The Game of Life

Another breath begins, another chance to win the fight.

It’s been years since I last considered the Scorpions one of my favorite bands. I’ve gone from identifying with every ballad to noting the tired cliches that fill them; from jamming with their older, harder songs to tiring of the repetitive “rock never dies” theme. But Humanity: Hour I is an album that I keep coming back to. Dystopian, haunting, unique, yet still driving, this is the sound that I still search for in music.

The quote above is a lyric that continually takes on new meaning for me. You don’t think about breathing much. It happens more or less automatically, a bodily function that keeps you alive and becomes important usually when it’s lacking.

Another breath begins, another chance to win the fight. Breath is everything for choir. We spend rehearsals learning how to breathe correctly, from the depths of our bellies; we time breaths, support breaths, silence breaths.

Another breath begins, another chance to win the fight. When I’m anxious, I find that I stop breathing. Intake appointments for therapy ask if I notice increased breathing rate, but it’s the opposite. When my chest tightens, I lose the careful control over my breath, so instead of allowing sobs, I just don’t allow breathing.

Another breath begins, another chance to win the fight. I’ve started meditating, over the protests of my overly-logical side that meditation is new-agey hippie pseudoscience. Deep, slow breaths. So slow that you hit your panic response, then breathe through it, convincing your lizard brain that you’re not about to asphyxiate, convincing your lizard brain to focus on the breaths instead of the panic. Focus on the breaths. Count the breaths. Use the breaths as a reminder that the storm of emotions surrounding your mind doesn’t actually exist. It’s not you. You’re just a body, breathing.

Another breath begins, another chance to win the fight.