Breathe Better, Live Better: How to Breathe Properly and Why it Changes Everything with Jenice Mattek

Full Episode Page: Breathe Better, Live Better: How to Breathe Properly and Why it Changes Everything

Jenice Mattek is a leading post-surgical wellness expert and co-owner of Chicago Integrative Movement Institute. In this episode, Jenice sits down with Kelly Berry to reveal why most people never learn how to breathe properly and what happens when they do. Drawing on decades of experience and her passion for movement, Jenice breaks down the science, habits, and easy fixes that can change your energy, health, and even your outlook on life. Discover why breathing is the secret to posture, pain relief, stress, and core stability. Jenice’s approachable insights and actionable tips will leave you with more than just “Aha!” moments - you’ll walk away ready to breathe (and feel) better, every single day.

Find Out:

• How to breathe for posture, pain relief, and a stronger core
• What nasal breathing does to regulate your nervous system
• Whether tight muscles and habits are restricting your breath
• Her take on diaphragmatic breathing and pelvic floor health
• The best and worst ways to build a breathing habit that lasts

Where to Find Jenice:

• Chicago Integrative Movement Institute
• Integrative Movement Institute on Instagram
• Integrative Movement Institute on YouTube
• Jenice on Instagram

Chapters
01:04 Meet Jenice Mattek: expert in post-surgical recovery and how to breathe properly
05:50 Email apnea, posture, and how poor breathing impacts back pain
12:25 Breathing and pelvic floor health: the connection most people miss
21:00 Why nasal breathing supports stress relief and energy
28:00 From migraines to mobility: Jenice's personal story of breathwork
31:00 Breathing for nervous system regulation
36:50 How breathing supports digestion and post-surgical healing
39:00 Mental health and the power of proper breath
43:00 A simple routine to start breathing properly

Life Intended is a podcast and coaching platform for women who are ready to stop waiting and start leading. Co-hosted by Kelly Berry and Sadie Wackett, each episode explores self-leadership, identity, emotional wellness, and living with intention.

About Kelly Berry
Kelly Berry is a strategic business leader, coach, and founder of Life Intended. She helps women build clarity, confidence, and alignment in life and work. She enjoys spending quality time with her husband American entrepreneur Nick Berry and daughter Vivienne. Her life is a testament to the power of resilience and intention.
🔗 kellyberry.info | @lifeintendedpodcast

About Sadie Wackett
Sadie Wackett is a C-suite HR executive, certified coach, and co-founder of Life Intended. She supports women through leadership transitions, self-trust, and personal transformation. Sadie is originally from the UK and now lives in South Florida with her husband, daughter and dog, Pickles.
🔗 sadiewackett.com | LinkedIn

Life Intended is published in partnership with FCG...

Transcript

(01:04) Meet Jenice Mattek: expert in post-surgical recovery and how to breathe properly
(03:05) Why learning how to breathe properly matters more than we think
(05:50) Email apnea, posture, and how poor breathing impacts back pain
(08:03) What happens in your body when you breathe properly
(11:00) Why common posture cues make it harder to breathe correctly
(12:25) Breathing and pelvic floor health: the connection most people miss
(14:45) Jenice's step-by-step method for how to breathe properly
(17:45) When and how to build a breath habit into your day
(21:00) Why nasal breathing supports stress relief and energy
(24:00) Her take on mouth tape, jaw shape, and modern breath trends
(28:00) From migraines to mobility: Jenice's personal story of breathwork
(31:00) Research-backed benefits of breathing for nervous system regulation
(36:50) How breathing supports digestion and post-surgical healing
(39:00) Mental health and the overlooked power of proper breath
(43:00) Try this: a simple routine to start breathing properly today
(46:30) Learn more: Jenice’s resources to help you breathe better

Kelly Berry (01:04)
I have a guest today who I've known for many, many years and her and her husband, Evan, have presented and spoken to many of our clients in the fitness space. They are just wonderful people and really phenomenal educators who I think are blazing a trail in the fitness industry. And I can't wait for Janiece to talk to you about what

she specializes in, which is post-surgery wellness for women and men struggling with scar tissue and the effects of surgeries like cesareans, hysterectomies, mastectomies, hernia, appendectomies, joint replacements, and more. In 2017, she co-authored the book, What Lies Beneath? The Underrealized Effects of Breast, Abdominal, and Pelvic Surgeries.

Janiece has spent the last 25 plus years working with clients to actively return to the activities they need, want, and love to do, and truly feels the best way to start is by helping her clients understand and experience the physical and psychological benefits of improving how they breathe. She's the co-owner of Chicago Integrative Movement Specialist, where she actively works with her clients in the studio and online. She is also the co-founder

of the Integrative Movement Institute where she teaches health and fitness professionals online and at live conferences and workshops. Hi, Janiece. Happy to have you here. How are you?

Jenice Mattek (02:21)
Hello, Kelly.

I'm good. I'm so excited to be here with you.

Kelly Berry (02:26)
Yeah, me too. Yeah, well, I can't wait to dive in today. I reached out to you because so many of the guests that I've had on the podcast have talked about, you know, whether it's regulating your nervous system or like regaining control of your mind, whatever it is, they all mention breathing and breath work and how important that is.

But nobody has really talked about like how to do that. What does that mean? Why is breath work so important? And so when I started thinking about that, was like, well, I know who to talk to. So that's what I kind of want to share with everybody is what is breath work and why is breathing so important? So help us out and help us understand.

Jenice Mattek (03:05)
Absolutely,

absolutely. My most favorite topics to speak about. So is there anything specific you want me to dive right into or you have any questions to start off with?

Kelly Berry (03:08)
Good.

Well, I guess, you I know that there are, I don't know what there are, but I know that there are so many like physiological and like physical impacts of proper breath. So I guess if you can start talking about like, why is breathing and not just like breathing, because we all do that, but why is like breathing correctly so important? And what is it, what actually happens in our bodies when we do that?

Jenice Mattek (03:33)
Mm-hmm. Right, right.

