Breathe the womb
The base technique of breathwork is a simple, circular breathing pattern where there is no pause between inhaling and exhaling. The circular motion of breath fosters physical, emotional, and spiritual balance. Breathing is healing. And with breathing come profound insights and discoveries.
My experience with breathwork kind of started on the wrong foot. But everything changed when breath-based practice made me experience pure bliss.
Today, I am a certified breathwork practitioner (Alchemy of Breath method), and also use this practice as a supporting tool in coaching and other programs. As it happens, I also combined breathwork with my work as a Sacred Womb practitioner, creating a new practice called Breathe the Womb.
Keep on reading to know more 🙂
Breathwork and me
I first practiced breathwork in 2016, during rebirthing and bioenergetics practice, with mixed feelings.
As I overcame my resistance to letting go, I loved the sense of liberation breathwork brings about. I could feel the energy flowing and my body expanding and opening – with a different range of sensations at every session.
And yet, I hated the instructor wanting us to stand still during the practice. I clearly remember a session where I was experiencing myself being on a gorgeous lawn, with flowers all around me – and the usually joyous feeling turning into annoyance as I realized I couldn’t move according to my body’s inclination.
Fast forward a few months and miles.
During my coaching certification in Mexico, I started practicing breathwork differently. I didn’t have to stand still and “just breathe” any longer, as the instructor allowed us to do whatever we felt like doing to embrace our sensations.
In those sessions, I screamed and cried and danced. I processed all kinds of individual and collective generational trauma. I unleashed my orgasmic power. And on the last day of practice, which was supposed to be “quiet enough”, I experienced pure bliss.
At that moment, I realized that my body was magic and that everything I had been searching for far and wide was already within me – in my body and my breath.
In my experience, breathwork is one of the most effective ways to connect with the deepest and most sacred layer of our Self through our body. This is why I included breath-based exercises in my coaching programs shortly after my diploma.
At first, my breath-based exercises were straightforward. I would encourage my clients to breathe consciously in their pelvic area, and focus their attention on their bodily sensations during sex or while pleasuring themselves. While breathing is normally automatic, conscious breathing entices a sense of presence and mindfulness, thus helping feel your body more.
Then, in September 2019, I expanded my knowledge further and become a breathwork practitioner with Alchemy of Breath. Shortly after, Breathe the Womb was born.
So, here I am 😉 And, what a wild ride it has been. When I started my training as a breathwork practitioner, my third daughter was just one month old. And I often asked myself whether studying towards qualification and taking care of a baby at the same time was the right thing to do. I’m truly happy I did.
What is breathwork and how it works
Breathwork practice yields many benefits and can help women reconnect with their body, pleasure, and sexual energy. Here’s a quick overview of good reasons why you might want to try:
But let’s go back to what breathwork is 😉
How often do you forget that you’re breathing? It still happens a lot to me.
Breathwork is about being aware of your breath. When you practice breathwork, your breath becomes “conscious and connected”. In other words, our breath becomes a means that helps us thrive rather than survive. It’s an amazing practice, and you only need your body for it.
The base technique of breathwork is a simple, circular breathing pattern where there is no pause between inhaling and exhaling. The circular motion of breath fosters physical, emotional, and spiritual balance. Breathing is healing. And with breathing come profound insights and discoveries.
A breathwork session with the Alchemy of Breath method is structured like a hike in the mountains, incorporating different breathing patterns.
It starts with gentle, conscious, and connected breathing with your mouth open. As you ascend the mountain, breathing progressively intensifies until you reach the peak – where the extra oxygenation accrued with intense breathing allows you to access a deeper state of consciousness.
As you descend the mountain, the breathing pattern becomes deeper and milder. This phase is where most breakthroughs and shifts happen.
Towards the end of the hike, you revert to breathing through your nose, savoring the different sensations. This fosters a deep rooting in Mother Earth and supports grounding after such a profound inner exploration.
Since I started teaching breathwork to women, I’ve been driven to combine the practice with my work as a Sacred Womb practitioner, which revolves around awareness of your feminine energy and power. Results have been amazing, gentle, and awe-inspiring.
If you’re not familiar with Sacred Womb Awakening, here’s some context for you 😊
Sacred Woman Awakening & womb work
Sacred Woman Awakening is a body of work combined and taught by Diana Beaulieu. It supports the healing and positive transformation of wounds and traumas that hold women back, to make room for tremendous long-lasting change and shifts in their feminine energy and their relationships.
Womb Awakening is an extraordinary journey back to our energy core, that empowers us to become and feel whole again.
In this context, the term womb is multifaceted. It connotes the deepest Truth within us, which is THE center of personal awareness, and includes:
Such energies can also be passed down through generations. After all, your mother’s oocytes (egg cells) formed in her womb before she was born, while she was in your grandmother’s womb.
The core of womb work includes 11 different practices. Other practices can be created by the Practitioner based on the client’s needs.
Womb work is designed to help us to:
Breathe the Womb is pure bliss
I didn’t combine breathwork and womb work intentionally. It simply happened.
At one point, I started feeling the urge of introducing womb work whenever I was guiding women through the most intense part of the breathwork session (the peak). After some initial resistance, I allowed my mind to wander off and just went with the flow of my body and soul.
The result? Pure bliss, every time. I felt recharged and refreshed as if I had just had the best tantric sex ever. Most of my clients reported similar sensations and experiences.
I’ve conducted many more breathwork sessions since that first experiment, in February 2020. And the plain truth is that I cannot refrain from guiding women through some sort of womb work as we approach the peak.
