It’s almost impossible to overstate how important a breath of fresh air is in our daily lives. Clean oxygen keeps our bodies and brains healthy and lets us perform at our best. That said, many people don’t understand or appreciate the benefits of clean air.
The fact is that the stale indoor air we breathe regularly isn’t very good for us. Our brains need clean air to operate, and air quality can even affect our mental health. The same is true for our lungs, which also need to pump fresh air throughout our bodies to keep us healthy.
Going outside often is crucial, and so is appreciating the need for clean air even indoors. For a guide to why you need fresh air daily, keep reading.
Your Brain Needs Oxygen
It should come as no surprise that our brains require a lot of resources to run efficiently. They consume the most energy out of any organ in our body, and they need a constant supply of oxygen to function. Around 20% of the oxygen you breathe goes to your brain.
Without it, your brain would start to shut down and you’d develop brain damage before too long. What’s more, is to keep a clear head, you need clean air. The fresher and better the air quality, the better your brain will perform.
“I need to get some air” isn’t only something you hear people say in movies. Going outside for a dose of fresh air can help you think, because the improvement in air quality literally clears your head. You’ll find you can concentrate more by improving the quality of the air you breathe.
Mental Health Matters
It’s about more than only a breath of fresh air, though. The clarity comes with another significant boost: to your mental health. As it turns out, the amount of serotonin your brain produces is reliant on your blood oxygen levels.
Going outside and filling your lungs with crisp, clean air will lift up your mood. The cleaner and fresher the air, the more pronounced the effect. The opposite is also true, as struggling to breathe increases anxiety, often causing panic attacks.
Your brain is happiest when it can function under optimal conditions. This means proper nutrition and hydration, but people always forget about air quality. Your brain needs oxygen as much as the rest of your body to keep working.
A happy and healthy brain will lead to a happy and healthier you as well. So while there’s no substitute for going outside, there are plenty of ways to get cleaner air indoors, too. You can check out sites like https://climeworks.com/subscriptions for solutions.
Your brain, body, and lungs will thank you.
Don’t Take Your Lungs for Granted
Let’s take a second to talk about your lungs. We use them every day to breathe, but many of us don’t appreciate how we do that. There are actually two main types of breathing that we do.
Apical Breathing
Apical breathing is the first one, and it’s also known as shallow breathing. We most often do this when we’re at rest and not spending tons of energy. The reason it’s called shallow breathing is that we only inhale air into the top part of our lungs during this process.
This is the breathing we often do indoors unless we’re exerting ourselves. It’s the way we breathe when doing boring office work or scrolling through social media on the couch. The other type of breathing is diaphragmatic breathing.
Diaphragmatic Breathing
As the name suggests, diaphragmatic breathing comes from deep in the lungs. The diaphragm is a pretty powerful muscle that sits right under the bottom of your lungs. When you need to breathe in super deep, this muscle activates to help the process.
Outdoor activities like running, walking, or sports, often trigger diaphragmatic breathing. When this happens, you gulp down more fresh air deep into your lungs. This has some serious benefits that apical breathing doesn’t have.
Benefits of Deep Breathing With Clean Air
Deep breathing with clean air is fantastic for your health. First off, you get more oxygen into your body and into all of the cells that need it. This improves oxygen flow through your body, such as to your brain.
Second, you can get rid of any airborne toxins lurking there by activating your lungs. A third benefit is that fresh air can help reduce your chances of getting sick. This isn’t some old wives’ tale or folk remedy, either.
Stale indoor air is more likely to carry pathogens like viruses and bacteria. The past few years of the pandemic have taught us a few things about this reality. These pathogens also have a reduced survival chance outside.
Part of the reason is they like humid environments, such as inside your home, and tend to die off in the cold outdoor air. Breathing in crisp outdoor air can act like a shock to many nasty pathogens trying to sneak into your lungs. This can reduce the chance of them multiplying and you getting sick.
You can add to this the fact that almost every organ and function works better with more clean air in your system. This includes your immune system, hormone production, mental health, digestion, and muscle recovery.
A Breath of Fresh Air
We all know that without air, we’d die, but many of us don’t appreciate why that air needs to be clean. Indoor air often isn’t as good, which can have negative impacts on our mental and physical health. It’s crucial we understand the necessity of clean air.
Going outdoors for a breath of fresh air does wonders for our overall well-being. It keeps our minds sharp, emotions balanced, and our natural immune and recovery systems ready to go.
Check out our other blog posts for more great guides about keeping your physical and mental health in check.
[ad_2]
Originally Appeared Here