Yeah, it's so interesting that that's a great question. When I was recently talking to a colleague and some friends and we're talking about, why did we not learn anatomy in high school? Like, why do we have to learn chemistry and all these other things that aren't really practical everyday life things you need for the health of your body? And so I think if we could teach every kid right from the start, like why breathing is so important. They would probably be so much more relaxed in their bodies. Their posture would be so much better and they'd probably just be healthier all over their whole body. So.

Couple really big takeaways, and I love to share these, is one, we know that if we breathe well, we can take control over how our mind feels, how anxious we feel, different things like that. And that's tapping into our parasympathetic nervous system. Everybody kind of equates, is relatively recent for all of us, is like after Thanksgiving dinner, you just kind of like rest and digest because all the blood is flowing into your intestines to help digest. So that's going into your parasympathetic nervous system where your body just feels calm and relaxed and feels like can be a little sleepy if it really wanted to.

It also helps with our posture. It also helps with the number two reason that so many people have to go to the doctor, which is low back pain. And it can also help improve your balance as well. So I think those are some really good reasons to want to improve how you breathe. And I think a really big challenge for people is I, people say a time, I breathe, otherwise I won't be standing here. That's a true statement. But how you feel in your body can be directly correlated to how you breathe. And so,

understanding what it means from a muscle standpoint, because it's also, lots of times we hear people say after they've had gone to the doctor, I'm like, I have low back pain, says I need to strengthen my core and create my core stability and blah, blah. And that's all well intended. However, most doctors don't share with you what your deepest core muscle is, which is your diaphragm muscle, which is your primary muscle of how you breathe or respiration. So understanding that helps people tap into, I can understand why how I breathe can become important.

for all these different parts of my life. So. So.

Kelly Berry (05:37)
Yeah, yeah,

yeah. I know I shared with you, I think before we were hit record or maybe in our previous conversation, but I know like sometimes I'm like sitting at my desk working and I'm just like, I'm not breathing. I'm literally like holding my breath. in realizing that like my posture's terrible, you I've got my neck out. I'm like in the full on worse, you know, one of those stories like.

Jenice Mattek (05:52)
Mm-hmm.

Hahaha.

Kelly Berry (06:03)
Sitting here rotting at my desk for sure. But yeah, I think even though it is easy to say well we all breathe because we're all alive like I mean How many people actually breathe well?

Jenice Mattek (06:15)
say not many at all. And I think it becomes a habit, right? Like you saying like, can tell when you're not breathing at your desk, and they actually termed it, they coined a term called email apnea. And especially during the time of COVID, so many clients will come in and be like, yeah, I'm at my desk all day. I absolutely know I'm not breathing or breathing well, or I find myself not breathing or holding my breath. Yeah, some I came over some some written magazine coined it email apnea, which makes sense. Because all of sudden, you may find yourself like taking a deep breath or a sigh

because you're literally not breathing, so your body's making you breathe. So yeah, and then we also know there's a study, a recent study on young men that actually said when you're in that forward head posture, it actually decreases your capacity to breathe by over 20%. So that's kind of an interesting concept too, because then we know if you're in a non-optimal postural position, you're automatically gonna change the quality and the effort you need to breathe.

Kelly Berry (06:45)
Thank you.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Jenice Mattek (07:13)
And so then you start to get into more of that chest breathing that people talk about and like that tight neck. We have so many muscles that go from our neck and our shoulder into our rib cage, which houses our diaphragm as well as our lungs. And so if those things, those muscles are being, over years, they're getting tighter, making it thus harder to breathe. And it kind of becomes this endless cycle until you get in and be like, Hey, I'm going to learn how to breathe well and optimally.

and I'm gonna practice it because I'm using muscles in my body, so it's doing an exercise. You're using muscles of your body, so you're doing an exercise. You're not just breathing.

Kelly Berry (07:49)
Mm-hmm. Yeah. So what are some of those physiological benefits besides the parasympathetic nervous system, but what happens to your anatomy when you start breathing better?

Jenice Mattek (08:03)
When you start breathing better, I say one of the things that we find with people is people who do not breathe well, constantly complain of feeling tight. They constantly complain of feeling tight. One, because either they're not breathing well or they're not breathing enough or they're breathing too much. Usually people breathe too much, not enough. Is they're overusing muscles that create tightness. And then all of a sudden they try to do something and they're moving with already tight muscles.

Kelly Berry (08:11)
Mm-hmm.

Jenice Mattek (08:28)
I know most people come in like, my neck is so tight. Like I can barely move it. It's always tight. I always want to stretch it. When people say, I always feel like I want to stretch something like, if I stretch it, feels better, but it never lasts. Like that's another sign to us that somebody is not breathing well. Once you breathe well and your spine feels more stable, then everything else just starts to feel better. You just have this better quality of movement, easier to move, easier to pick things up, easier to just go through your everyday life. So.

Kelly Berry (08:49)
Mm-hmm.

Jenice Mattek (08:56)
you start to create your whole brain, talks to your whole brain, your whole nervous system to like, hey, let's change how we're doing things. So that's another really big physiological response to it. And it's also understanding that your diaphragm muscle, which sits in the center of your, between your ribs and your pelvis or your hip bones, when that muscle moves well, it actually blends with deeper muscles of your spine. And that's why,

Kelly Berry (09:05)
Thank

Jenice Mattek (09:19)
When you breathe well, it changes how your low back might feel or other spinal discomfort that you might feel. Cause when we're in the anatomy lab, we can actually see this diaphragm muscle blends like like a sweater, we'll say like a sweater. actually blends into these other muscles that are in your low back. Unlike the muscles that we think about, like those big muscles on our back where people feel like they have road bump muscles on their back, going all the down their back. They're smaller muscles that actually help stabilize, truly stabilize your spine and your core.

So when we can breathe well, we can actually get those muscles to work more efficiently to help stabilize our spine and our core.

Kelly Berry (09:53)
Yeah, so what are some ways, I guess, if back pain, low back pain specifically, is like the number two thing that people go to the doctor for, how do you start to work with somebody who comes to you and says that they have that to, I guess to do like, then relieve that through improving their breath?

