How Air Baths Should Be Taken
At first expose the nude body to cool air only for short periods at a time, until the skin becomes inured to it.
Likewise, unless you are well used to the sun, take air baths of short duration, say from ten to twenty minutes, until your skin and your nervous system have become accustomed to the influence of heat and strong light. Prolonged exposure to the glaring rays of the noonday sun might produce severe burning of the skin, aside from a possible harmful effect upon the nervous system.
The novice should protect head and eyes against the fierce rays of sunlight. This is best accomplished by means of a wide-brimmed straw hat of light weight. In cases where dizziness results from the effect of the heat upon the brain, a wet cloth may be swathed around the head or placed inside a straw hat.
It will be found very pleasurable and invigorating to take a cold shower or spray off and on during the sun bath and to allow the air to dry the body. This will also increase its electromagnetic effects upon the system.
The Friction Bath
While taking the air bath, the skin may be rubbed or brushed with a rough towel or a flesh brush in order to remove the excretions and the atrophied cuticle. The friction bath should always be followed by a spray or a cold-water rub.
At the time of the air bath, practice breathing exercises and the curative gymnastics appropriate to your condition. (See Chapters Twenty-Eight and Thirty on "Correct Breathing" and "Physical Exercise.")
If the air bath is taken at night, before retiring, the less active breathing exercises, as numbers 1, 3, 7 and 13, may be taken with good results, but all vigorous stimulating movements should be avoided.
As the plant prospers under the life-giving influence of water and light, so the cuticle of the human skin becomes alive and active under the natural stimulation of water, air and sunlight. From the foregoing paragraphs it will be seen why the air and light baths are regarded among the most important natural methods of treatment in all the great Nature Cure sanitariums of Germany.
Chapter x.x.x
Correct Breathing
The lungs are to the body what the bellows are to the fires of the forge. The more regularly and vigorously the air is forced through the bellows and through the lungs, the livelier burns the flame in the smithy and the fires of life in the body.
Practice deep, regular breathing systematically for one week, and you will be surprised at the results. You will feel like a different person, and your working capacity, both physically and mentally, will be immensely increased.
A plentiful supply of fresh air is more necessary than food and drink. We can live without food for weeks, without water for days, but without air only a few minutes.
The Process of Breathing
With every inhalation, air is sucked in through the windpipe or trachea, which terminates in two tubes called bronchi, one leading to the right lung, one to the left. The air is then distributed over the lungs through a network of minute tubes, to the air cells, which are separated by only a thin membrane from equally fine and minute blood vessels forming another network of tubes.
The oxygen contained in the inhaled air pa.s.ses freely through these membranes, is absorbed by the blood, carried to the heart and thence through the arteries and their branches to the different organs and tissues of the body, fanning the fires of life into brighter flame all along its course and burning up the waste products and poisons that have acc.u.mulated during the vital processes of digestion, a.s.similation and elimination.
After the blood has unloaded its supply of oxygen, it takes up the carbonic acid gas which is produced during the oxidation and combustion of waste matter and carries it to the lungs, where the poisonous gases are transferred to the air cells and expelled with the exhaled breath. This return trip of the blood to the lungs is made through another set of blood vessels, the veins, and the blood, dark with the sewage of the system, is now called venous blood.
In the lungs the venous blood discharges its freight of excrement.i.tious poisons and gases, and by coming in contact with fresh air and a new supply of oxygen, it is again transformed into bright, red arterial blood, pregnant with oxygen and ozone, the life-sustaining elements of the atmosphere.
This explains why normal, deep, regular breathing is all-important to sustain life and as a means of cure. By proper breathing, which exercises and develops every part of the lungs, the capacity of the air cells is increased. This, as we have learned, means also an increased supply of life-sustaining and health-promoting oxygen to the tissues and organs of the body.
Bad Effects of Shallow Breathing
Very few people breathe correctly. Some, especially women, with tight skirtbands and corsets pressing on their vital organs, use only the upper part of their lungs. Others breathe only with the lower part and with the diaphragm, leaving the upper structures of the lungs inactive and collapsed.