As we connect to the energy of the womb in the session, different things can happen depending on the felt sense and inner urge. We might let go of the feelings and energies we don’t need anymore. Or meet the inner Sacred Woman – the deeper and wiser layer of our feminine nature – to ask for guidance through words and symbols. Or tend to our inner child and our relationship with her. Or reclaim parts of our identity we suppressed or neglected due to wounds and traumas.
Prep work for the individual session provides hints on how the practice might unfold. And yet, the vastly connected space we access during the session makes room for magic and transformation and following your intuition on how to best move forward.
Over group sessions, I learned that you never know where you might end up processing – as needs and insights naturally emerge during breathwork practice. I learned to trust the process, which provides each practitioner with just what she needs.
Each breathwork session revolves around a theme. And it’s amazing to see how the chosen theme is perfectly aligned with the needs of participants, every single time. Typical themes include:
During a Breathe the Womb session, I encourage women to go with the flow of their bodies and find a safe space (within or around them) they can refer back to in case of need.
The structure of a Breathe the Womb session
Breathe the Womb sessions are usually 35-40 minutes long, to avoid physical and emotional overload.
It all starts with feeling your body. Then, you shift the focus on the breath as “fluid light” that illuminates and opens the womb, allowing you to connect with its powerful yet often overlooked or neglected space. In the ascendant leg of the breathwork hike, I encourage you to formulate an intention and breathe it throughout the body, so that every cell can acknowledge and feel it.
At the peak, I guide you across the plateau and into a cave (or by a bonfire) where the magic happens. Depending on the insights emerging in the session, womb work in this stage might revolve around:
In the descending leg of the hike, I encourage you to look at the scenery and experience the vastity of your soul, walking with the layers of your identity that don’t believe in the magic nature of your Self yet. This is usually where breathwork triggers strong emotional reactions and fosters a sense of connection.
Every woman that tried Breathe the Womb loved the experience.
All could sense a deep connection with their souls and feminine energy, and many also felt the transfer of maternal and orgasmic energies.
Some of them explored the sensations, emotions, and memories stored in their womb, with a range of outcomes – from healing termination-related trauma to restoring their innate orgasmic power to letting go of generational wounds.
No two experiences are the same. Yet, all these women felt pure bliss
As a practitioner and facilitator, I feel so grateful for this amazing body of work. Not only do I have the privilege of passing down the practice – but my soul is also being healed and restored in the process.
Over time I also combined breathwork with Qoya, an amazing movement system that allows women to reconnect with their essence – which is wise, wild, and free. A perfect match, as the Qoya dance is a great way to awaken your body and soul, and prepare for acknowledging and embracing the profound insights emerging from breathwork practice.
To wrap up this presentation of breathwork and Breathe the Womb, here are the stories and thoughts of three clients of mine.
My experience with breathwork has been amazing and transformative, just as my clients’. And I look forward to guiding you through this mesmerizing inner journey too!
Violetta, one of the clients I’ve been working with for a long time, attended 5 individual sessions and at least 5 group sessions.
Her feedback is truly special to me. She reports a profound transformation and reclaiming deeper and deeper layers of her feminine nature with every session. She also says that each session of breath-based exercises (whether stand-alone or combined with coaching, womb work, or Qoya) brings about a sense of being firmly rooted “within herself”, and owning her feminine energy.
During breathwork sessions, Violetta’s expression often reflects the bliss she’s experiencing. So much so that we now have our own set of inside jokes about this 😊
Alessandra also attended several group sessions. Here’s how she describes the experience.
“Elisa is like Mother Nature: she’s maternal, gorgeous, and smiling. […] I try to attend all sessions she organizes. In my experience, each practice session is a different journey. Breathwork made me feel beautiful and glowing. I’d explain it as a circular breathing pattern with no pause between inhaling and exhaling, all through your mouth. Elisa’s sessions are 30 to 40 minutes long, accompanied by amazing music. She guides you through this incredible inner journey, and as you hike you have visions […]
I felt all sorts of things. I felt roots growing out of my womb and into Earth and felt I was one with Earth itself. As I opened my eyes, I saw that Elisa was smiling, and I felt accepted.
I love the music that goes with breathwork sessions. It pervades you and shines upon you. Experiences at the peak of the hike are always different; as you descend the mountain, and breathing becomes deeper yet less intense, the journey continues. On each descent, I see a different universe – it can be made of water or stars or planets. Every time is different and at the end of it, you breathe, and breathe, and breathe. It truly is an amazing journey.”
Rebecca attended 4 group sessions, and says this:
“Each breathwork session brought unique gifts to me. As I felt more rooted in my body, my head could finally let go. I experienced a range of sensations: melancholy, joy, happiness, sadness, excitement. I felt more energy within me.
At every session, I experienced myself being on a plateau resembling the ones you see in the movie Out of Africa. I’ve never visited Africa. On that plateau, I saw all sorts of animals: lions and impalas, giraffes, and zebras. I felt as free as those animals and experienced a sense of well-being and bliss.
I would recommend breath-based work to all women, for its huge transformative power. Breathwork helps you reconnect with your body and your sensations. It’s a nurturing and healing experience. It’s a super-strong way to reconnect with your Self.”
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The magic of your body ALIVE
BUT. Society tells us that the Truth lies in our minds. And social suppression triggers feelings of guilt and shame. So, we lose our ability to feel and live the magic of our bodies.
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