How do we breathe?

 Singing depends on breathing. No breathing, no singing. And good singing depends on good breath management. If anyone should know something about how we breathe. it is singers.

And still, over the last couple of years I have become aware of - and really slightly amused by - how many that do not know the basics about how we breathe. Now I am not talking about breathing as singers, or the elusive "support", but how we as human beings breathe. We breathe approximately 20.000 times per day, and most of the time we are completely unaware of it. But how?

Air comes into the lungs. We breathe in. Air goes out of the lungs. We breathe out. 

Air comes into the lungs because the lungs FIRST expand and become bigger. When the lungs become bigger, a vacuum is created inside the lungs, and if the airwaves are open, air will stream by itself into the lungs to fill the vacuum. When the lungs are compressed, the air is pushed out. Repeat - the lungs are expanded, so air streams into the vacuum. "Breathing in" is the simple term we use for this, but somehow it gives a slightly wrong picture. What we do, is expanding the lungs!

The lungs are connected to other parts of the body: They are connected to the ribs, so when we expand our rib cage, the lungs are pulled to all sides and are expanded. The muscles that contract and expand our rib cages are located between the ribs. They can be consciously activated, but they also work continuously and unconsciously.

And even more important: The lungs are connected to the diaphragm, this peculiar dome-shaped muscle that separates the chest cavity from the stomach region. When the diaphragm contracts, it flattens, it lowers. Because the lungs are connected to the diaphragm, they are being pulled down and expanded. Air comes in. When the diaphragm relaxes, it rises higher, and by doing so, it pushes the lungs. Air goes out.

We all know the heart - the muscle that throughout our whole life beats and beats to pump blood through our bodies. But the diaphragm is an equally marvelous muscle that throughout our whole life contracts and relaxes, contracts and relaxes without our conscious control. 

Having this basic knowledge about the mechanisms of breathing should be just as obvious has having a basic knowledge about the heart. And for singers - knowing how to use your breath correctly and how to "support" your voice, depends on knowing what happens when we breathe!