Jenice Mattek (10:07)
Mm-hmm.

Yep, yep. And so one of the things we have to do, which I think it's really common for people now, especially people who work out, is they do myofascial release techniques, like with a foam roller or a ball or something like that. So maybe we need to help release some of those muscles that are actually making it more difficult for them to get in a good or a good quality breath. So lots of things that we've learned can actually be hindering how we're breathing, which we've learned is like as we evolve and understand things better, we can start to see how that can happen.

And so when we think about posture that we commonly want to say, like lift your chest up, that can be a cue that you've, learned that from five years old, I think I learned to lift your chest up, hold your abs in, squeeze your glutes, pull your shoulders down and back. And if you actually did all of those things right now, squeeze your glutes, lots of times I do have people do this in a class like squeeze your glutes, hold your abs in, pull your shoulders down and back, which we hear that in fitness all the time.

Kelly Berry (11:10)
Thank you.

Jenice Mattek (11:10)
And you

hear that just from a postural standpoint. Some people are like, stand up straight, pull your shoulders back. But if you would do all of that and try to take a breath, it's nearly impossible to get a breath in. So now you think of people sitting at their desk and feeling themselves starting to slouch. So they lift their chest up so they're not slouching anymore. Or if they start to go down or kind of stanch down into their seat and now they're slouching. So now their glutes are squeezed as they're doing that and they're holding their abs in because maybe they don't feel comfortable with the way they look. And now you've just made it that much harder to breathe.

Kelly Berry (11:19)
Mm-hmm.

Jenice Mattek (11:39)
And so you're not going to have, you're going to have a low back pain because you're doing everything that's not supporting your low back in a good way.

Kelly Berry (11:39)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah,

you're putting yourself like in a little pretzel. Yeah.

Jenice Mattek (11:50)
Correct, correct. And I guess I should mention,

especially because we just had that talk about perimenopause, is that another really important reason to learn how to breathe well is because your pelvic floor muscles, those muscles that actually control bowel, bladder, and sexual function, are very synergistic with your muscles of respiration. So if you're not breathing well, you're likely not going to have great pelvic floor muscle strength and coordination either.

Kelly Berry (11:55)
Yeah

Jenice Mattek (12:15)
Learning to breathe well is really important for that as well.

Kelly Berry (12:19)
Mm-hmm. Yeah. like, talk to us about how do we improve our breath and what does that look like?

Jenice Mattek (12:25)
Yep, yep, absolutely. So the first thing is one, you want to make sure that you're, when you're practicing your breath work, you want to make sure that you're sitting or lying in a good position that allows the breath just to come in easily and effortlessly. So one of the things we'll tell people is like, hey, if you're going to be, if you're at work, stand up from your seat and then sit back down. So you're perched forward on the front of your chair.

Lots of times it's hard to show on a podcast, but we'll be like, hey, I want you to reach underneath your glutes and pull your glutes out so you're square on the broadest part of your hips or your pelvis. So you're not doing anything that's squeezing the ability for the breath to go all the way in. We'll tell people to think of like a nice long spine as though somebody's pulling you up towards the ceiling. Again, just creating that nice alignment because again, like we talked about, if your head is forward, it's going to be that much harder to get the breath in.

Kelly Berry (13:15)
Mm-hmm.

Jenice Mattek (13:17)
Lots times we'll explain to people, like, listen, want you, especially for women, it's a little bit easier. Use your bra strap around your rib cage as the marker for where your diaphragm muscle is. Put your hands there so as you breathe, you can feel your rib cage expanding into your hands. Because when your diaphragm move, it actually pulls a breath into your lungs, which is where it needs to go, right? As if your diaphragm actually has a muscle that's round and it sits inside your whole rib cage. And so when you breathe, it's not just, it's not a belly breath.

It's a whole trunk breath, like the whole trunk gets involved as you breathe. So you think about that round flat muscle moving down and pulling the breath up into your lungs, which it's really important for people to understand is your ribs go all the way up past where your collarbone is. And so your ribs and that's where your lungs go all the way up that high inside your rib cage. So it's really important to understand when you're bringing that breath in.

You also want to make sure it's a gentle breath. Oftentimes you feel like in a class, but okay, everybody take a deep breath in and everybody thinks they've got to make this really big, like big, big breath. And it doesn't need to be that effort filled because you really only have like two or three primary muscles that actually help you breathe well. So if you're using a lot of muscles, like if you can see your neck muscles popping out of your neck as you're quietly breathing,

That's a little too much effort required. are muscles that are supposed to help if you're doing your cardio and you're at the end of it and you're like, can't. That's when you might see those muscles coming out. So you just want to make sure that you're using good posture. And good posture doesn't mean stiff posture. Lift your chest up. It just means really gentle length. All the cues we use when we're teaching clients how to breathe are just super gentle cues because we're trying to tap into an easy way to breathe.

Kelly Berry (14:43)
me.

with me.

Jenice Mattek (15:03)
using

less muscles, making it less effort-filled, so you're getting the right muscles during the work and not all the extraneous accessory muscles doing that work. So posture would be number one. What does your posture look like when you're doing your breathing exercises or your program? Secondly, you might have to release some muscles that are tight that are inhibiting or making it harder to breathe with less effort. So for some people, it is those big road bump muscles that go all down the backside of your rib cage.

Some people, it may be their glutes that need to be released. Some people, maybe their lats. So you need to decide or help. You need to get a little bit of help for some people if they're really struggling with breathing well, like, hey, what muscles are actually tight on me, not what feels tight, like what's actually tight and restricting how my breath is going in. So posture, maybe doing some release work, and then oftentimes listen to something to help guide you through how to breathe well. And I think that's the best way,

countless times clients will be like, so much easier when I'm in this session with you to do it versus me trying to talk myself through it. And lots of times people, and I think I heard you say this on a podcast too, Kelly, like, I don't really know how to meditate. It doesn't ever feel right to me. Like I can't get that focus. And so I think for a lot of people, meditation isn't something that rings true to them as a way to do it. And so like I've done lots of 30 day breathing challenges where clients just like plug in their headphones and they just listen to me, talk them through.

