it is crazy how it is the little things that make the biggest difference for me. I have found through looking into this stuff that for me to have a cycle of breath be exhale first, then end on the inhale. when my mind gets stuck I tend to inhale, then exhale, then pause, so I just gently try to shift back, exhale, inhale, pause this way in the pause I am full og breath, as opposed to lacking in the other way. It also makes logical senxe to exhale first and then inhale. We would not put new furniture in a house first and then take the old stuff out, we would eliminate the old first and then bring in the new.
just thoughts
seeker
I totally agree…the furniture comparison is a really good way to put it. I’ve been taught from a very early age being involved in many sports to breathe in through your nose and out through your mouth…so I’ve had to relearn how to breathe
Inhale is the first thing we do and exhale is the last thing we do 
Absolutely! Though I’ve often said it another way:
“Inhalation is the breath of life. Exhalation is the breath of death”
one thing I would be interested in finding out the answer to is what is the first thing a child does when it enters the world. does it breathe in right away, does it start crying first, does it spit up some fluid from its throat? Inhaling may be the first thing it does for all I know, but I would be interested in finding the answer to that. I did a search and it is not easy to find the answer, but then again maybe I did not look hard enough.
just thoughts
Neil
Hi Neil,
I share in your curiosity about this This was one of my favorite parts of my physiology courses as an undergrad.
Some babies, who are born prematurely or without healthy, developed lung tissue, may not have sufficient pulmonary surfactant which keeps the lungs compliant; it also prevents the lungs from staying collapsed at the end of an exhalation. This is greatly simplified, but it allows the lung to change its volume. But if the baby is born with healthy lungs and the airways are cleared for air to move into the lungs, the process begins rather naturally. Exhaling would actually be the first part of the breath that a baby would actively perform and that is when you would hear a cry or howl. But we need an inhalation first! Our inhalation, our first and every one after, is due to high pressure moving into that of low pressure; and in this case, the deflated lung is the the area of lower pressure compared to the air of our immediate atmosphere. The air rushes into our lungs, it is passive on our parts, meaning it does not require activation of our respiratory muscles, but rather relaxation. Relaxation allows them to expand and increase the available volume in our lungs and thoracic cavity. You can think of it as the universe moving breath into your lungs.
Neil, you may enjoy Leslie Kaminoff’s work on respiration if this interests you. His physiology is very precise and his work is helping to bring truthfulness and accuracy to the language of the breath and respiration in the yoga community.
Stay curious,
thanks for your response nichole, it has cleared up a curious question. so the lung is deflated and when it comes into the world the air goes in automatically. Now that I know that I can go on living life 
and when the baby cries initially, how does this stop? does it normally stop once the mother is holding it?
Me too And on those days that I feel little blue and tired, I remember that if I just make myself available, the Universe will send all that is needed into my life, breath and all.
If the talk did touch the health of newborns, let me add a few thoughts too.
The soul* is incarnating into a physical body. The quality of the physical body depends at first on inheritence. The parents provide their genes, and a new body is formed. We must realize that incarnation is not random. The soul choses the most fitting body for it’s karma. One reason for a soul spending so long a time between death and a new birth is that it follows from the spiritual world the evolution of physical bodies, sometimes through many generations. And not just follows, but directs it !
A few clarifications must be made here. First, the soul is not in the capacity to really do these things. But in the realms where it travels after death, it is among spiritual beings, the same beings what are responsible for life and it’s manifestations. These beings are much more evolved, and are very wise, so they can create and live through such marvelous construct as the human physical body. Materialist science thinks that the physical body is a machine, once set in motion goes on forever until it breaks down. This is not the case. In every physiological action, a spiritual being is working in us, on us. (Remember, the concept of space is bound to the physical plane - there is no space on higher planes, but oneness)
Let us get back to the thought what generated this diversion. So, these beings (angels, archangels, archons, exusai, dynamis, kyriotetes - they all have the appropriate sanskrit names, too, perhaps someone knowledgable will share them) all work on man, and not just man, but on the world too, as these cannot be separated, according to man’s and the world’s karma, so everything goes accordingly to the plan of spiritual evolution.
When the soul gets to incarnate, the parents, and thus the germ of it’s future physical body are prepared for him, but according to his own will. The soul gives it’s consent to this, as while in the spiritual world, it shares the great wisdom of all the higher beings, so it knows why is that body is fit for it. It actually desires to be born, so karma can follow it’s course. This karma is not blind karma. It is consciously accepted, desired karma, and while in the spiritual worlds, the souls only desire is to get the body and fulfill it.
I have talked on the quality of the physical body. This depends on karmic needs. It is easy to see that sometimes a defective body is needed to achive some karmic feat. Also the quality of the body depends on another thing. If in a earlier life, a soul lived a full life, making good use of all organs what was given to it, and used them well in service of the world (and this service simply means that it used them according to their real nature and purpose) being open to the world, loved the wisdom manifesting in the world through the activity of the same beings I mentioned, and what has to be achived in this world, than such a soul will preserve-develop the capacity to make contact in the afterlife with these beings. This is very important, because this makes possible the preparation of a new physical body in the next incarnation.
Let’s make an example. Someone, who has been given healthy lungs, a good respiratory and circulatory system, and does not use them to their purpose, what is to find joy in their rightful usage, breathing, singing, chanting mantras, using their innate possoibility to make contact with spirituality, but uses them to curse, speak without thinking, curse, lie, such person will lose the capacity to contact the very beings what are responsible for their existence. In the afterlife, such person cannot fully work togheter with these forces, and the result will be weak lungs, prone to disease. Karma works in this specific way. This is not a punishment, but a wise decision. This happens so that the person will be lacking these possibilities in the next incarnation, and this lack will rise the desire in the person to aquire them. Thus, he/shel will feel drawn to a more spiritual use of these organs, and the course of his/her evolution is redressed.
This makes us understand that why there are birth defects, illnesses, why are we not all born sound and healthy. Most of the times, external, material reasons can be called, but these are just parts of world karma. There are no accidents, or bad things happening by chance. We must know that everything bad outthere is result of karma, and our own will, a decision taken from a much higher point of view. This is what gives strenght, and equanimity. We can’t blame others. We need to pay the debt, work off karma, and not because it is a punishment, but because it benefits us the most.
- I use the term, soul for that part of human constitution what goes through the cycle of death-birth. This is The Spirit-Self, and all other non physical parts that has been spiritualized (Buddhi, Manas)