Nurture our child is a very challenging responsibility. It takes lots of our energy when we spend time with our child in the day. There are times you wish you can just be single again without any kids especially when your child is not listening to you and do all sorts of stuns that might hurt himself or others. Most parents can only rest after their child has put into sleep.
Teacher or caregiver is also facing the same situation. Moreover, she has to handle more than 1 child at the same time. Taking care of other people’s child is huge responsibility because parents trust us that we are able to take good care of their child when they are away. Due to the trust, we ensure that we deliver the service and provide the best for the children. Taking care a group of children from different background is real challenging. End of the day, you might see me with the kitty hairstyle in the picture above! (smile!)
I found that we need to know how to distress ourselves from time to time especially we need to deal with children every day. Moreover, most of us do not breathe properly. Most of the time we do not breathe equally on both nostrils. Therefore, oxygen and carbon dioxide are not transported properly within our body. In long run, our body feels tired, stressed and getting weak without us realizing it due to the shallow breathe.
I have been practising Alternate Nostril Breathing lately. It helps to restore our health in long run. It only takes us 5 to 10 minutes every day to practice. We can even do it together with our child.  The activity is healthy and fun. We can encourage a better bonding with our child by doing the activity together. At the same time, we indirectly creating an exercise regime with our child.
Benefits of Alternate Nostril Breathing for both adult and child
- increases lung capacity which enable those with respiratory illnesses such as asthma to heal
- promotes detoxification in our body system as it increases the exchange of carbon dioxide and oxygen
- calms mind and reduces stress
- reduces emotional and nervous anxiety
- improves body immune system
- balance the breathing in both nostrils to stimulate logical thinking (left brain) and creative thinking (right brain). This is very helpful for a child’s development
Steps of performing Alternate Nostril Breathing
- Sit in a comfortable position with your spine straight. If you are sitting on a chair, make sure your feet touch the floor.
- Raise your right hand (or dominant hand) to your chest. Tuck in your index, middle and ring fingers into your palm. Straighten the thumb and the little finger.
- Move your hand nearer to your nose. Place the thumb on the right nostril and the little finger on the left nostril.
- Close the right nostril with your thumb and inhale air through the left nostril.
- Release the thumb and press the little finger on the left nostril. Exhale the air through the right nostril.
- Continue to press the little finger on the left nostril. Inhale air through the right nostril.
- Release the little finger while press the right nostril with the thumb. Exhale air through the left nostril. This is called one cycle.
- Repeat steps (4) to (7) for 5 to 10 times.
Do you find it simple? Practice it every day and you will notice a different. When you are doing this, your child might just want to imitate you. Therefore, it helps to nurture our child’s health in long run!
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