Kelly Berry (16:22)
Mm-hmm.

Jenice Mattek (16:29)
hey, put your hands here and think about sending your breath here, put your hands here, think about, and that's actually teaching them how to get a good proper, what we call three dimensional breath. Cause I just talked them through how to, how they're, and we just talked about this too, Kelly, how to get their brain to help access some of those areas in their body that maybe they've never thought about. And it's so much easier when somebody just guides you through how to do it. So that's it. If breathing is something that's hard for you or breathing is something that

Kelly Berry (16:45)
Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Jenice Mattek (16:58)
never felt important to you and maybe now you're kind of hearing the trend about how important breathing is, then it is really helpful to find a guide system that works for you. I think that's really the easiest way. I sometimes I don't like to listen to my own voice, but every once in while I'll plug in my headphones and listen to myself, take myself through a breathing exercise because it's just that much easier than being like, I'm thinking about breathing nice and gently because it's not that easy sometimes for people.

Kelly Berry (17:13)
Okay.

Yeah, yeah. So if somebody's like trying to improve how they breathe, is it kind of like working out? Like I need to set aside 30 minutes a day and work on my breath or like we'll say five minutes a day. Or is it something like I need to figure out how to do this all the time or somewhere in the middle? Like what is that?

Jenice Mattek (17:45)
in the middle, one of the things we try to do, because for some people, some people are on board right away. Some people are like, I don't know about this. And so then we just ask them like, hey, can you do this for two minutes twice a day? And most people will be like, yeah, I can do this two minutes twice a day. So like, hey, guess what? You're already in a great position when you're in bed. So before you get out of bed in the morning, and when you go to bed at night, I just want you to get yourself in a really good position. Make sure your head and neck are nice and gently laying on your pillow. Bend your knees up, and then just go ahead and practice your breathing right there.

Another really good place to do it. We always put social posts up about this, like, hey, back up from your desk and take a little breathing break. Just like what I talked about earlier, stand up, get perched at the edge of your chair. Think about a nice long spine, close your eyes. And another big thing I have people do is the breath is coming in through your nose. So I'll say, hey, just put your lips, put your, your fingers gently on the top of your lip, right where your nose is and get a sense of like, that's where the breath just gently comes in. So we use a lot of tactile cues so people don't have to.

think about it so much, but they have these tactile cues that connect their brain to how the breath comes in, where the breath should go, different things like that. So breaking it up and using it, because it's a great reset for your day. There's just natural physiology of like your cells need oxygen. And so if you're lacking oxygen, then your energy is going to start to deplete throughout your day. So instead of grabbing a cup of coffee, which is going to keep you up throughout the rest of the day and night,

Just take a little breathing break. Take a couple of breathing breaks, just like one to two minutes back up, sit back down, close your eyes, take in a few breaths. And it's miraculous how much more amazing you can feel just by doing that.

Kelly Berry (19:20)
Yeah, I need to try that because I am probably at a lifetime high of coffee consumption. I'm like, you know, back to perimenopause, I'm like, I think this is a sign because I am tired all the time, but I want to get I want to like, I love coffee. So I'm not really looking to ditch it, but I am looking to maybe get back somewhere on the normal scope. But that was that was what you just said was going to be one of my questions. So in proper breathing,

Jenice Mattek (19:26)
Hahaha!

Yeah

Mm-hmm.

Kelly Berry (19:49)
Is

it in through the nose out through the mouth? Is it in and out through the nose? Like what's the right way?

Jenice Mattek (19:54)
Yeah,

that's a great question. there's this great Chinese proverb, and I hope I don't like massacre when I say this right now, but it's something like the nose is for breathing, the mouth is for eating. And so we always teach people to breathe in and out through your nose, because if you're sleeping, you're not going, you're not doing that. And you're not doing that throughout your day either. Like that's thinking a lot about how you're breathing, if that's how you're breathing. Unfortunately, most people just, when they get into something, it's

Kelly Berry (20:05)
Okay.

Jenice Mattek (20:21)
they are already in that good nose breathers, just open their mouth and start to breathe. And there's so many bad things you can read about when you're just a mouth breather. It's bad for your teeth. It's bad for your health. It's all the things you want to breathe through your nose because your nose has a natural filtration system built in to take dust particles to take.

the bad things that are floating around, viruses, the little things like that. It actually cleans it all out. It warms it before it gets to your lungs. It does so many good things for you. Like we can't see up inside of our nose, but it has this whole system up there built for us to inhale through our nose. The reason we really like people to focus on exhaling through their nose when they're breathing, because it just makes it a much longer exhale and people don't have to think about the exhale so much. It makes them less forcing of the breath out. Cause lots of times people think of breathing as in through the nose, out through the mouth. And it's this real big, powerful breath out.

Kelly Berry (21:10)
Yeah.

Jenice Mattek (21:12)
And there is a time and place for all of those. there's that great book, Breath by James Nestor. He talks about the importance of breathing and why nose breathing is important. he went around the whole world doing ancient breathing studies and looking at the sizes of our mouth and all these different things. And it is a cool, cool book. So if nobody's read it, they should actually pick that up. But In and Out Through the Nose is how we breathe in our everyday life. if we're starting to build a good, we're trying to build good habits on breathing.

in and out through your nose is just the best way to go about it, in my opinion. There's lots of other research things out there, absolutely, but that is our preference.

Kelly Berry (21:47)
Okay. Yeah, I guess I would have thought in through the nose out through the mouth, because I feel like when you go to yoga or do something like that's what they're telling you. And, you know, I've always struggled when they're like, take a nice long slow exhale. It's like I have to think so hard about exhaling really slow through my mouth, that I'm probably just like losing all the benefits because then I'm like, hold my breath, stop, hold my breath, stop. It's like, stop and go, stop and go.

Jenice Mattek (21:56)
Mm-hmm.