In those parts of the lungs that are not used, slimy secretions acc.u.mulate, irritating the air cells and other tissues, which become inflamed and begin to decay. Thus a luxuriant soil is prepared for the tubercle bacillus, the pneumococcus and other disease-producing bacilli and germs.
This habit of shallow breathing, which does not allow the lungs to be thoroughly permeated with fresh air, accounts in a measure for the fact that one-third of all deaths result from diseases of the lungs. To one individual perishing from food starvation, thousands are dying from oxygen starvation.
Lung culture is more important than other branches of learning and training which require more time and a greater outlay of time, money and effort. In the Nature Cure regimen, breathing exercises play an important part.
Breathing Exercises
General Directions
The effectiveness of breathing exercises and of all other kinds of corrective movements depends upon the mental att.i.tude during the time of practice. Each motion should be accompanied by the conscious effort to make it produce a certain result. Much more can be accomplished with mental concentration, by keeping your mind on what you are doing, than by performing the exercises in an aimless, indifferent way.
Keep in the open air as much as possible and at all events sleep with windows open.
If your occupation is sedentary, take all opportunities for walking out of doors that present themselves. While walking, breathe regularly and deeply, filling the lungs to their fullest capacity and also expelling as much air as possible at each exhalation. Undue strain should, of course, be avoided. This applies to all breathing exercises.
Do not breathe through the mouth. Nature intends that the outer air shall reach the lungs by way of the nose, whose membranes are lined with fine hairs in order to sift the air and to prevent foreign particles, dust and dirt, from irritating the mucous linings of the air tract and entering the delicate structures of the lungs. Also, the air is warmed before it reaches the lungs by its pa.s.sage through the nose.
Let the exhalations take about double the time of the inhalations.
This will be further explained in connection with rhythmical breathing.
Do not hold the breath between inhalations. Though frequently recommended by teachers of certain methods of breath culture, this practice is more harmful than beneficial.
The Proper Standing Position
Of great importance is the position a.s.sumed habitually by the body while standing and walking. Carelessness in this respect is not only unpleasant to the beholder, but its consequences are far-reaching in their effects upon health and the well-being of the organism.
On the other hand, a good carriage of the body aids in the development of muscles and tissues generally and in the proper functioning of cells and organs in particular. With the weight of the body thrown upon the b.a.l.l.s of the feet and the center of gravity well focused, the abdominal organs will stay in place and there will be no strain upon the ligaments that support them.
In a.s.suming the proper standing position, stand with your back to the wall, touching it with heels, b.u.t.tocks, shoulders and head. Now bend the head backward and push the shoulders forward and away from the wall, still touching the wall with b.u.t.tocks and heels.
Straighten the head, keeping the shoulders in the forward position.
Now walk away from the wall and endeavor to maintain this position while taking the breathing exercises and practicing the various arm movements.
Take this position as often as possible during the day and try to maintain it while you go about your different tasks that must be performed while standing. Gradually this position will become second nature, and you will a.s.sume and maintain it without effort.
When the body is in this position, the viscera are in their normal place. This aids the digestion materially and benefits indirectly the entire functional organism.
Persistent practice of the above will correct protruding abdomen and other defects due to faulty position and carriage of the body.
The following breathing exercises are intended especially to develop greater lung capacity and to a.s.sist in forming the habit of breathing properly at all times. The different movements should be repeated from three to six times, according to endurance and the amount of time at disposal.
(1) With hands at sides or on hips, inhale and exhale slowly and deeply, bringing the entire respiratory apparatus into active play.
(2) (To expand the chest and increase the air capacity of the lungs.)
Jerk the shoulder forward in several separate movements, inhaling deeper at each forward jerk. Exhale slowly, bringing the shoulders back to the original position.
Reverse the exercise, jerking the shoulders backward in similar manner while inhaling. Alternate the movements, forcing the shoulders first forward, then backward.
(3) Stand erect, arms at sides. Inhale, raising the arms forward and upward until the palms touch above the head, at the same time raising on the toes as high as possible. Exhale, lowering the toes, bringing the hands downward in a wide circle until the palms touch the thighs.