ABSTRACT
Controlled breathing techniques known collectively as pranayama have long been utilized by yoga practitioners for health maintenance. In the twenty-first century, scientific research has begun to validate some of those breathing methods as effective means of anxiety reduction. In this chapter, I argue that such methods can be implemented to mitigate the effects of public speaker anxiety. To support this argument, I will first present a personal narrative about how I used pranayamic techniques to successfully alleviate the effects of a chronic illness and then utilized them as a public speaking instructor to mitigate students’ public speaker anxiety. Second, I will provide an overview of recent research on the relationship between controlled breathing and the vagus nerve, and that neurological structure's role in controlling anxiety. Finally, I will present methods, or as I call them, breathing strategies—manipulation of the breath in specific ways for particular effect—to assist public speakers in minimizing public speaker anxiety.
