you to return to your body’s natural, most efficient breathing pattern. In this practice, you gently guide your breath deep into your body, allowing your diaphragm, your primary breathing muscle, to do its full, natural work.
This simple shift has profound effects on your nervous system, your physiology, and your emotional well-being.
How Diaphragmatic Breathing Works in the Body
The diaphragm creates space for breath
The diaphragm is a dome-shaped sheet of muscle located beneath your lungs. When you inhale, the diaphragm contracts and moves downward, making more space for your lungs to expand. On exhale, the diaphragm relaxes and moves back upward.
With each breath, this natural motion gently massages the organs surrounding it, the heart, liver, stomach, intestines, and lymphatic system. This creates not just physical movement, but a sense of internal spaciousness.
You activate the lower lungs, where gas exchange is most efficient
The majority of alveoli, the tiny air sacs where oxygen and carbon dioxide exchange takes place, are located in the lower parts of the lungs. When you breathe deeply into your diaphragm, you activate this fuller capacity for gas exchange. This allows your body to maintain balanced oxygen and carbon dioxide levels, which support stable pH and steady nervous system function.1
The Vagus Nerve Connection
Running directly through the diaphragm is the vagus nerve, one of the primary pathways of your parasympathetic nervous system, often called the “rest and restore” branch.
Stretch receptors signal safety through the vagus nerve
As your lungs expand with each full breath, stretch receptors in the lung tissue sense this movement. These receptors send signals through the vagus nerve up to the brainstem, letting your brain know that you are safe. This incoming signal activates the parasympathetic nervous system, the branch responsible for rest, digestion, repair, and emotional regulation.2
Your nervous system shifts toward balance
With each diaphragmatic breath, your body sends continuous signals to your brain that you are in a state of safety. This helps to lower heart rate, stabilize blood pressure, support digestion, reduce inflammation, and soften emotional reactivity. Over time, this practice builds your system’s flexibility to adapt to both rest and stress with greater ease. 3
Why It May Feel Unfamiliar At First
If you are like many people, you may often breathe higher in the chest throughout the day, especially when you feel stressed or overwhelmed. Chest breathing tends to be faster, more shallow, and activates the sympathetic (fight or flight) system more readily.
Diaphragmatic breathing may feel awkward at first because you are gently retraining your body to use muscles it may not use regularly. This is not about forcing the breath or pushing out your belly. Instead, imagine expanding gently outward in all directions, front, sides, and back, like a balloon slowly inflating around your lower ribcage.
Take a moment to notice how you are breathing right now. Without changing anything, simply bring a gentle awareness to the breath. Where do you feel it most? No judgment. The more awareness we bring to our breath, the more opportunities arise to shift into a positive rhythm of breathing, like diaphragmatic breathing.
Over time, this becomes a natural rhythm your body remembers.
When to Practice
- Upon waking to center and ground
- Before stressful situations to support calm
- During work breaks to restore focus
- In the evening to prepare for sleep
- Anytime you feel anxious, overwhelmed, or disconnected from your body
How to Practice Diaphragmatic Breathing
- Sit, lie down, or recline in a comfortable position.
- Place one hand gently on your belly or lower ribcage.
- Inhale slowly through your nose, allowing your belly and ribs to gently expand outward.
- Exhale slowly through your nose or mouth, allowing your belly and ribs to soften inward.
- Breathe in a slow, steady rhythm that feels nourishing.
- If helpful, count your breath (for example, inhale for 4, exhale for 4).
- Practice for several minutes, allowing your breath to guide your attention inward.
Why It Still Works Even If You Don’t Feel Calm Right Away
There may be days when your breath feels tight or your mind stays busy. This does not mean you are doing it wrong. Every time you bring attention to your breath, you are offering your nervous system a chance to listen and respond. You are strengthening the brain-body communication pathways that help you return to safety over time.
The practice is not to force calm, but to offer steady signals of safety.
Bringing the Practice Into Your Life
Diaphragmatic breathing supports your nervous system by inviting the full breath into the lower lungs, where most of the alveoli, the tiny air sacs responsible for gas exchange, reside. This gentle expansion activates stretch receptors that signal through the vagus nerve to the brain: you are safe. Over time, this shifts your system toward balance, steadying heart rate, calming stress responses, regulating pH levels, and creating the conditions for emotional and physiological stability.
Some days your breath may flow easily. Other days it may feel restricted or uneven. Both are natural parts of the practice. With each breath, you are not aiming for perfection, but simply creating space for your system to respond, adapt, and settle in its own time.
You can integrate diaphragmatic breathing throughout your day: a few slow breaths in the morning before you begin, a pause before a conversation or meeting, or a calming rhythm before sleep. These small invitations help teach your system that safety is always accessible from within.
The work is not to force the breath. The work is to meet yourself gently, breath by breath, allowing your body to guide you home.
Try It Here
- Zaccaro A, Piarulli A, Laurino M, Garbella E, Menicucci D, Neri B, Gemignani A. How Breath-Control Can Change Your Life: A Systematic Review on Psycho-Physiological Correlates of Slow Breathing. Front Hum Neurosci. 2018 Sep 7;12:353. doi: 10.3389/fnhum.2018.00353. PMID: 30245619; PMCID: PMC6137615. ↩︎
- Breit S, Kupferberg A, Rogler G, Hasler G. Vagus Nerve as Modulator of the Brain-Gut Axis in Psychiatric and Inflammatory Disorders. Front Psychiatry. 2018 Mar 13;9:44. doi: 10.3389/fpsyt.2018.00044. PMID: 29593576; PMCID: PMC5859128. ↩︎
- Porges, S. W. (2011). The polyvagal theory: Neurophysiological foundations of emotions, attachment, communication, and self-regulation. W. W. Norton & Company. ↩︎