I

it's much easier to do a long breath through your nose because you get that natural, almost like resistance to it versus trying to like do that through your mouth. There's just like a natural resistance of exhaling through your nose. And I mean, definitely that yoga breathing is there's so much research on yoga breathing. So I'm definitely not going to poke poo poo how they teach yoga breathing because it has tons of benefits. But when you're just thinking of everyday life, in and out through your nose is just the most sensible way to do it.

Kelly Berry (22:24)
Thank

Okay.

Yeah. So I wasn't really expecting to go here, but that made me think about mouth tape. That is something that's really, really popular right now. So what's your opinion on or stance on using mouth tape? I guess maybe there's probably a lot of people who are like mouth tape. What can you tell us like what it is, why people use it before we talk about it? that a idea?

Jenice Mattek (22:49)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Yeah. Yep. Yep. Yeah. And oftentimes

I believe most people use it when they're sleeping because most people tend to open their mouth and then they have sleep apnea and different things like that. So it is the idea of literally taping your mouth shut. So you are forced to breathe through your nose, like butyco breathing. I probably massacred that as well. But yeah, it's that idea. Like you literally put like surgical tape over your mouth so that you cannot. And I've had a couple of clients try it and they're like, my God, I thought I was going to die. I couldn't do it. Whatever.

And I think there's a place and time for that as well. I think I might try when I'm awake just to see how I do with it. But again, for some people, especially if they're worried about developing sleep apnea, if they do struggle sleeping through the night, if they know they snore, it might be a good thing. mean, again, it's one of those things. There's really good research on it. So for some people it is good. Everything is not good for everyone. So it is definitely a technique that people have success with.

Kelly Berry (23:32)
Okay.

Yeah, I have heard it's a, where I hear it now is like, it's a big influencer product to talk about. And so I hear a lot of podcasters like kind of talking about their mouth tape or whatever, but they say like they sleep better. They sleep deeper. They don't wake up as much. you know, and I guess I don't think that I'm a nighttime mouth sleeper, but I guess, you know, I guess I would have to take my mouth shed to see if I like wake myself up. I can't breathe, but,

Jenice Mattek (24:00)
sure,

Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Kelly Berry (24:19)
I've also heard people say that it changes your jawline. Do you know anything about that or why that would happen?

Jenice Mattek (24:25)
Well, one of the things

that James Nestor talks about in his book is how historically our mouths have gotten so much smaller and that's one of the reasons why people struggle with breathing well. And so that can go back to if you've been nursed, what kind of food you eat, are you building up the muscles of your jaw, did you wear braces? All these different things can actually affect the size of your mouth, which in turn then affects your ability to breathe well. So if you are always mouth breathing,

Kelly Berry (24:51)
Mm-hmm.

Jenice Mattek (24:54)
you're using the muscles of respiration, you're using the muscles of your jaw differently. And so I could understand why it would definitely change the position of your jaw. Like if you're like a night teeth grinder kind of person too, like that changes the shape of your jaw because you're using so much muscular effort all night long while you're breathing and trying to breathe. So yeah, I could definitely see, I'm not sure why it does it. I'm sure it has something to do with the fact that you're using your jaw muscles differently when you're breathing through your nose and constantly breathing through your mouth.

Kelly Berry (25:20)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Jenice Mattek (25:22)
I would imagine if you're always in mouth breather, which I don't think I've been in a really long time now, that you put your jaw muscles on slack, which actually starts to create a little bit of, you're not using the muscles, so don't have that tone anymore, so it's gonna start to change.

Kelly Berry (25:36)
Yeah.

Yeah. Which I think I've seen that on people, you know, like maybe as people get older, there's like a little bit, I don't know, a little bit. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Interesting. Okay. Well, I wasn't expecting to go there, but I figured you would know. Okay. So before that though, we were on like how to breathe well, how to do it, you know, I guess is introducing it as part of your

Jenice Mattek (25:46)
like atrophy of the muscles of mastication or something.

Kelly Berry (26:04)
You know, like, want to breathe better. How do I start doing that? So just taking, your suggestion was to take like a few minutes, maybe multiple times a day and just listen to something or focus on how you're sitting, how you're breathing and try to, I guess, improve the way that you breathe. then does that, does that kind of then start to carry over and you start to breathe like that all the time?

Jenice Mattek (26:12)
Mm-hmm.

think what happens is it helps you bring more awareness to the fact of when they're not breathing well or they're not breathing at all. One of the things I love to do with people in a group, and I have clients do this all the time, is they actually go through a self-assessment of how their body feels before they take a few minutes to do breathing versus how their body feels. Sometimes that's just a basic, if they're lying down, get a sense of how your body is lying on the surface. Does it feel like you're holding tension in certain places? Does your back rest easily? Does your head rest easily? Do you have tension in your neck?

Some of it's just basic stuff like that, but some of it is like actual movement stuff. Like, can you bring your arms over your head? How does that feel when you turn your head to look over your right and left shoulder? Do you feel tension when you do that? And when you pause and breathe well, it starts to change literally how you move after you're done. And to me, that's like the... Because we teach people how to move all day long. To me, that's like the coolest thing that you can get from breathing from like an instantaneous, my gosh, I...

feel different. And I love when people are like their eyes like get really bright. my gosh, why is my neck moving better now than it was like two minutes ago? Because we took the tension out because we changed how you were breathing we took we changed the tension in your body like that's how quickly the changes can happen just by breathing better.

Kelly Berry (27:40)
Yeah, and I mean, I've seen what you're describing, like at conferences, you know, when somebody's like, okay, overhead press this or whatever and they can't, and then they're like, okay, set it down and then take how many ever breaths and then stop and do it and they can do movements. literally like same person two minutes before couldn't do.

Jenice Mattek (27:58)
Mm-hmm

Yeah, yeah, it's I mean it's an incredible and that's why you can see how your habit of how you habitually breathe affects the quality of how your body feels Because if you take moment in time and you just change that for a little bit and also you're like my gosh, I can move better. All I did was change my breathing maybe there's a little bit more value

Kelly Berry (28:12)
Mm-hmm.

