The Science of Breath
Would you tolerate your phone malfunctioning 20,000 times a day?
Probably not—so why tolerate it in your body?
That’s the question you need to ask yourself as you consider how breathing directly impacts your nervous system. You take 20,000+ breaths a day, and each one sends a chemical and mechanical signal of safety or threat to your nervous system. Under pressure—from work, relationships, parenting, trauma, or illness—your breath subtly shifts, becoming shorter, shallower, and faster.
Over time, these patterns can get stuck, keeping the system on high alert even after the stress has passed. Like too many tabs running in the background, this drains your energy, focus, and resilience—not because something is wrong, but because the system hasn’t been given a chance to reset.
Breathwork uses the breath as a remote control to access stress physiology directly, allowing stored tension to release, breathing patterns to reorganize naturally, and clarity, capacity, and ease to come back online..
But how does it work?
Here’s the briefest of overviews:
01
During a session, rhythmic breathing changes your blood chemistry and shifts your physiology
02
Through activation and rest, stress hormones like cortisol, adrenaline, and oxytocin reset.
03
Your brainwaves shift into new states, boosting memory, emotional process, creativity, and overall well-being
In a few more words, FBR Breathwork produces a temporary, measurable shift in physiology that alters how the brain and nervous system process information. During this state:
Activity in the prefrontal cortex decreases reducing top-down cognitive control, rumination, and excessive self-monitoring.
Increased access to interoceptive and somatic information that is often suppressed by cognitive dominance.
Access to implicit memory increases allowing sensations, emotional responses, and procedural memories—normally outside conscious awareness—to come into perception.
Neural patterns become more plastic creating conditions that support learning, integration, and the formation of new response pathways through experience rather than instruction.
About Facilitated Breath Repatterning (FBR)
Facilitated Breath Repatterning (FBR) is a science-informed, body-based approach to breathwork that works directly with the nervous system. Rather than focusing on breath as a technique to master, FBR uses breathing to understand how your body has learned to respond to stress, safety, connection, and threat—and to gently update those patterns through experience.
This work is offered one-on-one, because real change happens most reliably in the context of safety, attunement, and each individual’s unique pace. FBR is not a large group experience or a performance-based practice. It’s a space to slow down, turn inward, and listen to what your body has been communicating—often for a long time.
Why Breath Matters More Than You Think
You breath 20,000+ times per day. And your breath is in constant conversation with your nervous system. Through pathways such as the vagus nerve, the way you breathe sends ongoing signals to your brain and body about whether you are safe, overwhelmed, connected, or under threat—ften without you realizing it. Over time, stress can shape how you breathe and hold tension, creating habits the body keeps repeating even when danger has passed. That’s why change often needs to happen in the body, not just in the mind.
FBR works with these patterns at the level they live: in the body, the breath, and the nervous system—not just in thought or insight.
Why Talking Alone Isn’t Always Enough
Many people arrive at this work after years of therapy, mindfulness, or personal development. They often understand their patterns intellectually, yet still feel anxious, burnt out, shut down, or stuck in the same loops.
That’s because nearly 90% of nervous system activity happens below conscious awareness. The body makes decisions about safety, threat, and connection long before the thinking mind catches up. These patterns are stored not as stories, but as sensations, breathing habits, tension, and automatic responses. FBR doesn’t replace insight or therapy. Instead, it supports the missing piece: helping the body experience safety, completion, and choice directly, so change can actually take hold.
How Breath Repatterning Works
Breath is a unique access point because it bridges conscious and subconscious processes. In FBR, conscious connected breathing is used to create conditions where long-held patterns can soften and reorganize safely.
Through careful guidance, hands-on facilitations, and pacing, FBR works by supporting:
Interoceptive awareness: Reconnecting you with internal sensations that may have been muted or ignored, allowing the body’s signals to become clear again.
Physiological shifts: Temporary changes in oxygen and carbon dioxide balance can make rigid stress responses less fixed.
Completion of stress cycles: Helping the body discharge activation that was never fully resolved, rather than continuing to carry it forward.
Updated safety signals: Supporting the brain in recalibrating how it interprets sensation, presence, and rest in the body.
Increase capacity and your window of tolerance: Gradually increasing your nervous system’s ability to stay present with stress, emotion, and intensity without tipping into overwhelm or shutdown.
These shifts happen through experience, not force. The nervous system learns by being shown something new—not by being told what to do.
Why This Is One-on-One Work
FBR is most effective when it’s responsive and relational. Working one-on-one allows me to be with you breath by breath—tracking your cues, supporting regulation, and adjusting the pace so your system doesn’t become overwhelmed or disconnected.
Each session typically includes:
Time to talk through what you’re navigating and what you’re hoping to shift
A guided breathwork experience (approximately one hour)
Space for reflection and integration, so insights can carry into everyday life
This is not about pushing for release or chasing catharsis. It’s about creating enough safety and support for your body to do what it already knows how to do.
How I Work
I work one-on-one with individuals, grounding the work in a careful understanding of their history, patterns, and nervous system context—so the support is precise, attuned, and sustainable rather than forced.
Before we focus on change, we focus on understanding. Listening comes first. Your body’s pacing, capacity, and protective intelligence are always respected.
Who This Work Is For
This work is for people of all identities, belief systems, and life paths—especially those navigating stress, anxiety, burnout, grief, trauma, transition, or a sense of being stuck.
Many people are drawn to FBR because they’re looking for something that complements therapy or other healing work—something experiential, body-based, and grounded in real life rather than analysis alone.
What to Expect in a Typical Session
A typical Facilitated Breath Repatterning session is approximately two hours and is designed to be spacious, intentional, and paced to support your nervous system.
We begin with time to slow down and connect, exploring what you’re currently navigating and what you hope to shift. This conversation helps clarify your intention and allows the session to be tailored to your unique history, patterns, and capacity in the moment.
The core of the session is a guided breathwork journey of about one hour, supported by close, breath-by-breath facilitation. This is followed by dedicated time for reflection and integration, helping you make sense of what emerged and supporting the transition from insight into everyday life.
Each session is responsive and individualized—no two experiences are the same. The focus is not on forcing outcomes, but on creating the conditions for meaningful, sustainable change to unfold.
