ABSTRACT
Before we go any further, I would like you to try something. Sitting just as you are (I assume you’re sitting down to read this), I want you to take the deepest breath you can manage. Hold it for a count of three, and then let it out slowly and easily. Now change the way you’re sitting – not to put too fine a point on it, try sitting up. Put your feet flat on the ground so they act as stabilizers for your body. Shift your weight firmly onto what I always think of as the ‘sitting bones’ (yes, there are bones there under all that padding, and once your weight is settled on them you’ll become much more aware of them). Now let your spine lengthen upwards – you won’t need the chair back to support it any longer if your weight is balanced on the sitting bones – and let your head lift too. Your ribcage should lift in the lengthening process. In this taller, straighter position, let your shoulders and neck relax (which doesn’t mean that
they slump) and now take the deepest possible breath you can manage, just as before. Notice a difference? What you should have felt if you really sat up properly is how much easier it is to breathe deeply in, and to control the flow of breath out, when you are in a more upright position. It is breath that supports the sound we make with our voice – a fact that is so obvious it hardly needs stating. But if we know this, why don’t we make more effort to give our bodies every chance they possibly can to breathe easily and to make a comfortable sound?