Jenice Mattek (28:23)
to why I might want to work on this. And that's like a self inventory kind of thing and like what's important to you. I mean, somebody said, like, why do you like to talk about this? I'm like, well, because it literally changed my life. If I didn't change how I was breathing, I wouldn't be talking to you today because I would be the most miserable person on the face of this earth. like to me, it's that important.

Kelly Berry (28:41)
Mm-hmm. So what are some of the most common improvements that you see or what do people tell you that they feel after they've started to breathe better?

Jenice Mattek (28:53)
Well, one thing I will tell you is we give our clients

a series of exercises after every session. And sometimes they'll come in like, I didn't do any of my homework except I did my breathing. I did do my breathing. Because they see and they can feel the difference instantly. for some people, like I have a client who has a hiatal hernia. And when we can teach her how to breathe better, she just has like much more ease in her abdomen because it actually helps bring her stomach out of her hernia, which is so important for just like being able to move and feel better. Some clients will just be able to like raise their arms easier, their neck will move more freely.

I have a client that I got to see her just two times, once a month for two months, and she had digestive issues. And so another thing I didn't really talk about, but when you breathe well, you actually start to create this massage of your abdominal contents, specifically your digestive tract. And after two sessions and her being really religious about her homework of doing her breathing, she was a person who struggled with constipation regularly. And she's like, she's like, after our first session, like, I can't even express to you.

She's like, this is TMI. She's like, I went like so much. And then she's like, now I'm like, after two months, she's going regularly. And for been years of not regularly being able to move her bowel. So breathing can have that kind of impact on people. We've had older clients who've been really struggling with incontinence. And once they learned how to breathe better, their incontinence was minimal to none. mean, those are life changing type things that are really important to people.

And just being able to, like for me, it was getting rid of chronic migraine headaches. Like that was the game changer for me in my twenties of not having to struggle with those on a daily basis. So when you think about those kinds of things, there are people just feeling easier just to be in their bodies, to sit at their desks longer, to being able to, like we had somebody, we went through our program, he's like, I did my breathing when I was doing my kettlebells. And he was a big kettlebell guy, that's all he did. He's like, I could lift so much more and I could lift for longer if I just incorporated my breathing.

Because when you breathe well, it actually helps improve your alignment of your body. So you're stacking your joints better. You're not just letting the weight crush you. So from that standpoint, it can help improve your strength. It can help improve how you're feeling in your body. And can improve how your body's literally moving from the outside all the way into the inside.

Kelly Berry (31:03)
Yeah, so migraines. I hadn't thought about it for that, but I know a lot of people who really struggle with migraines.

Jenice Mattek (31:11)
Mm-hmm. And migraines have many different sources and unfortunately for a lot of people they don't know the source of their migraine headache. And for me after meeting my beloved husband, we were able to determine like my posture that I had learned from a really young age was really, really horrible. So I just changed, just didn't change. It took a really long time to change my posture. So...

Kelly Berry (31:17)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Jenice Mattek (31:37)
with learning how to breathe better and more efficiently and using less muscular effort to breathe, I was able to eliminate my migraine headaches within two years. So, I mean, that was game changing. Like I was taking a thousand milligrams of ibuprofen a day for like two years in my 20s.

Kelly Berry (31:47)
Wow.

Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Yeah, interesting. I wasn't expecting that either, but I guess, you know, I guess it makes sense when you talk about just like all of this constant tension. I mean, I am like, you know, probably for the past 20 years, anytime I've gone to get a massage or anything like the massage therapist, it's always like, my gosh, you are so tight. And I'm, you know, part of me is like, I think they tell that to everybody,

Jenice Mattek (32:03)
Hahaha!

Kelly Berry (32:19)
but I think like for me, I can just sitting here thinking about like how I breathe all of these times I'm saying, like, I don't realize that I'm not breathing. I, I bet that if I incorporated some like focus on breathing, that I would see a lot of that tension that I have, I've carried for years and years and years.

go away. So I'm going to try this. I'm going to find one of your breathing challenges and I'm going to do it.

Jenice Mattek (32:46)
I would say one of the biggest things people could do from a breathing standpoint that'd be super easy besides just like two minutes before you get out of bed, two minutes before you go to bed at night, one or two minutes throughout your day is when you think of your breathing, make the exhale longer than the inhale. So like...

Kelly Berry (33:04)
Okay.

Jenice Mattek (33:05)
We have people start with like inhale for three and then pause and exhale for four and pause and inhale. you're just like, ideally you should only be taking ideal, ideal, six breaths a minute. And so if you think of people who are mouth breathers, they're constantly like.

Kelly Berry (33:17)
Okay.

Jenice Mattek (33:21)
Like they almost look like a dog panting. So when you think about that, and like, think one of the biggest, the biggest groups of people who struggle breathing and changing their breathing habit are people who've been lifelong smokers because everything that they've done around breathing, inhaling and exhaling has been through the mouth and they just changed their whole muscular effort and breathing. So, but if you think about that, like just inhale for three, a little pause and exhale for four, like it just, and then build it up, build up your exhale to be longer.

Kelly Berry (33:21)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Jenice Mattek (33:50)
It's one, it really taps into your parasympathetic nervous system, which will help relax muscles. But it also just kind of like gives you just like a much like slower vibe in your body. I would say that's probably the reason I'm the most relaxed I've ever been in my life. Even when there's chaos everywhere, I think it's just cause I do have a, I do use breathing as like a regular exercise throughout my day.

Kelly Berry (34:12)
Mm-hmm. Yeah. So how do how about snoring? How did how does that how does breathing and snoring go together? What's the relationship?

Jenice Mattek (34:21)
And sometimes that has to do

with like just your literal position of where how your head is. can do with how they often say people who are overweight tend to be chronic snores just because I'm guessing the pressure on their diaphragm where they can't expand it properly. And if you think of any kind of inflammation, like I remember years ago, my husband was snoring a lot and he's like, and he would recognize as soon as he would get off of the dairy and the gluten, all those things that were very inflammatory to him, the snoring would go away. So

A of times when you're overweight and then what happens is your tongue starts to drop in your mouth because of the way your head is on your pillow and then you start to snore. And so there's reasons you start to open your mouth and then you start to snore.

