My post about breathing exercises not working for me got so many different replies with completely contradictory ideas that I decided to try breathing exercises thing again to try to explore this strange conundrum
This time I tried doing it while lying on my back and I didn't count, because counting led to me trying to breathe in too much air on the inhale, and force too much air out on the exhale, both of which were very uncomfortable. I breathed in through my nose and out through my mouth because that was the way I had been taught.
I think I did the inhale/hold/exhale cycle 10 or 12 times before I stopped. It felt physically uncomfortable in a way that was hard to describe, like it took a lot of effort and focus to make my body breathe a certain way, and the whole time my body was urging and fighting me to stop doing it and breathe normally. Also, the transition between inhaling through my nose and exhaling through my mouth felt weird. It seems a lot more natural to just breathe through my nose the whole time.
Afterward, at first it didn't feel noticeably bad, but now my body feels more tense than it did, particularly in my back and shoulder blades and even in my jaw. My neck and upper back feel stiff and a little sore. I also feel slightly more snappy or irritable than before. I wasn't very anxious or stressed before I started, so the breathing exercises definitely made my body and mind feel worse.
I got a lot of contradictory replies on my breathing exercises post about what parts of your body are supposed to move or be engaged when breathing deeply, with many people telling me I'm breathing the wrong way and nobody clearly explaining what it means to breathe the right way.
Breathe so that your belly rises and falls. No, your belly shouldn't rise and fall at all. Actually, your chest shouldn't rise and fall. You shouldn't be engaging your muscles to breathe. You shouldn't be voluntarily controlling your breath at all, you should just use "intention" to guide your breath.
There were also several replies something like "most people breathe incorrectly and you have to learn to breathe correctly." I don't believe this at all.
Like, if my body doesn't even have an automatic process like "breathing" figured out and I need to use my brain to modify it, how can I trust my body to do literally anything?
I guess a lot of people don't trust their bodies to do literally anything.
