For the most part, breath is involuntary. However, it is the voluntary practice of breath that aligns and stabilizes both the mind and body. The breath divinely connects to four breathing muscles, together known as the Deep Core Pressure Management System. This is your diaphragm, multifidus, transverse abdominis, and pelvic floor muscles. These are the first muscles your nervous system touches and communicates with. And when these muscles lengthen on inhale and contract on exhale, as they were so divinely designed, the nervous system stabilizes. Your inhale is the on switch: fight or flight Your exhale is the off switch: rest and digest [more on breath manipulation and optimizing nervous system power later] Seasons where pressure is rising, like aging, illness, injury, pregnancy, birth, and postpartum, can limit our ability to breathe efficiently. Inefficient breath reinforces the fight or flight stress response, increasing mind-body tension and inevitably the risk of injury. In order to manage increasing pressure, because stress, change, pain, and unpredictability cannot be avoided, we have to start with breath. We must return to our inherent divine nature, calm to think and move with efficiency. Remember the stress-recovery cycle I mentioned when I spoke on Divine Design: Birth last week? Only when completed do we receive rest, and the powers to heal and grow. It won’t happen when we’re stressed, or remain in fight or flight. However, when we move out of fight or flight and into our divine nature, calm, which connection to the DCPMS does for us, alignment improves, pain sensitivity lowers, and risk of injury lowers. Only when the nervous system is stable do we feel safe, and are we able to increase mind-body efficiency, longevity, and pleasure. We'll discuss how the DCPMS and nervous system affects sex and pleasure next time. For now, I'd love to know how breath technique has supported you in high demand seasons. Drop a comment below 🤍

Birth is hard and painful no matter which way it goes. However I’m told it can be “orgasmic”, beautiful, soul-opening, and down right easy with the right tools. My first year as a Pregnancy Postpartum Strength Expert God revealed those tools to me. If the pelvic floor pulls pressure up when you close it, it must allow pressure to shift down when you leave it open. So I reversed the diaphragmatic breath. I had my clients do this in every posture just like we do while strength training. Several positive client reviews later and I was teaching these tools to the other coaches. Six and a half years later and I’m proud to give women the tools they need to meet change, pain, and unpredictability with confidence and trust. I’m proud to remind women that they can birth with ease no matter what others have experienced or their own previous experience. A question I get at least once a year is, “How do you train women for birth when you’ve never given birth before?” I used to respond with “Well has your orthopedic surgeon had shoulder, knee or hip surgery?” I was a bit green and defensive then...now I say, “How does an athlete train for their first triathalon? They practice. They move and eat with intention. They increase their strength. They remove what is not serving them. They remember the goal and their divine design. Training mothers and soon to bes for birth is the same. Well kind of...we talk a lot more about vaginas, but you get the idea.” Truthfully training pregnant women came more natural to me than training athletes, birth being what our body is built for, and the fact that I want at least 7 babies myself...yes you read that right...as many babies as this body and God will give me. Yeah I’ll be stressed, life will be messy as ever, but to me that’s the idea. I will live this life to the fullest and make the most out of every breath I take. You might have thought the first thing you did Earth-side was cry, but in fact the first thing you did was breathe. You took a deep breath in, and that inhale activated your sympathetic nervous system, “fight or flight” stress response...and then you cried.

Truthfully, I'm not introducing you to anything new, but rather imploring you to remember what is inherently yours. Divine Design is how you're built, what makes you who you are and keeps you ascending physically, spiritually and emotionally. Everything from birth, breath, sex, strength, stress and recovery. All that has been gifted to your spirit, all that honored will Ground, Build, Lift the spirit, AndBeyond. The ancients understood breath as a life-giving, spiritual, and connective force. Since the beginning of time, breath-work has been known to increase our strength, and then reconnect and return us to our divine nature, calm, where healing and growth takes place. What would happen if you maintained that calm while under load… What does nervous system regulation have to do with your pelvic floor… What does birth and sex feel like when you know how to control your holes… How is breath a strong indicator of well being? The very first thing we did on earth was breathe. The breath is your life force. If you honor what gives you life, then you live a better balanced, longer life. Over the next few weeks I’ll be breaking down our Divine Design. And we start where it always starts — with birth. Which discussion are you most excited for?

Hi beautiful souls, I just added 3 new group classes to the classroom. Get your on-demand on! I update the classroom every week, so you'll always have the latest and greatest in pregnancy postpartum exercise. And if you're familiar with the GBL on-demand classes, let us know what you think by leaving a comment below. 🤍