One of the biggest perspective shifts I have made with regards to movement is that the position of the exercise is more important than the type of breathing.

I see breathing as being the movement that locks in the position rather than the facilitator.

If you dive deep enough into breathing, you will see that there are many different kinds of breathing.

Some more aggressive, others passive, and some with specific time constraints.

There is no problem with these based on the context but in my opinion, if we are looking to improve movement, it's important to focus on the position that we are in to create that movement. 

For example, laying on my back is going to yield different mobility results compared to laying on my side or stomach. 

If we take gravity into account, it makes sense that gravity will have some influence as to where the air will expand which yields different shapes of the ribcage and pelvis.

Tension creates “flatness” or areas of extension where someone is compressing. This will indicate a restriction in airflow going to that area. 

The analogy I use is: pretend that your car door has a dent in it. This would represent the area of tension.

Having an inside-out perspective (click here to read about inversion blog), we can use breath to punch out the dent.

Remember, it's important to realise that the position we put someone in is going to dictate where the airflow can be directed.

Take a water bottle that is half full. Picture the casing of the water bottle as the ribcage and the water inside is the air flow/volume.

If I lay the water bottle on its side (picture the casing as very malleable), the water bottle will flatten on the bottom causing the water to evenly distribute front-to-back or anterior-posterior.

So when I take a deep breath in, the airflow should expand my ribcage front-to-back.

Depending on the intention or where we want to improve motion based on our assessment is going to dictate the position of the exercise.

If you are looking to learn about these concepts further, check out my Foundations of Biomechanics Course!