Kelly Berry (35:01)
Okay. working on your breathing like we've talked about, have you seen that like impact people snoring or is it typically like they have it? Right.

Jenice Mattek (35:10)
I have not. The only thing I've, from a sleeping

standpoint, the most things people report is just better quality of sleep. Yeah.

Kelly Berry (35:16)
Okay, okay, nice.

All right, so what about, I know we've talked a lot about the physical benefits. Are there any physical benefits that we've not hit on yet or that you wanna make sure you?

Jenice Mattek (35:28)
Well, there's lots of different research

studies out there about the different physiological effects. I would say the biggest ones are balance. actually, cause when you can breathe better, and this one gets a little abstract for people, but when you can breathe better and you're using your diaphragm muscle inside of your rib cage and you're using your intercostal muscles, and those are the tiny muscles of respiration between each set of ribs, you're starting to then create more mobility through your rib cage.

And that just makes sense. You're using those muscles maybe you don't think about using. And then that in turn helps to affect your balance. Say if you're gonna like, say you like fall off a curb or somebody pushes you, it gives you that flexibility to respond back to that versus just being a log and falling over. When we think about older people and their balance, they become very rigid. And so they can't respond to that because they've become so rigid. So when you think about creating more flexibility in your body, breathing helps with that. So it can help with your balance.

which is very important for all of us as we age and maybe become a little less flexible. know, again, it helps support your spine and you're looking for real spinal control and core control or core stability, learning how to breathe better and improving your deep core muscles, that's gonna help a ton. So that's really important. But there's also research around menopause and perimenopause, how it can help decrease like hot flashes and things like that. It can improve your energy.

Kelly Berry (36:25)
Mm-hmm. Nice and loose.

Jenice Mattek (36:50)
There's a whole list of things that can do physiologically. So there's tons of research out there about the physiological effects. And if you're somebody, my other specialty, if you are somebody who's had it, like a C-section or a hysterectomy or something like that, and oftentimes one of the things that women do struggle with, doctors don't talk to them about that, is they do struggle with digestive issues after their surgeries because of scar tissue. It can actually create this gentle massage the way the diaphragm lowers down onto those...

content that does help create this massage in that area to help keep things moving along through the digestive tract.

Kelly Berry (37:24)
Interesting. Yeah, I'm sure I have a lot of listeners who have had C-sections. Yeah, that's super interesting. Wouldn't it be nice if we learned all these things as we were going through all of these things? Yeah. Yeah.

Jenice Mattek (37:35)
Right? I mean, just again, like

I was thinking about that today. I was like, why did I learn biology? I can't remember barely anything where biology and especially chemistry. And if somebody would talk to me a little bit more about just my anatomy, I'd have been like, that's really super interesting.

Kelly Berry (37:49)
Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah. So what about, like, mental? I know we talked about kind of like regulation and you've mentioned your parasympathetic nervous system a lot, but what are the mental health benefits of breathing better?

Jenice Mattek (37:51)
I could have learned how to use it in everyday life.

Yeah,

there's these three studies I talked about in recent talk, and I thought they were really good studies. Two of them were done in 2022, and one was done in 2014. And I liked it because the one in 2014 kept it very basic, and it was just about reading, and it still had the best response was. So the first group was looking at stressed out college students, and they gave them, three different groups. One group was using a little bit more of emotional intelligence to overcome their stress.

Another group was using more of this cognitive way of talking about your emotions and dealing with them. And then one of them was just doing a breathing practice. And the group that had the best sense of feeling better and more control over their stress was the group that did just breathing, which I think is very cool. And they had certain measures. And then I think the one, I think it even said the group that did emotional intelligence really felt like they had no improvement at all. The group that did cognitive, they had some improvement of how they felt about their stress.

Kelly Berry (38:55)
you

Jenice Mattek (39:00)
And then there was another group where they looked more at like heart rate and things like that about stress. And then they again used like a psychological technique of cognitive where you kind of like learn to rationalize your stress. And then another group just used breathing. And the group that used breathing had the better results, the heart rate was lower. And they also found that when they were in a stressful situation, they could handle the stress better, versus trying to do self-talk about the stress. So I thought that was very interesting.

Kelly Berry (39:29)
Yeah.

Jenice Mattek (39:30)
And then the

one that was the original study in 2014, it looked at veterans that were struggling with PTSD and they used breathing and then some kind of other cognitive talk therapy. And again, the lasting results and the immediate results these gentlemen, it was all men, could get was from a breathing practice. So when we talk about stress,

Kelly Berry (39:51)
Wow.

Jenice Mattek (39:53)
And to me, that gives me such hope because we have this natural, very not having to think about our stress way to decrease our stress. Because we know sometimes like we're talking to it when we're stressed, we're talking like, my God, I'm And we just keep piling on the stress, which gives us more stress. And instead of just being like, wait, I've got this way of like a really gentle approach that's already within me as a strategy to decrease my stress. So I think it's super cool.

Kelly Berry (40:03)
Thank you.

Yeah.

Yeah. And so accessible. know, like everybody can breathe. Everybody can work on that. And I think, you know, when you're stressed and then you're trying to figure out like, well, do I need a therapist? What kind of therapists do I need? How do I find them? Or how do I find a coach? Or who do I talk to? That just adds more stress and more to do. So this is just like so accessible to have such good results. So that's amazing.

Jenice Mattek (40:22)
Correct.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah, and I think it's one of those things where, sometimes clients are like, I feel like I might be thinking about it too much. And you probably are. You may have to think about it too much. And that's really why I encourage them. like, hey, listen, I made this recording for you. Just listen to the recording and having people, because we really want people to, we work very much in the physical standpoint. A lot of times the psychological things are just an added benefit of the work. So we work very much in the physical. And so we're teaching people to understand the importance of breathing or how to breathe. We usually get very tactile with them and put

put our hands in the space where their rib cage should be expanding, their diaphragm muscles should be expanding. And then it kind of takes the thinking part out of it and lets them be a little mechanical about it for a little bit until it just makes, it comes more natural for them. And so from that standpoint, it gets a little bit easier. don't have to think so hard. They can just use the tactile feedback that they have from themselves. Like, I'm just trying to get my breath into this space.

