The 4 breathing secrets that will transform your health today | James Nestor

**ZOE** (0:00)
Welcome to ZOE Science and Nutrition, where world-leading scientists explain how their research can improve your health.
The experiment was simple, but deeply uncomfortable. Two healthy men deliberately interfered with the body's most basic behavior, breathing. Their noses were sealed shut for 10 days. They inhaled and exhaled only through their mouths, while researchers tracked markers of health. The changes were dramatic. Blood pressure climbed, sleep became fragmented, cognitive function dropped, stress hormones surged. Within days, their physiology began to resemble that of people decades older. But this wasn't an extreme stress test. It closely mirrors how many people breathe every night, unaware of the strain that it places on their body. In this episode, we sit down with investigative journalist James Nestor, author of the international bestseller, BREATH, the new science of a lost art. He shares the science and history of breathing and how it can subtly impact your health. By the end, you'll see breathing not as something automatic, but as a powerful biological lever hiding in plain sight. And you'll know exactly what to do to get your breathing back on track using simple exercises. James, thank you so much for joining me today.

**James Nestor** (1:35)
Thanks for having me.

**ZOE** (1:37)
So we like to kick off our show here at ZOE with a rapid fire Q&A with questions from our listeners. Are you willing to give it a go?

**James Nestor** (1:45)
I am.

**ZOE** (1:45)
Good. And we have some very strict rules. You can say yes or no, or if you have to, a one sentence. Okay. Are most people breathing wrong?

**James Nestor** (1:57)
Yes.

**ZOE** (1:58)
Did you once plug your nose with silicon for 10 days in the name of science?

**James Nestor** (2:03)
Yes.

**ZOE** (2:04)
Is breathing through your mouth healthy?

**James Nestor** (2:07)
No.

**ZOE** (2:08)
Does mouth taping work?

**James Nestor** (2:11)
For some people.

**ZOE** (2:13)
What's the biggest thing that people get wrong about breathing?

**James Nestor** (2:18)
They breathe too much.

**ZOE** (2:20)
They breathe too much? Who knew that was a thing? Now, if you're listening to this right now, obviously you're breathing. I've been doing it all my life. And until about 15 seconds ago, I never put any thought into it. But now I'm worrying that I'm doing it apparently too much. And our listeners, it sounds like, might be doing this as well. How did you first get interested in breathing?

**James Nestor** (2:45)
It wasn't something I set out to do journalistically. I was having a bunch of respiratory problems, and I wasn't finding any long-term relief from them. I was getting bronchitis every year. I was getting mild pneumonia every year. And I noticed that my breathing was becoming more labored every year, even though I was eating the right food, sleeping eight hours a night, all that stuff. And finally, it got to the point where I was worried that I had a serious problem. Every time I went to the doctor, I was given antibiotics. This was before, of course, we knew what antibiotics do to your gut microbiome. And it wasn't until a doctor friend of mine suggested I check out a breathwork class, a breathing class. I'd never done anything like this. That was my entrée into this world.

**ZOE** (3:34)
So like very much a journey driven by your own personal health questions, that then became something that you investigated and wanted to understand yourself.

**James Nestor** (3:45)
Yeah. And that was about 13 years ago, 13, 14 years ago. And I'm not going to say what happened to me is going to happen for everybody, but I have not had one of those issues since. There isn't a control version of me. We can't compare it. But once I learned the foundations of proper breathing, I noticed my sleep was better, my energy levels were better, I could exercise longer. And I was convinced it was more than a placebo effect. And so I started exploring the science, which is what you're supposed to do if you're a journalist. And so it got me curious that maybe there was a larger story here. I brought it to my literary agent. She thought it was an absolutely terrible book idea. And this is all true. I kept researching it for my own personal growth, for my personal health. I noticed what it did for me. And I came back to her after several years and I said, there might be a larger story here. She still wasn't convinced, but she was tired of me begging.
And so we put together the proposal. That's how this book came about. There was no preconceived notion. There was no looking at if people were even interested in the subject. This was something I was deeply invested in from a personal standpoint and thought, again, that there might be a untold story that was hiding beneath all the stuff that we see online.