So that part, think makes it a little bit easier for people. But yeah, I just, love, I can't ever express the importance of learning how to breathe and breathe well and utilizing it for all the benefits it really, really has for your body.

Kelly Berry (41:52)
Yeah, do you have like a one of your challenges coming up? Do you have some place that people can go and like access you in your recordings? So I'm taking notes for myself because I'm gonna start to work on this like today.

Jenice Mattek (42:02)
I do.

I think I want to incorporate a new one just because you're always improving how you share, how you communicate it, how you help people be successful with it. So I think I'm going to do a new one for January. I I'll do a one for January.

Kelly Berry (42:16)
Mm-hmm.

Okay.

Yeah, for everybody listening, we're recording this in December, but this is going to be part of season two. So hopefully this will be out after Janiece redoes or has a new series. So we'll be sure to link to that because that would be amazing to have Janiece help everybody through this.

Jenice Mattek (42:38)
Hahaha!

Kelly Berry (42:38)
Awesome. Well, what I guess what else? Those were all my questions. What else should people know or like, I guess maybe challenges that you see where maybe it's like, if you're experiencing this, maybe don't try to use breathwork to fix it, maybe see a doctor or something like that. Anything else we should know?

Jenice Mattek (42:57)
Yeah, I think the biggest thing is always just keeping it simple. Like I said, really the biggest way, and the biggest way we get buy-in from people is do it at times where it's easy and it's accessible for you to do it. So really, if you're listening right now and you're like, hey, I just want to see if there's any benefit to this, just before you get out of bed in the morning, just get a sense of how your body feels and close your eyes and just put your hands on your

on the sides of your rib cage and just gently take a breath in through your nose, send the breath down towards your hands and just exhale slowly. Just let the breath slowly come out. Don't try to push it out. Just let it gently come out. You know, just start there. Just do that every day, every day before you get to bed, every night before you go to bed. And you'll find that you probably fall asleep a little bit easier. We're teaching this to professionals. This is like their homework from day to day in the class. Like, hey, go home, you gotta do and like some guy would be like, my God, I fell asleep before I even finished him.

It's like, how amazing is that? Like you fell asleep, you were so relaxed, you fell asleep before finishing 10 breaths. So, you know, start simple. Don't try to make yourself do it because we then take this next step into, let's put this into your actual exercise program. Let's have you breathing so that you're getting your core control from your breath where you should be getting that versus trying to like pull in your abs really tight, you know, and also think about your own posture.

Kelly Berry (43:52)
huh.

movements.

Jenice Mattek (44:16)
is your own posture inhibiting your ability to actually breathe well. And the biggest things would be, do you tend to be a person who holds your abdominals in all the time? And so many people do because it feels like it looks aesthetically better. It's what they've been told to do. They don't even know they're doing it. If you've had surgery, you likely hold your abdominals in if nobody's ever helped you relax them, because it's just a response to surgery.

just hold your abs in and try to take a breath. And you'll be like, gosh, I can't really take a breath in if I'm holding my abdominals in or if I'm squeezing my glutes, which is another big thing that people do. So think about those kinds of things. Like, am I possibly doing? What are some of my habits that I'm possibly doing that are inhibiting my ability to actually get a breath in well? So your posture, what are some habits that you might be doing already? And then just give yourself a little bit of time and just try it out.

What's the biggest thing? Just give it a try. Let's just take a gentle breath in through your nose. Hold for a second, exhale, and just keep working at it.

Kelly Berry (45:15)
literally everybody listening can do this, right? So, and see benefits, I'm sure. So, awesome. This was incredible and I'm really excited to put it to work and see what changes I have. And then also like, I just really love it as an accompaniment to all the people who suggested breathing as a part of, you know, how to work on other things. And so just, you know, I think sometimes when people are just like,

Jenice Mattek (45:37)
Mm-hmm.

Kelly Berry (45:41)
All you have to do is breathe. All you have to do is breathe. And then once you go to do it, you're like, wait, it doesn't, it's not actually that simple. Like how do I actually do it? And so now having some of your cues and information is so beneficial. So thank you so much.

Jenice Mattek (45:56)
It's so funny because I do

love there's a there's there's that thing like I post a lot of things about breathing and there's always that one picture like just breathe. I'm like, yeah, sounds good in theory. Like it sounds good. Like we'll breathe. Good. Let's make sure you're breathing. But just breathe is I get it. I get the idea behind it. But for a lot of people, that's not an easy thing to do. And and stress or life or habits or tragedy or whatever has taken that ease out of that.

Kelly Berry (46:05)
Okay.

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Jenice Mattek (46:25)
for them and the power of just giving that back to them is amazing.

Kelly Berry (46:31)
Yeah, awesome. So before we leave, us where can people find you? What kind of resources do you have that you can point them towards? Tell us more about how people can connect.

Jenice Mattek (46:43)
Yep, yep, so our practice is imsinchicago.com, I-M-S-I-M as in Mary S, and inchicago.com, that's our practice website. We've got some great articles and videos and blog posts on there that can get people a good start on a lot of things, breathing. I think we have some pretty intense, not intense, a bunch of different videos on breathing in there. You can actually contact us through that website as well.

And then you can always follow me. don't post a ton, each day is amazing on Instagram.

Kelly Berry (47:15)
Each day is amazing. Janice is awesome. Thank you so much for spending some time with me today and sharing everything that you shared. Yeah, this is gonna be great. So thank you so much. Yeah, we'll talk soon. Bye.

Jenice Mattek (47:25)
Thank you, Kelly. I appreciate it. Okay, bye.

Kelly Berry (47:29)
Thanks for listening to Life Intended.

Sadie Wackett (47:33)
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Kelly Berry (47:45)
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